37 and 38 weeks

by Chris and Mel

Looks like I reneged on my promise to update the blog every week. Let's pretend that it's last week, and that this picture from last week is not a week old (37 weeks):

The 37 week milestone was pretty exciting, since now I am in the "window" and in theory labor could begin at any second. I feel a bit like a ticking time bomb at work, and I think all the old guys are pretty nervous that I might pop at any second! It's kind of fun - all I have to do is grab my belly and breathe a little loudly and they stare at me with terrified looks in their eyes. But, despite my post-37 week status there are no signs of impending baby. My money isn't on an early delivery right now.


In the meantime we've kept busy. We've been getting stuff set up for the baby, including-but not limited to-a "pack N play" and a car seat. For those of you who haven't had kids in a while, a pack N play is a what they called a playpen when I was a kid that has an insert that lets you use it as a bassinet. It also has a thing on it that looks like a tricorder from Star Trek, who's function I have yet to determine. A car seat is still called a car seat, but now you have to have it professionally inspected by the fire department. I honestly don't know what there is to inspect-the design is pretty simple and it comes with handy leveling bubbles. I say that now, but I'm sure we'll fail the inspection.

For the record, I think the tricorder adaptor is supposed to make the Pack N Play vibrate and play music, because apparently that is the way you get these modern babies to sleep. Also, scanning for alien life forms.


Anyway, apparently things around here haven't been exciting/stressful enough with just the big move and the imminent parenthood, so Chris and I decided to make it more interesting by throwing "buying a house" into the mix. That's right - we finally found a good home for Baby Pat in Maryland and we are pretty excited! Here's a picture of the future Maryland Downey abode:


It's a real cute colonial in a nice old neighborhood in Silver Spring, and assuming all goes well with the inspection (no sinkholes in the basement or skeletons in the closet) we should close sometime in mid-November, after Pat has arrived but in time for the holidays. If you are interested in seeing more, there's some pictures posted at this site. Those of you who live in other parts of the country may be a bit surprised by how small it is, but trust us this is pretty good for the D.C. area. Getting a garage and driveway in this neighborhood was actually quite a coup!

We must be out of our minds.

A few people have asked me how the move will affect our commutes. Being the nerd that I am, I figured a picture is worth a thousand words, so I just made a picture. Melissa's commute will be a fair amount shorter. Mine will be about the same, I'll just come down the opposite side of the red line.

Wow, we've been writing so long another week has passed. Here's Melissa at 38 weeks. Where does the time go?