Nursery Progress & News

Generally the news at this point is that I am slow.  I'm slow walking to the bus stop, slow in updating my blog, slow in moving my derriere off the couch.  Aches and pains are frequent companions, particularly if I've walked or stood up too long.  My big problem is that I've yet to define what exactly is 'too long'.

Anyway, I'm not going to moan today, life is good.  I'm finishing up at the office on Tuesday and will work from home until the 15th of June.  I'll save two hours a day in travel and I won't have to get up and down the multiple flights of stairs at the office.  Yipee!  It does mean a bit of very repetitive data entry for a whole 8 days but I can do that and drink tea and listen to some tunes with my feet up so it's all good.

The big news for today is that the nursery is pretty much finished!  I still have to get some little wicker baskets for storage on the shelves and I have to make the curtains to keep the dust off the hanging clothes but those can be jobs for the maternity leave.  The weather was great last weekend so I got all the baby linen, nappies and clothes washed and packed away.  It was mighty strange watching MC hang his 6ft 3'' person clothes up on the washing line next to diddy little booties and newborn baby vests.  Very cute and heart warming, just totally hilarious too.

So here's some pics of the nursery:

A huge thank you to MC's Dad who gifted us a joiner to come take out the existing built in wardrobe and build this more child friendly space.  I may have mentioned before (on just a few occasions) that the previous occupant of this house was a bit of a DIY Cowboy and doing anything requires a lot of ripping out and starting from scratch.  When we peeled the wallpaper in this room we discovered at some point there'd been a leak which had never been allowed to dry before they papered over the top of the mould.  Nice.  Some bleach, an open window and a plaster later you'd never know where the holes, the mould or the dado rail had been!

For the sake of good economy (post plasterer's bill) we decided to use up the hoard of white paint left to us by the Cowboy.  MC decided I wasn't allowed to help paint because of the fumes so it's taken a while for him to put the obligatory 3 coats of paint on the new plaster and the MDF that the shelving in the wardrobe is made out of.  It's been frustrating for me not to be able to just dive in and help get the job done.  Those that know me know patience for an upside down house is not a strong point.

I couldn't have been more delighted on Friday when I came home to find all the painting paraphernalia removed from Munchkin's room.  Unfortunately for MC I probably did not express this very well given I'd gone from work to a leaving do and consequently got home at 10pm and fell straight into bed.  Honest, my wonderful husband, I was gleeful, just too pooped to express this adequately. To break up the somewhat clinical whiteness of the room we broke up the shelved section by using up some light green paint within the frame in contrast to the white shelves and bought bright stickers to put on the walls.

The stickers I could do!  That's what I thought anyway.  Turns out they weren't cut very well and so on several occasions they tore in multiple places making them very difficult to apply to the wall without the joins being very obvious.  The only major casualty was Tigger in the first photo of the wall stickers.  He came off the sheet in FOUR pieces, the worst of the joins cleverly disguised by randomly positioned leaves and a honeypot.  Well, you do what you can says I.  By the time Munchkin is old enough to care she'll probably have decided that she's too grown up for Winnie the Pooh and friends anyway. 

Freddie moves into his new home and is joined by... 

The Hedgehog of Love.  Bought by me some moons ago for a special person who was having a nasty time of things.  He worked his magic and his previous carer, now happy and in love, has sent him back to me to bring Munchkin some luck and happiness.







In the gap under the bookshelves in the built in space we're going to put a toybox (currently buried under mountains of boxes in my Mum's storage unit) with a padded cushion on top so it doubles as a wee person seat.  We haven't built the baby's furniture yet because my Mum's coming to stay in a couple of weeks so the lodger's old double bed is making its way from our bedroom back into the nursery temporarily, courtesy of some Canadian muscles.  If we go into labour at any point during her visit - well, I figure you're supposed to labour like 8-12 hours at home with your first child - lots of time for 3 people to build a cotbed, a changing unit and the rocker for a moses basket!

A few further thank yous going out over the pond - to MC's Mum and Stepdad for our nursing chair for the baby's room.  We've been holding out on ordering until I'm due to be home during the day to receive it but we have seen the very one we'd like (at our friends' house - copying is a very great form of flattery guys!).  We received some mystery bibs from the Netherlands during the week which were actually from MC's Mum too.  She's uber creative and has many talented friends, one of which made these two lovely strawberry patterned handmade bibs.  MC's stepsister, Munchkin's Aunty V, has been busy with the knitting needles and produced a lovely lemon yellow cardie with matching hat, each sporting a cheerie royal blue flower, as well as some pretty purple mitts.  Thank you for the presents and the card peeps and fret not, Munchkin may not have to wait till the Fall to wear them - this is Scotland after all and we seem to have had our week of good weather!  

