Waiting

Dorothy’s brother is not late yet, technically, since my due date is in a few days.  However, I had it in my head that since his parents are both early people in general—arriving unfashionably early to anything from the workday to the time one feeds the pets—the little guy would arrive sometime in the twenties of July.  This did not happen.

Because of my ADVANCED MATERNAL AGE, I have had weekly ultrasound images of the fine fellow, and in each one he seemed increasingly more comfortable, sucking his thumb and looking pleased as punch to be where he is, and oh excuse me, he’d like to stay longer for the ultrasound photo but he has some ribs to kick and a bladder to headbutt.

All this is to say that I no longer have confidence that he will enter this world in a timely fashion, and time is ticking for him to enter it punctually by the due date.  Luckily for me, there is such a thing called inducement, and we just might be resorting to that.

People with children tell us to enjoy this time by ourselves, rug-ratless, and we are trying to, although it is hard to enjoy anything when one moves like a hippo in stilettos, and it is now uncomfortable for me to sit and lie down.  (Which just seems wrong!  Sitting should always be comfy, as should a full recline.)  And then of course although Sean hasn’t joined me in hippo-dom, he has to listen to me moan about it. 

So there we are.  I will be happy to meet our guy face to face, instead of head to bladder, and – call me a curmudgeon – will  also be glad to no longer have my pregnancy be an invitation for strangers to talk to me on the street.  And call me mom.  On the flip side, I do admit to enjoying the fact that on the crowded train ride home, someone will usually give me a seat (although those someones are almost always young women.  Chivalry is dead).

Meanwhile, Posy is enjoying sleeping in the baby’s room, despite its pet gate, Plum can’t resist sharpening his claws on all of Sean’s furniture, especially the couches, and Dorothy is still OCD with the yard, even though she comes in with lizard legs—all wall to wall bumps from feisty mosquitoes.

 

"Paws" Vest

This took me way longer to complete than it should have, but here is the "Paws" vest I just finished for the baby-to-be:

It is from the new "Little Rowan" book, and I made it in the 6-9 month size.  Now I need to get a little white oxford shirt and perhaps some jeans or khakis.  And then, according to Sean, I need to write a little apology note to the kid for when he is older and looks back at pictures of himself.  Hmmpf.

Anyway, one thing I learned while knitting it is that I really prefer the fair isle method over the intarsia method.  I'm sure there is a way of doing intarsia without having to stop every ten stitches or so and untangle all the little balls of yarn hanging down--but I have yet to figure out what that method might be.

Now I'm about to start one more project from that book--a striped sweater called "Jack Horner".  I'm using colors that will make the little guy look like a creamsicle when he is wearing it.  Stay tuned!

Dorothy's Baby Brother To Be

At times over the past year we have flirted with the idea of getting Dorothy a new sibling.  We've thought of another Olde English Bulldogge, a Frenchie, a Dachshund, a Pug--but in the end we opted for a Human.  So if all continues to go as planned, in a couple of months or less Dorothy will have the new baby brother she never wanted!

On the plus side, Dorothy loves kids--and I mean loves them.  When she sees a toddler or a kid of any age on the street, she will either lie flat down on the ground so they will come up to her, or she will drag me with all her formidable strength to get over to them.  And once interacting with them, she is surprisingly gentle.  She seems to know not to jump up on the little ones, and loves to hug and kiss the older ones, if their parents allow it.  So in that sense we are lucky--Dorothy is going to have fun with her baby brother.

The one problem we will have is with her jealousy at first.  Dorothy does not like to share her father At All.  She does not even like her father to give me any attention, let alone when he tries to play with the cats.  So there will have to be a few lessons learned once the little guy is around.  I imagine we will be seeing a lot of this face:

Future Dorothy thinking, what's to like?  He cries, he mewls, he poops in the house, 

and I'm pretty sure he has a bad case of demodectic mange: