8 Weeks Remain Folks!

I have been so busy at home and at work I have really not had much time to pay attention to the fact that I'm pregnant! Work is busy as ever and I am really feeling wiped out by the time I leave for the day which, of course, is when my other full time job of being "mom" picks back up with no rest for the weary. At home we have several projects inside and out we are tackling, as well as moving Elliot to his new room and new bed and dealing with some periodic unpleasant changes to his behavior. Sigh.

In that vein, terrible twos should be called something else. On one hand, they're great. He's extremely verbal and very funny and loves to help with household tasks and show us how he can do things all by himself. On the other hand, I think he is sometimes a pod person who likes to defy what I say just for kicks and enjoys melting down in Macy's because I won't let him bang on a cool glass table that makes a really fun and loud noise when it is struck. So, maybe it should be pre-adolescence, or the "preview" twos. Challenging, trying, funny, heartbreaking, inspiring, and frustrating, yep. Terrible, I'll reserve judgment on that for now.

Meanwhile, pregnancy has made everything really difficult at this point. It is just so damn hard to come home and deal with all the physical stuff of having a toddler while shuffling and limping because A: I'm tired as hell, and B: I am in so much pain. What was an inconvenient and almost "cute" quirk of my last trimester with Elliot has been a nightmare with the second pregnancy. I developed pelvic pain early on which, coupled with muscle inflammation due to an unstable pelvis, pretty much makes doing anything - walking, laying, rolling over and getting up - really painful. Since I like to consider myself someone who just "powers through" that's what I've done. But it is getting worse all the time and I don't know how much longer I'll be able to take our nightly family walk. We used to go a couple of miles, now going to the end of the street is a once-a-week kind of occurrence. We did that tonight and as I sit here it feels like I am breaking in two. I don't think I could ever be pregnant again because my leg might just fall off. In Target the other day I was incredibly tempted to just hop on one of those scooters . . . I really was.

Oh one more thing. So Elliot has really come to love looking at my belly and hugging it, asking me "Is that my baby in there?" He also loves to blow zerberts on it. This is all very cute and lovable - at home. But the other day we were in a store and he apparently wanted to see the baby and my bellybutton (which he loves because it popped out). I was so distracted trying to find what I was looking for on the shelf that I didn't even realize that he was lifting up my shirt until I heard a "BBBBrrrrraaaappppp" coming from my midsection. It sounded like a super loud fart and my stretch marks were out there for everyone looking. Classy. Elliot thought it was hilarious.

you can take a girl out of eaton rd, but you cant take eaton rd out of the girl

i miss my neighbors. i miss my friends. i miss waving hello on my way to work in the morning. i miss bumping into everyone on our nightly after dinner walk. i miss the feel of the little friendly university heights street where i came to meet the best friends around. i feel far away, lost, not up on the hustle and bustle of life, distant and lonely.
eaton rd will always be part of me. its where i made my friends. its where i lived when my kids were born. its where they started their lives and development. its where i will always feel i'm home.
i live 2 miles away, yet it seems so far. 2 miles, to a better school district with a better pool (understatement), but without the sense of belonging we had before. dont get me wrong- we LOVE our new house (wet basement, disaster of a yard/landscaping and all). we know it was the right decision for us. but, eaton rd will always be home.
this blog started as a baby fever blog. and look how much has changed! gosh- ive had two kids. jami and cara each have 1 (so far), and abby is on the way to two. maybe its that once baby fever is over, thats when we leave our comfy little eaton rd home?
i dont have baby fever. its gone.
i want to go to cara's today to cuddle with liam. i want to hold and play with little babies, yet give them back when diapers need changing. and i want to sleep all night, uninterrupted.
am i selfish? maybe.....but ive been there and done it all myself too. and now, im psyched that my kids can tell me what they want with words. im psyched that it appears we may no longer need to buy diapers (dont quote me on that one yet. its only been 1.5 weeks!). im psyched that levi and i can go on "dates" and stay up late cuddling and watching movies, and he can have sleepovers with his grandmas and his friends. i love sleeping all night, although i could do without the 6:30am wake-up calls even on weekends....life is great. i can't complain.
but now you'll understand why you may see me on eaton rd, wandering up and down the street, even though i no longer live there. i miss it and i miss you, my friends. but im just a little ways away. lets not let our friendship change at all.