Morgan was probably our next favorite name because it was a name we both liked rather than one of us liking it more than the other. We discussed many throughout my pregnancy, but Morgan was always on the list. There are two Morgans that influenced us. One is my dear friend Morgan that I met on my study abroad, who has always brought joy around me and who was also my roommate when Adrian and I got married (and was a fabulous sport about sharing her room with a married woman, which probably did seem a little odd). The other is a young girl, I think now 5 years old, from a family in our ward in California. Both of these Morgans are incredibly sweet people and both come from families for whom we have a lot of respect. We often discuss things we’ve observed from these families as things we’d like to incorporate into our own family. So the name Morgan stuck around so well because of all these happy associations.

Oh my, little baby cardigan. Happily for me, my mom likes them as much as I do (thank you!). She looks like a little person here. It’s crazy.

The only problem with Morgan was a middle name. I always wanted to give my first daughter my middle name, Hope. So Morgan was the favorite name, but I just didn’t feel like it flowed well with Hope. So we kept trying other names until I realized at one point that her first name was more important to me than her middle name, since we’d obviously be using her first name more often. If we liked Morgan, that’s what her name should be. So we had to figure out a middle name we were happy with, or it was back to finding a first name that went with Hope.

She has started blowing little spit bubbles a lot. Hehe.

Friend and roommate Morgan’s middle name starts with a J, and she’s called MJ or Morgan J by her family. We played with other initials, but probably because of that nothing else seemed to fit to me besides a J. So we narrowed our hunt down to J names as possibilities. Josephine was one that stuck out, though I couldn’t come up with a meaning behind it besides the Empress Josephine of France, as in Napoleon and Josephine. She probably wasn’t someone you want your daughter emulating precisely, though he did write her some amazingly lovely letters that I used to go read in the library in college when I needed a break from studying.

Very soon before Morgan was born I picked up the Madeleine L’Engle autobiographies I have and on the first page she wrote about Josephine, her first daughter. Well! That satisfied me on having a meaning behind Josephine. I couldn’t name her Madeleine, but at least there could be some sort of connection there.

I’ve been hoping for weeks to get her little eyelashes captured. I never realized that they were something that would come in as she got older.

We still really didn’t name her until she was born. In fact, for the first three days we just called her “baby” and other nicknames. I was paranoid that it wouldn’t fit her, because I never really had a “yes, this is this child’s name” moment. But it fit, and I feel it is sufficiently pretty for our little girl. And slowly I’m getting used to calling her by it. For about the first month I still wasn’t in the habit of calling her Morgan. Hehe. I’m basically there now.

I love her little chubby hands. They are so soft, and sometimes as she nurses or sleeps she still grabs onto my finger.

And that’s the story of the name, for anyone who wanted to know. Mostly, it’s really for my own journaling purposes, but I’m sharing it with you just because.

Here’s me with Morgan on the edge of the tub where she was born. This is where I got into as soon as I could after we got there, and the water felt lovely, let me tell you. That may have been the reason I thought childbirth was so doable, who knows. It was definitely relaxing. Maybe I should say it was soothing, since I wouldn’t exactly describe it as relaxing… more exhausting, actually. Anyway, the water was nice! (Why do I require so many extra words to say such a simple thing?)

Adrian holding Morgan in the chair where he took her after he dried off while I was getting out of the tub and taking care of the, um, after baby stuff. That only took a few minutes because it was a lot easier than pushing out a baby!

This is the bed where we all went for the next few hours, where they checked me to make sure I was okay and did Morgan’s newborn exam and all that.

Here’s Morgan with Val, one of the midwives. Ali was actually the one on call when she was born, but we probably had the most visits with Val before the birth, and we hadn’t seen her since at our other appointments, so it was nice to see her again. She admired Morgan’s beautiful head shape. Hehe. She had heard about the birth from Ali, but we got to tell her our side of it and how we felt.

I’ve tried to not fill the blog with too many stats, but I feel I need to report that Morgan was 9 pounds, 4 ounces, which I think is awesome for a baby who was 6 pounds, 5.5 ounces 7 weeks ago. She’s made up for surprising us with her teeniness at birth by gaining plenty of weight since. It makes me happy to know she’s growing well. Also, yesterday was the first time I felt like she really smiled AT me. She’s been smiling for a while, once when Adrian got home but mostly at lights or windows, which she really likes. So of course that made me happy.

