Feeling Pretty Ready

Now the question of how I we want to try to birth the baby has been settled.

We've finally settled on two names--in fact, we keep coming back to those two names--and both of us are even leaning towards the same one more than the other. We will keep those two as The Names until the boy is actually born, and then we will say for sure that it's one or the other.

We've gotten the changing table into our room and are close to having the space cleared out for the co-sleeper.

The nursery is still in the state of closeness that it's been in since moving the Pumpkin into her new room. I'm starting to try to explain to her that the nursery is now going to be the baby brudda's room. I don't think she quite gets it yet, but I've got ideas for how to help her get it--mostly asking her to help us get it ready for him.

I've been reading tips for how to introduce the Pumpkin to the baby brudda. I'm planning to take her shopping this weekend so she can pick out a present for him!

I've gone through all of the Pumpkin's baby clothes, blankets, swaddles and burp clothes. We have a bunch of gender neutral clothes and a few boy clothes, thanks to my wonderful coworkers who gave me a baby shower last week and thanks to my SIL giving me clothes from the twins (I saved the boy clothes in case I needed them in the future. See how smart I am?). I just need to put them through the wash over the next few days.

I've got to print out and fill in the paperwork for my leave, but I've at least mostly figured out what I need to do, and I have a message in to get my final answer.

Finally, and not less importantly, I got my toenails cut and colored! They are an adorable purple-y pink.

We just need to finish up the setting up and prep more for the VBAC we'll be attempting, and we are ready for the boy! Who I still don't think will come until we rip him out of my abdomen on June 22.

I want to post about the Pumpkin more, because I feel like I'm so obsessing about the boy and his birth. But I suppose that's completely normal, considering my due date is in 15 days! I'll be back to the Pumpkin soon. Cause she is completely adorable and a supergenius!

There Is an End in Sight

And I don't just mean my big hind end!

I have scheduled the C-section for June 22nd, 3 days after my due date. I have been leaning one way, then another, and finally going back to the original plan. And you all have been wonderfully supportive, informative and above all kind throughout my frustrations. A special thanks goes to those of you who have had to suffer through phone conversations with me, which were usually prefaced by, "Even if you don't agree with me, I just need to you to listen and support me." Everyone loves talking to an emotional, hormonal 37.5 week pregnant woman, right?

So if I go into labor before the scheduled C-section, I plan to try for a VBAC. If this one follows the Pumpkin's scheduling skills (she was 10 days late), we will go in on the 22nd to get the boy out. This is the plan. If anyone doesn't like it or agree with it, too bad. I'm done debating, researching and crying (at least over this issue). I will, however, delve into research on ways to improve the success of a VBAC. I fear that the highest chance of success means no medication at all, and I've been planning on the epidural. Oh boy.

Oh, and the scheduled C-section for the 22nd? The only time slot they had left at the hospital was at 3:30 in the afternoon. Apparently, I we waited too long to finalize the decision about the date* and that's all they have. Why is that a problem, I naively asked. Because you can't have ANY FOOD OR DRINK for 8 hours prior to the surgery. Londo tried to be all bright-side about it and said that I'd only be missing lunch. I had to point out that I'd be missing second breakfast, lunch, early/first afternoon snack and all the water and juice that keeps me from being a dehydrated misery. Good times!

The woman who schedules said that surely one of the women scheduled on that day will go into labor prior to that day and I could be moved up. I told her that I hope to be a woman who goes into labor prior to that day. I don't think I will be, but Londo thinks I will. Shall we start a pool for delivery date? I'm taking the 22nd.

*If I wasn't going to try for a VBAC, the doctor wanted us to schedule for the week prior. So we didn't schedule either date until I (yes, I) had made a final decision. Apparently most other people are able to make their decisions earlier.

Because I Need More Drama...

Perhaps you will recall an off-hand mention of bunnies in our backyard. The backyard in which our dog roams free. The dog who is a beagle, a breed that is bred to hunt rabbits.

I'm happy to say that we believe our baby bunnies all made it out of the nest in our backyard. However, I'm unhappy to report that we--who am I kidding--Londo has discovered a few dead bunnies and one dead bird in our backyard. We had been keeping our dog on a leash in the backyard to prevent her killing of bunnies, but somehow dead bunnies (and the dead bird) ended up in our yard anyway. Who knows what killed those unfortunate animals (if Londo suspects anything specific, he does not tell me, and I'm glad).

Our neighborhood is literally infested with bunnies. They. Are. Everywhere. Lots of people in our pretty, suburb neighborhood have lovely flower or vegetable gardens in their front and backyards. In fact, the house to our left has had a vegetable garden in their yard since before we moved in and the house to our right just planted one this spring. Which puts us and our beagle in the yard between to very delicious gardens.

Did you know that bunnies love gardens? If you don't believe me, just ask Mr. McGregor. Did you know that the best way between two gardens is through our yard? We suspect we will have bunnies coming and going for the rest of the summer at the least.

But we can't live our lives in constant fear of the dumb bunnies. A huge reason we bought this house was to have a yard for the dog and us. We don't want to have to walk the dog anymore, especially with a toddler and a new baby. We want to sit in the backyard and enjoy ourselves, as we have before.

