Apparently, this baby wants us to pay a million dollars for an extra year of fancy schmancy preschool

Because if he wants to start kindergarten when he is 5, he needs to make an appearance by tomorrow at the latest. And judging by the fact that I have nothing going on labor wise, I feel like he is going to miss the cut off. Damn it.

I reached my own toes yesterday and was so excited at the feat (ha! feats! feet!) I did a DIY pedicure that turned out awesomely.

You know what being pregnant an extra 10+ days than usual gets you? FUCKING STRETCH MARKS. I am so pissed. It looks like a tiger might have scratched my back and hips and yesterday? Fuck it all, there was a scratch on my stomach. SO now I will never wear a 2-piece swimming suit again? Really? I have always had a couple small marks on my hips from fat college days, but they have always been hidden by my bikini bottoms. Now there's nowhere to hide, and I am so MAD.I bought some Bio Oil at target yesterday, so maybe that will help?

I had a babysitter yesterday while Ben taught a late class (he has about 5 weeks this semester where he leaves in the afternoon and doesn't come back until like 2 days later (except after the kids have gone to bed). Sucks. Anyway, while the babysitter was here, I went to Target and just walked around throwing random crap in my cart. Like stretch mark oil and DIY pedicure supplies. So glam.

I need to get H's first day of school clothes ready(Pirate polo from Gap Kids, gray shorts from Gap Kids, Sketchers Secret Lights shoes that he has been DYING to wear for weeks) and make his requested after-school snack on the off chance I miraculously go into labor and can't be home tomorrow, which would be terrible because it would traumatize him and would be wonderful because then would get to meet this baby who is grinding the hell out of my bladder. Oh. Also need to pack a school lunch and cross my fingers that he figures out how to buy milk in the cafeteria.

All I want to do is eat stuff and buy stuff, but today, I think I am too cranky and tired to go anywhere, so unless I online shop my fingers off, it looks like an eating day. When the babysitter comes over to handle dinner and outside playtime and bath, I hope to take a nap. Or maybe actually just go to bed. At like 4:30.

Did I mention also that I have horrible seasonal allergies right now? Made worse, no doubt, by the fact that outside my living room window is a huge field of WEEDS. As if the weight gain and the stretch marks (I am seriously enraged about the stretch marks-- I might as well have another baby now because my bounce-back chances are severely diminished) and the Shrek feet weren't enough, my nose is red, and my eyes are swollen into little slits.

See? I am a TREAT to be around today, huh? My kids are SO LUCKY to have me home with them.

39 Weeks and a Couple of Days.

This baby is apparently very comfy in here because he doesn't seem ready to evacuate. Every night, I have contractions for a few hours and then nothing. Such a tease.

Today, Harry and I went over to his school to meet his teacher and drop off his supplies. He was wildly chatty. His teacher was lovely. There are only 17 kids in his class, and they all have their own lockers, which are as tiny and adorable as you might imagine.

When he starts school later this week, he'll go ALL DAY 5 days a week. Totally crazy. All-day kindergarten is the only option in this district, but it seems like a lot of school for a little guy.

As much as I want to have the baby, I also want to be there for Harry's first day. I found an adorable photo pose on Pinterest which involved the purchase of a small slate, and I have already promised to make Harry chocolate chip brownies for his very first kindergarten after school snack. (I also got healthier snack ideas on Pinterest for later-- on the first day, he gets whatever he wants).

He was so relieved to find tons and tons and tons of toys in his classroom-- I think he was under the impression that kindergarten is all work all the time. He was also thrilled to discover that his class gets to play on BOTH playgrounds. The teacher asked him if he had any questions about kindergarten, and he tipped his head back and thought about it before asking, "Can we play on the big kid playground during recess?" When she said yes, he said, "Oh good. I have been so worried about that."

Well then. Sounds like he's going to be fine.

39 weeks. Nothing happening down there.

My kids were perfect little angels at the OB today, despite waiting for over an hour to see the doc. It helped that I doled out the Clif's Kids Z Bars and Twisted Fruit ropes (have you tried them? All dried fruit; no sugar; and organic!) and they each had their own iPad to play with. WHATEVER WORKS.

