Week 31 - only 9 more to go!

Violet’s eyes are still developing – as of this week her irises are responsive to light and they will contract or dilate as needed. She should be around 16 inches long and weigh more than three pounds. She’s filling out more with some fat that will make her skin look pink now, instead of red as it has been to this point. Her nails are getting longer and could be at her fingertips by now. Loud noises nearby may cause her to jump! We talk to her all the time now and read her the two books we’ve gotten so far – Goodnight Moon and Guess How Much I Love You. I also ordered Stellaluna used on Amazon – you can really save a good bit of money buying used books that way. Stellaluna is one of my all-time favorite kids’ books. Stellaluna is a fruit bat who gets separated from her mother and ends up living with some birds for a while.

We did a lot of stuff on Thursday and Friday in preparation for the storm, so we don’t have tons of the usual cleaning stuff to do today. We’re going to work on doing other things we’ve been meaning to get to. Ross is going to scrub the tub (sweet!) and I’m going to work on cleaning out and redoing our file cabinet of "important papers." This is my biggest project that I want to get done before Violet arrives, though I do have a whole giant list just waiting for me. It’ll make it so much easier to reduce clutter – we’re both kind of bad about the clutter, but we hate it so we’re working on it.

Yesterday I pulled some great recipes out of a couple of issues of Southern Living magazine, which Marilynn has thoughtfully given to me for Christmas for the past few years. Yesterday I made a pear crisp, which I figure is at least a little bit healthy since it has fruit, pecans and oats in it. I also made the Open Faced Monte Cristos, which isn’t as unhealthy as it sounds (they’re not deep fat fried or anything!). They’re pretty simple to make and really delicious. Today I’m making the Ginger Glazed Pork Tenderloin, which looks fabulous, and should give us a few leftovers, which is always nice. It’s so much easier for me to cook on Sunday now than it is the rest of the week, with working I just don’t have the energy even though I’m working less. So I like to make something bigger on Sunday that tastes great and will get us through Tuesday.

I’m supposed to work just Monday through Wednesday and then be finished with my job. I'm going to try to work 8 hours each day unless my feet swell up huge or something, which I just can't take, especially since I know that if I can sit down with my feet up for a while it helps a lot. But I'm going to try to make that final push for more hours since this is the last 3 days I'm working for a long, long while (scary!). I don’t know if they’ll want me to work Thursday and Friday to make up for not working those two days last week. I’m sure I will if they want me to – there’s absolutely no way I’m going to finish the project they have me doing. I hate that, I like to finish things. But I really can’t wait to be home. Growing a baby takes a lot out of you. And I can't stop thinking about that giant list I have waiting for me.

We’re supposed to go tour the hospital today at 5pm, so that should be fun. And that’s about it for today!