Nesting (finally)

For the last month, I've had a to-do list with at least 50 items on it, none of which have gotten done. One thing held me back: Bentley's preschool. Four other moms and I started one of those do-it-yourself preschools in September, and October was my month to run it. That was at my own request-- I was too afraid to take the first month, but also wanted to get my first turn finished before Lucky made his appearance; the other moms were very nice about indulging me. We only have the kids meet twice a week, Mondays and Wednesdays in the morning, so it's not like this was taking every second of my time. But it still sort of felt like that!

So with preschool preoccupying my thoughts and my time, I kept housework at a minimum and baby prep pretty much didn't happen at all.

But now that October is basically over, it was time to get the house ready. This also happens to be the ONLY Saturday before my due date where we had no plans. So today was the best day to put Craig to work, too.

So we have been working.

I have finally boxed up all of Bentley's and Kendra's clothes that don't fit them. This was kind of embarrassing, since some of Bentley's clothes that were hanging in his closet were size 18m! My poor little 4-year-old! In my defense, some of his size 2T stuff still fit, so that isn't quite as ridiculous as it sounds. Which leads me back to my last point: my poor little 4-year-old who can still wear size 2 clothing! Now it's equally embarrassing to look in his closet, since I feel like he has no clothes. But the truth is that what's hanging there is plenty for now. It just isn't a packed full closet like it used to be. That's probably a good thing.

As I boxed up Bentley's stuff, I looked at all those cute outfits and thought, "I hope Lucky is a boy!" so we can use these again! And then as I packed up all of Kendra's adorable dresses, I found myself thinking, "I hope Lucky is a girl so I can see all these cute dresses again!" I guess I really will be happy either way! I'll also be hoping that Child #4, some day, is the opposite, so I'll get to use EVERYthing again. But that's a long way off in the future.

Along with all the packing has come oodles of rearranging. Although Bentley and Kendra have been sharing a room since September, all of Bentley's clothes were still in the other bedroom, which we have been referring to as "the changing room" because it also has the changing table and all the diapering stuff in it. So today I moved Bentley's clothes into his and Kendra's room, which makes a lot more sense. And then while I was doing that, I had Craig rearrange all their furniture. Why is it SO fun to rearrange furniture? Probably because Craig does all the work and I just get to relax and boss him around. But also because it's so exciting to have an old space feel completely new! I love it.

Craig, when he's not moving furniture and heavy boxes for me, is keeping busy unpacking boxes of stuff for our rec room. When we finished that room, we moved all our stuff into it except three boxes. Then we ran out of steam and shoved those boxes in the changing room and forgot about them. But with Lucky's due date getting closer and closer, I felt like it was time to finally tackle that project, too. So Craig has been sorting through all that stuff and deciding which things need to be added to the rec room and which things can be moved to the crawl space. Included in the boxes of stuff to go in the crawl space are all the Christmas cards and newsletters I've ever received, all my old calendars, and my college notebooks that I just can't throw away. You just never know when you might need your notes on the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, or when I will need to re-read your Christmas newsletter!

Now that I'm writing this, it's occurring to me just how much work Craig has been doing for me this week. On Thursday he also planted two flats of pansies in a lovely row in front of our house. Our neighbors gave us these, which was so sweet of them. But I have to admit that when I discovered their gift on our porch, I nearly cried because I couldn't for the life of me figure out how I could possibly plant them or when Craig might have time to do it, since he's been busy grading all this week.

One other task I put to Craig was to fix the broken handle on the chest of drawers in the kids' room. It's just a cheap, fake wood sort of dresser, and the one handle (which broke when Bentley was a baby) has been hanging down over the next drawer, making it difficult to open and close. Now that Bentley will be sharing the dresser with Kendra, all the drawers will be utilized, so it makes sense to be able to open them all easily. We didn't have any other wooden handles lying around, so we made do with what we had. Now the dresser looks like it has a happy face. Or at least, a face:


We are so classy all the time. At least we have some flowers in front of our house!

Okay, I need to get back to work!