24 Weeks

I think I must be in the honeymoon phase of the pregnancy. I feel Caitlyn's kicks and turns and hiccups a lot lately which I love. Just this week I started noticing my belly actually moving with little jabs here and there. Don got to see it too. I find this so amusing and marvelous! And at the same time, I would like to thank my daughter for being a sweet little angel lately and sleeping through the night with me. Quality sleep is something I have learned to cherish and savor as I know these days are numbered.

I am also love, love, loving deep water aerobics. It took me a while to build the routine of making it to an evening class, but with a little practice, I've managed to make it a priority and am now consistently going about 3 times a week. It feels so good to be in the water and weightless. I get good cardio but without all the stress on my joints and a nice full range of motion. Some of the moves are really out of the ordinary too, like swinging your legs back and forth like a bell (think full conversion from back float to a front float but your head stays in one place), I just can't help but wonder what Caitlyn thinks is going on in there and it makes me smile.

Quality time with Don is also a huge focus for me right now. We've been cooking a lot of good meals together lately. The other night we came home from church and read to Caitlyn for about an hour and half. We've been going through the TV series Justified, and running errands together. Whatever it is, I'm deeply indulging in those moments of being able to be present and attentive to each other without a world of distractions. We have a lot to learn about being parents, but as husband and wife, I couldn't ask for anything more.

Oh, and the NESTING!!!! I was born to nest. Much progress has been made in the Early household. I made the transition to the new office a week or two ago (it's a bit of a blur now). I'm really happy with the new arrangement. It feels more like a real office for one (rather than a nook in my bedroom), so going to work actually feels like "going to work." I have a commute now, if only to the other end of the house.

With the transition to the new office we cleared out the nursery space and that's ready to assemble. We had considered painting but a small disagreement with the landlord took that off the table. Don and I are both OK with this. The finished product would have been cool, but it was starting to sound like a lot of work. As far as the nursery goes, I've already acquired a dresser, changing table, and very nice glider. We recently registered for a crib and mattress also on our Amazon Baby Registry and hoping someone may gift that to us sooner than later so that we can finish setting up the nursery (hint, hint). I'm really happy with being able to use the office nook in our master suite as the nursery area. Location wise it is perfect. However, the way the room is set up with double doors, large windows, an angled wall, and no closet, it will be interesting to see how everything fits in there. Particularly since I have a specific place I want the crib to go where we can see it from our bed.

Additional household projects have come together as well. This weekend we acquired some new shelving for our bathroom and picked up some new towels as our current supply was getting a little ragged. Plus we got some new towel hooks to go on the back of the door -- a muh more convenient location to the shower. I love the new arrangement! I think I already mentioned a few weeks ago that we acquired some new bookshelves also which have gone in the spare bedroom. Other projects I hope to accomplish today are picking up and installing some new mail slot organizers (as part of our never ending quest to keep on top of paperwork and keep the mail from piling up on the kitchen island like it always tends to do), and to finish going through the boxes of office supplies that we have yet to transition to the new office. We may also take a load of books today to the used book store after church to cash those in.

My biggest nesting project lately though has been in the category of meal planning! I finally found the perfect solution for organizing all of my online recipes and simplifying meal planning - Pinterest!!!! It is the best tool for how my mind works. I have been pinning all my favorite recipes in different categories (i.e., soups, salads, chicken recipes, etc). I also have a board for "This Week's Meal Plan." So now I can easily glance through my online recipe collection in a consolidated cookbook fashion and repin the recipes to my weekly meal plan that I want to try that week. Then it's as easy as printing out the recipes, making my grocery list, and done in 15 minutes! People keep telling me I won't have time or energy to cook when the baby comes; but I'm hanging on to the dream (delusional or not) that if I just have a really good plan, I can still make it happen.