My doctor, it turns out, was so late because he has a brand! new! intern! trailing along, and mine? Was this kid's first cervix. (I figure I should let anyone in there who wants to check it out and the rammier the better-- let's get this show on the ROAD).

I am not quiiiiiiite 2 centimeters, which means THERE'S NO ACTION YET. My doc said my cervix is not favorable for an induction (which I didn't even ask for-- he probably just looked at my cankles and my gyrating stomach and KNEW), but not to despair, I could still go into labor at any moment. Also, he'll see me next week. NEXT WEEEEEEEK????? I have a 40-week appointment? This is unheard of for me! Next week, H starts kindergarten in the morning, and I get to go see why the hell I am still pregnant in the afternoon. Kind of a sunrise/ sunset day.

The baby was super awake and active this morning. His heart beat sounded like a galloping horse, and he worked himself up to 180 bpm trying to dodge the doppler wand. But there's nowhere to hide in there-- a person who is 5'2" tall can only get so big, you know?

I am taking the kids to the zoo after lunch-- the day I went into labor with Jack I hauled myself around the zoo all afternoon. Who knows? maybe it was the sight of the giant tortoises mating that did the trick, or maybe it was all the walking. Either way, hoping for some big turtle love and a baby soon.

Still Pregnant

Friday, I have a personal record-setting 39-weeks appointment with my doctor, and I have to bring both kids with me. When I scheduled the appointment, I thought Oh I will have totally had the baby by then, so it doesn't matter if I have no childcare. Hahahaha. The joke is on me. Also the doctor. And his staff.

I would ask him what the hell we can do about getting this thing out of me, but, you know, I am trying to avoid intervention. My gym is closed this week to get ready for their fall activity schedule, so I can't even try to exercise him outta here. Maybe later when the babysitter comes over, I can go for a walk. (yes, I am officially too pregnant to take care of my own kids past normal work hours when Ben is late).

But I have stopped looking at all his tiny little clothes and am using this as an opportunity to do a better job of filling out his "Dear Baby" journal before he is born. Thanks to the kids' love of drawing huge pictures in it, I am almost to the end, which makes him look JUST AS IMPORTANT as the other 2 kids, which of course he is. But still. I am paranoid that we won't have as much memorabilia as H and J.
Harry enjoys making silly faces for the camera

Sometimes when Jack has been playing unsupervised for an irresponsible amount of time and I realize I haven't heard a peep out of him, I run downstairs expecting danger! and chaos! and find him reading quietly.

Harry's favorite thing to do is to pretend that straws are wands (even though he has no fewer than 3 licensed Harry Potter wands), so he brings them home from restaurants and screams "Expeliarmus!"


We toured this house when we were building because we really liked the floor plan (almost built it in fact, but it was only 2000 square feet w/o a finished basement and because of the model-to-lot rules in our development, we couldn't find a lot with enough exposure to let us get livable space in the basement without having to dig out egress windows-- we wanted actual, big windows. So, long story short, we didn't go with this plan, although sometimes I wish we had because we planned it with a central vac, which I miss soooooo much), and because the house is still for sale, nosy Jack loves to check it out every time we go for a walk

So nosy.

Jack is just tall enough to put his moth and tongue all over the drinking fountain, but he tries so hard to get a drink, I can't stop him. Perseverance!

Jack is transitioning from baby to kid-- his legs are thinning out, and his feet have developed arches, but he still has a couple chub rolls on his arms and thighs. Jack was happily eating mac and cheese with his fingers the other night, but I advised Harry to use a fork because he is a big boy. "Me can do this," Jack said, shoveling a handful in his mouth. "Because me still part baby, right?" Right.

Thank goodness for garbage day because we have made a lot of trash this week. What gives?

If I haven't had the baby by Monday, I might try to go to work because that's when the faculty contract year begins, and I don't want tot have to use ANOTHER week of freaking sick leave just to lay on my ass and watch reality TV (thanks, state, for having such a sucky, sucky maternity leave policy, by the way. they'll hold my job for a year, but any time I want to take off has to be unpaid or out of my sick leave bank. blech.)