Like I said, we were sad to leave the birth center. We both teared up a bit saying goodbye and telling Valerie how grateful we were to be able to come there. We miss home in California a lot, but I know that if we were there we wouldn’t have had this opportunity, since Orange County doesn’t exaclty have the hippie mentality you can find up here. If for no other reason than that, we’re glad we’ve been here during this time.

All of us at the beach… good thing Sarah’s friend was with us so that we could easily get a shot with all of us.

Us at the beach. I was trying to keep Morgan cold because of course it’s chilly at the beach at night, so I only exposed her head for the picture. Adrian, of course, was wearing shorts just because he could. Hooray for California!

Sunday morning we had Morgan’s baby blessing at our old ward in RSM. The blessing was so lovely and it was nice to see old friends. We also had lots of family and friends come for the blessing, which was really great. I felt lots of love, which is always a happy thing.

Morgan with her papa and grandpas (I imagine it’s obvious who is who, since Adrian and I both look similar enough to our dads)

Us outside for what is my current family photo (seeing as there aren’t too many)

Allison with Simon and me with Morgan. We were both pregnant at roughly the same time. Simon was born about two months before Morgan. These two and Glorious were troopers and stayed through the whole Sacrament meeting, which was exceptionally long that day.

After church we went over to my parents house and had a late lunch with our parents, my granda, and my aunt and uncle and cousins. Morgan with my dad’s mom, one of Morgan’s three great grandmothers.

Sarah holding Morgan. The shot is a little weird but it’s the best one I got of Morgan looking at Sarah so intently like that.

My mom (Mimi) holding Morgan. My mom wanted Morgan to wake up so she could play, but I think she was pretty well exhausted from our big weekend and wasn’t interested in anything but sleep right then.

We had a lovely weekend. Our flight back on Monday morning was fine, and Morgan slept almost the whole time there, too. Either she’s an amazing traveler or she really likes being snuggled in the wrap. Either way, she’s a wonderful little kid and we are so grateful for her!

All is well. We just got back from California, where we were for the weekend for Morgan’s baby blessing. I’ll put up photos later (the link for the pro photos just took less time, so that one’s up first!).

We had a pediatrician appointment this morning and everything looks good there, too. She’s growing and gaining weight like a champ which is relieving and gratifying as a breastfeeding mama. I mean, I’m glad I’m able to provide enough for her, you know? Because it’s hard to know for sure… though I guess the fact that she has plenty of dirty diapers and acts happy after eating should be enough to relax me on that one… Oh, and last night with all the exhaustion of travel she slept for 5 HOURS. Today I want to do nothing but kiss her all day for such a lovely gift. Hehehe. I kiss her tons no matter what, don’t worry!

Here I am in labor, still at home. Around this time (when contractions were starting to come closer to three minutes apart) I was finally starting to take it seriously, like maybe it WAS really happening. The fact that I was using that bowl for barfing purposes and was clutching onto that sheet and wouldn’t let go probably should have been indications to me. I think my body had done a lot of warming up in the days and weeks before because I’d had bouts of contractions that would eventually peter out, and I could feel that things were happening. They don’t routinely check for dilation at appointments, though, so I have no clue where it was medically or technically speaking. Anyhow, so once labor really started it came on faster than I expected, and I hadn’t had some normal signs (I’ll spare the specifics here) so I kept thinking to myself that it might be the real thing, might not be, and to just wait and see. I was paranoid about (a) calling anyone and then it turning out to be a false alarm or (b) it being the real deal but going in too early. Of course with where we were going I wouldn’t have been given pitocin or anything if I wasn’t “far enough”, but even still I didn’t want to go so early that if things went slowly it would make anyone nervous and we’d have to start thinking about needing a transfer to the hospital. So I was determined to stay at home until I was absolutely positive that I was in very active labor. But then I didn’t really believe that I was as far along as I was, so my plan might have had some flaws.

The car ride was mildly stinky but I only threw up a couple times and it went by well enough because I was paying attention to the turns to know exactly how long we had left. Around the time we left home I started keeping my eyes closed, though I wasn’t really aware of it at the time. As a side note, I was very proud of myself for not making a mess in Adrian’s car. I kept the barf in a bag, and then once we got to the parking lot and my bag had been taken from me I had the presence of mind and ability to move fast enough to get my head out of the car for the next heave. Haha. (Sorry for anyone queasy about these things… I’ve had such a weak stomach since childhood that throwing up in no way is all that gross to me. In fact, it’s usually nice because it relieves nausea, so I don’t mind at all.)

