The end of March.

Hard to believe it's here already. Next Sunday marks a year since we lost our sweet Roo cat. I still cry about her. In fact my eyes are spilling over as I type this, and I won't blame it on hormones. Kiki is sitting next to me, a big lump on the couch with her prim little paws and her grouchy old man face, as beautiful as can be. Does she miss her sister? I don't know. The grieving process for cats is not something I am an expert on. When Kiki is dragging her red toy around at night and howling, is she sad? Or just crazy? Has this year pass quickly for her?
I miss Roo everyday. We talked about naming the baby after her, or finding names that have Roo sounds in them (Ruth, Gertrude, etc) but I think we've decided not to do that, though I guess we will just wait and see til we meet the baby. Maybe he/she will look like Roo... black and white with a moustache and a freckle eye and long whiskers.

Does this make me sounds crazy? Perhaps. But I don't give a fuck. Kiki is sixteen now. Sixteen fucking years of my life have been spent with this cat. She is my best friend who never judges me, is never mean to me, is always up for hanging out, and sometimes throws up on my bed. She lays with me when I am sad, she is always happy to see me when I walk through the door. She is funny and bitchy and weird and awesome.... like me.

Trever and I were discussing last night how some people don't understand this bond. And even though he hasn't known her as long as I have, he loves my cat(s) like they are his own. I know some people think it's insane, that we won't go on vacation this summer because we don't want to leave Kiki behind. There are lots of other reasons, too, like not wanting to drive 6 hours with a two month old baby, take an hour ferry ride with a two month old baby, and be on island that is not near anything should anything happen to said two month old baby... but a BIG part of the decision is that I really don't want to leave my cat alone for a week. I fucking LOVE my cat. I would MISS her. She would MISS me. And who knows how much longer we have together?

Kiki has been sleeping in the crib. Trying on the hats I've knit for the baby. Hanging out in the baby's room, puking up hairballs on the floor. And before you feel the need to tell me that it's OMG SO DANGEROUS FOR CATS TO SLEEP WITH BABIES let me just say: I am not an asshole. I am not a fucking moron. I KNOW THIS. Holy fuck. But also... there is no baby here yet. And if Kiki needs to sleep in the crib to establish the fact SHE WAS HERE FIRST, then you better believe I am going to let her. Not to mention, I KNOW my cat, and she does not like children. She is terrified of babies. The first time she met Cassidy, when she was maybe six months old, her tail puffed out and she took off. Those few months when I lived at my sister's house, Cassidy was two. Kiki wanted absolutely NOTHING to do with her. Trever's ten year old sister? OH HELL NO. She doesn't even like his eighteen year old sister. Kiki is not interested in you until you can buy booze. Sure, she will be curious, no doubt. Also, annoyed. But let me assure you all out there in the world, Kiki will not be sleeping in the crib in the baby... because Kiki will be sleeping WITH ME. That's right, I will bedshare with my cat, but not with my kid.

friday: snow day

Trever shoveled the walk this morning, and we took a walk in the snow for coffees & easter candy. Other than that, it's been a day indoors... watched a terrible movie we rented from vudu, started a crappy knitting project (one day I will learn how to read a pattern, I swear), pet Kiki A LOT, ate too many jelly beans and peanut butter eggs, and now we are listening to Childish Gambino on vinyl. Hopefully baby is listening from the womb, cause we LOVE him (too bad his lyrics are not kid-friendly AT ALL.) There is a little dancing happening, by a skinny guy in long underwear, while he sorts out the non-baby crap in the baby room.

Today was supposed to be our 28 wk appt, which will now happen monday evening. It's hard to believe. I thought that time was moving so slow but now all of the sudden it's all very real and very close. Spring is coming and so is this kid. I finally got my registry done, for the most part, and sent out the e-vite to our baby shower. It's non-traditional for sure. The last thing I want to do is sit in a room full of women who watch me open presents and coo over everything and touch my belly. No fucking thanks. We are having it at a bowling alley, which is actually what my sister when she had her shower six years ago. That way, dudes & kids can come, and people can drink beer and bowl instead of just staring at me. Our birthing class is the first weekend of April. We still need to sign up for a CPR class, and I need to send in the application for baby's health insurance (please Mass Health, do not let me down - adding this kid to my policy will make it that I am only working to pay for insurance, and that does not work) as well as figure our our birthing plan. Get the baby out. That's about all I have so far.

