The Final Stretch | Weeks 38-39

The last days of pregnancy are the absolute longest… (especially for Georgia), but it’s given me extra nesting time, so that’s good! On Saturday, I completely gutted our master bedroom, flipped our mattress and even mopped under the bed before bringing in Will’s Pack ‘n Play. We’ve had two garage sales, completely emptied entire rooms in the house and I’ve taken 3 Jeep loads of donations to Goodwill so far, with more left to purge! I’m creating a bit of panic for the wife though, who doesn’t like to get rid of anything and is convinced that I am going to eventually toss, donate or recycle everything she owns, haha! We are now 38 weeks + 3 days, which means that Georgia has carried our little guy for 6 days longer than she carried Grace… and for us, 6 days feels like forever!

The mamas are ready for this sweet baby boy to make his appearance! Like soooo ready, and here’s why. Reason #1: Georgia is more than OVER being pregnant with our giant baby! I’ve been joking lately that if family and friends stop hearing from me, it’s because G has killed me and dumped my body in the Rio Grande River! But seriously, grumpy bear does not begin to describe my little preggers and I seem to get on her nerves now more than ever. Sometimes I bite back, but mostly I just apologize for mistakes I haven’t made, because that makes life in our household run more smoothly (and please sweet baby Jesus, do not let her read this post… I’ll be dead for sure)! ;) Reason #2: my job is draining my soul. The experience I’ve had preparing for FMLA with my current company, has been like night and day compared to my medical leave experience 5 years ago with my former organization. People in our leadership team have completely changed the way they interact with me since finding out that I intend to take the full 3 months off (they seriously assumed I would only take 2-3 weeks, as if…). I’ve also been reassigned to a new Director since sharing the news of my plans to take 3 months of leave and they’ve piled on the work. Like, regular workload x 3… I don’t want to think that I’m being retaliated against for taking medical leave, but it often feels that way. Reason #3: we just really, really want to meet our little guy! The anticipation of seeing his beautiful face is just too much. We want to hold him and smell him and kiss his little forehead so bad it hurts!

In baby prep news, Gracie went to her Big Sister/Big Brother class at the hospital this past weekend and it was just about the cutest thing I’ve ever seen! There were 7 kids ranging in age and Grace looked to fall somewhere in the middle of the age range. These little cuties spent the afternoon learning baby safety skills as well as how to change, swaddle and hold a baby. They took a tour of the hospital and watched a pretty hilarious video on what to expect when mom goes into labor. They each got to decorate a gift bag for their siblings “birthday” and select a gift to put inside for their sib. William will be getting a super soft and adorable blue knit hat as his gift from sister and we can’t wait to see Gracie give it to him! The class was, of course, heavy on the mom and dad lingo and we were the only rainbow family there, but we are pretty used to that. This, I have no doubt, is what prompted Grace to tell us that she wanted a dad the morning following the class. I knew the day might come when she would say something like this and so we did our research and have been prepared for the conversation and I think we handled it well. We wanted to make sure Gracie felt open to sharing her feelings and asked questions rather than taking over the conversation. As it turns out, the sole reason Gracie said she “wants a dad” is because, “they’re handsome”. That’s it. That was her reason and I had to keep from giggling when she said it. I swear we have the most Disn.ey Prince Charming obsessed kid on the planet! ;) We talked about other special dudes she has in her life who love her and once we were finished talking about her Papa, Grandpa K and her many uncles, she was satisfied with our 10-minute conversation and quickly shifted focus to her favorite cartoon, Loud House.

Georgia and I were able to sneak a last date night into the mix before baby and it was so nice. The fancy banquet was for Georgia’s work and required that we get all gussied up and find a babysitter. G looked beautiful, as always and I got to wear a new dress I bought long ago but hadn’t yet had a reason to wear it. I always enjoy going to the wife’s work stuff because I love seeing how admired she is by her colleagues. They all adore her and go to her for basically everything. Her career has sent us on many all-expense covered business trips as a family; they paid for nearly 80% of our IVF costs (amazing, right!) and financed 100% of Georgia’s MIS graduate degree. They’ve actually paid her what she’s truly worth these past 17 years and are about to send her on a second fully paid maternity leave following the baby shower they threw for us! If only every organization invested in their female employees as they’ve invested in her – our country would be in much better shape, IMO.

We found the last thing we needed for baby brother’s room, per the recommendation of another LBGT mama in one of my online parenting groups. Check out Will’s super cool Himalayan Salt Lamp (aka, his nightlight)! Georgia first introduced me to these things at Christmas when she bought her mom one, but I never thought to use it as a nightlight! It’s a natural air purifier, reduces allergies, improves mood, provides light therapy for baby boy and has the most soothing red and orange glow + it looks like a meteorite from Outer Space! That parts just a bonus. 

Warning: it is extremely heavy though. So if you get one for your kiddo, be sure to secure it to the wall. 

Our hospital bags are officially packed and there are two car seats in our vehicles now, you guys! TWO! Before installing little bear’s car seat, I wanted my Commander in the best possible shape, so I had a new windshield put in, did all the usual maintenance and had it detailed including steam cleaning the interior and now I feel like we’re ready to bring our little guy home in there. Grace loves that she will get to sit right next to him and is obsessed with playing with his rear-facing jungle mirror. I can’t get her to keep her sticky fingers off the darn thing, nor can I keep her out of brother’s room. She LOVES it in there!

Jumping topics, as I love to do – I have the most amazing news to share! Grace won the education lottery and got into our #1 private/charter elementary school of choice!!! I haven’t written about the grueling process we’ve gone through since December choosing an elementary school, but let’s just say, I’ve spent more time doing this than I did selecting a university when I was college bound… We’ve researched the heck out of all our options, both public and private/charter. We’ve attended open houses and info sessions like crazy. We’ve filled out countless applications, but all the while we had a #1 choice in mind. We knew the school we LOVED was only going to take around 30 incoming kindergartners because they have a returning student and student sibling policy, but we thought we would give it a try. We went to the open house and info session and completed the necessary paperwork entering Gracie’s name in the lottery and waited… and waited… Then today we got the call! Grace ended up being student #15 in a lottery of nearly 200 kindergarten applicants and she got in! I cried and G couldn’t believe it! We never win anything!

The school is everything we would want in an elementary and middle school for our gal! Starting in kindergarten, the students have music class and physical education, every week. They have a beautiful music room where they learn to play actual instruments and have classes like art and computer science weekly, with a 1/2 computer/student ratio in each class. G and I were most drawn to the school’s small teacher/student ratio and their emphasis on math and science. It’s a bonus that the school buildings are super modern and colorful, and they have awesome security. All visitors and parents are required to pass through 3 layers of security before you are in any area where there are kiddos, which puts our mama hearts at ease given the level of gun violence in schools in the US. But the best part by far is that Grace and William will go to the same school, together for several years now! W will start kindergarten when Grace starts 5^th grade and she will remain in his same school through 8^th grade. That part makes us the happiest! We’re so excited for the years she will spend learning and growing there. 

And that’s about it. Oh, and I’m working on inducing lactation. Have I mentioned that?! I’m about a month in and just started on birth control, so we’ll see how it goes. I’m not allowing myself to get too excited because I don’t want to be upset if it doesn’t work, but I’m going to give it a try. Here’s me pumping at work, lol!

And here is G’s beautiful belly at 38 weeks, 3 days. Ekkkkk!