like a robin in spring

In my search for the perfect image to capture my nesting instinct I came across this beautiful print on Etsy called Feathering the Nest by margin a UK digital artist whose stuff I am now just completely in love with! If I ever get my shop set up and get something sold, her shop will be one of the first I hit up with my earnings.

As you can see from the rest of my blog - this print inspired a bit of a makeover. I am totally in love with the colour combination. So much so that the decorations I picked up yesterday for the baby's Birth-Day party also match.

Nearly finished with much of the physical nesting and feeling almost* as prepared as we will ever be. Yesterday, after an incident with Sears' catalogue department, which warrants its own blog, we got a car seat from Toys'R'Us.** The house keeps swinging from order to chaos in what seems like seconds. This morning, Andrew let me 'sleep in' while he cleaned up - and while I wrote out things like the birth plans and instructions to Sebastian's caregivers, Andrew got the living room and kitchen spotless.

We then went for brunch with my dad and my sister, Casey, returned home and somehow in that time the house became littered again. Luckily, due to all this frantic cleaning and tidying, all our messes are surface messes and are easy to clean. Speaking of - it sounds like I have some mystery dinner coming my way (I love it when my husband is all James Bond-like and won't give me any information... it is sexy). But I should likely do some tidying before he gets back, maybe clear the table at least.

**what's that? you'd like to spend your hard-earned money on us? well lucky you, we have a registry. just go to here and spend, spend, spend!!! what could be more fun?


*we just need a bowl for the placenta and a trip to the grocery store for food for everyone. If budget allows I'd also really like to pick up a bottle of champagne - but we are currently dead broke.

could I really be this lazy?? yes, I could

I just sent my first giant mass email - informing folks that we have not had the baby yet - this is not really my style, but I can see the draw. Maybe I should set up a mailing list and do away with personal correspondence all together. There's something to ponder.

So that's the big news - no news.

I can see the end of this strange journey into second-time motherhood. The proximity of the end of the path surprises me because I have been so removed from the process of pregnancy this time around. This pregnancy has passed without the frantic studying of obstetrics my last pregnancy brought, it has passed without worrying about the music playing inside my uterus, or hearing and feeling every movement. It has passed without a constant counting down of days. The days, weeks and months have passed on their own - my body has grown and changed with my knowing at every moment exactly what is happening - my faith in my primal ability to grow and birth a child have been nearly unwavering.

This isn't to say I have been completely removed or ignorant of what is happening, it is just to say that so much else is going on I haven't been paying the same attention I did last time.

This past week has been one of sudden realisations and frantic preparing. I am now in full-on nesting mode, having made Andrew stay up with me long past bedtime to assemble our bassinet/co-sleeper. This thing came with the most irritatingly imprecise instructions - there were a minimum of three occasions where I was certain one of us was going to brain the other with a basket support bar. But, it is perfect and functional and best of all, was loaned to us by another family. I will therefore keep my complaining to a minimum.

Last night I stayed up late getting our lives on paper in some kind of order. I am generally the one left in charge of budgets and the like, despite my relative ineptitude, and while I have been getting pretty awesome I have to admit dropping a few balls. Mostly because my systems fell apart due to neglect and misuse, last night was like a late-night cram session - I got it all sorted out (knock on wood) and I am feeling quite together.

pregnancy update

OOF - I don't know where to start.

Nearing 36 weeks and at once feeling every bit as pregnant as I am and still caught completely off-guard by my bulging belly.

We're all nesting in earnest, even Sebastian. Today he found, among some second-hand toys we had picked up recently, a small doll house crib and a plastic kiwi. The kiwi became the baby and he fed, bathed, changed and kissed the wee baby. It was adorable and hilarious. Half an hour later he was changing the diaper on one of his hot wheels cars.

I am still attempting to pull my life together before the baby comes. Every passing day this goal becomes more absurd, and rather than allow myself to feel like I am failing (which I do do often) I am trying to remind myself that it *will* all work out and figure out where my priorities lie. There are a few things that really need to be in place, like bill and rent payments, some that I would prefer to have in place, like meal plans and getting the cupboards stocked, and a few that have already fallen to the side and I just need to come to terms with it.

Andrew has taken his own nesting to great lengths - while we were in Calgary he re-arranged the entire living/dining room *and* painted a wonderful mural in the kids' room. Our main living area is now more open and more child-friendly. It also now sports a kid-sized couch that used to be our fireplace mantle and those shelves that dove off the walls some months ago? They're back and can support (briefly) my beefcake husband! We also now own a stud-finder!!

As for the actual pregnancy - my belly is getting bigger, but magically (?) the rest of me seems to be getting smaller. I am still off sugar - but have cheated a little recently and feel like shit for it (one post-shower cake binge sent me into a night of panic - I was so very very sure I could not get the baby to move and that my little binge had killed it... dramatic much?). I could list my complaints, but none of them are out of the ordinary or very interesting. What is interesting is that my midwife had to cancel our appointment yesterday because she was in a minor fender-bender... with a semi... she will hopefully recover fully and be back on her feet in time to catch the little bean.