When is she coming...?

The weekend of the baby!

This weekend was Brent and my first real dose of baby-mania. On Friday night her hammock arrived by UPS...

We spent Saturday morning driving around to pick up her stroller at REI...

and the hammock stand from a Japanese baby store...

Saturday afternoon the girls from my walking group threw me a faaaaabulous baby shower in

the park, tripling our previous clothes/hats/bibs/blankets/toys supplies with boxes of their hand-me-downs and a few bags of new things as well! Sat. night and Sunday morning were spent washing, folding and putting away her new items and starting to pack our hospital bag. And finally, the weekend was topped off by our first 3 hr. birth prep class on Sunday evening!

Suddenly her arrival has seemed to go from happily anticipated, to real and somewhat imminent!

Well not imminent, imminent! Yesterday I turned 36 weeks. Officially, that means baby Smerdon Freeman will be considered full term in only 5 days... but her due date is still just under 4 weeks away (27 days as my calendar reminds me).

Now due dates mean different things to different people. Many enlightened prenatal care providers will tell you you really have a due month between weeks 37 and 41/42. Your actual due date is 40 weeks (9 months + 7 days) from the first day of your last period (sorry for Too Much Information) and statistically has a slightly higher likelihood of you giving birth than on the other 27 days of your due "month." But many 2nd and 3rd time moms will "go" early, and many 1st time moms will "go" late. That said, you'll hear tons of stories of FTM's going early and the mother of 7 being induced post-term. So really, it's anyone's guess!

According to my mother, I am destined to "go" late. Perhaps she was late with me, or she just thinks the full-moon on May 9 is perfect timing for her granddaughter's entrance. Since our little watermelon is a little on the small side and seems fairly content in there I tended to agree with her on the slightly late side.

Until today.

As our midwife palpated my stomach this morning, she checked the baby's position again and even confirmed with a quick ultrasoundic glimpse - baby's head is down, way down. She can still roll around, as she demonstrated by rolling her body from my left side to my right side during the ultrasound. But her head is deep down in my pelvis - also called "engaged," which means it will likely (hopefully) be stuck there now until birth. This also means that the pressure her head is now exerting on my cervix will hopefully/likely help it "efface" (i.e. thin from a few inches thick to paper thin before/as it opens) either by my due date, or very possibly, sooner.

So while I'm not going to get my hopes up and will still focus on April 27-30 as her likely arrival time (if not later) there is now an increased likelihood that the dates leading up to the end of April are just as likely as the dates after.

Which brings me to the point of this e-mail: time to start the betting! The Freemans got a bit of head start on this so here are their contributions:

Gavin - April 28

Brent - April 30

Grace - May 2

Diane - May 4

Elliott - May 7

Lois - May 9 (right mom?)

[But don't guess after May 11-14, as that will be induction time!]

So post your guesses as comments and we will keep track! And if you want to guess the same day as someone else, we'll just have to ask for times to see who gets it closer if you're right. And who knows, there could be anything from naming to bragging rights in it for the winner ;-)

Love to all of you from us,

XXx

A face a mother (and father) could love

I know she looks a bit alien-like, but here are some photos Brent and I received at our 3-D ultrasound appointment last month.

The appointment was a secret at the time as it produced our birthday present for Diane, a video of her first grandchild, still in utero!

The video is more entertaining than the photos alone, as our stubborn daughter (further confirming that she will be a Taurus like her parents) spent 15 min of our supposedly 15min appointment with her hands and feet firmly in front of her face! The technician (wanting to get her outrageous fee for a 'successful' ultrasound) let our appointment go 5 minutes over in her attempt to jiggle, roll, push, and suggest to our daughter to please stop hiding so mommy and daddy could see her face!

Finally, when I jiggled her hands and feet, our little monkey finally obliged. Then we got all sorts of antics from her - eyes open, yawning, sucking her fingers and toes and even her umbilical cord!

