Enjoying the Journey

As I mentioned in my previous post, Mark and I are trying to find a new place to live. We currently live in a 800 square foot second-floor apartment on a fairly busy road in Sunnyvale. We share a porch with neighbors who enjoy smoking on their half of the porch, which makes it impossible for us to open one of only three windows in our apartment without letting in cigarette smoke. Also, one of our neighbors seems to be a juvenile delinquent who, last fall, was under house arrest, ankle alarm and everything. The laundry room in our building has 3 washers(at $1.25/load) and only one working dryer(at $1/load). Our kitchen provides so little cupboard space that when we moved in we had to invest in a tall cabinet from Ikea so we would have some place to put our food. Our windows are single-pane, so we hear all the noise from the street, including ambulances or fire trucks blaring their sirens at least every other day. We have no storage other than the three closets in our apartment, only one of which is a walk-in.

This may not be so bad, I could live this way for a long time if it was just Mark, Cibo and myself.

Enter impending baby girl, due to arrive in 3 weeks.

How can I describe how much anxiety I have over bringing our baby home to this apartment? Over the thought of spending most of my day here, every day. I can’t imagine lugging an infant car seat up and down those stairs multiple times a day all the way to the parking lot. Or having to leave baby unattended while I make multiple trips all the way out to the car to unload groceries, or to the laundry room to change loads of laundry. I only have 2 hands!

Not to mention all the stuff that you use for a baby that you need room for…swing, high chair, toys, bouncer. I have no room for these things. Furniture is crammed in as it is!

I have searched craigslist for the past month in hopes that I would find a miraculous find. An apartment that meets all my needs within our budget, in the bay area. A place I could love to spend the coming days in, bonding with our baby girl. In a month of searching I have found 3 places that seemed remotely promising;

1. A small house that was already rented by the time we arrived 10 minutes early for the open house.

2. An apartment that was slightly larger than our current place and not on a main road. We were selected from all the applicants, but they wanted us to begin renting at the beginning of May, and we are stuck in our current contract until June 4th. Since we can’t afford rent at both places for the month of May, we had to turn it down.

3. A beautiful duplex that meets all our needs and then some, less than a half a mile from where we currently live. I fell in love with it, I want it. We’ll know by tonight if we got it. So here I sit, anxiously waiting by the phone. I need it, I have to have this place! I’m having anxiety attacks over it. I guess it’s easier to focus on this than on waiting for this baby to come out of me. If we don’t get this place we have to go in tomorrow and re-sign our lease here for another year. Another year of living here pains me. It just doesn’t feel right.

So here I am, on pins and needles. I just wish this was all over with. I wish I could fast-forward to a month from now. When hopefully we’ll have the housing situation figured out, the scary labor and delivery over, and just be enjoying our new baby. I’m tired of being pregnant. I’m impatient to move on to the next step.

Well as much as I thought that giving up all my sitting jobs would put me in a position of boredom for the final weeks of my pregnancy, I was wrong! I have been busy, but in a much more stress-free way, which is nice:).

Examples:
*I completed my quilt in just 2 days! I was shocked at how little time it took, and how well it came out. Sometimes I surprise myself by how domestic I actually can be!

*Mark and I got an unfortunate surprise when our apartment complex notified us that upon re-signing our lease at the beginning of June, they will be raising our rent $150/month. I hate paying rent, especially here. It feels like throwing money away. So Mark and I have been going back and forth about whether to move. If we did move, we would be doing it during the time I’m due to have our baby, and that just is not ideal at all. Yet the idea of paying any more than we already do for this shoebox-of-an-apartment is painful. We have 2 1/2 weeks to let our apartment complex know if we are resigning. Until then I am scouring craigslist about 20x a day.

*My wonderful sister-in-law and some friends are throwing me a baby shower this Friday and I can hardly wait! When they suggested the 20th of April all those months ago, it seemed so far away. I set it as one of my mental markers of when the baby is soon to arrive. So now that it is happening this week I realized how close my due date is and how far I’ve come!