Once we got to the birth center and they listened to her heartbeat through a contraction and took my blood pressure, the tub was ready and I got in. They asked if I wanted to be checked for dilation (bizarre to be asked that normally in a more medical situation, but it was clear that I was moving along just fine so if I didn’t want anyone, you know, invading my space they wouldn’t do it… kinda nice, really) and I did by then, and I was hugely relieved when Ali said I was at 8 cm and then that there was just a little lip left. I was relieved that all the intense-ness I was feeling wasn’t just me being wimpy–I really was far along. In fact, I was at the most intense point, so it wasn’t going to get worse than that. And I hadn’t stalled out from the car ride or anything, which I was afraid of. In fact, I found out later that while she was checking me, mid contraction, she felt me go from 8 to about 9.5.A minute after that my water broke, which I could actually feel the little pop! of. Funny feeling.

While I was pregnant I had developed sort of a mantra for myself to use in labor, something along the lines of “your body is meant to do this, women have been doing this for centuries” etc. And I never even thought anything like that once. At the time I felt very aware and alert, which is another reason I thought I must not have been too far along, but looking back I guess I was pretty focused inward. I just wasn’t even thinking, except to note things like what was going on around me. So at one point, someone said to me that my body clearly knew what it was doing, and I thought, “Hey, yeah! That’s right!” Hehe.

Pushing was fine, too. In non-public places I can describe it fairly clearly, but since it’s bathroom-y I’ll spare it here. I just really felt like I needed a bathroom, put it that way. When she was getting closer to out, I was able to feel her head with my hand, which I didn’t think I would want to but I sort of just automatically did. When she was getting closer to crowning, Tonya told me to try and hold her where she was so that she wouldn’t go back in at all but allow me to stretch a little more. I had the feeling of, “Um, and how am I supposed to do that?” But it worked, and being guided to let it all go gently I didn’t tear at all even though her hand was up against her head. Many, many hoorays on that one! Incidentally, I’d heard much talk of the “ring of fire” sensation as the baby crowned, but I really was detached enough from stressing over it that I just asked “So that’s the ring of fire?” as she started to crown.

I think this whole endeavor was successful for a couple of reasons. One is that I really did just completely stop thinking and allow my body to do what it needed to do. I found a rhythm of movement on the birth ball through contractions that somehow helped and I just stuck with it. It felt good to be in the tub, so I didn’t get back out. Mostly, though, it was the noise that proved to me, in retrospect, that I did a good job letting go. I had read, particularly in Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth (my absolute favorite, and I read it twice while pregnant) how making low noises can help because it opens the throat and therefore relaxes the body. I didn’t think I’d do that, though. I’m not really a noisy person in general, and the though of doing that just didn’t sound appealing. But oh my did I! I’ve never made that much noise in my life, I don’t think. They weren’t distressful noises, just really low moany grunty type things. Frankly, I think I sounded a bit like a cow. Not exactly what anyone thinks they want to do, but it absolutely worked for me so I’m glad I let myself go with the flow and not let some inhibitions jump in, but rather allow everything to go as quickly and resistance free as it could.

In terms of pain management, I think it went well because of my expectations. I was expecting it to be painful but manageable. Therefore, when I got there it didn’t scare me at all. I made a lot of noise, like I said, but there was no screaming like a Hollywood labor. And reflecting on it all, in all seriousness I would not describe it as painful. I think I was really prepared for it, so my body and mind didn’t tense up and fight any of the feeling. Pain is the time I accidentally opened the front door over my big toe and cut the nail. This was very different, and the only way I can explain is to say that it was intense. Complete, entire-body intensity.

I’m so glad that everything happened as it did. I realize completely that it’s not the right thing for everyone, but it was for us. Noise aside, Morgan was born in a very peaceful way. There was enough soft daylight coming through the shades on the windows, so inside there were only candles lit. Adrian was able to help bring her straight to my chest. (He was going to catch her, but because of the hand on her head thing Tonya did a little more guiding.) She let out a few little cries, but then was very cam and alert. I have done and still do a lot of thinking about how it must feel for babies to come into the world, so I like to think that it was as comfortable as it possibly could be for her. No one messed with her except to listen to her heart and lungs to make sure they were fine, and then left the rest of the newborn exam stuff until a few hours later. I’m just so grateful we were able to do it.

