a bit of nesting

Our new little baby... I know I should have a better nickname for him than that, but really that is his nickname; he is called "the new little baby inside Mommy" about twenty times a day in our home... turned in my womb last week. Not a huge surprise; he's been head down for a month or more, which was really nice, but my babies have thus far had a tendency to keep rotating all through the third trimester. I don't remember it being so painful before, though. Right now his head is under my ribs and while it gives me a literal thrill to put my hand right on the back of his head (or perhaps the front of it), having him in this weird position is really uncomfortable. I think he's pushing his feet against my spine and it is just miserable. I can't wait until tomorrow when I can go to the midwife and have him turned the right way again.

I'm doing a lot of nesting this week. Although when I think of the term nesting, I imagine a mama with a meticulous home who simply must scrub the walls again. That doesn't really describe what I'm up to right now. I have been letting a lot of the normal things go... not extremely much, but let's face it, one or two days of letting things go when you have two small, active children, and any visitor would easily surmise that the chaotic stacks of art projects and large mounds of clothes haven't been touched in a month. Keith is spending a lot of time researching through books left over from our college days as he prepares the materials for a Sunday school course that he is teaching about the cults. I'm so happy he's doing it... teaching is so good for him... but it does mean that there are fresh piles of theology books sprinkled liberally through the house. Our children's rooms are clean and organized... somehow I cannot stand to ever, ever, ever let those get out of control... but the kitchen counter is a mess, the living room attests to a day well played, and our bedroom... well, that one is the issue.

Having finally had a good meltdown over the lack of space in our house for a new baby, and having stressed sufficiently over whether my plan to leave everything the same (everyone in same bedrooms) and just have him be in our room for the next five months or so, I am now finally feeling like I can make this all work. Of course, my method for making it all work means attacking the stray stuff that has built up in the corners of our closet and room. Somehow I didn't even realize how many things were hiding in all those little nooks and crannies, and now I am attacking them with a vengeance. Or trying to; I tend to dump several boxes on our bed at once and then find myself out of energy.

I promised myself before Keith and I were married that I would always make our bedroom the most organized and restful room of our house. I wanted it to be a haven for us. And for the most part, that has been the case, but for some reason in this house, and without me quite realizing it, our bedroom has gradually become our office [think desk and filing cabinet], library [think loads of books], entertainment room [think computers and DVDs], sewing room [think sewing machine and all of my fabrics and sewing supplies], and storage room [think guitars under the bed and boxes of kitchen stuff in the corner]. It's ridiculous. And now I am trying to make room for a baby cradle and all of those other things that a mama with a newborn needs nearby... diapers, clothes, burp cloths, and so on. It's been a wee bit stressful. I'm actually making headway in weeding out most of the unnecessary stuff... enough to make me think that it will all be ready within the next week or so... and so that is quite satisfying. I should have taken some "before" pictures, but I'm sure I'll get some "after" ones up sooner or later.