March 30, 2007

Jury Duty

Matthew walked in the door this afternoon and said: "G, you're a winner!!" Then he handed me a summons for jury duty--set for April 12. Now, I think serving on a jury might be really interesting, and I think it is an important part of living and serving in a democratic nation. But doing jury duty while 8 1/2 months pregnant sounds awful (do they give you "potty breaks" every ten minutes? Can you shift in your chair a lot? Are naps allowed? Would it be distracting to munch on grapes or apple slices during closing arguments? If your water breaks, do you have to raise your hand and tell someone, or can you just get up and call your hubby on the cell phone?).

So I filled out the "Request for disqualification, excuse or postponement." I laughed as I decided between checking the box for "Physical or mental incapacity," which required a doctor's note for people under 70 years old, and the box that claims "You have a personal obligation (not related to your employment) to provide care to another between 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Monday-Friday. You must explain below why alternate care is not feasible."

I checked the latter. I subdued the urge to make wise-cracks about needing a plastic chair (just in case), access to an excellent anesthesiologist, and (if the kiddo arrives before said date) a qualified wet-nurse. I just wrote that I'm due May 5th and planning to breastfeed my infant. I'll let you know if they still want me.

March 23, 2007

the waiting game

We're at 34 weeks now, and the waiting game begins...when will the baby arrive? We're not hoping for anything too early, mind you, but I am feeling pretty ready to not be inhabited! As my energy becomes more sapped, Abby's is growing (correlation?); she was (literally) bouncing off the walls when she walked out the door for school today! She has been falling asleep during rest time at school--something she hasn't done for months--so I wonder if she's having another growth spurt. Her feet are now longer than my hands, and she is talking about sharing my clothes (and reminding me that the doc says she will be taller than her momma).

After school yesterday, Abby said "Let's go on a mommy and Abby adventure!" I was imagining a nap, but that was obviously not what she was thinking. So I suggested we go get manicures. She's never had a "real" manicure before, I mean the kind mommy doesn't do at home. I bit my lip and let her pick ANY color she wanted, no matter how wild. She went with a sensibly bright pink-fushia color, with glitter over that and flowers on her thumbs. They actually look very glamorous. I went with a french manicure on my already sensibly short nails. Funny how when your hands look nice, you feel more put together (even in your pajamas). Then we went to an art supply shop and got stretchy bracelet-making plastic wire, tracing paper, a flower stencil, and a kit to make a dolphin mosaic. I was thinking the mosaic would take her the whole weekend. She polished it off this morning before school. It has hundreds of pieces, but she apparently has some serious ability to concentrate on one thing till she's done with it.

This has been a big week for me: I finished and handed in my last seminar paper. This means I'm totally done with classes for my PhD! I have a ton of research and writing to do yet, but it feels great to have completed the coursework. I polished off my grading for the quarter (big sigh of relief) and handed in those grades, so now I have research for a professor to do, but on my own schedule!! I'm finally thinking about packing a bag for the hospital, wrapping up some scrapbooking so that baby #2 actually feels documented, and sitting quietly asking myself what I FEEL like doing! I have not had a chance to slow down like this in over two and a half years. No prelim studying, no papers to finish, no summer research projects to do. I'd take a deep breath if kiddo weren't pushing my lungs into my throat. :) Anyway, I feel really good about this time before baby arrives, and I'm actually super excited to see this little kiddo in person!!

March 7, 2007

Butterfly week


ready for school
Originally uploaded by gennabby.
It has been a good week so far! Abby is learning about butterflies and is getting ready to study the life cycle of frogs. (I did spy a jar of tadpoles in her class yesterday). She is clearly learning about things she's interested in; just last night I asked her to close the back door to keep the "skeeters" out (mosquitos). She proudly said: "Momma, I know something that will make you feel much better. You don't have to worry about the boy mosquitos at all. They are not interested in biting you. Only the girl ones will bite. See, so you don't need to worry about the boy ones!" She is also coming up with all kinds of funny phrases lately. I walked out of her room for a couple of minutes, and upon my return she said, "It is so nice to have you back again." I think she's about as cute as they get! We're really enjoying our kiddo, and we're confident that the timing of bubba #2 will be a great fit for our whole family! Times like these make me realize how and why we do everything that we do in order to be a family--I'm so thankful for my Matty and Abby. Speaking of Matty-- I woke up this morning (after going to bed, exhausted, at 9:30 last night) to a sparkling clean kitchen. And over the weekend, he took some 10+ loads of laundry (our usual laundry PLUS all of the baby stuff from storage) to the Laundromat and brought them home clean and FOLDED! He and Abby have been having raucously good times playing games, and he and I have been enjoying mornings out for coffee after dropping Abbs off at school. We know these quiet times of just the two of us are about to look very different! Anyway--that's our story. Hope all is well with y'all out there.

March 2, 2007

the girl cricket

Matthew and I met eyes across the table and giggled as we watched our radiant, bubbling, wiggly little girl hum "You're a Grand Old Flag" while rocking her bent arms to the beat. This went on for quite some time; all through dinner in fact (and sometimes there were words, sometimes just humming with eyes closed, sometimes determined-to-crack-mom-and-dad-up grunts to the beat). This is the new Merryhill-attending Abby--brimming over with things to share and feeling very confident! The after school barrage of new info. and ideas included the following (in no particular order):

"Momma, I held the tiniest snail today. Snails have just one foot. Just one body part! How many do we have? The snail slithered on my arm; it was tickly and soft. I was afraid at first, but then I wasn't."

"Mr. Runion timed me on the playground. I rode the bike all around the sidewalk part of the playground."

"I was in a play today. Lots of people were there watching! I was the girl cricket! The only girl cricket!" When asked what she did as the girl cricket, she replied: "I jumped!" We later found out that she was the beautiful girl cricket that made the boy cricket sing at last (the whole point of the play)! This was for a school assembly in front of parents and everything.

Other tid bits: The Jr. Kindergardeners will go to the Sacramento Zoo at the end of this month; next week is butterfly week in Abby's classroom (she's thrilled!); Abby started a new trend in her classroom--she requested a gold, puffy paint heart in the center of the (gold puffy paint) sun on her hat, which led to ALL the girls in class asking for such a heart in their suns. Abby is super happy about this. She's bringing her own flair to the class, for sure. She had a tough time falling asleep last night (for obvious reasons, I think), but I let her snuggle next to me while I graded papers and she was out in a matter of 5 minutes! Her later bed time did not hinder her from springing out of bed at 7 a.m. and saying: "I need to get to school; we're playing a game early today." Matthew told me she won the memory game tournament handily yesterday. Finally, I should mention that when we went to pick her up at 4:30 yesterday (giving her ample time to play after school, or so we thought), she requested that we go on ahead to the grocery store and leave her at school to play some more. We get the feeling she likes her new school.

March 1, 2007

off to a new school


off to school
Originally uploaded by gennabby.
Here's Abby in her uniform! She started Jr.Kindergarten today. I'll send an update when we pick her up from school this afternoon. Last night she told us we couldn't send her to school with "Yo-baby" or blues clues yogurt anymore, because it would seem "babyish" to the other kids.