-* Merry Christmas! *- Check-In Thread

[*MamaJen*]

By popular demand, it's the amazing Christmas check-in thread.
We had a really beautiful Christmas Eve. I had been a little sad that I couldn't go home for Christmas this year, but we spent the first part of the night with my sister and her new baby boy, then we went to Aaron's family's house (they live in town) and did the family thing there. Then we came home and built a fire and snuggled on the sofa. We revived a tradition from both our childhood's and opened one present each. There are five stocking hanging above the mantle now, one for the baby, one for each of us, and two for the dogs. That's my family now.
Today is my first official due date, though 12/28 is the other contender. I hope baby stays put today.
Merry Christmas, everyone.

[Lizzardbits]

LOL!!! looks like you beat me to the punch, Jen! Aww well, Great minds think alike-right!?!

40+2 and no contrax. That in and of itself is a great Christmas present.

[*MamaJen*]

Here's an editorial from this morning's NY Times. For those of us on the brink of having babies, it somehow seems particularly apropos.

When Christmas Morning Comes
Editorial
Published: December 25, 2007
NY Times

This is a simple holiday. Ask any child, or, better yet, ask yourself what you recall from your own childhood Christmases. Presents, yes, and shopping and decorations and the return of familiar songs and the smells of baking and perhaps the cadence of a few verses from the early chapters of Matthew and Luke.
What persists above all is the feeling of finally going to bed on a dark winter’s night full of hope for what the morning will bring. Even jaded adults can remember how that felt, and they remember it as viscerally as they remember anything.
The emotional truth in that transition lies at the heart of Christmas. It captures the most basic rhythm of our lives — going to bed at night and getting up in the morning — and makes us keenly, happily aware of it. That rhythm is all the more stirring because the season is so penetrating, the winter darkness so long.
Both of the basic stories we tell about Christmas, the shepherds in their fields by night and the peregrinations of Santa Claus, fill the darkness with life and possibility. A stranger, an extragalactic visitor wise enough to look past all the shopping, might be forgiven for thinking that this is the festival in which we celebrate the magic of sleep.
After all, what other holiday do we attend in robes and pajamas?
The optimism, the generosity, the charitable warmth of Christmas do stem, of course, from the pattern and the meaning of the biblical story. They have their source, too, in the sense of regeneration now that we’ve turned this darkest corner of the solar year.
Christmas is imbued with a more everyday hope as well, a recognition that the transition from sleep to waking always carries with it the immeasurable gift of a new day. The very premise is hopeful.
No one expects to wake every day as joyfully as a child at Christmas, or to sleep as badly the night before. The gift of possibility is there every morning.

[CowsRock]

Happy EDD to meeeeee. Please don't come today baby! I was feeling pretty crampy last night but let's just say I should be making a post in the stinky thread so I think it was just gas.

Actually I guess I don't really have anything to add to that. My parents are coming over today to celebrate Christmas with us. I'm hoping we'll have the energy to do another trial run of the birth pool after they leave, it should be early enough. Then tomorrow my mom comes back alone and she'll be staying for a while...til I kick her out, or til baby comes or until we give up on baby coming. Her job shuts down for a while between Christmas and New Years so we have some time to play with before she starts dipping into her leave. We'll probably do a lot of feeding of the freezer. I didn't put much in there yet even though I had lots of plans. I'm sure that must be what baby is waiting for.

I'd like to at least get past today and tomorrow. I'm not opposed to going into January except that one of my friends who is supposed to be attending the birth is leaving for Mexico on New Year's day. I'm not sure how long she'll be gone. I've been working on adjusting my thinking about who will be there. Our Bradley teacher does doula work too but I'm having a hard time with the cost considering I'm already paying the midwife out of pocket. I have another friend that would be great but she is just so far away and has two young kids and I don't know if her mom-in-law is still staying with them to even take care of the kids...too many unknowns and I don't want to make it stressful for any of us. Ugh, like my sig says, I'm just a tiny spirit soul and not the one who's in control...all I can do is keep my mind open to possibilities being presented and see how it all plays out. If I try too hard to "plan" something that can't be planned then all I'm going to do is set myself up to have to work over a big mental hurdle if things don't work out to my ideas. I'll be there and my hubby will be there and baby will come. I assume my midwife and/or her assistant will make it, and I assume my mom will be able to be there, and I assume that if an additional friend is needed then it will somehow work out that someone will be available and if it doesn't then I didn't need an additional person. And if the other people don't make it either then that is how it goes, no worries. Sorry, I just subjected everyone to my mental gymnastics to return to my neutral mental space.

