I've almost finished my first week of maternity leave. It was exceptionally hard to get used to on the first day- so, seeking things to do, I naturally decided it would be a good idea to go into work and finish up the last bits of filing. After about three hours and couple of cups of tea, I realised I had to ban myself from doing that again, or else I'll just be loitering around work non-stop.
After that it only took me a couple of hours to watch every interesting cooking or baby show on Foxtel, and then I began to sink into a cold panic at the thought of six weeks of this... Oh dear...
I'm happy to say that five days later I've adjusted to the heavy stresses of doing nothing much at all, and I'm feeling quite relaxed. The current tally of activities undertaken to amuse myself:
Books read: Five.
In five days. An unsustainable rate, I'm sure you'll agree. All I can say is damn you, Jen, for hooking me on two different series (Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum novels, and *much* more insidiously compulsive, Stephenie Meyer's Twilight and sequels). I think I'm going to have to moderate my reading rate a tad.
Baked goods produced: Two.
This is less than expected. However the consumption rate is right on target- it only took us three or four days to eat the entire lemon yoghurt cake (yum!), and I predict that today's apple date muffins will be gone by tomorrow, since we have a five-hour car trip to undertake.
Chocolate consumed (to the nearest kilogram): Er... I can't tell you that.
Let's just say there isn't any chocolate left in the house. Not even emergency chocolate. And the hot chocolate is almost all gone too. Even (sob) the cooking chocolate. I made the unfortunate discovery of a technique for making the easiest chocolate fudge sauce ever- a handful of dark cooking chocolate buttons, a tablespoon of butter, and a slurp of evaporated milk (in place of cream), all in the microwave for twenty or so seconds, and that's it. A whole tub of Connossieur vanilla ice-cream lasted about three days once the fudge was discovered. But hey, I was having it with sliced strawberries. That has to count for something. And I'm sitting right on 11kg gained in 35 weeks of pregnancy, so I'm doing perfectly at that. Clearly the ice-cream and fudge is necessary.
Rooms tidied: Hmm... Well, I've tidied bits of the worst-offending rooms. And moved things around quite a lot.
Hospital bags packed: All three (labour, hospital and baby)!
This seems horrendously organised, but we're a little spooked by the fact that we'll be driving off five hours away from home (and hospital) tomorrow, and it's only 11 days before the point at which I was born in my mother's pregnancy. So, we feel it's sensible to take all the hospital bags and the car seat- in fact, being *that* organised about it probably guarantees that nothing will happen. Fingers crossed.
I'm feeling much better this week, mental-health-wise- thanks for all your support out there, by the way :) I haven't started taking any medication- it's a long story, but illustrates why I do need to start taking it- I've actually lost the prescription somewhere in my house. Yes, it's that much of a disaster zone...
What I *haven't* done yet is start looking at writing, in any capacity. I wanted a whole week to relax, zone out and do nothing much at all before diving in there, so next week I anticipate getting right back into it. I'll even set myself some kind of schedule- one that will include the promised blog posts on the character/ dialogue course I took.
So, that's about all I've got at the moment. Right now the baby is having her first hiccup session for the day- she's been up to four or five sessions lately. It was kind of cute at first, seeing my belly do the little jumps, but it's just not that cute anymore. She has her head jammed right down there and every hiccup is a nice little headbutt (repeated once every two seconds for fifteen minutes- arrgh!). There's also some serious foot action happening across the top of my stomach lately- I guess it's getting squishy as heck in there, but boy, you can physically see how much she's grown in the last month or two.
I'll admit I'm starting to have moments of blind panic about the whole process of giving birth, but they're only moments, and for 99% of the time I absolutely believe in my ability to do this. I kind of see it as a team effort between me and the wee girl- we each have our part to play, and our bodies are both designed to do this. It's just incredible to think that in five weeks or less she'll actually be here.
Tomorrow we're taking Daisy the mad beagle-maltese dog to the big city to get her head sorted by the Bark Busters behavioural people. Or as I understand it, they train us in how to be less crappy pack leaders, and she is magically cured. I guess we'll see how it goes...
Excerpt from Between the Lines
A memory wavered into his mind, shimmery as heat rising off the road in summer.
