The home stretch...marks

Just shy of 8 months. I can't stay awake when I want to stay awake and I can't stay asleep when I want to stay asleep, which leads the way to the weird world of earlyearlymorning instant messaging and a-bit-later-than-midnight snacks. I sometimes use two pillows - one to keep me from rolling on my back and one to support my cantilevering belly - and no blankets. It gets too hot, especially when we unplug our space heater and forget to change it from the default 95 degrees.

I've had a cold since Sunday, and the sneezes got pretty violent for a while there. I think a combination of sneezing and getting kicked bruised my side a little bit. Poor kid. Can you imagine being inside of somebody during a sneezing fit? Terrifying.

Andy's really stepping up to the challenge - making the dinners (or opting for Taco Tuesday, if it's Tuesday), doing all the dishes, being brave enough to let me go to bed at 8:30, scrubbing the bathroom, coaching me on blowing my doublestuft nose so I don't sniff to death in the night, making me giggle until - combined with the womb pushing up against my diaphragm - I literally can't breathe. He takes good care of me.

Things are slowly falling into place. I don't think I ever experienced much of "the nesting instinct," but I would like to clean our house quite a bit more before the baby comes. Mostly because it needs to get done and it will be that much harder with a baby around. We're still getting together all the equipment, though we more or less have every big item that we need. I've been putting every blanket/burp rag/sock/onesie/plush toy/and so on through the wash, and then I've packed them all in a big suitcase so they don't get dusty. We're mostly packed for the hospital - I've got hygienic items, nursing items, a book for Andy and I to read together, clothes for all of us.

That's when it hits me, when I look at his clothes. They're so, so small. And as I fold up his clothes I can't help but imagine his tiny body in them and I want to hold him so bad. It's true that a lot of things can make me cry these days, and that's one of them.