I still find it a bit difficult to make a correlation between these images and the face we'll see in the birthing room, but we stare at her face lovingly nevertheless.

Love,

Jen, Brent and our little monkey

(Her eyes are open in many of the photos, and you can often see her umbilical cord, including the first and last ones where she's got it in her mouth)

In My Humble Opinion...

It seems that not much inspires judgement in our society as much as parenting. Whether it be self-righteousness or self-consciousness, no one seems to be able to look at the act of creating, bearing and raising a child in this world without judging whether each act is right or wrong, good or bad, advisable or not.

I just came back from my weekly walking group where a new group of moms had gathered (my 4 usual companions were all unable to make it). Two were labor and delivery (L&D) nurses at a local hospital, one with two toddlers and one with a 7 week old baby. The other two ladies were young moms with 7 and 11 month old babies.

We discussed the usual topics of where they delivered, how their births went, what the transition to motherhood was like, etc. before the host of questions began for the pregnant lady (aka me) - when was I due, what was I having, did she have a name yet... when we got on to where I would deliver. As soon as I mentioned the words "Birth Center" their expressions changed: "Oh. You're one of the ones who is going to try it without drugs!" Knowing smirks were exchanged between the L&D nurses. They looked at me with a mix of humor and condescension, like parents humoring their obviously disillusioned child.

A little while later I was discussing feeding with the constantly flustered mother of the 7 week old (one of the L&D nurses) who casually slipped in - "well you're probably breastfeeding, right? I just assume because you're going for natural childbirth, you're one of those moms..." I tried to let that one go as I watched her formula-feed her infant a few minutes later.

Finally, as I was making my exit (completely bored) I asked whether I would see the women next week. "Sure;" one of the L&D nurses responded, "unless you're not here for a while..." [indicating that I may have delivered]. "Oh, I hope she'll stay inside for at least another month. She can't come before my mother arrives on April 16th - she would have a fit!" I joked. "Well, we'll be eager to hear how it goes if you do!" Another loaded glance passed between them with suppressed giggles, before the older one added, "We'll see if you earned your gold star!"

This conversation is just the latest example of what I have realized is another mark of new parenthood - a honed auditory filter and a passable fake smile as you receive the frequent barrage of advice from friends, family and strangers on the street once you are marked as being in the care of a child. The tricky part is getting the information you want out of all the stuff you don't. Which is where we come back to my original point on judgement.

For example...

1) The crunchy/non crunchy camps

A term used to describe how "hippie" you are, it is worn on natural mom chat sites like a badge. Everyone wants to know (or profess) how crunchy are you! Points seem to be awarded for your support of: natural childbirth, breastfeeding, cloth diapering, baby wearing (to do with carrying your baby around in a sling or wrap), attachment parenting, co-sleeping, your suspicion of traditional vaccine schedules, and feeding your child homemade (organic) baby food when they (ever) wean from the breast.

By most standards, Brent and I fall primarily into the 'pretty darn crunchy' category, but that doesn't stop it irking me that as much self-righteousness seems to flow from the crunchy camp as from the L&D nurses today.

2) The old-school/"modern" moms camps

In one example, I received warning today of the responses I could encounter if we choose to take our daughter out in public shortly after her birth. Depending on how I'm feeling postpartum, this had been something Brent and I were excited about. Apparently, women of the older generation in San Diego have been known (as many of the women attested) to chide new mothers for bringing their babies outdoors at such a young age - apparently they think starving alone in your apartment is preferable to entering a grocery store with a <1 week old baby. This can go the other way though too. Many 'modern' moms considering themselves baby-product savvy will refuse anything not directly off the highest-end baby store shelf for fear of quality, safety and style; looking down their noses at any moms that have not outfitted their children in anything but the best brand-names, and can spot your make of stroller a mile off. 3) The It's YOUR baby camp

