We are ready & WAITING - 38 weeks... 13 days or so!

So we are in the finally count down and we are ready and waiting! Will switched back to working nights TODAY so now we figure I will probably go into labor at night, etc. Well at least he only works 3 nights this week. So we have been getting all the final things ready around the house the last few days. Here I am today at 38.1 weeks... dakota made it back into these photos. In the first one I just got out of the shower and my hair is sticking up a bit. In the second one dakota was too lazy (after a hard day outside) to sit up for the photo.

Our bags are packed and sitting by the door... 

Arabella's room is all set, I even finally finished the drapes this evening (2nd picture). Mom gave me the idea of using that fabric tape to hem them up and it worked great. Much easier than hauling them over to someone's house to sew a simple hem. 

So in the final curtain re-do, I ditched the bows and went with a simpler tie back. I even ironed them - mom would be so proud and possibly shocked. 

Over the last few days we have had fantastic weather, almost 70 both days. I even got a sunburn from working in the garden on Saturday. I really wanted to get the front garden beds weeded and all set up for the summer season. Also just cleaning up the yard in the spring after the winter is a lot of work. So over the last few days we have gotten out into the yard and gotten a lot done. It is nice to get it done now and know that we won't have to worry about it later this month... I'm sure we will be too busy to deal with it all then. 

As you can see all our perennials are starting to come back up! We even got all our deck and summer furniture back out and ready. We even got a head start on our garden. We got 3 of the beds all weeded and 2 of them planted. Of course it is too early to plant most things - we have to wait till after Memorial day... but we were able to plant onions and strawberries since they can handle the colder nights till then. 

The bummer part is that the black flies have also arrived with all this warm weather. I got a TON of bites over the last few days working outside. I tried to take a picture of one of them on my arm.. it is hard to see (the red blotchy area)  but mostly you can tell that my forearm is swollen from it. Black fly bites are the worst and I react worse to them than any other bugs. The good thing is that black flies are only around for a few weeks a year, they will be gone in a few short weeks. 

Speaking of swelling, I have had such bad swelling in my feet/legs over the last few weeks. I think the leg swelling started around week 30 and has progressed since then. I took a picture today of my feet/lower legs. Will said I had sausage toes a few weeks ago... ugh. At least they said it will all go down in the weeks following her delivery. They said I will be peeing and sweating up a storm to get rid of all of this fluid. Apparently I am just someone who retains LOTS of water. If you think my feet/legs look swollen here this is nothing... the swelling is 100x less than it was a week ago before I stopped working. It has gone down a bunch since I don't have to be on my feet all day anymore. I even had to go buy a cheap pair of flip flops to wear because none of my shoes fit me anymore. 

Well hopefully our next post will include some pictures of our new arrival. Will thinks that she will arrive this coming Wednesday... he doesn't have a reason, just thinks it will be this week. I think it will probably be this week as well but I'm not committed to any one day. I guess we will just have to wait and see and ultimately it is up to her!

Arabella's room is almost complete!

Well we came home today and did some final work in Arabella's room to get things all set. We got the bedding in the crib and hung the drapes. I still have to hem the bottom of the curtains but I shortened them already. I will go to a friends house next week to borrow her sewing machine to hem them. I will need mom's help when she comes to make some better more permanent bows/ties for them but the ribbon is a great match with the room, I just tied them in bows for now. We also got a new cover for the futon to match the rest of the room. We have been looking for some pink pillows to put on the couch but so far we have had no luck.

This is our new Bob Stroller - we love it and can't wait to use it! That is all of the stuff for Arabella for the hospital stay - her outfit for coming home and blanket. We will get the infant seat adapter for the stroller as well, that way we can stick our infant seat right in it. It will be nice for walks this summer.

36.5 weeks... the final countdown... only 24 days left

Well we are finally almost to the end of the road. Now that we are here it seems like it has gone by fast. I know Arabella will be here with us before we know it. We thought we would update you with some recent photos of me and baby Arabella's room - which is almost ready.

The first few are of my today... 36.5 weeks pregnant. I'm definitely getting bigger and as some have told me, now that my belly button is poking out, that I look almost done. She dropped down into my pelvis over 3 weeks ago now and has been head down for even longer than than. 

The next ones are of Arabella's room, which is almost ready. We have a few final things left to do - including putting the bedding on/in the crib, putting up the curtain rods/drapes and we also ordered letters to go on the wall that spell out Arabella - we will put them above her crib once they arrive. I think she will arrive before the letters do but at least we can have everything else ready. What do you think of the wall polka dots? We weren't sure at first with the wood walls, but after we finished putting them up we like them... It definitely adds to the room.

Of course now that things are getting all set up - both Cali and Dakota think that this new room and stuff all belongs to them. Cali thinks that the changing area is a new bed for her..

We will post some more pictures next week once we finally get the curtains and bedding finished. Soon we will be posting pictures of our new addition - we can't wait!