Nesting.

Nesting plus moving into a new apartment plus an already existing obsession with decorating equals one very tired pregnant me.

I've felt like a mad woman this past week. I wake up at 7 a.m., sometimes earlier, and the to-do list starts forming in my mind before my feet even hit the floor. I want things done, and I want them done now.

I try to reason with myself. It's probably not the best idea for someone in her third trimester to attempt to mount that mirror or to rearrange that furniture or to put together that dear god way-too-complicated-to-put-together changing table. But I always give in. If it's too heavy (and, yes, I'm being careful), I find some way to manipulate it into manageability. The mirror goes first onto the chair, with the help of my knee. Then, with a nudge, I lever it onto the table. Then I position it against the wall. And then all it takes is two seconds of lifting and I have it positioned perfectly onto the nails. It would make a lot more sense to, say, wait a few hours for Jason to come home, since he can lift the mirror to the wall in one simple step. But no. I simply cannot wait those few hours because then my baby will be living in a mirror-less, bland, undecorated home and then what sort of mother would I be???

It's starting to feel like some sort of psychosis. While writing this post, I've also ordered Jason a wall-mount for his guitar and found the washer and dryer we're going to buy on Craigslist (I literally can't even shut off the nesting long enough to write for 10 minutes).

I was on my way to get the vacuum when I saw my poor, lonely computer sitting at the desk we put together last night and felt compelled to take the smallest of breaks to clear my mind. And now all I can think about is that I need to vacuum.

For anyone who can remember their inner monologue during pregnancy, I have to ask: am I going crazy or is this, in fact, normal? Or at least normal-ish?

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Life post-job.

I am now officially off the schedule at my job. I'm still technically an employee, only I'm now an "on-call" producer. My boss really, really didn't want me to quit, and this way, after I give birth and feel ready/decide to return I can do so easily and without having to sign any papers.

So that means for the past five days I have gone to bed at night, with my fiance by my side, without sunlight boisterously pushing its way through the cracks in my blinds. I wake up in the morning, with my fiance still by my side and the welcome sight of sunlight coming through the blinds. It's been heaven.

It's been so nice, in fact, that it's overshadowed the fact that I suddenly feel so tangibly, irreparably, undeniably PREGNANT. I have to stop to take a breath on my way up the stairs. I moan when I bend down and even louder when I stand back up. Hardly a minute goes by of any day that I'm not stricken with some new ache or pain coming from my baby-making area. I walk around with my hand on my back. The clerk at the gas station, the waiter at the restaurant, the old lady staring me down in line at the grocery store all ask me when I'm due. There's no turning back now.

Jason and I are moving next weekend, so I have very, very, very slowly started the packing process. I figure if I pack two boxes a day until then I can spend D-day drinking hot cocoa and watching the movers do every single ounce of dirty work without feeling the smallest bit of guilt.

The components of Adelyn's nursery are starting to come together. The type A part of me is way too excited about setting everything up. I'm almost salivating at the thought of putting the room together (or maybe it's the promise of the cheeseburger Jason's bringing me on his way home from work in a few minutes).

One more week.

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Changes.

I'm about to take pictures of our apartment to post on Craigslist. The hope is that we can have it leased out by next week, our new place picked by then, and everything moved by next weekend. Ambitious, and a little ridiculous, but that's how Jason and I are. We decide to do something and then do it way too fast and with hardly enough planning and we get incredibly stressed and on edge and then, suddenly, everything's done and all's right with the world.

I hate moving. With every fiber of my being. Except this time I have a good, solid excuse to not do all that much. You know, the whole pregnancy thing. So I'm in charge of taking pictures of our apartment now and packing up all the non-heavy stuff and unpacking that same stuff and organizing everything.

Now we just have to find a place.

And this is my last week of working at Channel 4, at least for now. I become an "on-call" producer starting Monday the 2nd, meaning I'll be taken off the schedule until I'm ready to come back. They wouldn't let me quit. This way I don't have to be "rehired" when (if) I decide to come back (I probably won't).

And, by the way, I don't get my insurance through my employer, just incase anyone thought I was manipulating them into keeping my coverage while I sat on my lazy pregnant behind.

This means that, starting Sunday morning when I get off work after working overnight, I will no longer be a pregnant vampire. I can sleep at night--at the same time as my fiance--and wake up when the sun is shining. What a novel thought.

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Happy 3AM.

My new work game plan was to try to sleep from about nine in the morning until five or six, because that's eight hours and then I'd at least have the night to spend with Jason before I have to go to work at midnight.

I fell asleep at nine easily. But now it's about two in the afternoon. I woke up at one, and there was no convincing my body to go back to sleep. My body still frustratingly hasn't gotten the hint that sunny outside does not necessarily equal wakey wakey time. Unless of course it's my day off, and then I always have to force the message across.

So now I'm sitting in the living room, eating a microwaveable burrito with a cracker and peanut butter appetizer, watching strangers birth babies on A Baby Story. It's all a very surreal way to spend your three o'clock in the morning.

We're not going to Austin. But it turned out for the best. Jason still gets to do the job, just from Tennessee. He'll be flying down a lot to oversee it. I, however, don't have to worry about moving in between moving while pregnant, so that makes me happy and takes my stress level down a notch. Now we just have to find a new place to live here.

I've realized that I have, finally, gotten over my obsession with needing a cigarette. Just in case I wasn't entirely clear before, I did quit a long time ago. All the writing I've done since then about quitting has been about the still-daily struggle with the urge, and if you've ever been a smoker you know that just because you're not giving into the addiction it doesn't mean the battle is won. I realized at work this morning, after an even more stressful shift than usual, that I hadn't thought about cigarettes or how much easier the morning would be if I could just have one, and for that I was--and am--proud.

I will surely have a lot more to say this weekend. On Sunday, I'm going to Memphis with Jason. We're inevitably going to hang out with his always-drunk and rowdy friends while we're there, so I'm sure that will inspire lots of fun preggo-stories.

And on Saturday, the big event. After three months of ignoring wedding plans, my mom and I are going wedding dress shopping. We went in April, back when my stomach didn't pooch out in a burgeoning baby bump, and I of course fell in love with one way over our budget. Now, things have changed.

I just really need to pick out a dress before I get much bigger, right? It scares me to think I have no way to predict exactly what size I will be five months post-baby for our wedding. So I guess I'll have to settle for something relatively shapeless. Perhaps a white, crystal-studded burlap sack?

I can't wait to be the pregnant girl shopping for her wedding dress. Get ready.

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