Enjoying Summer

We had a week that was relatively uneventful, but enjoyable. Work is work, and the next month to month and a half will be fairly packed  for me in terms of stuff I have to get done, so I've been working on making a list and setting arbitrary dates for finishing things. But by mid August or so, I expect to be all done with major work things, and getting ready for baby full-time.

On Friday evening we had a new colleague and his partner over for dinner, and we intended to barbecue but there was an unexpected thunderstorm. It wasn't major, but just in case there was giant hail like the previous Friday, we ordered pizza instead. On Saturday during the day we did some baby shopping, and although going out shopping did not result in any purchases, we did make some purchases online. Then on Saturday evening we had friends over for dinner.

Today we drove about an hour and fifteen minutes to a provincial park that has a big sandy beach on a lake. We spent the afternoon swimming and reading on the beach. This is something we could never really do in Oregon, since all the lakes there are either mountain lakes and extremely cold or dammed rivers and extremely cold or muddy-bottomed and full of salamanders. Before moving here I have not really had the pleasure of really good lake swimming, and it turns out that it's tons of fun :-)

We are doing our best to enjoy summer now as much as we can, since I'm not sure how I will feel by late summer, and this is our last summer just the two of us. Most of the people at the lake today were families with children, and I'm sure that we will continue to do lots of the same things that we do now, but it will definitely be different. So it makes sense to enjoy what we have now, and look forward to what is to come!

Many things

1. Our only shower is in a state of disrepair. I have two grab bars in the shower to help with balance, and a little over a week ago Jeff was washing his feet off and used one of the bars to help stabilize himself as he swung his feet out of the shower. As he pulled on the bar, the bar, the tile, and the wall behind it started to pull away. At first he was concerned that he had done something to break it, but right away it was clear that there was something serious wrong – he shouldn't have been able to break it even if he tried. There was definitely water that had gotten behind the tile, possibly a long time ago, possibly beginning before we even moved into the house, and in order for it to be even minimally safe for me to use the grab bar it needs to be fixed. We had one guy come in and take a look, and his "estimate" of how much it would cost to fix (which he said was not really an estimate, and don't hold him to any of it, because it could end up being quite a bit more) seemed outrageously high.

We had another company come take a look, and they gave us an exact price (assuming they do not find any additional damage) which was less than half of what the first guy said was "just a ballpark." They were very professional, and gave us a number of options for what we would like done and how, and we generally like them, so this is who we are going to go with. However, they have a backlog and so it could be 10 to 12 weeks before the shower gets fixed, and it is only thirteen weeks until my due date. Meanwhile, I have a grab bar that allows me to get in and out of the shower but not to move around once I am in, so I have to use a bath chair temporarily (which I already had for using in certain circumstances). The timing of this is not great, since my balance will just get worse and worse as I get bigger and bigger, but I suppose with all of that I might have needed to use the bath chair anyway.

2. Sleep is a constantly changing struggle, but we are adapting. Probably almost immediately after writing the blog post about sleeping on my back, it became uncomfortable to be on my back for very long. The baby has just gotten too heavy. I was lamenting that I might have to figure out how to sleep on my side after all, but my doctor suggested getting a wedge pillow to put under my right hip so that when I am lying on my back I am at a slight angle, which changes how the weight is distributed. There was not a single store in town that had wedge pillows in stock, so I had to order from Amazon and wait (I ended up ordering two different kinds because they were each less than fifteen dollars and I had to get up to twenty-five for free shipping, so I figured it couldn't hurt). It turns out these pillows are currently amazing for me. I put one under my right hip as suggested, and one next to my belly on the left side. The one under my hip changes the weight distribution just enough that it is comfortable to mostly be on my back again, and the one next to my belly makes it more comfortable to roll onto my side if I need to change positions. They are small, don't get in Jeff's way too much, and for the time being make it so that I can sleep. So I currently have five pillows either in bed with me or right next to the bed so I can access them easily if needed – one for my head, the two wedge pillows, one to go between my knees and ankles if I do roll onto my side, and another one to hug with my arms if I end up rolling onto my side. It is working for the time being, but it seems that things constantly change related to this!