It has been some time since the last belly shot.  Here it is...

I am a house.  More specifically I am a slow moving studio apartment with one long half Canadian resident.  However, this doesn't phase me quite so much, not now that I know our actual house is ready and equipped to be the Munchkin's home too.

The Answer to the Question is... ?

I think you can tell apart people who enjoy being pregnant and those who feel, well, not so much enthralled by the business, by whether they are counting weeks down, or weeks to go.  I'm definitely in the 'weeks to go' category.  I woke up this morning and thought, 'Nearly halfway there!'  Then lay back down and thought, 'No, in a month, I'll be halfway there.'  So, 16 weeks of pregnancy down, 24 to go, ish.  16 days of uncontrollable coughing down, back to the doctor on Tuesday.  I wonder if they do temp replacement lungs for pregnancy impaired immune systems on the NHS? 

I'm not going to regale you this week with the whole category of downs; like round ligament pain, sciatica or the whole ongoing coughing/gagging confusion.  Suffice to say, when I cough I don't know whether to hold my belly, my left butt cheek or just take off for the porcelain bowl.  

So, moving swiftly on to some ups.  The bump is now a prominent feature and despite the odd moment of 'Oh No, it's getting bigger', it's quite comforting.  It's supposed to be growing and it is.  Evidence below by popular demand (sorry about the flash rebound but when I asked MC to take a pic for me he was unable to do so without getting my Sunday morning bed-head in the shot for some reason).

Sporting a fetching belly band here because belly is now so big that all my t-shirts stop at my belly button about an inch above my trousers and it's still January people.

Other ups?  I made it through a whole 5 and a half day working week this week without any sick time, yay me!  I caught up with my now-very-pregnant cousin, who is due to pop at the end of February, for what could be the last time before her sprog arrives.  It was a fun night.  We got to make use of the 50% off voucher at Vittoria (yay pasta fest) and MC came along for some dinner and baby chat.  Yesterday I met my longest standing friend for a gossip.  I tried very hard not to do too much whingeing and whining given it had been so long since I saw her.  Other than having to sip water every 30 seconds to keep the coughing fits to a minimum it was a fun way to pass an afternoon.

Today, MC and I went to the Pregnancy and Parents Centre where they were having a nearly new sale along with a real nappy and sling info event.  The cake was good and I picked up some expando-waist work trousers for next to no pennies but we refrained from buying baby apparatus.  I was tempted by a moses basket but MC wasn't thrilled with the idea of carrying it home on the bus.  Our joiner still hasn't quoted to sort the wardrobe in the nursery yet and until that's done we can't really store anything in there.  

MC and I will be rescheduling our end of February baby-moon, and this time it's not because it doesn't fit well with my work schedule.  Our twenty week scan appointment (where yes, we will be finding out the sex of the munchkin where possible) has come through for bang in the middle of the week we were meant to be away.  Thank crunchie we didn't book anything.  "We will not reschedule this appointment unless under exceptional circumstances."  It didn't sound like they were looking to be too flexible.  Evidence suggests that the NHS is not coping well with the Scottish baby boom.  

General news - congratulations going out to two of MC and I's friends who gave birth to a gorgeous baby boy this week.  Well one of them gave birth and the other became a proud Daddy to a backdrop of a little bit of drama, what with the water breaking at work thing, but it was a job well done by both of them.  She's the second friend I've had in a short space of time who has given birth a couple of weeks before her due date.  It's making me a bit nervous about my plan to take just 2 weeks off before the munchkin is due.  Traditionally, the babies in my family turn up late (lazy little heifers) and I'd rather be spending my maternity leave with the baby than with my feet up watching Jeremy Kyle (that's a British Jerry Springer for all the relations on the other side of the big swim) but at the same time, I really don't want to have to go from work to the birthing centre with no time for a long-lie in between!

So, 24 weeks to go.  Or maybe not?  Anyone got a crystal ball handy?  I read somewhere that the answer to the question is actually 42.  Now, 16 and 24 do not make 42.  But I'm going to go with the cult classic and not book more days off before munchkin is due to make an appearance.  If by some chance I do not get that long lie, or am forced to suffer the indignity of labour related leakage in the middle of a project meeting...

Well unless I've come to love my pregnancy by then, I might just break out a manic bonkers happy dance on the well polished surface of the Wayne Enterprises-esque boardroom table!