This past weekend, Londo spent a good amount of time cleaning up our yard, mowing, trimming and making sure there were no defenseless animals in the yard. There was a bunny, but that one was very capable of hopping through the fence to the neighbor's yard. We decided to let our dog back out in the yard without us again. We knew that she would sniff around like crazy (scent hound, you know) and probably get some good chasing in. But even when she had a baby bunny cornered a week or so ago, she just kind of nosed at it and kept it cornered until Londo could get her back from it. After all, she wasn't bred to kill the animals, just find them and corner them and alert the owners that she found them. Which she did.

Yesterday, I had a very emotionally draining day, which followed a very emotionally and physically draining weekend. As Londo was putting the Pumpkin to bed, I fed the dog and cat and let the dog out. She was taking a while, and I figured she was sniffing around the whole yard, maybe eating bunny poop (a favorite of hers). I was tired and just wanted to go to bed.

WARNING: This next paragraph is not for the squimish.

I opened the door to call her in, and she was at the bottom of the steps. As the light shined full on her, I saw a bunny hanging from her mouth. The legs were definitely bunny legs. It was not moving. And as I shrieked, my dog started to wolf the bunny down.

I will not go into more graphic details, because I can't even think about it! Ugh, I want to throw up just writing what I did!

I slammed the door because I couldn't watch or deal with it. I knew exactly what the dog was doing, because I watched her do the same thing to a dead bird I was trying to get from her once many years ago. That's the kind of image that sticks with you.

I screamed for Londo, and he came scrambling out of the Pumpkin's room and hurried out to take care of the situation. By the time he got out there, there was no situation to take care of. In fact, he wasn't sure I'd even seen a bunny. Dude, trust me. She was not across the yard in dim light. She was within a few feet of me in full light. I unfortunately know exactly what I saw. I know she left no evidence of what happened, because the same thing happened with the dead bird years ago--which I watched in horror as it happened.

So this was a long, gross post that I'm sure everyone is glad I shared. But I need to exorcise this story, and I do so by writing about it. I also wanted to point out that a woman who is 37.5 weeks pregnant is only emotionally and hormonally capable of handling so much. I think I'm at my breaking point. Let me please suggest to everyone who knows me to please just tell me good news, be supportive of me even if you don't agree and encourage me to put my feet up and rest a spell. And for goodness sake, don't let my dog loose in the backyard. I'd also love any volunteers take the dog out on a leash even in the backyard, or even just check the freaking yard for me before the dog goes out.

Question of the Week - Share a Story

The Pumpkin is having one of those weird mornings where she is having fun and we're laughing and then you ask her something, and there she goes. She gets her pout on, nothing is right and she refuses the thing she just wanted. I call The Twos (and I'm not the only one calling it that). I also call it not getting enough sleep.

Luckily, we did have a lot of fun for the most part. Partly that is because I have a doctor's appointment this morning and didn't have to hurry and get ready to go to work while watching her this morning. And Londo is working from home today. So we had time to let her fuss and cajole her out of it, as needed. We also had a few funny moments that I thought I'd share. Because when you are dealing with The Twos, you need to write down, revisit and hear from others all the cute moments you can!

Which is why this week's question of the week is:
Do you have a cute story to share?

Here are two of mine from this morning.

At one point, Londo and I were sitting on the couch with the Pumpkin between us drinking her milk. We were all watching a Blue's Clues, giving Londo and I time to drink a little coffee and wake ourselves up a bit. This morning, the clues were animal footprints, a tail and animal ears. We had the following conversation:

Londo, to me over the Pumpkin's head: It's Batman.
caramama: Batman doesn't have a tail.
Londo: We don't know what's under that cape.
The Pumpkin suddenly pipes up: I have a tail.

We burst out laughing. It was just so unexpected and cute. Then I said something about how she's good at wagging her tail. And sure enough, she started wiggling as if wagging her bottom while sitting. It was so cute.

The other story from this morning was me really entertaining myself while playing with the Pumpkin. I got her out of one funk by suggesting we build towers with blocks. We went from towers to a house to a car to a bridge. In fact, here was a cute exchange:

caramama: What should we build now? How about a bridge?
The Pumpkin: Good idea, Mommy! Good idea! Let's build a bridge!

So I we built a bridge, and I pretended one of the single blocks was a guy going over the bridge. The Pumpkin looked around and picked up one of her little stuffed dogs to go over the bridge. As she made the dog start to go up the steps to the bridge, I pulled out a single yellow block, and I sang, "I'm the grumpy old troll who lives under the bridge. I'm the grumpy old troll who lives under the bridge.* If you want to go over the bridge, you have to answer the following question. What is your favorite color?**" The Pumpkin looked at her toy dog, and after thinking for a minute, she pointed to the dog's back and said, "It's brown." I chuckled, very amused, and let the dog pass.

So those are a couple of cute moments from this morning. It's often the little things that get me through the more frustrating moments. Three days in a row of no napping does take its toll on all of us.

But I could use more cute moments. What have you got?

Name That Reference game:
*Which TV show reference is this?
**Which movie reference is this?