This dichotomy may baffle me the most. For all the unsolicited, nosy, self-assured judgements that complete strangers feel free to make on parents, there seems to be an increasing lack of communal responsibility/friendship towards parents with babies or children in other areas. For example, I have witnessed, experienced and heard of numerous incidences of the general public's lack of courtesy with regards to both pregnant women and mothers with small children. The giving up of seats on buses, opening of doors to those with strollers, let alone assisting a stroller up stairs seems to be becoming a rarity. If your baby cries in a restaurant, airplane or store you are likely to be shot death glares more than sympathetic smiles. And then there's some individuals' reactions to breastfeeding in public! A friend of mine actually carries around a card that states California's pro-breastfeeding laws, while I have heard the laments of mothers in other states where breastfeeding in public is illegal!

Perhaps when our little one comes we'll post a sign on her stroller that reminds folks that the only perfect parents are those without children ;-)


Meanwhile, our increasingly heavy honeydew melon is now 35 weeks, weighs nearly 5.5 lbs (though her mom is carrying around 25 lbs!) and is about as long as she'll be at birth. Which theoretically could happen at any time in the next 6 weeks. There are less than 5 weeks till her due date, though she'll be full term in less than 2! Eek! I really don't think she'll be making her appearance until after her due date, but maybe we better go install the car seat just in case...!

Love to all of you,

Jen, Brent & our little honeydew

Maui Movie Madness

Well, it's a movie of our trip to Maui. The madness part came in me trying to wrestle with Microsoft Movie Maker's quirky movie making program! How I wish our photos were on Brent's Mac...

Enjoy (and be forgiving or I may not be making another one)!

Love,

Jen, Brent and our not-so-little watermelon

Rude tram drivers, the Zen of gridlock and my obsession with vampires

I'm on my lunch hour, so I thought I'd share with you a tale from my morning commute and my latest obsession...

Since Maui, Brent and I have been slowly readjusting to SD time until this morning, when we pushed ourselves out of bed at our "usual" wake-up time of 5:45am to make our first trip back to the gym (those macadamia nut pancakes aren't going to work themselves off you know!). I was taking the car today so that I can go to my prenatal yoga class tonight, so we went to the gym closer to Brent's work. I dropped him off at 8:15 and began the 15min drive to USD. Three blocks from Brent's work a police van blocked the main road to the highway, directing traffic up a side road. I went with the flow, thinking, like most roads in San Diego, that there would be a fairly straightforward parallel route - the cars in front of me likely knew it (or were being guided by their GPS's) so I'd just follow them. That's how I ended up in 15min lineup of drivers weaving through stop sign and crosswalk-speckled suburbia! By the time I finally made it onto interstate 8, I edged over to the fast lane only to be greeted by another wall of brake lights 3min after getting on the freeway! An accident was waiting to be cleared just before my exit, leaving me in solid gridlock for another half an hour!

For most drivers this would be an infuriating chain of events, but instead of letting my blood pressure climb with each lurching minute, I tried to take the gridlock as an opportunity to practice Zen philosophy (perhaps for the first time). I'm no expert, but I seemed to remember it has something to do with acceptance. I had a choice of how to approach my predicament: bang my head repeatedly against the steering wheel and get into fights with anyone who cut me off/didn't let me in as we inched along the 7 miles of asphalt until my turn-off; or, simply accept that there was nothing I could do to change the situation and refuse to let it bother me. I'd get to work when I got there.

Well the latter option worked for me all the way to the university. I had to park in the lower lot as I was so late, and faced the uphill climb up to the IPJ (the entire university is perched on a steep hill) with trepidation. I was carrying 3 bags and already tired from my workout. So you can imagine my relief when I saw one of the university shuttles approaching a stop on the hill that would take me up. The doors to the crowded bus opened and a young, athletic 20-something student got on ahead of me. Then I stepped on. That's when the driver said, "Excuse me, there's another shuttle coming in a minute that will have room." Um, me? The 8-month out-of-breath pregnant lady carrying 3 bags? Or the hoard of fit, Gucci-purse toting freshmen you're letting on? Evidently he meant me. And evidently none of the spoilt, rich, OMG-I'm-so-bummed-my-chauffeur-didn't-take-me-this-morning USD students felt there was anything wrong with me getting off the bus. There was no other shuttle in sight, and before the bus pulled away, I started heaving myself up the hill. Again, the driver seemed to see nothing wrong with this and passed me.

