Max: 41. Expected: 27. Who's Counting?

Me.

So I had originally begun a post about "Enjoying the Waiting." Going to the mom blogs and posts from about 30 weeks onward showed a growing core of anxious moms eager to get these little buns out of the oven. I felt no such eagerness.

As I would reply when people asked: "Oh no, I am not so uncomfortable that I have forgotten that there is a forever baby on the other end of this. Who I am excited to meet. But not just yet."

And then I did two things:

Close Approximation of Actual Photo

First - I went camping at 35 weeks pregnant. I know. I know. Who does that? But it's been a long tradition in my family to camp every summer at Suttle Lake in the Deschuttes National Forest - camping pregnant, with infants, no matter what for the dedicated core. Speaking to this dedication is a fabulous photo of my younger sister running around in her birthday suit and sitting on her training potty under a tree (a Douglas Fir if I recall correctly). Priceless.



I slept on a camper bed courtesy of my Aunt's tent trailer with only two pillows (left side only if you want to breathe thank you very much). I waddled, I mean walked, to the toilet (hole) at least once a night by flashlight or moonlight. I went hiking and swimming despite a growing baseline of breathlessness. Uncomfortable. But not entirely unpleasant. I also ate delicious food and enjoyed the excellent company of my sister, cousins, family and friends. And next year I dread look forward to carting a toddling 10 month old around the trails on her first Suttle Lake camping adventure - Tradition!(cue music from the Fiddler On the Roof.) Tradition!

Note that the Pacific Northwest (where I was before coming back to Chicago) was having record RAINFALL in June...

Second - I travelled back to Chicago. Where it has been hot as blazes. And I missed most of the heat wave, 100 degree + temperatures. As I was sitting in my dining room with my air conditioner on full blast, with a friend who was wearing a cardigan, and said, "God, I am so hot," and she looked at me with raised eyebrows I knew something was off. My body temperature mostly. 

And so the countdown has begun. Because summer heat isn't going anywhere between now and D(ue)-Day.