The warmest babies in Toronto

Ok, let's talk baby showers.
A couple of weeks ago, two of my very good friends, Stefanie and Maria got together to throw me a shower. (here they are preparing before the event)

Because it was the middle of summer and for some reason people like to take vacations then, not everyone could make it, but the turn out was still enough to fill Stefanie's back yard. (who knew I had so many friends?)
Games were played, food was eaten (lots and lots of food) and fun was had.
There were also many presents for the little one.
A few highlights from the gifts include:

A really cool bib with a hand embroidered duck from Jasmine (along with a Beatrix Potter book)


A kimono designed and made by my neice


and of course the baby monitor otherwise known as the 'walkie talkie set' from our friends Todd and Cait.

There was a lot more, including some really cute outfits and lots of necessary blankies, towels and diapers. But I'm a bad blogger and not much of it is recorded for posterity. But it will all be used, I assure you!

Then, last night at Lettuce Knit, the regular Wednesday night stitch and bitch turned into a massive 3 way baby shower for myself, Jen and Mel. Sadly none of us thought to bring our cameras so we will have to depend on the kindness of others - mostly Laura, for pictures of the actual event.
But I did take a picture today of all the beautiful knits that I have recieved for the little one. Stephanie mentioned that these three babies will be the warmest kids in Toronto this winter and I have to say I agree.


That's everything from last night, plus a couple of knitted things that were given to me earlier.
Across the bottom we have the orange placket sweater from Jill, the wrap sweater from Jean Anne, the bonnet and bootie set from Mel, and the gifts from Jen - the stuffed frog, the green booties, one of my fave kids books The Very Hungry Caterpiller and some amazing smelling Lush soap.
Next row up is the sweater from Laura made from her own handspun, and the infamous Tulip sweater from the Stephanie.
Above that are the blocks from Emily (whose daughter I love and would steal away in a second if I wasn't about to have my own), then the unbeliveably cute booties from Erin, across the blanket we have the stuffed ice cream cone (we've decided the flavour is french vanilla) from Aleta and Rachel H's gift of the beautiful stuffed sheep and the book, Is Your Mama a Llama.
But the piece de resistance is the amazing blanket that everyone from SnB contributed to.

Thank you to everyone. I can't believe how lucky I am to have such great friends and I can't wait for my daughter to meet all you wonderful people.

Another week, another doctor's appointment, another position for the baby.

At least this time, it's the correct position! Finally! She is head down with her back towards my front. She actually responded to the stern talking to she got from Joe last night to stop fooling around. This has really relieved a lot of anxiety on out part. We had been a bit terrified that we would go in for our appointment and the doctor would say 'what the hell, let's just get her out of there now' and start prepping me for a c-section right there - this actually happened to someone I know at work. I don't know the details of why she had to have a c-section, but her doctor decided at her weekly appointment that he had to get the baby out that day, but the way she told it, it didn't seem like it was an emergency. I've had a bit of irrational fear of that happening to me and it has spread to Joe.

I do have to admit that I am starting to really want her to be outside rather than inside now. I'm not necessarily sick of being pregnant, but I am getting really impatient. The tiredness and back aches have also increased to make me just not enthusiastic to do much of anything anymore. I am baking though, which I have been told means that labour is imminent.
It's funny, last week, I thought, no way I'm giving birth before my due date, now, I'm not so sure. For the longest time, I've has it in my head that she would be born on the 6th of September, but this last week, I've moved the estimate up to next weekend. I'm officially due the 3rd and I think I'll hit very close to that. Now I'm not sure that my body is telling me that or if it's just a case of wishful thinking!

Sorry about the lack of post last week. We went away for a few days and I've just been keeping myself too busy since we got back.
But the news for the week is that the baby changed position. She is no longer lying posterior but is now lying transverse (ie: sideways). This is worse. If I go into labour and she doesn't change position the likely course would be a C-section.
After 8 months of smooth sailing, now she decides to act up!
We are trying all we can think of to convince her to lie head down. I've been playing music through headphones very low on my pelvis, and Joe has been trying to talk her down as well. She moves around a bit when that is happening, but then it seems like she just goes back to her new favourite position.
This does give us a bit of hope though as she still seems to have a lot of room to move around in, and I don't feel like I'm going to be going into labour any time soon so we have some time to work with.
I've been told that swimming would help as well so I think if it's warm enough tomorrow, I will be off to my sister's place to just hang out in the pool for a while.

Well, I've officially started my mat leave today. It's really strange to think that I won't be going back into work until next September. Since going to work was the only thing giving my weeks structure, I expect to start losing track of what day it is by the end of the weekend.

I am happy about being off (really, who wouldn't be?) because now I can really concentrate on getting ready for the baby. Since at the end of the week I will be 37 weeks gone, I am considered full term!!! That means that technically, she can come ANY TIME NOW!!! and I am in no way ready for her. Joe is, but he doesn't have a house to clean and piles of baby clothes to launder. He put the crib up earlier this week (holy shit, there's a crib in our bedroom!) so his job is done. (this is not to say he doesn't help with cleaning the house, it's just that he doesn't feel quite the same need to say, clean out the fridge, like I do.)

I'm actually a bit intimidated by how much I need/want to do around the house before the baby arrives. I haven't hit the point with the nesting instinct that I have to start moving the furniture around or anything, well, only a little, but every time I look around, I see more places that I should really unclutter, and really is it so unreasonable to rent a carpet steamer for our one bit of carpet in the hallway?
But I will not start today. Today is all about me enjoying a day off. I hit the spa this afternoon for a pedicure that I got for my birthday. It's at the Elmwood, so I will be 'taking the waters' there before hand. Then I meet up with Joe to do a little shopping downtown and then off to meet up with everybody's favourite Drunken Knitters. The nesting instinct can wait until tomorrow.