Baby Prep

Nearly there: One month to Due Day.

Mummy
With only 4 1/2 weeks to go to The Big Event, I'm thinking almost exclusively about rearranging furniture and buying missing baby bits (moses basket, cot bumper, changing table etc). Quote Jose: "You get to rearrange your bedroom once you're past the magic date after which you're allowed the home birth" - as if that had anything to do with anything. But I can wait another 9 days I guess, and obsess about cot bumpers, glider chairs (and where to put them), or how to get the over-the-(not yet present) changing-table mobile attached to the rather high ceiling.
I'm not thinking exclusively about scrubbing the top of curtain railings or the underside of kitchen cupboards yet, nor have I even considered ironing any of the about 58 baby vests we somehow have accumulated (HOW?!!) so there's hope that there's plenty time to achieve all before the big day. Uh, never mind the Filling Of The Freezer With Wholesome Homemade Tasties (if only I could cook!).

Getting Tara's baby clothes out (the hat no longer fits)

Tara sporting her first top, size 'early baby'*

I've dreamt about having him twice already, and looking at "his face" in the one dream was a special treat that made my day before it had even started.
I still can't really believe that I'm going to have a son, but different from the week we found the gender out, I'm no longer scared, stunned and intimidated by it but simply in awe. A boy! Wow.
I can't wait to meet him, and I can't wait for the pregnancy to be over. It's not been as physically pleasant as the first, and how it it have been, with a job and a child and a household to look after. It's been more painful, more uncomfortable, more tiring with greater weight gain, and stretch marks starting not two days before the due date but two whole months before. I'm more worried about the birth than I was before because I ascribe the great uncomplicated ease of Tara's birth to the high levels of fitness I'd worked up in the years before, and the've plummeted considerably since.
Maternity leave is scheduled to start ten days before the bub is due, and while I hope that he'll be a little early (please, and don't get too big in there either, please!), I'm also hoping that I'll have few days of rest just to myself (how nice would that be?!).
I'm looking forward to having a baby again, I can't wait to have my boy, I'm looking forward to a home birth, and I've just spent an hour browsing a home birth web site, cause that's what it will be this time!

Papi
Serves all-weekend two-parent-duty so The Pregnant Lady can rest, knock herself out at the gym doing her remaining weekly low-input class and soak in a bath. Also, on driving duty from one baby shop to the other (luckily there aren't many about), and the remaining closest GAP shop on the outskirts of London (local GAP coverage is a scandal). Push chair assembley and all associated mechanical tasks, of course, are the man's, as are the occasional dish washing rounds when The Pregnant Lady can't be bothered. Other duties are clipping my toe nails and occasionally getting my socks on me. Last, but not least, Papi serves as sounding board for potential names, and it is crucial to note that although he claims the right to reject any old name he dislikes, he makes no suggestions. The first name has been agreed and in full use for the last 3 months at least. The second / middle name is still up in the air.
And now, behold: Man and child critically testing and assessing the (then) newly acquired push chair.


Tara
My gorgeous darling girl! I'll just quote her: "When my baby brother is coming out we're gonna love him and love him and love him." She pats the tummy and cuddles and kisses it, and speaks to her brother, not infrequently in German (how odd): "Hallo, is (ich) bin Tara. Is bin deine g(r)osse Schwester" (Hello, I'm Tara. I'm your big sister). And when the neighbour asks, what are you going to do when he cries? "I'm going to cuddle him lots."
Or how is this one: "Mami, is hatte einen T(r)aum (Mummy, I had a dream). Leo was here. Er hat mit Mami gekuschelt (he was cuddling with mummy)." Me: "And what were you doing?" Tara: "I was cuddling mummy."
She's got this whole loved-up scenario worked out in her head, best summed up by all of the above, along with what she told me today: "When my baby brother Leo is here, I'm not going to nursery any more." We'll be snuggled up, the three of us, all day long, there will be lots of kisses and cuddles, and when Leo goes in the push chair, Tara is going to be there with him, all tucked up under one warm big blankey.
She makes plans for him, she thinks about him, and she's practising with her babies. See?

Tara's baby Puppi trying out Leo's (Tara's old) clothes.

Ice-cream? Sharing and feeding, of course.

Home corner! One baby asleep in the crib, one jiggled on mum's knee.

And OF COURSE Baby Sofia comes shopping to try out the new kind of cart.

You get the idea. Well. Tara got the idea. She'll be the greatest big sister... once we've somehow dealt with our different ideas about her going to nursery (me) versus her staing at home (Tara)...

Leo
There we go: Tara's brother's name. I'm so used to calling him by his name it doesn't feel right to pretend he didn't have one yet, and call him 'baby'. Tara and Leo. Lovely. Jose keeps calling him Theo, but he'll surely get it right once Leo is there. He's quite an active little chap, my son, wriggling a lot more than I remember Tara wriggling. But then, he better wriggle a lot more still - until he's in a reasonable position that does not spell 'cesarian' and 'hospital'. I'm talking to him daily (nightly), but he's still horizontal rather than vertical, and the wrong way round to boot (his back to mine, as opposed to facing my back). I'm told I can encourage the correct position by scrubbing floors all day long, or simply getting down on all fours and wriggling gently with my bum. Sweet. Alternatively, I could swim all day long (breast stroke but no froggy legs) - not really feasible either. Leo, what are you up to? Get your head down and kick me some in the ribs like a good boy should! We ain't got that long now and your bed sure is made, and snuggly too (Tara is trying it out for you tonight).

PS.: I'm trying to get across to Tara that life with a new baby isn't all sweet and cuddly but can be boring at times. Her very own Baby Sofia already seems to have given her a taste of it:

Booooring!

Or is it more to do with mum and dad shopping forever, and Tara not having seen the sweets in the trolley?

* I had to bribe her for permission to take this photo: "I'm going to pay you three sweeties if you let me take that picture and give me a smile!"