*I have been sleeping, a lot. Not so much at night, but I get to sleep in in the mornings and take naps if I feel like it. It’s wonderful!

5 weeks to go and I am getting anxious and nervous and even more excited (if that’s possible)! I still have fears about being a mom, and my life changing, but now I’ve added fears about the actual labor and birth. The only truly helpful information I’ve gleaned from all my reading is that there is no way to predict what a particular birth will be like. Each one is so unique and different that I have no idea what to expect. I only hope that it will be smooth and quick. Doubtful, very doubtful…

So I’ve been missing in action lately. I took a much-needed trip to Utah to visit family and friends. It’s kind of sad in a way because from here on out it is going to be much harder to jet off on trips any time I want. I left the hubby at home since he tends to get bored and restless at my parent’s house for more than a few days:) My week in Utah was filled with visiting old friends, hanging out with my family, picking out fabric for a baby quilt my amazing mom is making for Peanette, enjoying a wonderful baby shower with close friends and family, and basically just enjoying some “me” time. I also spent a night and day at my sister’s house to get a taste for a typical day in the life of a new mommy (her baby girl is just 4 months old).

The trip was fun, but by the end I definitely missed my sweet hubby, who always makes me feel normal again, especially during this time of heightened emotions and stressful planning. At the end of the day, no matter how crazy I am with my hormones and pushy baby planning, he always understands (or at least pretends to:)) and supports me. I’m so lucky.

In Utah news:

1. My only niece from my family-Rhianna, is smiling and even giggling. Especially now, when the reality of my baby coming is so close and a little scary, holding Rhianna calms my frazzled nerves and reminds me why I am excited to have a baby of my own.

2. My adventurous 21-year-old little sister Kellee bought herself a motorcycle. I’m not talking a little dirtbike or girlie scooter, I’m talkin’ BIG bike! A Yamaha V-star 650. She’s rad.

3. My parents are preparing their house for sale. The only house I spent more than 2 years in, and that I spent most of my teenage years in will probably be inhabited by another family when next I visit Utah. I’m glad my Dad is finally getting his wish to move to an area where they will have more space and land, and he gets to build another house which is always fun for him. But it will be sad to visit home, and have it be a different home than I remember. I hate when things change.

4. My brothers are becoming teenagers. Heaven help us all!

5. It’s nice how you can get together with some friends and it’s like no time has passed at all and nothing has changed. Even after 10 years my Starmaker girls will alway have a place close to my heart. One of my trip highlights was hanging out on Saturday night at my friend Cheryl’s work at a back table late into the night telling stories and sharing recent experiences. We’ve all ended up in such different places, but I still love, admire and enjoy each of my high school girl friends. It’s nice to know that some friendships will always be there:)

Nothing new to report on the going-ons of our little Peanette. She just moves and kicks a lot more these days. Maybe she’s as anxious to come out as I am to have her out! We are in the home stretch- just 6 weeks until she’s due and I hope that she is on time or even a little early. I can’t be patient much longer! We got a ton of great stuff for her at our Utah shower and I am excited to use it all.

I thought I would just post some pics of my trip to wrap this up. I’m going to have a lot more free time these days, but I have a few things on the agenda to fill the time. Most exciting of them is a quilt I am making. I’ll post pics of it when it’s done!

Rhianna’s first Easter dress!

4 generations. Left to right-My grandma (Noni), my sister Aubree holding her daughter Rhianna, and my Mom.

Don’t worry, it’s not really poo! We played the “Poo Game” at my shower. Each diaper has been filled with a candy bar and then melted in the microwave to make it resemble, well, poo. Then the diapers are passed around and the person who can correctly identify the most diapers contents wins. You may smell or touch the contents but no tasting allowed! Ew!

My mommy is a young looking grandma huh? Just 6 weeks until she is a grandma of two!