The End Woes

Today is Sunday Sept. 10, 2006 and my son has yet to arrive (he's 4 days late). It has it's ups and downs that he hasn't made an appearance yet for instance and up is that I have time to get a few extra things done like blogging and a down is that I am very pregnant and getting rather cramped. So today is the day that you will all be let in on the joys of late pregnancy. Lets start at the top...The puffy fingers. All I really have to say about that is it's a good thing my engagement ring started a little too big because now it has become hard to get it off. Oh yeah, sometimes the joints in my fingers get sore too like I've been clinching my fists for a really long time.














Next for the feet. They have been the source of laughter many times among myself and my friends and loved ones. My favorite is when the vietnamese people at the pedicure place say, "You swole. Once baby come, no more." Swollen feet don't necessarily hurt but they make wearing shoes a difficult task. In the morning they aren't too bad but all it takes is standing in the shower to puff 'em right up. I can feel it happening too, like someone dropped a bunch of needles down the inside of my legs. That feeling only happens when they first start swelling up for the day. Here's what they start off like...


















And here's what they look like by the end of the day...


Matt said to me one night that by just looking at my feet it seems like I should be at least a hundred pounds overweight because they swell up so bad on the tops . Notice the indents by my toes from the shoes I was wearing. Oh well, at least my toes look good.






And this is what happens when you wear socks... Needless to say I've only worn socks once.














I managed to go without stretch marks for the majority of my pregnancy but about three weeks the inevitable occurred. Matt pointed them out to me since they appeared on the lower part of my giant beach ball belly and I couldn't see them. They aren't that bad really. I don't think very many have actually broken the skin, but only time will tell what the permanent damage is. I'm really excited to be able to see that part of my stomach again even though it will look totally different than ever before. With so much weight being carried out in front of me and the recent craving for root beer floats, avoiding stretch marks would've been nothing short of a miracle.

Another end of pregnancy thing that happens to a lot of women is nesting. I mentioned this in an earlier post and you can see an example of how clean things stay around my house if you look at all the pictures in my home sweet home part II blog entry. But in the home is not the only place nesting occurs. Just yesterday I walked outside on my front porch to water my plants and noticed that there were quite a few dead leaves covering the walk way. I decided, although they would probably just end up right back where they started off, that I would sweep them into the yard. While doing this I realized just how much the grass had grown over the concrete. It was really hindering my sweeping of the leaves so, like some uncontrollable force had taken over me, I started pulling the weeds away from the walkway. The irony of all this is that in the 2 1/2 months I've lived here that was the most I'd ever walked on that walkway. So everyday I maintain the housekeeping so that it feels clean enough to bring my baby home to whenever he finally decides grace us with his little self. I'm so excited to see him and hold him and kiss him on the lips. It makes all these ending woes seem very worth it.