Nesting?

Having company over sometimes is my only safeguard against absolute, out-of-control chaos in my home. As difficult as it can be at times to get my home in shape for company, I am always glad for the forced blitz cleaning/decluttering.

Today, my house magically became more and more box-free, thanks to a friend who has a great balance of keeping me company while helping me accomplish things. Whenever she helps me, I can look around and see a huge difference in my home, yet I am not exhausted. I love that. It was getting a little discouraging sinking deeper and deeper into chaos in my home, being away at least 2 days out of the week (doing laundry and cleaning our other house in ABQ) and having Casey gone for a week. Our washer and dryer were delivered on Thursday, and I can't believe what a difference it has made to be able to once again do laundry while working on other house stuff.

We are finally entering the homestretch with our ABQ house. The plan is to finish up cleaning and whatever projects are left tomorrow after church. After the carpets are cleaned and the bug man sprays, our tenants are free to start moving in, probably next weekend. Yay! We're so close!

(Here's how our cleaning expedition went. Lots of help from the girls and we got alot done.)

And I also am walking daily w/the girls as of a few weeks ago. Nothing aerobic, but I am exercising ON PURPOSE again. Now I just need to step-it-up on the protein and I'll be doing better about the upcoming labor. Thankfully, my body is getting me VERY ready in the contraction/relaxation department. Lots of strong ones coming on now at 33 weeks. I'm trying to figure out what I should plan for labor day, though. The fact is that I really don't feel confident that I'll do well during the really hard work if I have observers besides the very few people who need to be there. Ruby talks alot about the baby coming and wanting to "hold it on my shoulder," even though it will be "slippy" and "have bwood." She is so into this birth thing, and I really think it could be great to have her there. I have no doubt that I can do pre- and early-labor with the two of them close by, as many of my contractions are already strong enough to warrant cessation of activity (or at the very least, "going easy") for at least 1/2 a minute or more, and I'm dealing with them anywhere from 20 minutes apart to 3 min. apart, all the while caring for my children and home. However, I can see that it would be good to have a back-up plan at least for Claire, and maybe even Ruby, should they cause more distraction than is okay during my really hard work. More for Casey's and the midwive's sake than mine. I don't want them having to go off and deal with the girls instead of attending to what needs to be done. I'm pretty sure I'll be able to focus like I did last time no matter what naughtiness might go on, but I don't want to put my helpers in that situation. Something will have to be done.

I'm quite excited about this upcoming labor, and really feel the pressure of only a few weeks left to prepare. This baby will be here in about 7 weeks! Wow! I need to get going!