Waiting for Baby

January has been spent waiting for baby.  Early signs of intense “warm-up” labor gave me hope that Baby would come early.  After all, my brothers and I were all three weeks early for my mom- it was a reasonable hope.  I clung to my hope while the air around me was filled with the voices of all the moms whose children, especially their firsts, were late.  I clung to my hope as the false – I mean “warm-up”--labor continued, all month long.

I've declared that "I'm ready" for Baby for the last 3 weeks, because I was.  Many told me I wasn't because I hadn’t dropped, because my sides hadn’t filled out, because I wasn’t “big enough”, because, because, because.  But I was ready like a chaperone after an all-night lock-in is ready to go to sleep once the kids have all gone home.  I’m ready to hold the baby in my arms, not my abs.  I’m ready to share the baby with Emrys and our friends and families.  Not just the occasional kicking spurts, but the warm little wiggly person.  I’m ready to meet this Little One and have a face and a name to the kicks and wiggles and growing belly I’ve had with me for the last 9 months.  

 Now it’s two days past the due date and we’re waiting.  Friends and family in the internet nebula pass along their tricks that made their baby come.  If it’s on the Top-10 list for getting baby to come, we’ve tried.  I’ve tried walking, cleaning, walking some more.  I’ve vetoed the spicy food option since spicy food and I don’t get along well to start with.  My to-do list is cleared, my project list a semi-clean slate.  The crib is in place, the bags are in the back of the car and there’s a snowstorm predicted for tonight into tomorrow. 

 So I pick up my latest for-fun crochet project (which is turning out really, really cool and will be blogged after it’s gifted), sit back and wait.   I already went out in the freezing cold morning and walked around the track that the snowmobiles have made at General Clinton Park in Bainbridge, then walked all over the grocery store since it’s not one where I’m a regular.   And tomorrow, I may walk in the fresh snow, if we’re still waiting…