He was six years old, and he’d been in Stonehaven no more than a week. He was hollow and lonely, confused. He missed the bustle of Melbourne. He missed the other kids on his street, the whole gang of them and their scampy games. He was stuck out in the bush, all of a sudden, with nobody but Lionel for company. Lionel had spent the first day ignoring him completely, and the last few beating the stuffing out of him whenever he got the chance. So that day, he’d wandered out to the back garden, if it could even be called that- just a scrubbed, flat expanse of hot red dirt with a veil of tangled trees and shrubs behind it.
The bush.
On impulse, he’d taken a couple of steps toward it, bare feet burning on the hot ground. The air was filled with the lemony scent of eucalyptus and the fresh tang of the distant sea. He'd filled his lungs and the two steps had turned into six, then ten, then before he knew it he was running headlong toward the wall of whispering green and brown, pushing all his mother’s warnings about snakes and savages from his head. He barrelled between the first spicy-scented leaves and, to his surprise, popped out on a sort of beaten down track, hidden from view of the house. After a moment’s pause to wonder how many strokes of the belt he’d get for this, he set off down the track toward the most interesting noise he’d heard so far- the babbling giggle of flowing water, and laced in with it, the high, clear notes of a girl’s voice, singing.
He stepped off the track with his heart hammering in his chest, suddenly terrified as he caught side of the wide river bank and the rolling mass of glassy green water.
She was standing there, all right- a girl not much taller than him, skinny as a rake, skin the golden brown of tree bark lit by sun. A cascade of golden curls rolled over her shoulders to skim at her waist, tendrils flicking out here and there as she drew back her arm and lobbed a big rock into the water.
He watched it go, traced the arc with his eyes until it hit the water with a loud splash and was swallowed. She was singing, still, her voice high and clear. She was wearing a white dress that finished at her knees and puffed into short sleeves at her shoulders. He looked down at himself, his grey shorts and jumper coated in jam, dirt and everything else he’d been busy with that morning. He stared at her back with suspicion. She was pristine. The only dirty bit of her was her feet, bare as his.
If it hadn’t been for those feet, he might have thought she was an angel. Or a ghost.
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5 comments:
LMAO...glad I could be of help. :) Which books are you on in the two series??
And gak. I know you're about to embark on a very scary, trying adventure, but I can't help being jealous of your _twelve_ months of leave. Good grief. (g) All I want is more than a day off every week and I can't seem to manage that. A vacation seems like my impossible dream. LOL.
Jen
Madonna Clara!
The last time I replied to one of your blogs was in January. Since then I have done NO writing AT ALL nor have I visited Compuserve and I live with perpetual dialogue in my head...I'll have more time tomorrow! Yeh. Right.
BUT YOU!!!! You have been busy creating a baby! Nobody can top that for time well spent.
As you say, it's going to be an interesting experience for both of you to share. I wish you all the best and look forward to an eye-opening blog after the event.
God bless you.
Wendy
Glad to hear you're settling into the leave. Enjoy it.
I've got book four of Janet Evanovich's series to start on - love those books - and bought Twilight the other day, to see what all the fuss is about. Can't wait to get into them.
And Jen - it ain't no vacation she's about to embark upon, believe me!
Rach
Hey Claire,
Oh yes, the Twilight series is definitely addictive...have you finished yet? *grin* I'm interested to see what you think of the last book, Breaking Dawn,when you get there.
As for chocolate...heh. There are times in life where it really isn't a good idea to count how much chocolate you're eating. I had a crummy week this week just gone, so my chocolate consumption went _way_ up. (It is _so_ dangerous working two minutes walk from a chocolate shop...) I don't want to contemplate how much chocolate I ate in the week...as long as my pants still fit, I figure it's okay *laughs*
Hope your trip goes well and that you become suitable pack leaders for Daisy *g*
LOL! Ditto what Rachel said...it is definitely an Adventure...but it is in no way a vacation!
CLAIRE, IF YOU'RE HAVING "ONE OF THOSE DAYS," DON'T READ READ BELOW--
It's kinda the anti-vacation...no more days off again...ever. Even if you have a babysitter, you're never truly "off" again. It's inexpressibly glorious and beautiful too...but there's a reason someone once said that being a parent means having your heart live outside your body.
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