38 weeks

I have a goal this weekend to get a decent picture of me at 38 weeks pregnant. Until then, I'll let you gaze at the soybeans in the field behind our house that are turning bright yellow right before our eyes.

My friend Shannon told me right when we got pregnant with this baby that the best thing she did when she was pregnant with her last baby was have professional house cleaners come and deep clean her home just before her due date. Largely because at 9 months pregnant you're not really scrubbing your bathtub anymore (...or ever), but also because after the baby you don't have to stare at all the dust and dirt while enjoying your new babe. So we did that yesterday and I think my house is

cleaner today than the day we moved in. Best decision ever. Tuck this little wisdom away for when you have a baby or your sister/daughter/friend has one...

Elsie got a cold last week and it has worked its way through our whole family. We've burned through an insane amount of kleenex at this house, but I think we are on the upswing. At least I really hope we are.

I got an email from The Baby Center today telling me that at 38 weeks my baby is the size of a leek. I hope not. I think they take their measurements based on the length of the vegetable, but a leek just seems too scrawny to be accurately associated with the seven pound babe inside of me. 

On Saturday night I ended up going grocery shopping by myself at the last minute. The plan was for the family to go, but we had car trouble, so I jumped in the truck to do it on my own. I hadn't fully thought through how tired I was to do a full week's worth of grocery shopping and by the end I was exhausted. I was walking from the last aisle to the check out lines at a very slow swagger when a very elderly man came out from his aisle, pushing his cart, to walk towards the same check out line. We were neck and neck. We walked with the same fatigued posture and he smiled big at me.  We had a sweet and unspoken, though very bonding, moment. Then he turned into lane 7 and I went to lane 5. 

The kids are doing awesome and start preschool next week. I have them in for two mornings a week, in the same class, and we are all very excited. They can't wait to bring their backpacks to hang on their hooks and I can't wait to have some consistent, undivided time with the new baby. I have started calling them my velcro. They must sense all the change that is to come, but I cannot leave a room without two bodies physically finding their way to be as close to me as possible. Lots of cuddles and snuggles are needed lately and it is very sweet. (and I'm back to edit that word a bit...sometimes smothering. It's sweet when I'm thinking about it. It's smothering when I'm living it...)

At our midwives appointment this week Elsie asked if the midwives would listen to her baby too. So when I was done, she crawled up on the table and they listened for her baby and let her listen. Ivar was quite sure someone needed to tell Elsie that she does not actually have a baby in her, but Rory was quick to quiet him so she could have her special time. She told the midwives proudly, "only girls have babies."