I fear the lateness of this blog is only a sign of things to come...while I'm feeling pretty good these days (a combination of seeing a prenatal chiropractor and some serious spoiling by Billy has helped my back and hips tremendously) I'm back to the 8:30 bedtimes of my first trimester. I try so hard to stay awake, but it seems that as soon as I let myself lay back into the couch I'm gone. Things like blogs have to wait a day or two.
My lateness is an even sadder thing because there's so much to write about! Billy and I spent the weekend in Minneapolis where my aunt Jackie hosted my final shower. Every little detail was so perfect and the shower was a lot of fun. My mom even flew up from West Virginia and stayed at my aunt's house, so the three of us (notice I'm excluding Billy, who spent most of the weekend working on his dissertation from a nearby coffee shop) had plenty of time for reminiscing and lounging by the fire. The shower had so many special touches: the gifts were put in the baby carriage my aunt ordered from England in 1969 when my cousin was a baby, and the christening gown that has been in my family for over a hundred years was displayed along with some of the more special outfits and such from my cousin's and my childhood.
Despite the somewhat hectic schedule, the weekend was comforting and relaxing because I got to spend time with some of our oldest friends, including my mom's best friend from college (who brought beautiful flowers and a delicious cake that, unfortunately, had been decorated with a bizarre old-man looking baby!) and her daughters, my mom's best friend from her flight attendant days, and my aunt Brenda. After so many moves over the years, there is always something comforting about being with the people who have known me my whole life.
In addition to lots of adorable gifts (this little boy is going to be so spoiled!) we left with some neat things from my mom. She surprised us with an album with entries from this blog and she also brought along many of my favorite toys from childhood. My favorites are a set of Beatrix Potter books, a Peter Rabbit tea set, and a Peter Rabit gardening book I used to pour over while imagining how wonderful it would be to start my own little garden. Remembering my early dreams and schemes has made me excited to share some of my childhood goals (like starting a vegetable garden) with our son.
When we returned home Sunday night and unpacked our bags, we realized we won't be needing them again until our trip to the hospital. This, of course, led to making a list of things we'll need for the hospital, and this led to starting the actual packing process. While I'm guessing that packing hospital bags at 32 weeks is a little unusual, I must point out that I'm the girl who packed for my trip to England four weeks early last year, and that Billy and I both completely unpacked our bags at 12:30am after an 18 hour trip home from England a couple weeks later. We don't like putting things off! I think this tendency will be illustrated by the nesting list I've already compiled for next weekend...we'll keep you posted!
Courtney
