Still chugging along

It has been 21 days since my last post, so I figure I had better get on it before my cousin in China yells at me. By the way, Emily, congrats on your own new daughter. You have been a warm and compassionate person your entire life and I am certain that you are an amazing mother!

Now on to our own update. We have been in our house for a little over a month now. We got everything moved out of our old apartment and into the house by December 20th. In the midst of our moving, we managed to get the bathroom redone, most of the walls in the first floor painted, and new carpet installed. We are currently restoring the wood floors in two of our rooms (one will be the nursery), and we will be getting some electrical work done as well. In the midst of making cosmetic improvements we have stumbled across some things that needed to be fixed, but on the whole we have been fortunate to have a house that has been relatively easy to convert into something that feels a little more like our own every day.

Erin is doing well. With 10 weeks to go in her pregnancy we feel like the time will both fly by quickly and drag on slowly simultaneously. She is very healthy and everything continues to go smoothly with the pregnancy. We still haven't completely settled on a name for the child yet and we still have various nursery things to collect, but I think we will manage to pull it together by the time the small person gets here.

What more can I say? Everything is well and with a little luck we can have most of our house updates/repairs done by the end of the year. Sorry this isn't a long update, but life has been moving along far too fast to think about much else.

Playing catch-up

Well, I see that it has been a few weeks since my last post.  Allow me to give you a brief update. 

We finally closed on our house the day before Thanksgiving.  More surprising than that was that the woman who had owned it had managed to get everything completely out of the house and had cleaned it for us before she left.  We were very pleased to be able to step into our new house later that evening.  My mother and step-father were there to see the house in all of it's extremely dated beauty and we immediately started calling contractors and painters and such to make changes to the place before we moved in.  We have our contractor hired but we are still looking for someone to paint and lay carpet.  I am going to personally handle pulling up carpet and restoring the hardwood floors underneath in two of our rooms.  We have begun moving our stuff to locations in the house that are not going to be affected by anything else.  We intend to be moved by the 20th so our current landlord will be able to get his crew into our old apartment to clean and paint before the next person moves in.

Moving in December is about as fun as you might expect.  Not too much snow to speak of (thank goodness) but wearing a bulky coat can make lifting some things kind of interesting.  Plus, Erin is not able to help with any of the heavy lifting so I am getting a bit of a workout these days.  I will need to find help moving the big items (furniture, washer/dryer, etc.).  Frankly, we may end up hiring someone to do that as every strong person I know either lives far away or they are injured and shouldn't be lifting things like that.

As far as Erin is concerned, she is doing ok.  The pregnancy is progressing just fine and mother and baby are both as healthy as can be.  We have officially entered the third trimester and the baby is still breach.  There is still time for her to turn, but if she does not then Erin might have to have a C-section, which she is really not keen on.

Erin and I love the idea of having a baby.  We can't wait to be parents and we are looking forward to all of the changes it will bring.  However, as much as Erin is looking forwards to being a mother, she absolutely HATES being pregnant.  Some women don't have any problems through their pregnancy and everything is absolutely smooth sailing.  Erin has a lot of pain and, as with most every pregnant women, she hates always having to buy new clothes because she doesn't fit into her old ones -- even though she will most likely outgrow the new ones within a month or two.  Fortunately none of her problems have anything to do with the fact that she is diabetic.  She is just miserable all the time.  I wish I could help her more with that.  I guess that lifting heavy boxes is my load to carry.  The only difference is that I can set my load down and rest and she has hers all day, every day.

More updates when I can.  Life is, to say the least, very busy these days.

Why does nothing ever go smoothly?

Let me start by saying that everything is fine with Erin and the baby.  It seems as if I felt it kick once, but every time Erin announces that the baby is kicking and I should feel her tummy the baby stops moving at once.  Hopefully my amazing powers to calm the child with a touch will continue after she is born. 

No, our problems are regarding the house we have been trying to buy.  I'll shorten part of the drama for you.  We saw this house several months ago and it was pretty over-priced.  We made a bit of a low-ball bid and after some going back and forth we walked away after our final offer we not accepted.  Then, a month or so after that, our final bid was accepted.  We were still interested in the house and the fun dance of house buying began.