3. On Friday we had the biggest hail I have ever seen:

You can't really tell from the video, but the diameter of each hailstone is about half an inch, maybe more. There was damage in the garden, but it seems like most of the plants will recover.

4. Koshka may be wary of how things are changing, but Maddy appears to like the new size and shape of my belly:

5. Yesterday we went to Regina's pride parade. It was bigger than Jeff thought it would be, much less crowded than I thought it would be, but a good time. I am a big fan of parades :-)

6. Yesterday evening we went for a walk at a park that is about a ten minute drive from our house. I had never been there before, and Jeff had only run/biked past it. It turned out to be a very lovely park and a nice walk.

I was reminded that when the conditions are right (the ground is reasonably level, there are no huge obstacles, the sidewalks are not deteriorating) going for a walk can be very nice in the summer (always while holding Jeff's hand for stability). The winter is always rough because it is so icy, and our neighborhood has patchwork sidewalks that mostly slant toward the road and change materials (concrete, asphalt, deteriorating concrete, gravel, concrete with big rocks in it, etc.) about every 10 feet. Going for walks can be something of an ordeal, so I had forgotten how nice it can be. With this reminder, I'm going to try to get out on walks as often as possible!

Ottawa was fun, scary heavy doll filled with rocks

We had an excellent visit to Ottawa. First we visited with Brandon, Krista, and Eric, then we went to our respective conferences (Canadian Psychological Association for me and Canadian Society for Brain, Behavior, and Behavioral Science for Jeff), and then visited Scott, Amica, and Rowan. We had lots of toddler time,

Reading to Eric

Teaching Rowan about old Nintendo

saw the sites,

At the Ottawa river with Brandon

On Parliament Hill

 and had the chance to visit some of Ottawa's more unusual offerings. We went out to a place called House of Targ where you can play video games, pinball, and get really good pierogies.

Video gaming at House of Targ

Last day in Ottawa with Rowan and Scott

 Since returning, we have been organizing our selves out work for the summer and organizing our plans for getting ready for the baby. There is a lot to do at work to get ready to be gone for an extended period of time, and trying to figure out how to get all that done can be a bit overwhelming but I'm sure it will all work out. We made a list of all the things we need to have ready before the baby comes, including things we need to buy, and we essentially filled each weekend for the next ten or so weeks with one or more of the most important things from the list. I think that this will mostly be fun, but it is also a lot of work. Yesterday we moved my desk and office things into the room that has been Jeff's office in order to start turning my office into a baby room. That was mostly work and not so much fun, but doing things like going to baby stores and garage sales should be better.

I think I may have mentioned that I have had a couple of sessions with an occupational therapist, specifically related to figuring out what kinds of adaptations I may need in order to be as independent as possible in taking care of the baby. One of the things that she mentioned was possibly trying certain things out with a weighted doll, which of course is nothing like a real baby that wriggles and such, but for certain things might be better than no preparation. For example, figuring out how I need to distribute weight for safe carrying – whether I can carry the baby in a car seat, whether I can wear the baby in a carrier, whether I can lift the baby out of the crib, etc. The problem was that we could not find a doll that was realistically weighted.

But on Friday I went to a baby store in search of a wedge pillow to help with positioning while sleeping (an ongoing issue which I will surely blog about again soon), and although they didn't have the pillow the woman at the store mentioned that they have weighted dolls that they use for letting people try out different baby carriers. I asked where they got them, and the woman explained that they make them from dolls they buy at Walmart which they fill with aquarium rocks. I was super excited by this, and armed with the knowledge that there are instructions online for how to do this, this morning I went to Walmart and bought a doll and some aquarium rocks. It took the better part of an afternoon, but now I have a doll that weighs a little over 9 pounds, which I can use for the purposes of occupational therapy. The doll is not perfectly realistic in terms of shape or distribution of weight, but it will absolutely serve my purposes.

Koshka is concerned about the doll

Both Jeff and I initially thought that it felt much heavier than 9 pounds, and looks a little scary, and Koshka seems to agree. But if she doesn't like this, she's in for quite a shock come September!