30 weeks

Oh the fog. When the last hour of my last full day of work arrived, I couldn't do it. I had to go upstairs and take a nap. Suddenly, I'm very, very tired. Blindingly tired. I thought it was some esoteric phase of late pregnancy, like a trance, as in "the maternal trance". Mais non. It is just fatigue. The half days are great, but I'm not sure I can stay upright with my eyes open and my brain functioning for 4 hours straight at this point. I saw one of my favorite families yesterday in the clinic. They have had 4 babies in 5 years. She took one look at me yesterday and said: I know where you are right now. (Except, we're in the south, and what she said verbatim was, "I know where yerrat"). Patients have actually stopped pumping me with questions. They finally have sympathy. The "conversation" is now down to about 5 a day and my retort to the statement "ohyou'repregnant!!!!" is now a curt, "yup", and people seem to sense not to go any further.

The shopping is done. Now it is just packages arriving and arranging stuff and putting away stuff and making sure smoke detectors work and everything. I've washed some newborn and preemie stuff and all of the linens.

I'm planning on packing a bag to leave in the car tomorrow, just in case. May 20- June 2 is my mantra, but we cannot ignore the potential for emergency (and tragedy as well).

I've put things in the living room that will be there when GG and Mo arrive. Actually, on this point: Gregg was all, "can we put that stuff away?" and I was all,"are you in denial of what's about to occur here?" (except I didn't say my part out loud). My thinking is for us to get used to the baby gear in the heretofore adult space. His thinking is probably, "we have to look at this junk for the next year, and then other junk for years on end, so why do it sooner than we have to?" I am of both minds, really. I'm a preparer, he's a deal-with-it-in-the-momenter.

Gregg is supposed to be reading about labor so that he can help me without passing out if we get to go naturally. I'm reading about sleep training twins. He asked me if I bought anything that we didn't need for years on end (he knows how far in advance my preparation can go), and I said no, but then I realized I did buy one thing...a book about how to raise emotionally intelligent children. It has about 2 paragraphs about infancy, but it really is focused on toddlers and up, obviously I guess.

There is a bluebird family nesting right outside of the nursery window, and when I lay down in bed, I can watch the mom and dad come and go endlessly preparing the nest. It's very poignant. We're the same, except we have packages from amazon in our beaks, not dog fur and dried grass. Although babies probably wouldn't mind a bed made of dog fur and hay.

The roses, wisteria and azaleas are in full bloom. It's all very beautiful.

Some pics, as promised...

Gregg's lovely wall hanging. It made me cry.

This makes me cry too.

This will be put away tomorrow. Or I'll cry.

The closet isn't so bad!

Bluebird house. They nest. We nest.

30 gigantic weeks.

I remember 18 weeks