There was a point at the birth center where I looked up and said, “Hey, it’s too late for a hospital transfer now anyway, isn’t it?” That was a big point for me, to realize that like it or not this baby was coming and I couldn’t change my mind on the whole medicine question at that point. I’d like to point out that I had not ever asked for medicine or said in any seriousness that I wanted to go to the hospital. But it was just that even though I hadn’t actually birthed her yet, at that point I felt like I had done what I planned to do, and I felt proud of that. I didn’t quite feel the “Whee!!! I DID IT!!!” that I thought I would at the end of it all, but that was my moment I think. It was just a good feeling to know that with all the unpredictability of childbirth, we were able to do what we had wanted and planned. And that was a good feeling.

Plus, you know, we had this really darling, healthy baby, and there’s nothing better or more important than that.

Relatedly, I’ve been feeling annoyed when I see or think about other people I know who’ve had kids recently. I see a picture (or think of one I’ve seen before) and I think, “Are you kidding? She looks so normal. Is that makeup? I can’t remember the last time I brushed my teeth…” Not helping was that it was hard for me to shower at first because of some issues, so for the first time since I was in high school I actually skipped days without showering. Like, um, four days at first. Yeah, sick. It just seems like people handle this transition better than I have, and so then I’m hard on myself for not being all put together. Part of this, I realize, I bring on myself because we hold her so much. So I guess that’s just my choice that then causes me to get so little done besides feeding her, and clearly I’m not changing my choice so it must be more important to me to do that than to cook dinner or something. I probably should have known that newborn days would be hard for me. Caring for a newborn has been easier than I expected it to be because I’ve always been so nervous with little babies, but that doesn’t mean it’s been a piece of cake by any means. And for goodness sake, that lack of sleep is a killer for me. Maybe it’s just that it seems easier for other people because I’m not inside and living that life–I only know my own. It always looks easier on the outside.

So! I don’t mean to be a downer or anything, that’s just a report on life at M+4 weeks. Life is good, it’s just flying by in some sort of fog and I’m hoping to pull out of it a little. Today my accomplishment was folding some towels and doing a teeny bit of ironing. Woo hoo!

I had a little photo session with Morgan because the light was fairly decent. I really feel like I need to learn to use my camera better. The other day I was looking at pictures on the computer and I thought I must be focusing wrong because so many are blurry, and I realized that by refusing to use flash in a rather grey place, when one of us moves at all the picture comes out blurry. I’m a genius for having not realized this before. There is a prime example of life in this baby daze.

This is the “I’m ready to eat now… why are you still taking pictures of me?” look. Aww.

I had a hard time picking which ones to post, so go to the flickr albums (link in the left sidebar) for more.

Before you see them, yes I do realize that every picture I have posted has her wearing a onesie with a blanket. She does now actually finally fit into a few select clothing items we have for her, so that will start to change soon. But the onesie is so simple and easy, really, and it’s so nice to snuggle her in blankets that it might continue.
Not the best picture ever, but that’s my fault. She’s still cute, though somehow this doesn’t quite look like her to me. I always wonder what she is thinking/feeling.
Why do yawning pictures entertain me so much? (And the picture’s color is off, which again is my fault, trying to play with the light available and not knowing really what I’m doing with my camera.)
I love her lips and I love her hands. I think they’re adorable.
Looking back at the headboard, I think. When she’s awake she’s incredibly alert and aware of things around her. We played with a ribbon yesterday and she followed it, even moving her head, all the way back and forth in front of her. I was impressed. It’s neat to see her learn but then I do already have a nostalgic feeling for when she was super tiny and new and only wanted to lay on my chest (actually, she still probably only wants that, so nevermind on that point). I try to remind myself that growing up means a little more rest for me… and maybe eventually she’ll eat less than once every two hours, which right now seems to consume my entire existence. But then conversely I remind myself when I’m slipping into unconsciousness while feeding her AGAIN in the middle of the night that this won’t last forever and I should enjoy her being so small. I guess it really did take having my own baby to understand the newborn joy.