I better go clean up a bit before my parent's arrive. Can't wait to see my dad's face when he sees the birth pool all set up and waiting.

[transformed]

Checking in...

WITH A BABY!!!!

:

Jenny

[CowsRock]

Originally Posted by transformed

Checking in...

WITH A BABY!!!!

WOW! Congrats! Can't wait to hear more.

[starry_mama]

Hi mamas! Here, no baby. Had a stressful morning, but then I had a big ol' cry and now I'm eating chocolate and I feel much better.

[Belleweather]

Nothing nothing, tralalala... Labor Support SWAT Team arrives tomorrow at 7:3pm, so perhaps that's what the baby is waiting for?

Other than that, we had a fantastic Christmas morning. It was actually kind of nice to take it slow and be able to open presents at DS's own pace so he could play with everything. And, miracle of all miracles, he got mostly fun, open-ended and age appropriate toys, even from the inlaws!!

[CowsRock]

Originally Posted by starry_mama

Hi mamas! Here, no baby. Had a stressful morning, but then I had a big ol' cry and now I'm eating chocolate and I feel much better.

glad you are feeling better. I just had a great dose of chocolate too.

[PGinthe612]

Originally Posted by starry_mama

Hi mamas! Here, no baby. Had a stressful morning, but then I had a big ol' cry and now I'm eating chocolate and I feel much better.

Sounds just like my morning, minus the chocolate, which i must go in search of now!

40+3, lots o' cramps last night, no baby. I'm shooting for the weekend.

[DucetteMama21842]

Still here.. no baby...

I'm the hippiest kinda girl in my church... so all the girls that were due a month after me have already been induced/sectioned and have their babies already. Somehow I ended up being last and everyone's waiting on me..

[Elsaraw]

Merry Xmas!
Nothing new today, quiet home day with dh and the cat.
Other than being an emotional train wreck I have no feelings that the baby will come out this year at all.
I think there is only a small handful of us pregnant people left....... ??

[HumbleLuna]

I am still here. Today is my due date. We really need this baby to come before the 30th before Nana flys home.Please, please send me some labor vibes.

[CowsRock]

Originally Posted by mamablueberry

I am still here. Today is my due date. We really need this baby to come before the 30th before Nana flys home.Please, please send me some labor vibes.

: : : :

[look11]

Still here... 40 + 5. Had the most wonderful, relaxing Christmas at home with Dh and DD. We haven't seen another soul all day! I'm really glad baby stayed in since it was just magical to have it be one last Christmas with the 3 of us. DD was sweet and thankful. The day was mellow. I decided last minute to make us a roast and Yorkshire Pudding with homemade marshmallows dipped in chocolate for dessert. I even made the dining room all FANCY. We have NEVER had a fancy dinner in this house (2 years) and the sight of my husband and daughter sitting in the candle light with the silver and good china seriously brought tears to my eyes.

I'm so thankful! It was like last celebration of our current family, and now we are so ready to welcome baby and become a new family! Ugh... the pg emotions are welling up!

My mother gave me the children's book "Someday," and I totally broke down reading it to DD this morning. Have you read it? It's so sweet, but careful, it may kill you!

So, physically, I think I'm finally ready to be done being pg. I'm extremely achy and sore in the crotch and now the lower back is acting up. I feel like a waddling duck and can't cope with bending over, climbing stairs, etc. And our only bathroom is upstairs... sigh. Anyway, hope everyone else had wonderful days.

CONGRATULATIONS to the new mamas!!!!