Skip ahead to about a month and a half ago.  Our seller had signed papers accepting our offer and we set a date for November 16th to close.  In the mean time we had the place inspected and noticed that they still hadn't packed one box.  But, we still had three weeks before closing and this was an estate sale so nobody was still living in the house.  While we were concerned, we were still optimistic.

Well, the 16th was upon us and we had not really heard from the seller despite the efforts of lots of people.  Finally we found out that the sellers still had not moved anything out of the house.  Now we have some livid people who had expected this to be a done deal -- not only us but our realtor, our lawyer, and her realtor.  Everyone starts getting very serious about contacting the seller on our behalf to get this thing in gear.  We start to panic because the approval of our mortage runs out at the end of the month and nobody will be working on this over the Thanksgiving holiday.  Then word comes from our realtor that the sellers have started to move stuff out of the house and it looks like we might be able to end this drama in the three days prior to Thanksgiving.  It isn't ideal, but we'll take it.

Then yesterday we are contacted by the receptionist of our lawyer who says that the buyer will not be able to close on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving (as had been scheduled) because they still have some things to move.  This leaves us one whole day in which to have this thing signed for (the Monday after Thanksgiving) or we have to re-apply for a mortage, which could land us with a higher interest rate amongst other things.

So, the Wilburn's aren't happy right now but there isn't anything we can really do about it.  The thing is, it really isn't about the house.  This is about the fresh start that we want to coincide with the birth of our child.  Many people will get a nursery ready when their baby is coming, but we have set some higher goals.  Maybe we have taken on too much, but it is what we want to do and it really sucks when your plans get smacked around by circumstances beyond your control.  In the mean time we will continue to pack up our apartment and get ready for the big move -- when and if that happens.

Swelling

By now you may have guessed that my entry titles have more than one meaning.

Yes, swelling refers to body parts.  Poor Erin.  I know that body changes are an expected part of pregnancy, but it is just one more thing I would save her from if I could.  She hates her clothes and she feels unattractive.  Nothing I say will help her feel attractive, but I continue to tell her anyway -- even if she doesn't believe me.  Some people never quite get the idea that it is possible to find someone attractive no matter what they look like.  In fact, were that not the case, I probably wouldn't have ever gone on a date in my life, much less gotten married.  People have so much more to offer than the way they look.  You can put a piece of gold in a cardboard box and you still have a treasure.  And no, I'm not calling my wife a cardboard box.

Swelling also refers to how life seems to be growing so rapidly these days that it is hard to keep up with it.  Gotta pack.  Gotta fix some stuff with the new house.  Gotta move into the new house.  Gotta prepare for the baby.  Gotta find day care.  Gotta have the baby.  Gotta take care of the baby.  In other words -- gotta lot to do.

And, I find that when I don't think I can do much more that I find new energy to get things done that need to be done.  There is so much important stuff to do that resting doesn't seem like an option -- but for once I don't mind.  This isn't stess born of frustration.  This is a stress that comes with the anticipation of new and exciting changes.  It isn't always fun but the light at the end of this tunnel seems so bright that I am a lot happier about working to get there.

Every time I see my wife these days, I smile in anticipation of what is to come.  That makes her even more beautiful in my eyes and I could absolutely care less about the way she looks on the outside because all I see when I look at her is our future together.  I have a good feeling that our future will be wonderful.

The first _______

Yesterday was the first snowfall for this portion of New York.  That tends to tick off most people.  I hear questions like "why is this so early" and "what happened to fall".  True, fall and spring have become almost non-existent seasons, but you would think that people would be used to stuff like that by now.  And snow in mid-October certainly isn't unheard of.  I remember as a child that trick-or-treating was flat out canceled in my area one Halloween due to a winter storm that left nearly everything in sight covered in roughly half an inch of solid ice.  It was amazing to see even though it was very dangerous.  I don't think I even minded missing out on trick-or-treating that year because I could walk down the street and feel like I was living on Krypton.