Some of the excitement of having a baby is, of course, all the fun little things we get to buy or have new. It’s like a grown up game of house… when sometimes you remember that an actual baby is going to come out of this little game you’re playing. Woo! Anyway, here are a few of my favorites that I can’t wait to use or share with our little baby.
Handmade love! The blanket on the left was made by Adrian’s mom, and the one on the right my aunt made. I don’t think of either of these people as old enough to be the grandma or great-aunt who crochets… but they clearly have talent. Did that sentence make any sense? Anyway, I love these and I hope the baby likes snuggling in them.
Finger puppets are cool. That’s all there is to it. My mom bought these and I want to play with them. Having the kid to entertain is really just an excuse for me.
Ironed receiving blankets. Yes, I’m weird. The rest of them are stacked in the bag to take for labor, but something about having soft flannel blankets all ironed and folded makes me feel happy.
This awesome wrap. It’s like a Moby wrap, but I got it off etsy, so it is also handmade love… just not from anyone I know. I wanted one like this ever since we went to the babywearing class because it seems really snuggly for little babies. So I’m very excited to try it out with an actual baby in it. I tried it on over my belly and it just didn’t seem to quite work the same.

[I'm sorry the color on that picture is weird. I don't like using flash when I can avoid it. But then my pictures come out funny sometimes, even in the day... because we live in a really cloudy place. Clouds usually are actually better for photography than direct sun, but it's just really grey here. There are only two places in the house where I can even try for good natural light, so basically all the pictures come from them. And even then it's not great. Sorry. It's just how it has to be for now.]
This is a preview of the actual crib bedding for the little one. It’s just not all set up in anything right now, and all I have is this cool Boppy cover my mom found. People on ebay get creative, and apparently someone bought a crib sheet and made it into a cover. So now at least there’s a preview of what her room will someday look like, and looking at it and thinking of the rest of it makes me smile.

Well! All that explanation aside, I took a picture the other night of one of our favorite things to do together…Canasta! Our friends Scott and Melinda introduced us to the game and proceeded to cream us. I bought it for Adrian’s birthday and we’ve played many a game since then. So lately it’s been on my nightstand and we’ll hop in bed a little before bedtime and play a few rounds… or a full game… and suddenly it’s really late and we’re really tired.

These are the kinds of things that won’t happen soon. Pretty soon we’ll be cuddling a little baby, trying to get her to sleep. And that’ll be good. I just want to remember some of the “us” stuff, too, because in a few years we might not even remember what on earth we did with our time before we had kids around to keep us busy.

YES my hips hurt, my arms/hands go numb, I’m exhausted, I’m a little anxious, I have to go to the bathroom a lot, I get heartburn (mildly, luckily), early pregnancy nausea brought me to tears a few times, my giant belly gets in the way of everyday movement, I have stretch marks across the lower half of that belly (extra-concentrated in the area where she spends most of her time, interestingly), and my body has gone through some really funky hormone-induced changes that I’ll spare you all the details of because trust me you don’t want to know. Oh, and I snore and make Adrian crazy because my lungs are pushed up somewhere in my throat. But, um… I’m producing another life. Of course I’m going to go through a lot of changes. This is not a bad thing.

The way you frame something– anything– really does affect the way you feel about it. I promise. I’m trying to be positive about everything, and I really do then feel positive about it. The only times I feel un-positive are when I start regretting all that extra attention I probably could have been milking all this time. Oh, and when I get comments like, “Oh, are you uncomfortable? You look uncomfortable.” And I reply, “No, actually I feel pretty good…” (That’s right up there with comments along the lines of, “You look really tired” and you start wondering how terrible you must look to other people because you thought you were looking okay that day.)

So… here’s what I’ll miss most of all: the baby kicking at me. I LOVE it. I wish she moved more. Sometimes I’ll eat something high in sugar and move her around a bit just to get a few extra kicks out of her. I just imagine her squirming around and playing and learning and growing all while inside of me. I also always make a point of telling her aloud how much I like feeling her, because I really believe that babies can feel our emotions and I want her to know that I’m happy when she’s moving. Her movements equal a healthy growing baby, and I want her to feel comfortable. Now she’s moving deeper into my pelvis and I can feel her putting pressure on everything with her head so the movements have changed, but I still tell her to keep going and doing what she needs to do in there. Her movements are exactly “right” to prepare both of us for birth.

