election night distraction

Ack! A and I are watching the election returns and need to busy ourselves with something other than fretting over who will ultimately win this crazy race. The early McCain lead is freaking us out, but as CNN tells us, he was expected to win South Carolina and Tennessee, so no worries…yet.

That said, let’s spend a few minutes reviewing all things pregnancy. First, the nesting. Oh, the nesting! Here’s a photo that encapsulates the madness. In a word, quilting. I believe A was in the 5th grade the last time she made a quilt. She’s planning a gorgeous one for the baby as you can see by the fabric strewn across the length of the crib rail (yep, that’s the crib we got off Craigslist). But the nesting hormones are truly amazing. At this rate we are bound to have the cleanest, most well-organized house in South Minneapolis by the time the baby arrives, which is fine because it’s not likely to ever be that way again.

This pregnancy has been so perfect in so many ways – A has been healthy and passing all her tests (the glucose test was negative, meaning no gestational diabetes), the baby has been growing well and passing all it’s tests (obviously, we still don’t know if we’re having a girl or boy, but we’ll find out soon enough). So, it would seem inevitable that we would experience something less than positive at some point in this journey, and we did over the weekend. A got into a car accident on Saturday–not a bad one, and no one was hurt–but it was scary when it happened, and we did spend a little time in the hospital monitoring the baby to be sure everything was ok. And everything is fine, but then the day after the accident, A had what she thinks was her first Braxton-Hicks contraction. The timing was nothing more than coincidental, but given the recent events we weren’t entirely sure. A called our midwife and moved our next prenatal visit up a couple weeks–again, just to make sure everything continues to go smoothly. Once we figured out that the contraction wasn’t a pre-term labor situation, but something normal and common and nothing to worry about, we have been gradually gaining back our confidence.

And now, Barack Obama appears to be ahead in many states and has just been predicted the winner in Pennsylvania. The experts are assuring us that things are almost certain. The night seems to be moving in the right direction, and we are gradually, ever so cautiously, regaining our confidence. It’s only a little while longer until we know for sure.