Yesterday I took the dog out for her morning potty break before heading to work.  There was maybe an inch of snow stuck to the ground outside and it was still coming down in large, slowly drifting clumps.  It was really beautiful and I took a few minutes to watch, which is certainly preferable to watching the dog do her business.  I wish I could have stayed out longer, but I had places to be.  I started thinking then, and continued to think through the rest of the day, about the firsts in my daughter's life.  There will be the very first snowfall for her, when I imagine she will be staring up at the sky and crinkling up her nose when she gets hit by a particularly large snowflake.  I want to be there for all of those firsts -- first steps, first words, first day of school.  Those are the things I'm looking forward to.  I want to be there to help a new human experience the world for the first time.  I want to watch her go through the process of learning how things work, like the day she figures out that just because the toy went behind daddy's back doesn't mean that it doesn't exist anymore.

I'm looking forward to looking at the world through a fresh pair of eyes.  I'm sure it will help me learn almost as much as she will, and I look forward to having those experiences together.

Kind of dumbfounded

A girl.  We are having a girl.  At least, the doctor says he is about 97% sure that we are having a girl.  It is hard to tell since our daughter seems to be very modest and doesn't like to have any pictures taken -- just like mom and dad.  In the last round of ultrasounds she covered up her face a lot and kept her legs crossed so it took some effort to get a peek at her gender.  I would very much apprciate it if that same modesty continues for the rest of her life.

So, to be honest, I was in a little bit of a daze when I heard it was a girl.  Please be aware that I was not hoping for one sex over the other -- at least not for myself.  I think Erin and I were hoping for a boy for the sake of her father, who has never had a little boy around to show things to and experience new things with.  He has two daughters and his son-in-law (and future son-in-law) aren't really the same kind of guy he is.  I love my father-in-law to death but he and I are pretty different people.  Still, I am hoping he will take me up on my planned requests to have him show me how to do home repair and maintainance.  I think he will like having the chance to show a guy the ropes and I can have the benefit of learning things I didn't know how to do before.  True, those are things I would have loved to have learned from my own father, but I'm the one who moved several hundred miles away and that makes stopping over to help with home repairs kind of inconvenient.  So, I hope Erin's dad will enjoy helping me with the new house.  Still, I'm not a replacement for a grandson that I'm sure he would have enjoyed greatly.

Aside from that, the news that we were expecting a girl still stunned me because, frankly, I don't understand women at all.  Little boys are easy to figure out.  We are kind of like walking Id's -- we pretty much do whatever we feel like and there isn't a lot of deep thinking involved.  If we feel like putting a bucket on our heads and running into walls we do it because it seemed like a good idea at the time -- you know, before the concussion and the getting in trouble.  But no matter how long I have studied human behavior and no matter how many letters I can put behind my name to say that I have advanced degrees pertaining to knowledge of humans in general, I will never understand women.  For that reason, the idea of having a daughter frankly intimidates me.  I think I was mentally prepared for the wear-your-thoughts-on-your-sleeve behavior of a boy, but I just don't know what to expect from a girl. 

Maybe that's what I should be asking my father-in-law for help with.

The halfway point

Well, we reached four and a half months.  Frankly, every day that everything seems ok is really a blessing, so in some ways the time has flown by and in some ways I have been anxious about each day that passes.  I could say that we can relax a little more now, but there is a long way to go.  And, I am positive that the stress levels in the Wilburn household have nowhere to go but up.

The mortage papers for our new house were signed on Friday.  We will be moving in a month and that is, by any standard, stressful enough.  At least this time we are only moving about 12 miles away and not 3 hours away.  And, since we are kind of lazy and we didn't ever have a lot of room in this apartment, much of the things we own are still boxed up from a year ago.

I've entered a busy time at work and there is lots to do to prepare for 2010.  I hope to have the vast majority of my scheduling for next year done by the end of the month, but that means some hard-working days in the office while I will be coming home to more hard work in order to move in the second half of November.  Plus, I am hoping to begin work on a study I want to do involving dual diagnosis in individuals with developmental disabilities and, if I get some help, write a federal grant proposal to fund that study.