I’m not trying to be contrary or anything here, I just want to be one voice out there that is positive about pregnancy. I know a lot of people who are a little or a lot pregnant right now, and I don’t want to add more fodder to the fire… because I probably could answer that yes I’m uncomfortable and go into great detail about why. But why focus on that? Yeah, it’s a total change. And there are moments where I just feel huge and cranky. But these are good things, and it means this baby is getting ready to join us, more and more every day. It is absolutely amazing that our bodies can grow other bodies and produce little babies. It’s mind-blowing to feel another life growing in you, and I’m guessing that then giving birth to this life only cements that miracle. So a few stretch marks, some uncomfortable sleep, and a few months of weird body changes? Yeah, it’s worth it.

As the title suggests, I feel like we’re basically ready for the baby to come. At this point, we have everything we absolutely need, and a whole lot of what we don’t but that it’s nice to have. I read this great quote a couple months ago about how people stress out about having all these “essential” baby items but really only really needing some diapers and your breasts. That aside, here are some “before” shots of the baby prep.
The bassinet. I’ve had people ask about having her room set up, and… no, this is the extent of “her room”. This is for a number of reasons, the main one being that we were planning on having her in our room anyway so when we moved, knowing this was not our permanent home and that we’ll likely move before she’s 6 months old, we figured there was no reason to take up a whole room with baby stuff. So one spare room is the guest room, and the other very small room is Twinkie’s room (with a bed in case we really need two guest rooms at once). So anyway, there’s the bassinet.
The really snazzy co-sleeper so that she can be in our bed at night but still have her own space. It’s a good thing we have such a nice big bed. We just need to figure out how we’re going to arrange things because Adrian and I were actually looking forward to sleeping next to each other again after having the pillow mountain between us for the past few months.

Yes, I know, you’re thinking we might sleep better and not wake up to every noise if she’s not right next to us. If that becomes an issue, the bassinet is pretty movable. The spot in the closet currently taken up by the “take with us for birth” bag would be an excellent place for her to have her own spot where we can still hear her when she needs us but not hear every single noise.
Changing station. Why spend money and space on an extra piece of furniture when you have room and can stick the pad on the bathroom counter… and then be conveniently next to a sink to boot? Of course we didn’t realize how long these things are and it prettymuch takes up all the room between our sinks. Oh well. I just ordered some more diapering stuff yesterday so once that comes we’ll really have everything we’re planning on getting for now.
Very fancy dresser. That is to say, I bought some plastic drawers and stuck them in our closet. But the point here is that everything is washed and folded and ready to go.
A nursing basket. Today I decided I should put together a basket of nursing essentials, so there’s the cream, burp clothes, pillow, and reading material. Notice Martha: I’ve been too busy to read January yet! Horrors!

I am aware that all you moms out there are laughing at the fact that I included reading in this basket. A girl can dream, okay?
And this is probably my favorite… Adrian wanted to get a car seat that would look good in his car. I figure if that’s what it takes, then sure, whatever, because it’ll be nice to not have to switch things back and forth whenever we take different cars. So we got a convertible one that goes from birth up to booster. He picked it out, based on color but also feeling how comfortable it appeared. Last night Adrian took it out and figured out the straps and everything and then just had to test out if he could fit in it. Yes, my husband’s behind is much smaller than mine (especially now) and he fit.

I’m getting excited, and not just because we’ve got the stuff ready. I’m getting really curious to know what she looks like. That’s maybe not the best reason to want her out here, but oh well. It works.

Feeling more ready with these physical things is helping me to feel ready all around, like mentally and emotionally… but can you ever really be ready for the birth of a child? I suspect not.

So now I’m at home, and it’s so lonely without Toby around. Normally he follows me around the house. Actually, I came back and went back to sleep, so now I’ve also essentially wasted half my day, too. But the point is that I woke up from my “nap” thinking I’d see Toby, and there was no happy little doggy face to greet me. I had a voicemail from the vet and when I called back I’m pretty sure I could hear Toby’s bark in the background. I know it could be another dog, but I also do know Toby’s bark. How’s that for ripping out my poor little heart? (See, I AM going to be insane with children, I know it.)

And now, assuming I’m not in labor, he needs to go back in a week for his teeth cleaning. I should have scheduled it all for today, but somehow I didn’t realize he was due for it, and by napping I missed the message and it’s now too late in the day for them to give him the anesthesia. Yes, they actually have such a thing where they knock out the dogs to clean their teeth. Yes, we have doggy insurance that covers these things.

Am I a complete nut job or does anyone else feel this way about their pets? Then again, I think most everyone who reads this blog regularly doesn’t have pets, so I guess you’d all be on the “nut job” side of that question.

