sausage dogs

... and you'd still be wrong.

10 days over and ... it's still me and Masaki hanging out together all day (and check out what great company he is, he very rarely leaves that mat). 

My hospital has a policy of 10 days past due date, but my obstetrician has given me a deadline of 14 days. Whilst I'm a believer of not rushing these things and letting baby come in his/her own time, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry!

Oh well, I'm so very close now, just impatient to meet this little wriggler.

If you came here to see a cute newborn, check out Lauren's instead, love that fuzzy hair!! Eeeee!!

if you thought the brief silence meant baby has arrived...

... unfortunately you'd be wrong. Baby apparently isn't quite ready yet. So instead of having a baby I made a cat with a bow-tie.

Behold:

11.11.11

A very catchy date.. Sunny Spring weather.. the perfect day to be born yes? Apparently not.

But that's ok, I'm very thrilled with this little baby. I'd been rather gloomy all week after my obstetrician bandied the "Caesarean" word about at our last appointment, because baby's head was not engaged and didn't look like it was going to. Anyway, I jotted down a million questions for my appointment yesterday but needn't have bothered - baby is now locked and loaded! Nice work.

Except now I've really got nothing at all to do.. except be the personal doorman to this guy who likes to come in/go out about 50 times a day (and lets you know if you don't respond quickly enough!).

So then I did something really insane:

I know. Wrapping Christmas presents in November isn't normal behaviour. But that's what it's come to.

I did get a pleasant surprise this morning - this is what happens to your blog stats when gorgeous Jodi from Che and Fidel mentions you in her post (wow, how did she get here?) :

I was most confused for a while! Thank you to all those who visited, and who left comments, I now have lots of lovely new blogs to peruse, instead of being a crazy lady who does Christmas wrapping in early November.

waiting.

I have completed my epic list of pre-baby tasks. So now there's not much to do..

..but float along and scare other beach goers with my giant belly (we went to Sorrento for the weekend which was just bliss),

..and do some bonus unnecessary baby craft.

The freezer is stocked with pre-made meals.

And the hospital bags are packed.

So now it's time to rest, relax and wait. 

40 weeks.

Well, here we are and I can't believe it! The past 9 months have both flown and dragged at the same time.

I'm grateful to have had an easy pregnancy - no sickness, dramas or too much discomfort. I kept reading ahead in my Up the Duff book and thinking "uh oh, it gets bad soon" but it never did. Sure I've been a bit puffy (the wedding ring hasn't been worn for a while), sleeping has been much more interrupted recently (but if I can't handle that then I can't handle a baby!) and the constant heartburn is uncomfortable, but I've found the whole thing exciting and enjoyable. 

I'm certainly not at the "get it out of me" point yet, and there's apparently a theory you need to feel a bit like that to go into labour - I don't know how true that is. Also, the baby isn't locked and loaded ("engaged") which apparently it should have by now. My obstetrician even threw out the c-word at my last appointment (caesarian you dirty bird!) which I was a bit surprised by - he said I could go a week over and then that's what we'd need to think about. Hopefully it won't come to that, but either way, I'm not holding my breath for anything to happen right away.

... but I could be mistaken! Whatever happens we are so close to meeting our little bebe. And even though I've had 9 months to get used to the idea, I simply can't imagine it! 

(I do have a head, and I sometimes wear clothing that isn't grey.. occasionally).

baby shower.

My three gorgeous pals Liz, Kate and Zoë (the A-team) threw me a truly beautiful baby shower on the weekend. It was the perfect mix of close friends, family, delicious treats, and lovely decorating.

Mum and Clare of Hortensia flowers did the floral things, along with some blatant branding (bottom left). 

We played a couple of games - one was guess the size of my belly. All of the guesses except one were huge (see bottom left!), how rude, but thankfully my aunt Kate was kinder and won. 

Tim, bebe and I were very spoilt with thoughtful gifts we'll treasure very much.

Thank you so much ladies, what a perfect day xox

(Wow my second chin is growing at the same rate as my tummy).

to do list.

I bought this cute little plant stand for $10 at a market on the weekend, score! So I went and found some pots and cute plants for it today. Still undecided about the bottom row, any suggestions? 

This was one of the items on my "to do" list, but I am clearly having problems prioritising. Get pots and plants for stand: check. Buy some newborn clothes for the baby to wear: fail. 

My list has also been hindered by a weird bout of gastro earlier in the week. I've not had that before - I don't recommend it. I think I got off fairly lightly, but because I'm packing a baby everything is slightly more of a drama and had to go into hospital for some IV stuff because I was dehydrated and poor bebe's heartbeat was high. Then whilst being monitored they noticed I was having regular "tightenings". Uh oh, I could see where this was going. But thankfully not! We managed to get out of there and everything settled down after a long rest. Anyways, all good now. Tomorrow I shall definitely do something important on my list.

36 weeks.

This will be my first week of completely unstructured days, which come to think of it hasn't happened since I finished uni and didn't yet have a job. It's sort of daunting! Not that I have nothing to do, I have an INSANELY long list of nesting and baby-related tasks...

... like washing and sorting all the clothes. Seriously? These socks are trying to kill me with cuteness. Damn you tiny socks.

... and last minute reading on birth and what you actually do with a baby

... and setting up the baby's room with cute but unnecessary items, like this cloud bookcase

... and just triple checking that we've fully exhausted all the naming options (with the help of the freaky bunny lamp)

Plus many more actually important tasks like: get rid of even more clutter as we still don't have enough room, finish getting all the baby things, pack the hospital bag, get a car seat fitted, cook and freeze meals, try and do my tax, etc etc. 

(I know, I know, and get plenty of rest too!)

Spring.

Spring is here - and soon our wee babe will be too! What an excellent time of year to be born. We're at 32 weeks now, and there's been a big growth spurt, check it out:

Argh! It's all starting to happen now - birth classes, 2 more weeks of work, painting the baby's room, and beginning to buy all the bits and pieces. And baby is kicking and wriggling around like crazy.

Tim and I had our hospital birth class this weekend. We had done the Calmbirth course a few weeks ago which left me feeling much more positive and confident about the whole business. I was worried the hospital class would set me back again and be very "drugs drugs - get on them" but they seem to have a very similar take on it all to Calmbirth. So it left me feeling very reassured.

However there were a few traumatic bits in the class including one terrible video from the 80's which showed a birth not going quite to plan - I'm not quite sure which was scarier: the fashion or the extreme close-ups of a forceps birth. 

One surreal moment involved me massaging Tim's back with a plastic turtle whilst he pretended to have a contraction on a Swiss ball (why the partners had to do this I don't know).

Next week we go back and learn how to care for this wriggly baby!

28 weeks.

Another milestone - the third trimester! According to the books, if baby were to come now he/she would have a "good chance of survival" (but please wait another 12 weeks baby). It's also a significant week, because this is the number of weeks gestation as when my husband was born. It's hard to imagine now that he's about 6 ft, but once he was tiny, and held onto life by a thread. I'm feeling extra grateful this week to have my Tim.