Hope one of these next few posts has a squishy baby in it.

Eclipsed

My new camera has this creepy feature that allows it to automatically take pictures when it detects smiles. Or at least bared teeth.

It's really handy because I am forever missing my kids' smiles, and they don't even have to hold still-- the camera just clicks away when it thinks it sees a pleasant expression.



Harry has been having some trouble adjusting to our new house. He really misses our old house (he actually claims to still miss the Toyota Matrix I haven't driven since Jack was newborn also), and he is a little scared of this house. In the morning after breakfast, Jack trots happily downstairs to the playroom, but Harry prefers to hang in his room where there are no toys. Today he told me he just wanted to sit on his bed and pet his stuffed snake. So that's what he did, except he got super bored and could not resist bugging the crap out of me and Ben every 3 minutes.

I blame myself for reading him the first 3 Harry Potter books-- he seemed to be freaked out by them even though he loved them and all things Harry. (We decided to wait on the rest of the series because damn! That shit gets scary, so we have launched into the creepy ass world of Roald Dahl an are loving Charlie and the Chocolate Factory with big plans for James and the Giant Peach next. I bought a Dahl 6-pack at Costco, which cracked me up because OF COURSE I had to buy a half dozen-- it's Costco after all.)

He is also facing a huge transition in terms of kindergarten, which starts next week. Moving in sight of school helped calm my fears, but H is still freaking out, I think.

I know that most people go back to work when their kids start school, but back when Ben was still a 9-5er I was going to quit my job this year because Harry will be gone so much, and I wanted one of us to be completely available to him everyday after school. Kindergarten is full-day here-- no options. I am thrilled that either Ben or me will be able to bring the little kids to walk Harry home everyday and that we can volunteer in his class every week. Knowing we can do that makes ME feel better, but I think he is still a huge bundle of nerves.

He has a cute little North Face back pack, a couple of pairs of light-up shoes, a bunch of polos that are yet unstained and all his cute little school supplies packed up and ready to go. He's registered. We meet his teacher next week. We've snooped inside and shown him his classroom and the nearest bathroom.

But I can't help but feel as though this very special time for him has been eclipsed by the new baby whose arrival is (I HOPE) immanent. I hope I am not actually IN the hospital on his first day, that I can haul my fat ass onto the porch for more tentative smile pictures, that I can lumber across the street with him.

This blog always makes me remember when it was just Harry, the center of our universe. I am glad he got a solid foundation of adoration because I worry sometimes that he feels pushed out by his brother and his brother-on-the-way. Sometimes I feel like I don't have TIME for him to be nervous or patience because I just want him to realize how great things are right now. He's just a little boy, though, who wiggles his teeth all the time in the hopes that one will suddenly be loose and who has left the only house he's ever remembered and is a little scared of the dark and of noises and of leaving all his preschool friends.

Glad I have a camera that catches him smiling.

Holy shit. I am huge.

Behold my hugeness:




In other news, my camera broke, and I took it to Best Buy to get fixed, but they had to send it away to the place where all good Canons go, and it;s going to take 2-3 weeks to come back to me. So I bought a new one! A super zoom! It's super cool!

So cool that Ben even took pictures of animals at the zoo with it, like this awesome alligator (or crocodile?) picture:

and this one of a polar bear taking a crap

Also some cute kid pics




Ugh. I think I am going to be pregnant forever. AND I got a terrible hair cut last week. My stylist was leaving for a vacation in Portugal later that night, and she clearly did not care about my hair, seeing as she cut some random layers and chopped my bangs to mom-length. I really hope it grows out okay, but the layers are so random that my pony tails look wimpy, which is not what I need when I am trying to balance out the size of my ass with big hair.

Ugh. Just want to record the reality of pregnancy in case we stumble across some other pictures and only remember the beautiful parts and get crazy enough to do this all over again.

Ugh.

Afternoon

Harry brought home a Chinese dragon art project from school the other day and has been nagging me to do it ever since. I resisted because I freaking hate glitter glue and am an asshole but today, we had NO PLANS if you couldn't tell. So I flipped over the Lego top of the Lego table and got down his little box of markers and scissors, and Harry got to work.