Note: I wrote this October 1st, but due to some issues with my computer and not having Adrian’s set up I wasn’t able to post the picture that I really wanted with it, so I’ve just been holding on to it. So realize that whatever is here is now really really old information. I no longer have four months to mull over my transition to motherhood! I never did get the picture to work that I wanted with it, so just imagine there’s this neat picture of my grandma in the 40s holding my uncle as a little baby. This is so old that I almost feel like I shouldn’t even bother to post it, but I think I will anyway. It’s been sitting in our list of posts for so long, making Adrian nuts, that for all that effort I might as well just publish the thing.

Last weekend (about a week ago now, I guess) I made another quick sneak trip to California. My dad’s brother had died, and the funeral was on Monday. It’s his family role to give eulogies, it seems, and so he got the job of talking about his brother’s life and telling stories. Luckily he was there before we were, by the way, because my mom and I got lost three times en route, and from looking at the map and rushing I started throwing up… it was quite the start to the morning. And my grandma and other uncle (the only one of my dad’s four brothers remaining alive) barely made it from multiple flight issues. But we all eventually got there and it was actually quite nice. I heard stories I’d never heard before about times my dad spent with his brother and his wife, like having bean wars. Apparently they’d have these battles with forts and everything in the backyard where they’d spit beans at each other through straws. Odd, but apparently they all got really into it and had a good time.

It was a little drizzly that morning, and my dad said that it was appropriate because his family always liked rain. He said that his brother loved it because when they were all young and it would rain their parents would open all the windows and the whole family would watch and listen to the rain. It suddenly clicked why I love rain, too. Did my dad do this with me as a kid? I don’t remember, actually, but I know that I love listening to rain. And what do you think I had I done that very morning before the funeral? My mom and I heard thunder, so I took Trevor and Tyler up to the balcony doors on the third floor for a good view. We opened the doors and sat and watched the rain and listened for thunder claps. I enjoyed the full-circle feeling of it all.

Because my grandma was out of town, my dad had gone to her house to clean and get everything ready for people to come over after the service. I was with him on Saturday after he picked me up at the airport. Admittedly I wasn’t a ton of help, but I did go through and find a bunch of old pictures. I’d been wanting to get some of that from my grandma. She’s never been a big talker, at least in my memory, and I don’t know a lot about when she was younger. Anyway, so I borrowed the pictures and took them to my parents’ house to scan. I never burned myself a disk, but I did email a few to myself, including this one of my grandma. I think I like it so much because my grandma looks so young, something I’ve never even heard about, as I said. It’s from 1943 in Chicago, and she’s holding her first baby, the uncle for whose funeral I was home. She looks happy. I wonder how she felt when she was at the point in life, more or less, that I’m at, with my first little baby coming. Okay, so she was ten years younger than I am (and I’m not exactly old), but that’s not the point. So then I also wonder: what was life like for my mom’s mom at my age? If I have the timing of things right, by my age I think she had four kids already with no husband around. I don’t feel that same sense of curiosity with my own mom, because I know her and have always looked at pictures and movies from their 20s, so it’s not really an unknown to me.

Speaking of this baby, she’s getting big, which means so am I! I’ll try to take a picture of myself this weekend. Any day I’ve showered and done anything more that put my hair in a ponytail–or put any makeup on!–I don’t think about taking a picture. When I do think about it, I certainly don’t want a picture of myself because I probably haven’t showered or anything. Overall I feel great. I can feel her wiggling around, which is so cool. She’s been sleepy the past few days, though, I think. Hehe. I still sleep through the night without bathroom breaks and have avoided serious indigestion or food weirdness or random cravings. If one of us talks about a food, it will suddenly sound good to me, but it’s not like I have a “MUST EAT THAT FOOD NOW!” feeling or anything. So far I’m getting the fun parts of this stage of pregnancy without any big negatives. I’m grateful for it. Only about four months to go! Neat!

I have moments of fear about the responsibility of having a baby and raising a child. For the most part, I’m very excited, but I just worry about being a good mom and somehow teaching her all she’ll need. And then I wonder about having more babies. Two sides there, too: I’m so excited for this baby that I can’t imagine ever wanting another one (because how can you improve on such a lovely situation?), and then I also can’t imagine how much work two–or more–kids would be. I realize I have plenty of time to work out these things in my head. It’s too late to question whether I’m ready for a child, and perhaps that’s why we get them first as babies. We get to care for them and love them infinitely before they start testing us.