Perhaps I'm being irrational? Maybe this is just the hormones talking? But seriously, don't you think some degree of common courtesy could have either a) allowed me on anyway, or b) asked the young, fit, guy to wait for the next bus?, and either way, once they saw that I didn't have time to wait (already being late for work), wouldn't you let me on anyway? I had been so Zen up until then!

Well it's over now. I survived the sweaty (yes, it's hot here) lunge-like trek up the hill and into the office without a heart-attack or going into labor. So to take my mind off the indignation of this morning, I'm focusing on the 5 remaining hours I have until I can get my latest fix - of vampires that is. Well, a vampire book. Or rather, series. Ok, so I'm addicted to the teeny-bopper Twilight series! There, I said it! I almost added it as an entire section of my Maui post, just because it quickly transformed from a light beach read to an all-consuming obsession, even requiring a mid-week late-night drive two towns over to the Barnes and Noble to pick up the next book in the series (which I already owned, but had left in SD thinking there was no way I was going to get through a 500 pg. book amidst a week of activities in paradise!)!

As my friend Nicky surmised: reading Twilight saga is like eating a bag of chips - you know it's not good for you, and it's not making you a better person, but you just can't stop! I have also concluded that for women at least, the 17 year old main character Bella's first-person narrative has an eerily uncanny ability to return intelligent, adult women to our love-struck teenage romances (whether we actually had them or just wished we did). Bella, mind you can be a bit frustrating. In the second book in particular. But she's madly in love with a vampire (and I hope not a werewolf too!), so I guess she deserves a bit of a break. BUT, I better leave it there in case any of you are mid-series or about to be hooked! I hastily ordered the last two books within an hour of us returning to San Diego Sat night, but due to the weekend I've been forced to wait until tonight for my 2-day expedited shipping to get the books from Amazon to my doorstep (and be on my doorstep they better be! If UPS tries to misdeliver this package -like it has my last two- there are going to be serious consequences!!!).

Now if I were to skip my prenatal yoga class tonight I would only have 3 hrs until my fix...! Hmm... I guess I should get back to work then ;-)

Maui

Yes it's a week of multiple posts! You lucky folks ;-)

On Saturday night Brent and I returned home from our last plane trip before we start travelling as a family of 3 (even though we know things will be irreversibly different after her arrival, we both refuse to refer to this as our last "hurrah"!).

Strangely, I didn't feel a huge urge to go to Hawaii before this trip, mostly because so many other destinations are already at the top of my (never ending) "as soon as time and money allows, I have to go there!" list. Well I stand corrected -Maui was fabulous! Much more than an over-touristed collection of luxury hotels and golf courses out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, Maui was not only scenically beautiful, but had surprisingly (to me at least) varied terrain, and despite our trip coinciding with the height of tourist season, it was fairly laid-back!

A play-by-play of our 9 days would take a little too long, so here are some highlights, with photos to do most of the talking:

Beaches (of course)...

It's what most people go for I guess - the beaches. And I have to say, they are pretty nice. Not as crowded as I'd feared and often aquamarine with coral ridges encircling most of the island.

The snorkeling was good at most of the more sheltered beaches we found, and on the rest, the surfing (had I been in a condition to try it) looked like it would have been great (though a bit intimidating to try amidst all the pro-looking surfers).

Rainforests...