He was happy with the results

And I took it upstairs to dry on the dryer unmolested.

Then he spent the next solid hour nagging at me to ask if it was dry. After spending the last 2 days nagging at me to do the craft.

After I put the laundry away, I assessed the dragon, and it looked mostly dry, so I brought it back downstairs where Harry started playing with it like it was an action figure and ripped it instantly.

Tears. Hysteria. Total lack of logic and incomprehension that a paper dragon is not really a sturdy toy.

So I fixed the damn thing and put it back upstairs to dry.

And now we are on hour number 2 of nagging at me to ask if it's dry.

AUGHHHHHHHHH!

We also played outside and at the park and that part of the day was not emotionally damaging for anyone:

Irony

After I screamed at the kids to STOP SCREAMING AT EACH OTHER, I realized that the windows were all open AND the new neighbors were in their new driveway unloading a few things. Nice.

So we went to the gym where I enjoyed 45 minutes on the elliptical reading Redbook and the kids played with some friends on the playground. When I picked them up they were red and sweaty, and they ate lunch really well with only minimal bickering (Jack even ate a VEGETABLE-- sugar snap peas-- color me shocked).

As soon as I clean up the kitchen for the third time today (FML), we are going to the park. At this rate, maybe they'll be in bed BEFORE dinner...

You DON'T dress up like a Power Ranger to eat brownies at 9 am? Weird.

Long day's jounrey into I hope somebody comes home soon but he's not due home until dinner SAVE ME!

Today is the first day I have been home by myself with the kids in a long time. Holy crap. Kids can be really annoying. And it's raining. Of course it is. And as soon as the rain dries, our sprinklers will come on. So what I am saying is, outside is out for now.

Luckily, except for one kind of shitty day (no offense, kids) where I am on the hook for J and the baby all day and Harry from after school until bedtime (bedtime for 3 kids by myself? Sounds fucking terrible. I have a sitter coming between 1 and 3 days a week to help with bedtime depending on Ben's class schedule, which is kind of erratic), I am really not going to be doing a ton of solo parenting this semester at all. One half day with the baby, the aforementioned long day that's mostly just 2 kids, and a perfectly normal work-hour day with J and the baby and then all 3 for about an hour. BUT there are a few nights throughout the semester (about 16) that Ben has night classes, meaning I will be alone from crabby time until bedtime (hence the sitter).

Can you tell I am dreading it? I think it's because I have NO PATIENCE lately, and I cannot imagine that I will have more when I am totally sleep deprived. Also, we dropped J from 3 full days of preschool to 3 half days because all he does is take a nap in the afternoon, and one of us is home everyday anyway because of the baby. So, less childcare. And AGAIN, Ben's days home have more childcare than mine.

We are going to try to swing this precarious schedule for 4 semesters, until the baby is 2 and can start preschool, although we may be in the market for a 2-part-day-a-week nanny when the baby is 1, which would allow Ben to work more day classes and not teach at night anymore. Also, next year, J can go to 4K through the school district, which is 5 half days. We are committed, though, to being home with the baby sitter-free for a year, even if we have to figure out weird times to get all of our work done.

But really, the point of this post is that I have been dreading today for like a week because I haven't had to deal with the kids by myself for most of the summer thanks to year-round preschool, which is such a good idea! Because let's face it, at home they eat bowls of snacks and hang out with this a lot: (LIKE RIGHT NOW)

They really wanted to bake (from boxes because I am lazy), even though they look kind of crabby in the pictures), but we had finished that by 7:30 am.



Then they played some super heroes

Then as evidenced by the trail of bat costumes, they DRESSED like super heroes (I don't know because all I heard was dulled screaming while I mopped up the baking mess less than half an hour after I mopped up the breakfast mess)

Now they have abandoned super play in favor of other costumes and-- you guessed it-- a bowl of snack because eating at mealtimes is apparently for SUCKERS.



I'll keep you posted-- not because my day is thrilling but because I need virtual support.