We are doing okay, I think. We'd be doing better if we found a bag of cash, but who wouldn't be.

I am going to make cupcakes now.

This sums up Kiki's day.

Slow.

Time is flying but I am not. I move so much slower these days. I can only imagine how I will be moving in one month's time. It's frustrating to need to ask for help at work because I can't move twelve 35lb boxes anymore. If no one is there to help me, I am stuck waiting. And I hate waiting. It's not that I am impatient, it's that I like to move at my own pace, which is generally a little faster than everyone else's. A good example of this: I am perpetually early. I always have been. When I was in high school and I would usher at church on Sundays, I would have to get there by 9:30am, and I was ALWAYS late since I had to rely on my fucking slow ass (ex)step dad to drive me there. I always got to school early, so I would have enough time to goof off, or when I was a senior, enough time to smoke a cigarette across the street and then freshen up in the bathroom before class started. Once I got to college, it was worse. I remember getting to my Painting 1 class and having everything all set up and ready to go by 8 am, even though class didn't begin until 8:30... I was always there before the teacher.

Since I have stopped taking the MBTA to work and have started driving, the only way to not sit in a shit ton of traffic each day is to get to work between 6-6:30 am. The store doesn't open until 8:30, but I always have things to do... unless no one has moved boxes for me the previous day, and then I just have to fuck around or find a few small boxes, or attempt to drag or kick a box down the hall. And then even when I am ready to go, everything just takes longer. I have to stop working so I can pee every half hour to forty minutes. I need more water. Then I need to pee again. Then I need a snack. And another snack. Have to put lotion on my hands from touching cardboard all morning. Have to listen to my coworkers talk about things that I just don't care about.

It's all bugging me.
And now I am at home, and there is still quite a bit to organize and straighten and find homes for, but here I am moving slow, too. I get overheated. I need to pet the cat. My sister calls. I need to sit down. I need second breakfast, and then early lunch, and then lunch dessert. I just can't move as quickly, now that I am carrying around so much extra weight.

I just want things to be done. I want to find a dresser/changing table for the baby room. I want to find a home for all the guitars. I want the turtles to stop fighting and just eat their damn fish. I want to find my muffin pan so I can make cupcakes and eat three of them. WHO LOSES A MUFFIN PAN? Apparently me.

Wow. That was all a big long whine. Sorry about that. On a good note, I can now SEE my stomach move when I feel the baby move. Fucking WEIRD and COOL and totally like a science project.

Currently.

I am tired.

There is a crib in our apartment.

I think Kiki is mad at me.

We finally have a shelving unit for our records which we bought (reluctantly) from IKEA.

It's 55 degrees out today.

We still have a lot of stuff to unpack.

My niece's 6th birthday is this weekend and her party is at a roller skating rink. (I will not be skating but I am making Trever.)

For Valentine's Day we went to Target so I could buy underwear that fit.

Someone at work keeps eating my cheese sticks.

Someone else at work keeps putting the toilet paper and paper towels on the WRONG way.

My annoyance at things that I shouldn't care is reaching an uncontrollable level. (Sorry for being a total bitch.)

My back, feet, and pelvic bone hurt.

Water gives me acid reflux.

I have chocolate chip gelato to eat tonight.

BYE.

Just in case you are interested:

I have a Vine account. I am really only using it for videos of Kiki, because we all know the internet is made for CATS. Enjoy these fine moments with my furry best friend:

Follwing Kiki

Still Following Kiki

My username is bontielou, if you want to see more Kiki videos and the occasional turtle.

Snowcation.

In case you live under a rock and didn't hear, we in the northeast got hit with a pretty big snowstorm over the weekend. It started Friday morning, and luckily both Trever & I were off from work that day. Friday night we lost power. We woke up to a chilly apartment Saturday, and it was still snowing. All told we got about two feet, with big snow drifts, and virtually our whole town lost power. It was pretty and exciting for about an hour, and then it became annoying real fast. We had plans to get so much unpacking done and finish moving over the last of our other belongings from our old place, but obviously the weather didn't let that happen. And it's hard to unpack when you are wearing two pairs of pants, three shirts, a sweater, and slippers, and you are still cold. Saturday night we went to sleep with every blanket on the bed, layers of clothing, and I kept my hat on. Sunday morning our apartment was a toasty fifty degrees. The turtles were in near hibernation mode. I think the only one who didn't mind was Kiki. The cold floor wasn't a good spot to lay, but for the most part she didn't leave her spot on the couch, where she spends most of her time anyways. No heat, no hot water, and no electricity for a little over two days, and let me tell you, I have no interest in living in a cabin in the woods. I APPRECIATE these modern miracles, yes I do.

