I'm Pregnant!

Somehow my annual April Fool's Day joke seems less believable this year...

Too Many Christmas Cookies?

Yep, this is me now. I guess it's official: I'm pregnant.

2007

Here it is: the year of the baby! Game on!

Okay, it's for real. I'm pregnant. Unbelievably, I'm already in my sixth month. I'm getting bigger daily, and the kid sure does love to kick me. So, it's time to get serious and start doing some real planning and preparation. Here's the list so far.

1. Sign up for childbirth class (Check. We're on for a full day one Sunday in March.)
2. Talk to work about my maternity leave plans (I'm hoping to do this the week after next.)
3. Start getting the house ready (Check. We made big progress this weekend with my brother-in-law moving into the basement apartment. His old room will be the nursery.)
4. Start getting gear (Setting up the registries was a good start. BD is also checking out video cameras and cars.)

I'm feeling good...kind of excited actually. Here's to a happy, healthy, a peaceful 2007 for all!

Working While Pregnant

A great article with tips on working while pregnant (particulary about the timing of the announcement):

http://www.askdrsears.com/html/1/T011900.asp

Being an Earth Goddess

One of the first stops I made after realizing that I was pregnant was to my little hippie town's natural food co-op to stock up on flax seed, fruit leathers, and organic milk. And of course a copy of a magazine called "Pregnant Hippie Earth Goddess" or something.

I had visions of nurturing my little one in utero with the best natural foods, pre-natal yoga and massage. Once delivered, we're going to use cloth diapers, breastfeed for years, and bond over Joni Mitchell music... or so we think now.

The first of these plans that fell by the wayside was the midwife. Every year, a group of natural parenting advocates and midwives march in our town's independence day parade, so I knew we had midwives around. I set up the appointment early (even before I had called my regular ob-gyn), to go see what this was really all about.

Let's leave it to say that I was not impressed. She told me they can't guarentee they'd be there for delivery and that they don't actually have many hospital rights. Heck, they even deliver at the same place my ob-gyn does. But the clincher... she charged me for the visit! In my opinion, this was a marketing moment for her, not a medical appointment for me.

So I opted to go the standard route. Hopefully, I'll be able to hold out a bit longer on the other elements of hippie mothering. Or maybe, like women across the country, I'll find out that this Earth Goddess thing isn't all it's cracked up to be.