We moved

It's official . . . we actually moved. There are a ton of issues with the house, the move was a mess, and I'm so completely exhausted I can barely see straight, and I can't get Elliot to stop bringing crap in and mucking around with stuff. We have SOOO much unpacking to do, not to mention all the stuff we left behind at my place - I have no idea where all this stuff is going to fit! I can't even think about all the crap still at my house . . . and in the storage unit. I wish we could just throw it all away and not miss any of it.

I'm exhausted and going to go to sleep.

Moving Hell

It's official - we are in the midst of moving hell. I'm so tired I can't see straight, my feet hurt, I'm contracting like crazy, and I swear it feels like the baby is shoving a sharp pointy object into my cervix just for fun. I've spent most of the week trying to pack up - I took care of the linen closets, kitchen, pantry and vanities (thanks to help from my organizer, Leslie, and good old Mom & Dad)! We moved all that stuff over to the house today and unpacked it. Elliot moved the new rugs in, and we had a cleaning service come through today. There are still issues with the floors, and a missing vanity, and a hole in the shower wall, and a bunch of other things that are still unfinished, but for now, it is livable. We still have SOOOO much left to do before tomorrow morning - we are just trying to shovel out from so much crap it is unbelievable! We have to clear out all the garbage before we can even pack up, and I have no idea how the mover is even going to get to all of our stuff. Tomorrow is going to be a LONG day. After a long week of running around hunting for rugs and all kinds of other odds and ends that we needed. I'm so far behind on my work right now. Ugh! What a week!

32 week ultrasound!

Today was our 32 week ultrasound, and so far, everything is looking great! The baby is about 4 lbs right now (3 lbs 15 ozs) and he was measuring in the 34th percentile (which is a little smaller than he was measuring last month). We got an adorable 3D shot of him, too - I think he might look like Elliot! He is still head down, we were able to see him breathing and we got a great view of his heart. My cervix is holding steady, although it has started to shrink some - it was down to about 2.7 cm today, but it is still in the "safe" zone for now. The best news, however, is that Frank shrunk! At my 28 and 30 week ultrasounds, he was about 5.4 cm x 4.9 cm x 3.5 cm . . . almost the size of a fist! As of today, he was only 4 cm x 4 cm x 2 cm, so he shrunk about 1 cm all around. I had thought that I was feeling much better (and experiencing much less pain), so I was relieved to hear it isn't just a cruel trick of the medicines, but that I should be feeling better! Hopefully, that will make the next 4 weeks much easier for me. We go back again in 2 more weeks, and then we start weekly appointments to measure the baby.

So, here are the pictures:




Well, off to continue packing! We spent the past 2 days trying to acquire rugs for the house and get all the little details done. We are hoping that things are still on track for moving on Sunday!

Packing

We have officially started packing. We are starting with a huge mess, so trying to pack up a disaster zone is . . . complicated. We have been working with an organizer, Leslie, over the past 2 years, first to help empty out Elliot's house and combine our houses into my place, and now to pull all of our stuff together here and get it to the new house and put away. The biggest bone of contention in our marriage is cleanliness. Elliot is a collector of junk (although he gets upset when I call his "stuff" junk), and tends not to put things away. I, on the other hand, believe everything should have a place, and most things should be either completely put away every day or two, or at least never exceed a small neatly stacked pile in 1 location of the house. The problem is, since Elliot emptied his house and moved all his stuff into my place, things don't have a place anymore. We never did manage to put everything away. So, it makes it difficult to ask him to clean up when there is nowhere for it to go. We also had to cancel our cleaning lady, because with stuff all over the place, it was not possible for her to come and clean. Back in May, I sort of gave up the fight - I figured we were moving in a month, so why bother any more, right? Well, 1 month has turned into 6+ months, and let's just say that my house looks like a tornado swept through here.

Since I am really supposed to be taking it easy (and packing and heavy lifting are things I'm supposed to be avoiding), we enlisted Leslie's help to get things packed and sorted. Last week, we packed up the linen closets, my knitting/crocheting, my baking stuff, and the bathroom vanities, and we moved all the boxes over to the house and stored them there. Today, we tackled the kitchen and now she is upstairs trying to pack up Elliot's office.

So, assuming the contractor completes the work he is supposed to complete by Friday, we are all set to move in on Sunday. We have too much stuff (and I'm too afraid of creating another messy situation like we did when Elliot moved his stuff here) to move everything at once. Instead, we decided to move in shifts. We are only moving what is necessary for us to start living in the house. We are going to move our kitchen stuff, clothing, linen closets, and vanities. We will be taking the bedroom set and any other big furniture that we are certain will fit in the house. For now, we are leaving behind a few decorative tables (we aren't sure where/if they will fit) and some file cabinets, and a tv armoire, and my office stuff. We are leaving all of the artwork/personal items behind for now, too. We will slowly move those over when we know where they are going. We also need to deal with our storage unit, but that is definitely a challenge for another day.

