A short note of sunny encouragement.

I feel like I've dropped off the face of the earth. I hear that's okay when you're nine months pregnant. I don't feel like blogging a lot because I feel like all I will do is complain. Because this is the fun part. Speaking of which, can I just say I hate false labor? I never really had it with the girls so it's a new and fun experience. While not really physically painful, it's driving me batty. Also I'm probably going to have a nervous breakdown. Stupid contractions. Also, our furnace broke and our house is cold. That is definitely helping my emotional well-being. Also, Jessie is starting a new job next week. This is a good thing but for some reason it seemed prudent to put it in the middle of my list of awesome things. So you can see why blogging is at the top of my list of priorities. Just one of many things being left on the wayside as I travel into irrational hormonal hermitage. Other things include dishes, laundry, cleaning, entertaining my children, cooking, church, and Words with Friends. So you see, this is getting serious. I'll let you know if the governor declares a state of emergency. Until then, direct all inquiries through our disaster management guru Jessie, who manages to maintain a happy demeanor by being amused at my eccentricities. Thank goodness for long-suffering spouses. Until next time, I'll be on the couch timing contractions and strategizing baby eviction plans.

All about pregnancy and me and pregnancy and babies.

I have a little bit of a one track mind lately. Can you blame me? When your every move feels like a freight train, you start to get a little obsessed with your stomach. And if it will ever return to normal proportions. We have five weeks until the due date, which sounds really close but not nearly close enough. Today we got a little crazy, and since Madeline is still obsessed with chains from Christmas, we combined our obsessions and created this:

It's a little hard to see, but you should be impressed. This is our Ali Baba countdown. It's highly complex and amazing. We have two more weeks of white chains. Then we move into yellow, which means CAUTION! FULL TERM! 10% chance of baby or maybe snow! But based on past experience, this is a depressing phase in which I will hopefully wonder every day if maybe today is the day, but nothing will happen except an excess of walking and drinking pineapple juice. My birthday has a special chain with balloons and birthday cake, because Madeline has expressed great concern that there is birthday cake this month. Then on Valentine's Day we have the special green link in honor of my due date. Green for go time, obviously. Not that we'll have a baby by then. Then we move into red territory. Red meaning danger: Cami is liable to be extremely hormonal and dangerous and ready to consume castor oil. Red meaning: We love you Ali Baba, but you're late and if you know what's good for you you will exit the premises immediately. Then, at the top, a handmade visual depiction of our new little man on the 22nd, which is my induction date. This was not my choice. I have no qualms with being induced the second I hit my due date. I also love epidurals and other medical interventions. I'm probably on some dangerous mother list somewhere. But back to induction: My doctor is out of town the week of my due date, so it was early induction or waiting it out. Woe is me. I'm going to be an unhappy blimp by the 22nd. Speaking of which:

I feel like I'm bursting. I know, other women have been bigger. But I feel like this is the biggest I've ever been pregnant, and I can't look away from my slow descent into rotundity.

Anyway. You've probably been thoroughly inundated with pregnancy updates now, so we'll give you a break. Thanks for sticking through. I promise that in a month there will be a reward for your patience. And mine. I have been assured that no women has ever been pregnant forever.

Happy New Year. Check.

Ha. Did I say I was working on a New Year's post? I'm only about four days late. Blame it on the fun we're having trying to get two girls to sleep in the same room. On the bright side, they've been sleeping in a little bit later than usual, which has the unintended side effect of proving to me I can be functional at seven if I don't have to wake up an hour before that. But I have thought about some New Year's goals. Mostly they are pretty short term. Survive until I have this baby. Try not to let my kids run wild. Try to keep my house in some semblance of order. Huge goals like that. I've decided to keep my sanity by not trying to make huge goals right now. So in honor of New Year's, I will instead give you a list of goals we've already accomplished this year, because we are awesome. Because that's much more fun than coming up with more things you have to do.

1. Move girls into the same room. Check. We won't mention the fact that we're still miles away from smooth napping and bedtimes. But their beds are in the same physical space. Score.

2. Get ready for baby. Check. Crib, car seat, bassinet, clothes, hospital registration, diapers, binkis, etc. Jessie got motivated and now all systems are go. The only problem is we've still got six weeks until D-day. Drat it all. And we haven't settled on a name yet. But babies don't need names. Just diapers. So we can totally cross this off.

(Random belly picture to show you how hard we are working on this baby thing. We take our goals very seriously.)

3. Put away Christmas. Check. We have successfully killed the Christmas spirit. All cheery decor has been safely stowed and hidden away. The front room is back to normal and Christmas treats were consumed and converted to fat. The piles of toys all over our house with no home are a different story. We don't talk about that.

4. Party like it's 2012. Check. We are fun machines. We've attended New year's parties, played Jessie's new Ticket to Ride game, attended a Jazz game/girls night, eaten eclairs, made cookies, and basically just been awesome. We're exhausted. But awesome.

5. Fulfill public speaking duties. Check. Jessie was supposed to give a talk in church on Sunday, but didn't have to because he spoke after a returned missionary who kindly used the whole meeting and got Jessie off the hook. Jessie knew this would probably happen, so he wasn't broken up about it, and I feel like this has probably gotten him off the hook for talking for another year. And more importantly, gets me off the hook to have to talk with him. Score.

That seems like a good list. Suddenly I feel very accomplished and productive. For the first time this year. I love revisionist histories. I feel like you all should go set New Year's goals to be as awesome as us. Hope your year is a ball of fun so far.