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While I was tidying up yesterday, I found the brochure I had for the Alberta Cord Blood Bank, and I checked out their website a few minutes ago. I had planned on donating our baby's cord blood, and am now a little sad because the organization stops accepting registrations after the 34th week of pregnancy, and I'm now nearly halfway through week 35. Blah. I wonder if there's a medical reason for the 34 week cut-off, or if it's just an administrational, red-tape kind of thing?
I'm a little tardy in showing off the blanket that my friend Ada crocheted for the little person, but at long last, here it is:
I had to wait for some good light to take the photo in :) The neatest thing about the blanket is that it has a little hood in one of the corners. I think that's so smart - extra head warmth for chillier days!
At the moment I have my first load of baby laundry in the washer - I got a little panicked yesterday about not having anything packed for the hospital. This gets me a little way there ... if I need to throw something together in a hurry, at least we'll have some clean clothes for the little person and myself!
Chris and I are off to our pre-natal class on babycare this evening. It conflicts with the second game of the Stanley Cup playoffs, and I've been trying to covince Chris that the baby will forgive him for missing the game :)
Fun reads over at Salon right now, if you have the patience to watch the ad for the free daypass:
I had quite a few posts over at Going Domestic back in April when I first bought my serger about how I was mastering (hee hee!) the settings and learning to thread the needles and the loopers by hemming scads of flannel for receiving blankets. I think that once I'm done studying for the CFA exam, I'm going to embark on my first real project - a fleece sleep sack like these ones. While I'm not sure if our house will be cool enough at night to warrant a blanket for the little person, it won't cost me much in terms of materials, and the concept seems easy enough. The only thing that I am nervous about is the zipper because I've never sewn one of those in before!
Also, we did see Shrek 2 on Saturday night, and it was fun. I laughed and sipped on Dr. Pepper, which probably should have been contraband because of caffeine :)
I've been thinking that I'm going to try my own hand at taking some artsy photos of the baby when it's here, instead of going to a pro photographer. I say this because the photographer who shot my maternity photos got by just fine without a professional-level digital camera. In fact, her camera was just a 4.0 megapixel like mine (which I must admit surprised us!). Lately I've been lurking on the Photog Forum website, trying to pick up ideas on neat poses and such, and I stumbled on this very useful thread: Draping 101 for Newborn Photos. I'd love to do a little collage of assorted baby parts - little hands, little feet … Another shot that I've seen a lot of is of the newborn all curled up on a stack of fluffy white towels against a black background - it's really cute!
Is anyone else kind of struggling with a birth plan? Earlier this week, Chris and I sat down together and highlighted the stuff that we wanted to put into our birth plan - between the sample one that our doula gave us to use as a starting point, and the things that we'd learned at our childbirth classes last weekend, we had a good idea of what we wanted. I madly took our highlighted points and typed them into a tidy Word document of two pages of brief paragraphs on Tuesday, and I thought that our first draft was pretty good. It wasn't wordy, and the first page was more full of "highlights" than anything else! But somehow, despite the work that we put in, there's a disconnect between Chris and I with our birth plan. I don't know what it is … I know that he's pro-hospital/medical stuff and I'm not, but I thought that we'd at least sorted that out between us, argued our positions, and decided what our official stance was on all points of contention. It was just really frustrating to have put in the work for nothing. I still want to go to the hospital with a plan, but not with one that Chris doesn't support or even want to finish reading … I'm actually kind of stressed out about this, even though I know that we make a good team and will get past this!
Birth plans have also been a topic of discussion over at A Princess and her Pea - she has a really nice plan posted, and through it I found this birth plan creator tool, too.
Last day of work for me!!! *happy happy dance*
I think that this would be be good weekend to take in a showing of Shrek 2 at the cinema because if there's another fire-breathing dragon in it, I can relate. I seem to be experiencing a tad of pregnancy heartburn, which is quite uncomfortable in a nagging/lingering kind of way. No more eating anything with peppers in it for me!
I've been a bit down lately. My company has eliminated my position here, and did do the compassionate thing and is letting me go on mat leave early (tomorrow is my last day) before packaging me out. The problem is, the work that I did hasn't been eliminated. It looks like others in the organization said that they'd do my work in order to secure continued employment for themselves. Boo. Even though I am more than ready to leave this place behind: Boo. It's just really annoying to have to put these last few days of work. But come Monday, I will be happily napping as frequently as I want!
This past Friday evening and Saturday morning/afternoon, Chris and I attended our childbirth classes. Has anyone else taken them and been left with a feeling of being less prepared than they were before? I am now filled with worry that my doctor will not make it to the hospital in time to catch and I will be left at the mercy of the on-call obstetrician, and the on-call obstetrician will happen to be the one that our childbirth educator warned us about - Dr. Foreceps! *chills*
Last night Chris and I attended our hospital orientation at the Rockyview. Before we got to the hospital, I was actually looking forward to it. I was expecting a tour, being shown what the rooms look like, a stroll past the nursery, stuff like that … but instead it was an hour-long Powerpoint presentation. Our educator (who was really good and enthusiastic) noted that when it's our turn to be in the labour and delivery rooms, we'll appreciate that it's nice not to have a crowd of expectant parents touring the ward and gawking. Point taken. I just wish that I wasn't so freaked out by the idea of hospitals. My stomach started to turn five minutes after we arrived, and my legs were a little shakey.
We're back there on Friday night and Saturday for our childbirth classes. I'm going to have to steel myself somehow for eight hours at the hospital … do you think that I could just send in a stand-in?
Chris and I feel that it's important to introduce our child to the awesomeness that is Ikea early on:
Actually, my parents are responsible for our first piece of furniture for the baby's room - this chest of drawers converts to a changing table. They brought this up from Edmonton for us this past weekend, and Chris and I think it's pretty awesome (and a very generous gift!). Very nice that it won't be retired as soon as the little person is out of diapers! There's also a shelving unit that attaches to the top, which is kind of tempting.
And yes, those are my order of cloth diapers that you spy on top on the chest of drawers. Very excited about the Great Cloth-Diapering Experiment! I ordered a dozen chinese pre-folds, a few covers, and a set of cute newborn-sized fitted diapers which are so soft!!!
I guess this is somewhat on-topic - two of the characters on my favourite comic strip are going to become parents again!
