We started our Lamaze classes tonight. No, they are not just about breathing. We spent more time tonight on proper car seat purchase and installation than we did on breathing. The classes promise to be very helpful in how-to baby advice. There are six sessions over the next seven weeks and they are three hours each. The teacher is a high-risk pregnancy nurse, so we are getting lots of potential scenarios thrown at us. Our doctor required that we take these classes, and I’m glad that he did.

We have so many irons in the fire right now that I’m not sure what to write about. Unpacking is going well and it’s good to be finally done with the move that would not end. I have a lot of stuff. I moved into my wife’s existing apartment and she had a fair amount of stuff. For fun and for profit my wife makes stuff in both glass and ceramics. As long as we have been together there has been a steady stream of made stuff into the apartment. I used to junk shop for relaxation (um, used to Mr. Pool table?), but there is no room for anything. We got married and people bought us more stuff. We are stuffed. I feel bad that with so much stuff I have to buy more stuff for the house.

We borrowed David’s electric mower before we went to Wisconsin and we got home to an overgrown yard. Jes didn’t want me to buy a new mower yet. She said, “Let’s get one at an estate or garage sale.” The day after she said that I was on my lunch break from a work related in-service and I drove past a guy selling two older Snappers out of his front yard. I got a 1986 self propelled snapper, with a bag and an optional mulching deck, for a hundred bucks – with new belts and air filter. I think that was a fair price for an older rebuilt as a comparable new one would be around five hundred. David thinks it’s more machine than I need, but I like the overkill. His electric one just never made me feel like I might accidentally chop my own foot off, and I think that feeling is important to the gestalt of mowing.

We have been gardening. I have pictures of that somewhere. (By “we” I mean to include David and Mira as they have done most of the work.) We took out two barberry bushes and a mountain of weeds. We planted my two lavender bushes leftover for H’s greenhouse sale. We’ve also planted a butterfly bush, a hibiscus, a crape myrtle, and a small herb garden with sage, golden thyme, strawberries, mint, chamomile, and oregano. The mint got eaten, as did a small fern that I forgot to mention. I might have to fence that area until the herbs are established. The mint was in a pot so as to curtail its invasiveness, but that turned out to be more of a serving platter for area rabbits. I need to spend more time out there with the dog. We have a number of raised beds with steel boarders, so it’s more a matter of bringing the garden back then really starting fresh.

The pets LOVE the house. They are very happy to have all the space and Bastian loves the yard. I put a cat door into the furnace room to sequester the stink of the litter box and the cat has the door mastered. The exercise necessitated by all the stairs will be good for both of them, though it’s an eventual concern as Bastian’s hips worsen with age. He can’t jump into the back of the truck anymore and only rarely gets on the bed with us. If there are any baby jealousy issues Mira and David have offered to take the pets, but I certainly hope it doesn’t come to that. My sister Sandy gave us a cat tent for the crib to keep Ajax out. She and Steve actually put in a chicken wire door to keep their three cats away from Henry when he was first born.

My mind is full of details like that, as well as the planning of my new classes. It’s a full plate, but all the food is good. My new school is paying me early and my old school still has a check for me, so I am double on the bump this month; which is good since Jes has stopped working. We’re really in final count down mode – three months to parenthood.