I can't believe it looks like we are finally moving! I'm so ready to be moved into Elliot's house already! I have an appointment with a place that does blinds tomorrow (hopefully we can have blinds put in soon) and we have a green cleaning service coming on Friday. Elliot is trying to arrange our phone/internet, and I guess we'll figure out the rest as we go. We are definitely going to need to buy more furniture items, but I just am not sure exactly what yet. Our living room couch will arrive on Tuesday, and we are still waiting for the basement couch and the dining room table top, both of which should arrive by mid-November. We still need to buy some area rugs for the living room, dining room and master bedroom, but we think we might have found what we need. That puts us in great shape for the baby's arrival!

I suck at hypnobirthing

We started our first hypnobirthing class on Thursday. I have been quite excited about this, and looking forward to learning these techniques. As I mentioned, we learned 2 breathing techniques (simple enough) and we were given homework: practice each breathing technique for 2 minutes when we wake up and before we go to sleep, and listen to the relaxation CD for 10 minutes a day. Seems easy, right? I've been doing my breathing, and I'm getting more comfortable with it. I have even put on the relaxation CD every day so far (3 days in a row). There enlies my problem. I thought I was great at relaxing . . . I mean, I can be one of the laziest people around! I am quite content to sit and veg out for hours at a time without moving around or doing anything else. I love getting massages and spa treatments and relaxing that way. Self-hypnosis/relaxation CDs should be the same thing, right?

The first night I put it on, I could not seem to sit there and participate. So I listened to it . . . and got up and did some cleaning while it was playing, and ripped the tracks to iTunes so I could transfer it to my ipod. Not the right idea, huh? I told myself I was just feeling the CD out and preparing for better usage.

Last night, I thought I would set myself up for success. I brought the ipod upstairs, hooked it up to my stereo, got in bed with Elliot & Nugget around 1:30 or 2:00 am with all the lights off, tv off, and figured deep relaxation just prior to bed was ideal! I put on the CD, and in about 5 minutes . . . Elliot was out cold, and I think the dog was totally unconscious as well. Me, on the otherhand . . . . I was WOUND. My leg was itching, my heart was racing (perhaps from the Terbutaline), I felt like I was having trouble taking deep breaths, and all I could think about was how thirsty I was. So, I drank some water. Then I needed to go to the bathroom. Then I came back to the CD, and my eye was itching, so I had to get up to put eye drops in. I restarted the CD, and tried again. Still fidgety, and kept changing positions, and was really distracted by my racing heart. I could hear a heart beating in my ear (probably my own, but I decided to think it was the baby) but it was so loud it was hurting my ear drum. I spent all 30 minutes listening to the CD, and thinking about the things it said, and doing my best to relax. I do think I may have finally gotten relaxed the last 5-10 minutes, and when the CD ended I heard it, and I drifted slowly off to sleep shortly thereafter.

Today I made another attempt with the CD. I thought perhaps the problem was that I did the CD before bed, and I get fidgety late at night and at bedtime. So, this afternoon, I was bored. I'm really not supposed to go running all over doing errands, and I don't feel like packing . . . or doing my work . . . or finishing my other projects. I thought maybe it would help me relax and pass the afternoon if I tried the relaxation CD again. I did a few stretches, did the deep breathing to relax, stretched out on the couch, and started to play the CD from my computer (don't you love iTunes?). Immediately, I couldn't sit still. My leg started to itch again, and suddenly I had to sneeze, and once again, I was desperately thirsty. My heart was still racing (I'm going to blame the Terbutaline again for that) and I could hear the heartbeat sound in my ear again. Nevertheless, I persisted. The CD started talking about different colors, and next thing you know, I'm thinking about running to the store to buy yarn. I open my eyes to look around, and I see that Nugget is curled up by the computer, unconscious and drooling. Apparently, the CD really works great . . . . I've never seen her more relaxed and totally unconscious!! I try to bring my focus back to the CD, and my hip is hurting. Thankfully, the phone rang and I threw in the towel on the CD. Nugget is still out cold . . . . I wonder if I need to gently rouse her so she doesn't stay in this state all day.

So . . . now what? Please tell me that each time I practice I will get better at relaxing? I really want to learn how to do this, but apparently, I suck at relaxing. Elliot and Nugget, on the other hand, have already mastered the technique. Clearly, I should have let Nugget have puppies - she is quite skilled at this hypnobirthing thing. If only she was a good teacher.