For some reason I didn't expect Maui to have rainforests (thinking any former foliage had long been cleared for condos, resorts and pineapples). Go figure. We rented a condo in the small beach town of Napili, at the foot of the tropical foothills of Maui's jagged north-western mountains. That range contained the Iao Valley state park, where the few meters of paved boardwalk failed to satiate us, leading all 6 of us to climb railings, ignore signposts and venture off on a (very well-worn but nevertheless forbidden) trail amidst the luscious, cloud-covered peaks.

Our other major excursion into tropical rainforest was on the must-see (but highly discouraged by car rental companies) 6hr+ out-and-back trip to Hana. The

road is the destination, with 45 miles of winding switchbacks along one of Maui's most rugged and exposed coastlines. If you keep your wits about you and stay ON the treacherous road, waterfalls, black sand beaches, monster waves and world- (or at least Maui-) famous banana bread await you!

However, there was one notable exception to the sopping greenery covering most of the island: Haleakala "Crater."

Venturing to the top of the volcano in the south east of the island was well worth the over 1hr switchback climb up to the 10,028 ft peak.

The 19 sq. mile "crater" (actually caused by erosion, rather than eruption, but filled with many smaller craters) looks more like a moonscape than the "volcano" archetype of active bubbling magma found on the Big Island. I was careful to not gallivant around too much at altitude, but the freezing wind left none of us really wanting to do the 3-8hr hikes at the peak.

Whales whales and more whales...

(look carefully, the photo below is a breech not a tail...)

I expected the sun, sand and surf, but what I didn't realize was that we were arriving smack-dab in the middle of whale season! And while I've been lucky enough to grow up around whales all my life, I have never seen such overcrowded abundance as the humpbacks mating and calving off Maui. As we watched the sun set on the beach our first night in Napili we couldn't believe our luck when we glimpsed a whale breeching a ways offshore. The next morning we were on our way to another part of the island and along the coast road we started seeing more splashes and spray fairly near to shore. Like typical tourists, we quickly pulled off at the nearest viewpoint. Well after about 10 min we'd lost track of all the spouts, tail and fin slaps and the odd breach (of jousting males) going on in every direction!

The real highlight came when we ventured out on a 47' catamaran to Molokini crater for Diane's birthday. The 5hr snorkeling trip included a 2-3.5 hr sail out and back from the crater, which ended up doubling as a whale watching trip. There were so many humpbacks that our two-man crew was grumbling that they were having to navigate a whale slalom course just to get back to the harbor!

You can see from the photos how close the whales were to our snorkeling site (the island in the background with the boats in front), so a part of me did consider venturing beyond the crater to see if I could catch a glimpse of them underwater (what do they tell you about not approaching mothers with young???). Luckily perhaps, it was soon obvious that that was a bit too far to go, but we got another thrill when, at the edge of the crater a diving expedition to see some triggerfish I suddenly had deja-vu from a grade 4 science movie... The water was filled with a cacophony of whale cries! Turns out sound travels better just a few feet underwater, so the more we dove, the more gentle mother-baby screeches we got to hear. Soooo neat!

Of course there's lots more I could write about, but for now I'll leave you with the photos instead. Maybe if I get really creative (and find a lot of free time) I may even try to make one of these "vacation videos" that my talented friend Cat seems to come up with!

In the meantime, it's back to work!

Love, Jen, Brent and our wriggling watermelon

Tegan's photos

Sorry I've been a little incommunicado lately...

I meant to post these earlier.

The story is that an incredibly talented photographer, who happens to be one of my closest, dearest and oldest friends (due to our 22+ years of friendship, not her age... though she does hit the big 3-0 this year just over a month before I do! What a geezer ;-) Tegan, somehow convinced me to wrap myself in a sheet and some mesh fabric (from B & my wedding no less!), then stand out on Willows beach (Victoria, Canada) in FEBRUARY! The results, as you can see, are some stunningly beautiful photos that she managed to take of me and the belly (in between the shivering)... (ok, the first one is in her living room, when we were still sane)

p.s. you can check out some of her other work at her blog, in my friend's blog list on the right of this page.