Where is Junior?

Many people are asking. Junior is taking his time to make his first appearance. Probably because he is nice and cosy in his bubble and he's been told that it is getting cold, wet (wetter) and windy outside.

I am seeing the doctors on Tuesday to negotiate induction dates. Hopefully it won't come to that...but they like to book you in in advance. I will hold off as ong as I can as I would rather not be induced. Their protocol is 12 days late but apparently they are negotiable. Maybe he will make an appearance on his Daddy's birthday - Wednesday the 29th of October??

Original and new

A few weeks ago, we were staying at the Newton's during a rainy weekend and Thom suggested that I make a new 2008 Gonk for Junior. Soon I was raiding Sue's button collection and stash of leftover fabric. She wizzed up a pattern on newspaper based on original Gonk and in no time I had all the pieces ready to make a new one. Admittedly, Sue helped me with some of the sewing and she hand-stitched the mouth as well so I couldn't have done it without her. We were all very happy with the result and here he is with half-finished hair.

Gonk

Whenever we have visited Thom's parents place in Essex and stayed over, Thom and I have always admired his childhood 'gonk'.
It has always made us laugh out loud with his simplicity - button eyes, square shape and stocking insides. We have always thought how great it was that something made from scraps could have so much personality. He has now been handed down to Junior...

A walk in the park

The other weekend Thom and I went to the Muswell Hill Farmers market (yum) followed by a walk in Alexandra Palace park. I am always lagging behind and out of breath as the baby is pushing up on my diaphragm. Thom took this shot as I was trying to get my breath back.

Belly Cam - 37 weeks

Apologies for the lack of Blog updates...there is really no excuse! Good news about the placenta, the 34 week scan showed that it had moved up and out the way so we are set for a natural birth. Could be anytime now but most likely to be around or after the 20th October sometime. I am now 38 weeks, so in my 39th week. We are both getting very excited, a bit nervous and trying to make the most of sleep and spending time together. We have completed some antenatal classes, so feel as if we have some knowledge about all of the possible scenario's during birth and have hired a Doula, who will be with us and assisting us during the birth. I have been busy 'nesting' but feel as if I have run out of steam a bit lately as Junior is taking up maximum space now and various areas of my body can be quite uncomfortable. Up until a couple of weeks ago, I was anaemic, which explains alot of the tiredness during June/July and August. At the time I put alot of the exhaustion down to Dad's accident and the aftermath of that so I guess one would have affected the other. After alot of careful dietary adjustment, (including eating some red meat, unfortunately) and taking some hardcore iron tablets, I'm happy to say that levels are back in the normal range.