3 Weeks

This has been an excruciating week for me.
Though I am busy, so very busy with all of your siblings, my mind always circles back to you.
I'm so curious--and yet, I'm enjoying the wait.

It's sort of like Christmas...the build-up is a huge portion of the fun.
Finding out about you is the Christmas Day.
But this, this right here, is part of the giddy, this-is-going-to-be-so-GREAT! beginning.
It's like I'm at December 20.
Only five more days until Christmas.

Maybe.

And it's longer than five days until I know, by the way, though I am looking for signs of you.
If I'm right, and if you're following your blueprint correctly, you have probably found your new little home inside me.
I had some slight cramping yesterday and I wondered...is that you?
Or is it just wishful thinking?
It's a crazy thing, yearning for a pregnancy because the mind seeks what the heart wants proof of.
So if I feel a cramp or a tenderness...I go into Are You There? over-drive.
I'm constantly having to check that for myself.
Because while I say, "are you there?" I realize that I really think you are.
And yet I don't want my hopes dashed.

I've said to Daddy a few times, "I hope it worked."
And by that, I mean the making of you.
Which, by the way, was highly planned.
I'm a planner.
You should know this right away.
I like to plan things.
I don't like surprises and I don't like when things don't go according to plan.
I can roll with the punches for sure, but I like my life nice and tidy.

So here was my logic with you:
First of all, your brother is a maniac.
He's getting better but he's the family monster and I say this endearingly.
I love him to bits but he's not an easy fellow.
The longer we could hold off on you, the more time we'd be able to give him to find and utilize his self-control button.

He's still looking.

But it no longer terrifies me to think of caring for him PLUS an infant.
(That would be you.)

Secondly, the timing was right for you to arrive in the summer.
Since FOREVER, I've wanted a spring baby.
I have one winter, one summer, and two fall.
No spring.
I really wanted spring.
But we missed the boat a little bit.
We weren't totally ready; the conditions weren't right.

This past month, right in the middle of October, would bring you to me in July.
July is a FANTASTIC month for a birthday and I speak of what I know here since I happen to be a June babe (though really just a blink from July).
The summer is perfect for me to relax at home with you.
There's no school.
No sports.
No obligations except watching your siblings play all day and catch lightening bugs at night.
It would give me time to acclimate to the addition of you before stepping off the plank that is autumn.

I'm a bit torn because your due date falls right around your sister's birthday.
I'm not a fan of sharing birthdays.
Only Child Syndrome is what that is.
(Your auntie is 12 years younger than me so I grew up mostly alone and so consider my childhood as an "Only".)

Because since I'm planning you, (we haven't planned all of your siblings--sometimes they just sneak up on us!) I thought I'd really try and plan it the way it works best for the whole family.
Summer baby= bliss
Autumn baby= straight jacket

Sorry to make it sound that way but really.
When September rolls, we have obligations out the ying-yang, followed by two birthdays, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, then another sibs birthday.
It's just ALOT.
So hopefully, you're a snug little bug right now and I'm going on endlessly about nothing.
But for sure, we'll shoot to catch you as an August-y if we don't have you already.

I say now that we'll stop trying for the winter months so we don't hit any more fall birthdays but I don't know deep down if I have the self-control for that.
Because while I say I "planned" you this month, it was really out of my control.
I just felt pulled to making you.
It was like I had to and I didn't feel it at all these last couple of months.
The time passed...with nary a peep from my baby-lusting lips.
But this month (and last)...it was so different.

Nothing could have been more important than at least giving you the chance at life right then, at that moment.
I think this is a huge reason why I think you're there.
I think it was your time.
And I was just following your signal.

Loving you already,

Mama