32 weeks!

It's going! I am 32 weeks pregnant tomorrow - can't believe it! I had forgotten how long pregnancy lasts.

People ask me, "Are you about ready for this to be over?" My answer is mostly no and a little bit yes. My sacroiliac joint on the left side is causing me a lot of grief. I've tried yoga and it makes it worse, sadly. I know yoga can be really good for Mom and Baby, but it's apparently not good for me in my current residence - Relaxin City, Texas. So the pain is no good. I'm ready for that to be over.  

Philippians 4:13 "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." This Scripture has to do with contentment and I'm working on it - being content even though I'm hurting and struggling some.

On the other hand, there are many, many more things about pregnancy that I truly love and will miss in eight weeks or less. First, babies are easier for me inside. I get to sleep all night, am sleep-refreshed, and have some free time during the day when the boys are in preschool. Second, I love looking pregnant. I feel better about my body when I'm pregnant. I don't think I have a poor body image, but my tummy is my trouble spot and now it's supposed to look this way! Love that.

Lastly, it's a really special time for me and this baby to be just us sometimes, and it is amazing how sweet the boys are to me and to their baby sister. They help me up when I'm sitting down and they need me, they snuggle my belly and make sweet noises and faces to their baby sis, and her biggest brother is absolutely gleeful about feeling her move.

And move she does. Yikes! I don't remember LB being this movey. She waves her hands around (they are in my lower belly), sticks her butt out (on the right and even with my bellybutton), bends her knees (bellybutton), and kicks me out to the right side like her big brother used to. Late in the day when I sit down she must stretch out because she's practically up in my sternum. Sometimes she wiggles around, getting comfortable I guess, and it feels like a tempest brewing in there. BB puts his hand on my belly and every time he feels a movement says, "Was that you? Was that you?" He can always feel her. They're tight, those two. This afternoon he sang her his ABCs. I will miss that.

People also ask if we're ready. Do they not know who they are dealing with? Me! I'm the worst procrastinator. We have a room. It's newly painted lavender. No crib, no sheets, no monitor, no dresser, no changing pad, no nothing. We do have plenty of baby washcloths and some cloth diapers for burping. We also have a PacknPlay we'll set up in our room for awhile. I guess we ought to make sure we still have all the parts! So no, we're not ready.

So am I about ready for this pregnancy to be over? It doesn't look like it! Even though this is now my second pregnancy, after years of trying to get pregnant it still feels like such a novelty - something I thought I'd never experience once let alone two times. As I sit here and type, looking down over my sweet baby inside, I can't believe it's really happening again. A huge blessing.

To my sweet friends still waiting, I love you dearly! And as I was saying to someone recently, this stage of pregnancy and newborn is just the tip of the parenting iceberg. There is so much more to parenting than being pregnant! As time has passed and the boys are older, I feel more and more like a parent. At first when they were small I felt like I wasn't a parent if they weren't babies. Isn't that something? I had never really thought about parenting past the newborn stage. And it turns out, um, I don't really covet the newborn stage. Sleep and babysitters are not overrated.