Woznation

A collection of random thoughts and events before baby #3 gets here:

• Evie loves singing ‘zippity do dah’, but cant quite make out the ‘Z’ so instead runs around the house singing ‘lippity do dah’
• I cant wait to burn all my maternity clothes.  I hate everything I wear every day, but refuse to spend money on clothes while pregnant because its not like i feel good in anything anyway.  I feel like I am wearing a ridiculous costume every day and can barely take myself seriously when I look in the mirror.
• Every once in a while, I lay down with Wil during his ‘quiet time’ and in even rarer occasions, we both actually fall asleep.  I absolutely cherish these moments when I wake-up next to my sweet boy and we get a few minutes to snuggle before getting up for the afternoon.  I’m guessing when #3 arrives, these occasions will disappear all together.
• I finally had a play-doh epiphany a few weeks ago.  I used to be a nazi about mixing play-dohs.  “DONT MIX THE COLORS”.  But whyyyyyyyy?  Why do I care?!  Why do I spend some much energy making sure the precious play-doh colors remain separate.  We have been using the same 3 canisters of the same 3 colors for like a year!  I had like 10 more colors on reserve in the laundry room.  I gave up.  I bought a new 24-pack of colors for like 15 bucks and we’ve been mixing colors ever since.  I’ll buy more once its a uniform brown color. Everyone is happier.
• I wrote a blog post about how great Phil is but he wont let me post it. So just know that hes wonderful and we love him very much.
• I dont think its possible for me to get any bigger.  I’m nearing a physical breaking point.  But, as I thought more about it, thats exactly what 40-weeks gestation is, in an evolutionary sense: a breaking point.  This is as far as the human body can possibly take a baby in utero without it killing us. I’m so there.  Along those same lines – I really hope I go into labor in the morning, after a good nights sleep.  I’m so tired.  If I go into labor after like 5pm – just forget it.  Just wheel me into the operating room – there is no way I’m going to have the energy to get this thing out of me.
• After talking about how there is no way to meet people at school – there have suddenly been a plethora of activities…..that I have no time or energy for.  Seriously, in the last 2 weeks of my pregnancy, there has been a ‘Moms night out’, a before-school moms breakfast, a classmates birthday party, and a field trip.  I have attended zero of these events.  I bummed – but also know my limits and know that I can not push myself right now.  There are too many other things to take care of at the moment.
• Wil understands the difference between ‘quiet’ and ‘silence’.  So if hes being really loud and obnoxious and I ask him to please be quiet – hes only the slightest bit quieter.  So when I really need the noise to stop I have to say ‘Silence, Wil!’.  Which is just a ridiculous thing to have to say.  “SILENCE”.  I catch myself saying it and wonder how on earth I got to this point in my life where I’m needing to yell SILENCE multiple times a day.
• Evie is the anti-cuddler.  One morning she woke up particularly early and I didnt have the energy to try to sing her songs and get her back to sleep like a normal middle of the night waking – so I just said – “do you want to come sleep in mommy’s bed”  (which we usually dont do to avoid it becoming habit-forming).  But instead – she just said “No, I’ll lay back down”.  HA.  after all the energy I have spent trying to get that girl to go to sleep – all I had to do was suggest she come cuddle with me in my bed.  Go figure.
• Wil was drawing today and we asked him what it was and he said ‘turtle poop.  turtle poop is yellow’. so I said, ‘oh really? did you learn that at school?’ and he responded ‘no, i just know it’.  (and now my search history has a google image search of turtle poop).

So there you have it.  Thats life these days, and its about to get turned upside down.  We’re just trying to make it down the home stretch.  My mom came to stay with me while Phil was on a work trip (in Baltimore).  Luckily, I did not go into labor while he was away, but my body is definitely going down hill.  Phil comes home everyday and immediately takes the kids to the playground by himself for an hour or so, and I rest in the tub or on the couch. (PS – Phil is a connoisseur of playgrounds.  He finds them while running with Barney in the morning, and has a new one practically every day for the kids. They LOVE it when daddy gets home.) I have handed off my projects at work and am really looking forward to putting an automated ‘maternity leave’ email response up.  Things are mostly in place for #3 around here.  We’re ready when he is!