Still, stress is all relative.  While there is a whole lifetime of stress on the horizon you really have to keep things in perspective.  It is easy sometimes to think of the enormity of all of the things that lie ahead and throw yourself into a panic state.  I choose to focus right now on the fact that my wife and my child are both healthy and as happy as can be expected.  Everything else is just a temporary hurdle.

A firm foundation

Once again there is the strong possibility that we will have a new house.  I refuse to say that we have it since the last time I thought that we had one it snaked out from under us.  However, whatever luck that I have that drives me forward seems to have worked in our favor once again.  While the house we would have bought certainly had it's positives, it also had some problems.  In almost every way, the house we may end up in is so much better than the one that got away.  See, my life is absolutely full of instances where it appears as though I have had some sort of misfortune, only to have that turn around and have my situation be better in the end.  This may indeed be one of those times.

The new house is an estate sale.  In other words, the people who owned it passed away.  They decorated the place as people from past generations do and Erin and I will have some cosmetic changes to make.  But, aside from those things, the house has what I truly look for -- a strong foundation, a good heart, and comforting shelter.  I could say that the house has an excellent basement with absolutely no moisture problems and the walls and floors are solid.  I could say that the furnace, the water heater, and the electrical wiring and breaker box are all new.  I could tell you that the roof is new.  But, a house is more than the sum of it's parts. 

If this house is to be the first one that my child grows up in then it had better be a solid one -- from the basement to the roof and one where the family inside is equally strong and secure.

Stunned...

Last night the wife and I went to Target.  She headed for the women's underwear so naturally I went to the electronics department. 

I can't help it.  I think that everybody has a section of the store that they automatically want to go to whether they need anything in that department or not.  When we are young, naturally the toy department calls to us.  As we get older and our tastes mature we gravitate toward other areas of the store or other stores altogether.  My department of choice is now the electronics department.  It is my safe zone in the store.

Lately I have found myself wandering out of my safe zone.  The electronics department only makes me sad these days because it is filled with things that I may never get again.  Priorities shift.  Instead, I have found myself walking in the baby departments.  I don't look at the clothes because I don't have any concern about them.  No, I now walk amongst the baby strollers and cars seats and diapers and various other things that babies need with my mouth wide open at how much these things cost and with a multitude of thoughts running through my head. 

This is what a pack and play is?  How do I know which one won't cave in and crush my child to death?  Do the shocks on some strollers really matter that much?  Do you really need a changing table?  How long will it take me to go through a package of disposable diapers?  What do you mean you have to "special order" good cloth diapers?  They actually make double breast pumps?  Is that so one boob doesn't feel left out at any given time?  Did I miss some class that teaches all of this stuff?

I take some comfort in knowing that I understand a fair amount about developmental milestones and child psychology and even what toys are developmentally appropriate and helpful at any given stage of a child's life.  But, that has almost NOTHING to do with being a parent.  My supervisor laughed when she told me that everything I had learned about children academically would do me no good as a parent.  I'm pretty sure she's right.

Will you be seeing some scared soon-to-be-daddy posts coming up here soon?  Yes, you most certainly will.

Out of my hands

I’ve decided that it is a bit of a challenge being the husband of a pregnant wife.


I’m sure that is probably not only an understatement, but an amazingly obvious one as well. I’m sure many of you think that I’m about to complain about hormonal mood changes or strange cravings. No, what I find the hardest these days is knowing that there are things I just can’t help with.

When she is in pain or uncomfortable in some way I can help sometimes, but not always. I get medicine or comfort food or I give hugs, but it really tears me up sometimes when I know that I can only help so much. I’ve always been the kind of person who wants to ease the burden of others, but I don’t feel like I can do enough this time.

Maybe I should accept that I am doing my best and get over myself. But, that doesn’t mean that I won’t stop trying.

Welcome to my strangeness!

In the coming days...weeks...months...years...til I get tired of it, I will be posting thoughts here.  I will attempt to keep it family-friendly, but I do get ranty somtimes.  Mostly, I have created this site to keep family and friends up-to-date on the lives of Erin and I (and the baby on the way that we have nicknamed "Monty").  Hopefully I will do a good job at keeping this up.  Then again, this may be my one and only post.  Only time will tell.