Here I am standing in front of a giant snow pile:

I ended up missing two more days of work, because I couldn't get there on Sunday, and yesterday we had an doc appt in the middle of day and it didn't make sense to go in for only a couple hours when the state is still recovering from the storm. (Schools are still canceled even though it's in the 40's today. There is just piles of fucking snow EVERYWHERE.)

So in the four days off, you'd think I would manage to be productive.
And if you think that, you are pretty wrong.

The only thing I really managed to do, other than bake non stop to stay warm and wash the dishes in pots of water in the bathtub, was to start creating my baby registry. IT'S COMPLICATED STUFF, MAN. I am not a gear person, especially not baby gear! Also everything feels so expensive. We are pretty cheap at living, so it feels weird to pick out one thing that costs of hundreds of dollars, that isn't something that goes under my car's hood. Throughout this pregnancy I've learned to let go of my pride a little bit more and actually ask for help when I need it, and I think once we have this little person, it will be even easier for us to do this. A big part of this is allowing family & friends to buy us the things we will need. I just hope that people stick to the script, so to speak. As in, PLEASE buy us the things we are registering for and not a bunch of outfits & toys. Clothes and toys will come in the way of a million hand-me-downs, so just buy us a car seat and portable washer and call it good. My aunt ordered the crib last night. It will get to us in a couple weeks, which means the six crates of records and my organ need to a new home, pronto. It's all becoming VERY real.

(oh and quick cervical update: It's all looking good... which leads me to believe that the first measurement was taken incorrectly and they just don't want to admit it. Either way, we are RELIEVED.)

We moved.

The past couple of weeks have been fairly crazy. We moved on Saturday, so the week prior was spent working and packing. Then from Sunday on has been spent working and unpacking. It turns that out that I don't have enough energy to do all of this, not while cooking a baby, so we are not as settled as I would like to be. Trever has been really great, working his butt off, not sleeping enough, but hey, he can pound the coffees down and I can't, so fair is fair.

The first night there was particularly hard on Kiki. She was up all night. Not that she sleeps through the night, ever, but she was on the bed, meowing in my ear, dragging her plastic weeble feather toy around, basically non stop. I didn't sleep, because she wouldn't let me. And before you suggest that I just close the door and shut her out, I will tell you now that I will never ever do that. Since that night, she has started getting used to her new space. Friends brought us over a new(used) couch, so for the first time in years we have a couch that is big enough for more than two people to sit on. Kiki's first reaction was WHERE IS MY COUCH but she has now warmed up to our new blue giant. Piles of catnip and stinky fish treats have helped in this process. I think once we really get unpacked, she will start to relax more, but for now I have resigned myself to the fact that I need to spend at least an hour and half laying with her when I get home each day, to soothe her stressed old lady nerves. (Like I really mind taking a daily nap with my best friend, please.)

I don't know where my clothes are... which is of little consequence since I only have a few items that fit me anyways. I am wearing the same top today that I wore on Monday. It's clean, though, I promise.

We still have stuff left at the old place, which we were planning on moving over this Saturday, but it looks like we are shaping up to get almost two feet of snow Friday night into Saturday morning, throwing a real big wrench in our plans. We will do as much as we can tomorrow morning before the snow hits (probably won't be much since I can't lift much and it will just be the two of us) and then we will hunker down for the next two days and unpack as much as we can.

I know I am supposed to be getting all excited about picking out baby things but honestly the whole thing is a little daunting, especially when the baby's room is filled with every other thing we own. Seriously, every book, every record, all my clothes, many guitars, and a variety of other junk cover every inch of the floor. We are going to have a killer yard sale in the spring, just you wait.

Oh, this little starseed I am growing is 24 weeks today. I feel the movements but they are mostly on my bladder. I am looking forward to the day when I get kicked in the ribs for a change.