Belly Baby notes: February 1, 2008

With less than two months to go until Belly Baby’s estimated due date (March 27), we’re all getting pretty excited — even Lucy, who is currently obsessed with my belly button.

p{color:gray}. Photo: Here I am last week, 31 weeks along and still smiling!

Lucy seems to understand (maybe as much as we all do) that there is a baby growing in Mama’s belly. She sometimes like to pat the baby, and she loves to call “Baby!” into my belly button. Since I have an extremely wound-up “innie,” my belly button hasn’t popped out yet (it never did with Lucy), and she loves to stick her finger in it. This motivates me to keep Lucy’s nails trimmed! Lucy also adores the book “_I’m a Big Sister_”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0688145094/octothorppres-20 and wants us to read it to her all the time. Thanks to Kindra for that recommendation!

Now that I’m fully into my third trimester, I’m experiencing a few more typical pregnancy discomforts, but nothing terrible — mild heartburn, a bit of backache, twinges here and there. Weirdly, I have a very small appetite, but I’m supplementing with my favorite “chocolate cupcakes”:http://www.marthastewart.com:80/recipe/chocolate-cupcakes?xsc=stf_MSLO-RECIPE, so blessedly the weight gain isn’t suffering much. (Although I am pleased that I’m still weighing in at about 10 lbs less than I did at this point with Lucy — hooray!) I have rediscovered the exquisite pleasure of turning over in bed while being hugely pregnant. Truly! After sleeping on one side for several hours, my hips are sore and I have to pee. But then, coming back to bed and getting all tucked in with pillows while lying on my other side feels just _fabulous._ I know that’s weird, but I love it. (And I do miss sleeping on my back.)

In general, I’m really enjoying my big, rounded belly — I’ve always been conscious of having a little tummy pooch, and pregnancy is the one time that I happily flaunt it. Jon even got me a “Belly Chime”:http://www.novanatural.com/s.nl/it.A/id.1762/.f for a Christmas present (see photo). It is a little silver ball that makes a delicate ringing sound, and supposedly the baby can hear it. I don’t know about that, but Lucy sure loves to play with it, and it kind of helps to emphasize the “I’m pregnant, not just fat” message.

Another plus to pregnancy: it’s tons of fun to feel a tiny human moving around in there! I think this little girl kicks harder than Lucy did in utero, but perhaps my memory is failing me? If her current activity level is any indicator, she’ll be _at least_ as vibrantly physical as her big sister. (But will she be addicted to the “Blue Ball”:http://boydsnest.org/news/2006/bouncing-baby-boyd/? Hmm, we rather hope not…)

My midwife has been telling me for months that I need to stop carrying Lucy, and I took that to heart around Halloween when I started feeling uncomfortable abdominal twinges when I lifted too much. But Lucy is taking my inability to pick her up like a champ. She’s very content to hold my hand and walk pretty much wherever we have to go. If she really wants a hug, I sit in a chair and she climbs into my lap. Recently, I asked Jon to move our loveseat into Lucy’s room because our rocking chair just wasn’t working anymore for reading books to Lucy — she was practically falling off my lap and constantly elbowing me in the belly. Everyone is much happier now.

Another side effect that has come along with the third trimester: nesting explosion. I’ve been making a list of things to do for a few months, but saying, “We’ll work on this after the Christmas season is over.” Well, I don’t know what Santa left in my stocking, but Christmas night my nesting instinct shifted into high gear and hasn’t come down much since. Although I know I won’t get all of these projects done, here are some from my list, in no particular order. I’m so pleased that lots are getting checked off!

* buy a car (“check”:http://boydsnest.org/news/2007/certified-geeks/)
* bleach bathroom floor grout
* find childcare (a few hours a week, starting now, to continue after baby is born)
* revise list of “needs” and “helpers” for post-partum
* organize recipe binder
* plan “freezer meals”:http://boydsnest.org/news/2008/easy-to-freeze-bolognese-sauce/ and make them
* make “truffles”:http://annagram.org/extras/truffles.html for baby’s birth (I did this for Lucy and must have them again!)
* make more “cupcakes”:http://www.marthastewart.com:80/recipe/chocolate-cupcakes?xsc=stf_MSLO-RECIPE to freeze and frost for a “labor project”:http://boydsnest.org/news/2006/labor-projects/ (I made these for Lucy’s birth, and although I didn’t frost them while in labor, I did frost them later and enjoyed eating them!)
* make a new “please knock” sign for our doorbell (our “old one”:http://boydsnest.org/news/2006/nap-patience/ bit the dust)
* print out letters to put baby’s name on the nursery wall, next to “Lucy’s”:http://boydsnest.org/news/2006/one-year-of-lucy/
* pack hospital bag
* vacuum ceiling fans
* get a haircut in early March
* update scrapbook through summer 2005 (currently in winter 2001, with about a year’s progress done in the past couple of weeks)
* purge kitchen cabinets and reorganize
* organize basement (lots of little projects within this one)
* move co-sleeper upstairs and re-arrange bedroom furniture to accommodate
* finish childproofing some areas of the house
* move loveseat into Lucy’s room (check)
* touch-up paint on foyer doorway
* make a continuous “Lucy video”:http://boydsnest.org/news/category/baby/video/ (so Lucy can watch and I don’t have to click through them all while nursing an infant)
* move newborn clothes upstairs (early March)
* move post-partum clothes upstairs (early March)
* buy cute post-partum pajamas so I don’t feel like a slob

No, I don’t have boundless energy — just lots of little goals, hormonal determination, and a daily nap. And I’m getting addicted to this project management software called “OmniFocus”:http://www.omnigroup.com/applications/omnifocus/ (based on the “_Getting Things Done_”:http://boydsnest.org/news/2006/getting-things-done-by-david-allen/ system). I love having an organized place to write stuff down, check it off, and figure out small next steps. My theory is that even the mother of an infant and a toddler can get things done if they are just broken down into small enough steps. Is it true? Time will tell!