Incidentally, who knows what’s up with the crazy weather here. The snow has now all melted, which the rain helped to accomplish in the end, but now we’re getting so much rain that some areas are flooding. If anyone saw that in the news (it was the main story on cnn.com last night), don’t be alarmed for us. We’re not in that area that’s been evacuated. Still pretty wild, though.

I stayed up way way too late reading the manual and playing with it all, but the battery was still charging so finally I had to give up and go to bed. But then I woke up really early and had a hard time falling back asleep because I knew the battery would be charged and I could get up and play if I wanted. Hehe.

So between playing with the new camera and reading the manual and being SO TIRED from (a) staying up late playing with the camera and (b) being 8 months pregnant… I haven’t been blogging. Also, we’ve been working on some fun stuff behind the scenes with the blog. Mostly this falls to Adrian, since he’s the genius with that. If we can work kinks out the way we want, it’ll be a lot of fun, so just wait and see.

As it drove back down the street, I looked out the window and saw that it was, in fact, a snow plow. It is evidence of the lack of snow-related infrastructure in place that our street got plowed ten days after the heavy snow started. In the meantime, we’ve spent days stuck in the house because there was snow up to our bumpers and we figured it wasn’t bright to drive in that. And then starting about three days ago the temperature went above freezing and the blessed rain came back (who’d have thought we’d say that, eh?) and started to turn all that snow into slush, which made it possible to drive carefully.

It was just a “huh” moment.

I still do have pictures of us enjoying the aforementioned snow, and of course we have had some holiday fun I could post about. So don’t fret, dear readership. I’ll get to posting eventually. Lots to do, you know. I’ve been working on baby laundry and figuring out where to put all that.

Baby laundry? Does that mean there actually might be a baby coming in the next month-ish? Yikes.

My question is this: why do I only like doing half the laundry job? I actually really enjoy sorting and washing and all that, but then when it comes to hanging and folding I just don’t like it. So we end up with piles and baskets of clean clothes everywhere. Admittedly this is way better than piles of dirty clothes everywhere, but I still get really annoyed with myself when I have to toss a pile of clean stuff to the floor or across the footboard just to get in bed. Anyone else have this issue? I guess the solution here is to stop writing blog posts about it and just DO it.

It did take a little effort to get the right size, though, once they went on sale. Adrian and I went to Gymboree together to try and find the proper size, and Adrian found this random dress that according to the associates had only been sold online (in the Spring collection of this year) but must have been returned to the store. I swear it was there for us, because it’s another gorgeous duppioni silk dress, this one white/cream (real silk is never bright white because it’s a natural fiber), that just so happened to be the smallest size they made it in. So, what is it for us? A baby blessing dress!

I was so excited. I didn’t really want a “traditional” Christening-type dress anyway. This is not really so far off the norm, except that it’s not one of those crazy long dresses that a lot of people do, but it’s just different enough that I adore it. Originally I was thinking that there’s no reason for babies to be dressed in white at all, it’s just tradition… so at least this is just cream and not purple or something crazy. Haha. (This probably all goes back to how I’d do whatever I had to do to get a silk wedding dress, because I was adamant about not wearing polyester (GAH!!!) but couldn’t afford to buy a designer dress for thousands of dollars. Luckily I found someone who could make it and got a fabulous price on silk. And then I thought about cutting up my wedding dress to make a blessing dress, but I have no clothes-sewing skills. So this dress saved my wedding dress, which truth be told has never been cleaned and all that since I wore it anyway.)

And then, while continuing to hunt at another location for the proper size red dress, Adrian thought we should get ANOTHER dress for good measure. I’m giving him the credit here because (a) he really did find these at the store and (b) I applaud his good taste. Also I appreciate that he’ll support me in an occasional indulgence. Really, though, it’s not like they were $5 each but we did get them all on sale and with extra discounts so for silk dresses they’re actually pretty cheap. Well, and my mom bought the Christmas one (thanks again!). Anyhow, we also bought this lovely pink duppioni silk dress that will be the right size to fit her in Spring/for Easter when she’s one.  
I know it’s silly, but I love having these darling silk dresses lined up for our little girl. She’ll be much better dressed than either of us! At least we know her big holiday dresses are taken care of for the next year and a half.