Might as well

It's been a long while (over 1-1/2 years) since I've blogged anything (sounds like the beginning of all my journal entries). Huh. That went really fast. I'm not so good at recording my life history. Sorry self and future generations, should any of this even survive that long.

So here I am 36 weeks pregnant with #4, a girl, who we think we are going to name Ella after my grandpa's grandma. And all I want to do is sleep...really. I have a whole list of things that my brain tells me I should be doing and need to be doing ranging from housework to organization to teaching the kids, experiencing all sorts of amazing life things/knowledge with my kids, finding new, healthy and cheap meal ideas, exercising, socializing, making and recording memories, etc, etc, but all I want to do is sleep. It doesn't feel so much like a depression thing as it does an "I'm a 35 year old pregnant woman who is entitled to some rest and relaxation this lazy summer while I make a baby" kind of feeling. I know, downright Diva of me, right?

Here has been my lazy baby-growing schedule the last 2-3 weeks (okay, let's be honest, at least a month or more):
-Wake up about 8:30/9:00 ish to either kids fighting or asking me when I'm finally going to get up. If the kids haven't already made themselves some breakfast, I'll pull out the cereal and milk and yell, "Come eat Breakfast!" I'll eat, maybe shower, make sure the kids have showered and dressed, then go back to bed for an hour nap.
-Get up about 10:30 and maybe throw a load of laundry in the washer if Reagan already hasn't, take a shower if I already haven't, and get dressed in big, over-sized, make me feel like an elephant maternity clothes. YAY!
-Take the kids to the free school lunch program because 1) I don't have to make lunch, and 2) I don't have money for groceries anyway.
-Get home and take another nap because apparently watching my children eat wears me out completely. This time I sleep for about 2-3 hours while my children clean their rooms, do their jobs, do my jobs or wreak havoc. Give or take, it's a toss up and surprise each day.
-About this time I start thinking, "Well, I'd better make it look like I did something today, so I'll make my bed, and maybe do some dishes. Oh, I guess I'd better think about dinner." So I putter around at a snail's pace trying not to moan too loudly as my aching back tries to keep me from walking at all. (I know, poor, poor mommy).
-By time I've moved the pace of molasses, we finally eat dinner around 7:30/8:00 (yes, I've been working on the kitchen and dinner for almost three hours). The awesome little people I've bored into submission, clean up most of the mess from dinner, and I putter around some more trying to feel like I've accomplished something, but give up and go get in bed, though not before yelling outside at the kids who are trampoline junkies to come inside and get ready for bed.
-An hour or so later, the kids finally have pajamas on, their teeth might be brushed and we might have read a story. Ryan has come home somewhere in this weird time frame and we say  family prayer. The kids watch or touch my belly as baby sister moves around for a bit, they kiss my belly goodnight and we all go to bed. Though, not really, because then the girls read books and laugh and giggle (or argue) together until about 11:00, Ryder stays up reading, playing with legos or "cleaning his room" (still haven't figured that one out since it still looks like Mt St. Helen's just went off in there each morning) till about midnight, and Ryan and I are watching our DVRed NCIS, Big Bang Theory, or How I Met Your Mother till each of us randomly falls asleep with the tv still on.
-Next, the real fun begins, the I'm-so-uncomfortable-how-am-I-possibly-going-to-acutally-get-some-real-sleep kind of fun. Mix that with "Holy moly I've got to pee again, RIGHT NOW" and "Man, why are the commercials of the still-on tv so dang loud?" and we have a recipe for maybe 3 hours of sleep. After getting up, honest-to-goodness, 4-5 times just to pee, then turn off the tv, roll over (which takes at least 5 minutes) a good five times each night, I guess it's no wonder that I feel the need to sleep all dang day.

So there you have it folks, my lazy summer. I have made a schedule of what I call fun themed days to make my kids believe we really are having a fun summer, as follows: Baking day (we make a treat to give away and not eat it all by ourselves, though this one has kind of bombed because you need groceries to actually make something), Game day (play board games, the Wii, or anything else that could be fun without too much physical effort on my part), Library/Reading day (my voracious readers and their mother get to read all day long if they want), Movie day (I bought dollar theater movie passes where once a week they are entertained for 1-1/2 hours while I take a nap in a cool, dark theater), and Field trip/swimming day (the one day a week we go do something fun-ish). So far, so good. I have them fooled into thinking we are having a grand ol' time, most of the time anyway.

In the meantime, the house (I mean the upstairs of the house) is barely maintained and all the organizing that needs to take place in the basement is continuing to gather dust and I continue to wish I was always asleep Sad thing is, summer time is slipping quickly away. I really am sad to see school starting again, especially before baby is due to arrive..I'm not looking forward to the rigid schedule or the homework or the missing my babies were gathered around me all day feeling while feeling even more sleep-deprived with a newborn in the house. I wish the kids could have had the whole summer to play with her before going back to school. At this point, she will be here the week after they start school, which should be really interesting in the "who is going to take care of the kids and get them to and from school while I am giving birth to kid-servant #4?" department. I want Ryan at the hospital with me as much as possible, so I still have that detail to work out, along with a bajillion others.

For instance, where do we put this new angel? Right now, all the baby stuff sits waiting in the front room, because we really don't have anywhere for her to land. We were hoping Ryder's room, but as I mentioned before, Mt. St. Helen's, right? I still don't have the crib up, I don't have the car seat ready/washed, I don't have my bags packed, I haven't pre-registered at the hospital, I haven't even toured the hospital I've never given birth at before (and frankly, don't want to), I haven't talked with insurance co yet because I really don't want to be told how much I'm going to have to pay (didn't have this insurance for the birth of any of the other kids), and so on and so on. Blah, blah, blah.

So why am I posting today? 1) To get out of doing other work that I'm supposed to be doing right now, of course. 2) Hoping to show myself the reality of my ridiculousness so I can be shocked back into actually doing something other than sleeping, 3) I feel like I owe the world a confession/apology for some odd reason as to why I have not been contributing to the greater good, or to any good for that matter.

And there you have it (while my awesome Reagan just did a load of laundry and is now, on her own accord, voluntarily cleaning and vacuuming out the couches upstairs). Happy reading. Maybe you'll hear from me again tomorrow when I tell you I actually got something done. Here's to hoping.

p.s. Thank goodness for my children who have worked their butts off this summer to do their jobs without any real incentive other than they like to help me out (and not get yelled at, I'm such a good mom). They have totally been my sanity-savers this summer. And also thanks for a husband who hasn't left me with all the intensely aggressive emotions that come spewing out of my mouth. Wow...I am a piece of work. Old and pregnant is really not a good combination. Whose idea was this anyway. Sheesh!