Getting Ready for Bebe Dois

Things are gradually slowing down at Z Casa as we are in the home-stretch now with this pregnancy! My due date is September 22 (Wednesday!), my body is definitely in birth preparation mode (lots of good contractions all week, baby has dropped a ton, and other aspects of readiness that I won't get into since my brothers always threaten to quit reading when I mention anything too graphic), and we have completed the most pressing of our projects (like getting the new baby room put together and decorated). So now we wait. And stay within the area code, as my midwife was not real thrilled when I told her we were in Chicago over Labor Day!

I'm planning on baby being here next week. I really feel like things are moving along - a lot more than with Gabriela at this point - and my gut just tells me that I won't be going 10 days past my due date this time. And Eric has decided that next week is a good week for him to be out of the office. So, obviously, we just need to go ahead and have the baby on her due week. But not over the weekend, as I have plans to get a couple more projects done around here. Thank goodness I'm not picky and not a planner, huh? ;)

I am feeling really good still (and yes, I did the 5K last weekend with a time of 46 minutes - no speed records or anything, but I did finish!), I'm just having trouble getting comfortable at night what with eighteen sharp pointy baby parts poking out of various locations across my abdomen and what not. I've found that by strategically positioning something like eleven pillows around myself, I can create a nest worthy of catching some sleep in. Eric just laughs at me up on my pillow-throne as he curls up on his side of the bed with his one pitifully flat (just as he likes it) pillow and laments about the days when I used to cuddle up to him at night.

Trying to cheer on the Cyclones while watching the Iowa/Iowa State game last weekend with friends. It was a disappointing day for Gabs as both Iowa State and the Georgia Bulldogs suffered losses!

Gabriela is getting back to normal after a couple tough weeks of teething. I never even knew she was teething when her first two teeth came in at 13 months. But in the last month she has cut her top two teeth, a third bottom tooth, a molar on one side, and has another molar about to pop through. I think the molars are sort of rough on her and make her quite clingy/whiny during the daytime if she is not kept distracted.

Otherwise though, she has been awesome. She is signing a ton now and adding a few "words" and several sounds to her vocabulary. She is out of diapers 100% of her awake time at home now and has gone the last week without a single accident! She signs when she needs to go potty, although I also am still suggesting that she go several times per day too to help make sure we avoid messes! Even though she is only going to be 17 months old, I was really hoping to have her mostly out of diapers before the next baby arrives. It looks like we're there - YAY!

This week we decided to try transitioning her into a toddler bed too. We moved the crib into the baby room a couple weeks ago and just had her sleeping in the pack-n-play until we were ready to tackle moving her into the toddler bed. She's been in her little toddler bed for naps and nighttime since Monday and is doing well with it. She quite often ends up crawling out of bed and sleeping on the floor, but I don't really have a problem with that so long as she is sleeping. Her door is always shut at nap time so I don't disturb her, but we like to have her door half-open at night so we could hear her if she were to wake up. Concerned that she might crawl out of bed during the night and roam around the house (and get into who knows what) without us hearing her, we've been putting the baby gate up in her doorway overnight. It's a solution that has let us all sleep well!

It's always fun to wake up and peek in on her to see where she ended up overnight. The first morning she actually was half-under the pack-n-play fast asleep! Eric thinks the "poor thing" woke up in the middle of the night, realized she wasn't in her "bed", crawled over to it half asleep, and, when she couldn't get in the pack-n-play, pitifully crawled underneath to try and be in her proper sleeping place. I think Papai is just a great big softie. But then again, I laugh at the carpet marks she has across her face and chest after napping on the floor. It might just be that I am a bit more heartless than some . . . hehe

All in all, we're doing well around here! Hopefully we'll have some big baby news soon! And maybe, since I am mostly caught up on nesting and our projects, I will get to sit down at the computer and be a little more present in blogland too!