We start our childbirth classes tonight. I'm pretty excited about it, if only because that means we are getting closer to meeting this baby! We are taking them through the Vanderbilt Nurse-Midwife Center where we go for our appointments. The class is on Tuesday nights for the next 6 weeks. I'm not exactly sure what to expect, since my only experience with these types of classes is what I see on tv. I am sure that getting some facts and tips about the labor process will help calm some fears. I am not feeling any anxiety about that yet, but I am sure that I will get to that point. Right now, I'm more concerned with my inability to sleep through the night, the fact that I can't breath very easily at times, and the relentless activity of this child inside me. All of those, combined with occasional nausea, stomach and/or back pain, are making my work experience a lot more difficult. It's bad enough that I spend my days sitting at a computer trying to entertain myself.

So we took our stray cat in to be spayed, and apparently she was pregnant. Not knowing anything about cats, we assumed that she was still pregnant even after the spay, although we weren't sure exactly what spaying involved. I soon found out that they remove the entire uterus, meaning that we unknowingly participated in a kitten abortion. Although we are relieved to not have to care for a pregnant "queen" for several more weeks and then try and figure out what to do with the kittens, I was a little upset. Mom cat seems to be doing fine, though, and Andy is on a quiet campaign to try and keep her. My allergies are forming a revolt against his campaign, as are the dogs. She really is a sweet cat.

Some of you know that we have had two large piles of dirt in our front yard for several months, brought in for a landscaping project that we no longer have the funds for. I finally found some people to take it! We have 5 or 6 people all coming to take some of it, and hopefully that will get rid of it all! If there is a little left, we can of course just spread it out and seed it. But at least we won't have two small hills in the front yard anymore. It's all part of getting ready for the baby.

29 days of work left! I am so ready for the time off. I am starting to feel the strain of these 9 hour work days and the walking all over campus. My abdomen and my back are so sore by the time I get home, I just want to lay down and stay there. But there is of course so much to do around the house. I know we still have 11 weeks until the due date, but a little preterm labor scare this week (that turned out to be nothing) made me realize that it just might come sooner than we think. There's just no time to be putting off projects anymore. We are lucky to have a great group of friends in this area that want to have a work day at our house to help get things ready for the baby. I think we will do that on November 5 so that it can be done for the shower we're having here the following weekend.

There isn't a lot going on around our house other than home projects. Andy is also getting a good amount of freelance work that he's spending some evening and weekend time on, which is great considering that not all of our projects are inexpensive. I put a new picture of me in the photos section. In case you are curious what's happening with our baby at this stage, they now weigh about 2 1/2 pounds and they are a tad over 15 inches long from head to heel. Their muscles and lungs are continuing to mature, and their head is growing bigger to accommodate the brain ? which is busy developing billions of neurons.

We had our 28 week visit this morning, and everything is still going just as it should. The baby still has a strong heartbeat, and it is moving around all the time. They also did a glucose tolerance test this morning for gestational diabetes, so if that comes out positive I'll hear about it in a few days. I don't anticipate it being a problem.

I have gained 3 pounds since my last visit, which was 3 weeks ago, so that is right on track. Now I'm up to 11 pounds gained. I am still not back up to the weight I was before I did the medical research study right before we got pregnant. I will definitely surpass that before all is said and done with this pregnancy, though.

My next appointment is on October 20, because now I go every 2 weeks instead of every 4. There are 84 days left until our due date, and 35 days left of work before I start staying home. How exciting! Andy asked me yesterday what I am looking forward to most about having this baby. I'm not really sure what specifically I am excited about. I've just always wanted to be a mom since I can remember, and I think it will be my ideal job. To invest my life into a little person in a mother-child relationship will be challenging and rewarding.

We started working on the nursery last night. This weekend we got the furniture, fabric, and paint for the room while my mom was here for a conference. The crib won't be coming until mom comes back for my shower in November, because our store didn't have it in stock and so my parents picked it up at the one in Chicago.

So last night, Andy and I pulled the carpet out of the room and thankfully the wood floor underneath is in great shape. Just a few paint splatters that I think we can get to come off. Also, the floor is the same as the wood floor in the rest of the house, but apparently the previous owner stained it darker after he put the carpet in, so this wood is lighter. It actually matches our furniture almost exactly, though. And now of course we'll have to get a cozy rug for the nursery.

Also this weekend, we got a free sofa sleeper from a couple in East Nashville. They posted it on our e-mail listserv for anyone who wanted to come get it, and we were the first! It's pretty nice for a free sofa, and it came with a green slipcover.

The fabric store had JUST ENOUGH of the fabric we wanted to make our crib bumper and dust ruffle and the curtains. I like it a lot, and the paint colors we picked out are perfect for it. We got 5 colors of paint for the nursery. The main colors are a light green on top and a darker green on bottom with a creme stripe in between. We got two accent colors of green, as well.

So, it's coming together! 86 more days until the due date, and only 37 more days of work! How wonderful.