Here are a few leftover pictures of our fall so far:

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We’ve been loving fall around here.  It hasnt been too terribly cold yet at all, so we’ve been able to get out and enjoy the season here in the midwest.  We made it to Goebberts Pumpkin Farm as a family one afternoon:

By far the highlight of our trip was the corn playground — they filled this whole play area with corn kernels!  It was Wil’s favorite thing in the whole world (Phil liked it too):

We managed to get a semi-decent family picture before leaving:

We’ve also been spending a lot of time on ‘adventure walks’.  We usually write-up some sort of scavenger hunt, grab our trick-or-treating pumpkins and go exploring outside:

We’ve also made it back to the crabtree nature center a handful of times – the kids cant get enough of it.  Phil was finally able to join us one weekend:

We brought out pumpkins for a scavenger hunt one afternoon – but they stopped us on the way in and asked “by chance are you guys planning on collecting any items today”, to which i responded “whyyyyy thats exactly what we were planning on doing”.  But apparently you are not supposed to take things off trails in nature centers.  Oops.

I think Evie looks hilarious in this hobo picture in her hodge-podge clothing, playing in a little make-shift tent:

Then Phil and Wil headed back to Goebberts for a class field trip.  I didnt think I could handle taking both kids by myself, so Phil rearranged his schedule to be there.  They had a blast:

Giant inflatable jumping pillow:

Feeding the animals:

Giant pumpkin-eating dinosaur was a big hit:

We’re hoping the nice weather and pretty colors last a few more weeks! I would love to get baby #3 outside a bit before we start hibernating for the winter!

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After a crazy, crazy summer — we’re finally slowing down around here. I wish I would have kept all my to-do lists so I could look back and see what all we accomplished.  There was so much to get done with the move and preparing for baby. Big things like ‘buy new car’ were right next to little things like ’email speech teacher’.  Some of the big things were: New license and registration for cars, finding schools/doctors/vet, getting insurance switched over.  And I feel like NOTHING went smoothly. Its wasnt like I just walked in and got the title switched over on our cars and walked out.  I called and one person told me exactly what I needed – so the next day I went in to complete everything and a new person told me that I did NOT have everything I needed – so I went home got more things and went back the next day.  Then we received the title for the Jetta – but not the Rav.  So I had to call and there is some sort of administrative problem that no one can see in the system and they have to have someone call me back. Ive called 4 times in 2 weeks and no one has called me back.  So I still dont have a title for the Rav even though we technically SOLD the Rav as trade-in for a new chevy traverse (that can fit 3 car seats, yay).  So a process that we started in Mid-August is still ongoing.  Then, with insurance, I switched policies over to IL – but the new agent wrote brand new policies instead of doing a state-to-state transfer, then had to back track and re-do things.  And I couldnt do a policy for my jewelry since i didnt have a recent appraisal – so I had to go get that done – now we are working on getting insurance switched from the Rav to the new car.  And oh, did I mention, that the random state farm agent that I picked to transfer everything to just sent a letter saying that he is retiring, so our policies are being transferred again to a new agent in the area.  So we still dont have insurance in place on the new car either. Fine.  Whatever. I have more stories like this —  About things not going smoothly.  Intricate problems about getting access to the dog park down the street. Multiple phone calls regarding getting my OB services covered by insurance (they werent covering me because they had me listed as Male in the system.).  But I’ll leave it at that.

Anyway. Most things are done now and we are focusing on getting things ready for baby.  We have finally picked a name (we went DEEP into baby names, people).  I have pulled out and washed all the old baby clothes and even have some newborn diapers that Phil and Maggie gave us.  I feel like we are mostly ready!  Friends and family have asked us if we need anything, but we really seem to have everything left over from the other two kids.  I told Celia that if I were to have a baby shower for #3 that people should only bring wine/beer.  Thats all I’ll really need once this baby arrives.

I have 2 projects I am finishing up at work — then will only stay on to answer questions about manuscripts I am involved with – no. new. projects.  The main researcher I work with requested that I dont terminate my employee status until the manuscripts are submitted/accepted (which could take forever.) Its almost like I cant quit this place!  I was all set to pass everything off in mid-May, then they convinced me to stay on until two high-impact papers were published.  But now I’m back to working on old projects instead of handing them off.  I really hope to be done soon.  If it gets too overwhelming, I will eventually have to pull the plug.

Even with all the craziness, we’ve been able to have a few really nice weekends.  Phil and I went to Cleveland for Rusty’s wedding over Labor Day. Mark and Char came to watch the kids and we had 3 whole days alone (and not packing boxes!). It was the first time I felt relaxed in a very long time.  Phil has been able to enjoy some Chicago sports. He hopped down to the city to watch the first Bears game, then went to a Cubs game with his dad, uncle and brother, and went to a Bears game with Jared!  I was finally able to get that massage.  Next up, Phil’s heading on a week-long work trip, so my mom is going to come help (and make sure I’m not alone if I go into labor!). I’m glad most of the big items are taken care of and now hoping to have a few slower weeks before this baby comes.

Here are a few leftover pictures from our summer.

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