I'm having a rough time with what to do in my free time. Right now, I'm watching Project Runway and I feel like I need to be doing something else at the same time. I have two books to be reading for book clubs, a set of needlepoint blocks, and several blog ideas. I feel like I need to made the most of my time because its limited. Not just limited like its been for the last year or so, but limited in that I feel I may have absolutely no time (or energy) for myself any day now. I'm worrying about losing my identity. With Natalie, I had time to relax whenever she was sleeping, nursing, or playing alone. But with two children with completely different needs and sleeping schedules, I feel that I'll have no time. I'm foresee myself too tired to read while nursing or too busy interacting with Natalie whenever William is sleeping.

So, I feel that any business I've started I need to finish up now. But its like it used to be with my grading sometimes. Having too many things I should do paralyzes me to do anything.

And this isn't taking into account anything new. All the new things I'll want to write about William. Baby gift thank you notes and birth announcements. William's baby book. Christmas shopping. New book club choices.

In some ways, have four weeks to the due date seems like no time. Its only 28 days until September 1st. (That's enough time for zombies to take over England, haha). But, we have nothing really planned during this time, except doctor's appointments. Its a lot of waiting. With Natalie, I had the windfall for three weeks of subbing just before she was born. It gave me a huge distraction. Our regular routines around here aren't really good for making time fly. Luckily, we have a few offers for play dates and the weather has cooled down for at least the time being.

While I'm here, a couple of words about last week. Last week was our last crazy week before things get a totally different kind of crazy around here.

• Sunday and Monday were mostly about trying to still take it easy because I was just home from the hospital, but still trying to get the house cleaned up before my parents came to visit.
  
• Tuesday, my parents arrive around 11. Natalie and I were at the library, and it was a disastor. She didn't want to stay in at story time and kept trying to leave on the elevator. But, she was very happy to see my parents. She got so excited showing them her room. the downside was that she couldn't calm down for nap. She did eventually sleep and Mike and I went out to see the final installment of Harry Potter, which was really our five year anniverary date that we'd put off for over a week. We really enjoyed the movie, and when Natalie got up she had a great time with my parents.
  
• Wednesday my parents and I took Natalie to the park and then we went out to lunch. The park was a disastor. I couldn't really figure out why. It might have been her being thirsty and she couldn't get her straw cup to work for her. She was happy in the restaurant even though she didn't eat much of the food we paid for. After lunch, my parents left as I put Natalie down for nap. The whole visit was great. We were all very happy about how excited Natalie was to see them and spend time with them in her own house. It really helped to ease our minds about when we have to go to the hospital.
  
• Thursday was a pretty normal day, though I had a doctor's appointment and our home visitor came in the evening.
  
• Friday, my sister, her husband, and his mother came to visit after Natalie's nap. Natalie was happy to see my sister and had a great time making her read her books and play with her in her room. But, she was not okay with the in laws. It might have been because I woke her up from nap from a deep sleep only a few minutes before they arrived. When I left her alone to help them get settled in the kitchen for lunch, she ran after me thinking I was leaving with them and did her slow super upset cry and ran into my leg. I had to scoop her up and snuggle her on the couch. She warmed up after maybe 90 minutes, but they left soon after that. Later that night, our friends from MA came to visit. We stayed up talking to them for a bit before turning in.
  
• Saturday morning, I got to sleep in a little bit, but not too much since we planned to go out for breakfast. It took us a little while to get everyone ready, then we went to breakfast. This went well for everyone, including Natalie. Almost immediately after we got home, we got ready to go out again. It was pretty warm that day, so I went out and did the shopping and everyone else went to the Gray animal park. My parents had given us (or William) a gift of some money when they visited, so when I went shopping, I went to Kohls to get him the remaining clothes items we needed and also some things at Walmart including his mattress. It was a long shopping trip, but I also used our end of the month coupons saving us just shy of $40 at Walmart and about $21 at Kohls (then earning $10, so I'm going to return an item and rebuy it with that coupon bringing it up to $30). That afternoon, everyone else went swimming as I got dinner going. Our friends left just before Natalie's bed time.
  
• Sunday was mostly dominated by tons of laundry, including lots of new items for William and a stack of extra towels. But, we also went out to Sears to get a new fridge. Ours has had problems since the day we got it from Mike's mom. The most recent problem was leaking water all over our floor. It will be cool getting a new fridge, but its not set to get here until the 26th, which is a long time to wait. And, if William is at all early, it might get a little complicated.
  
• Monday was mostly a regular day. At play group, I overheard another couple taking to the group facilator about their need for household items. My heart has gone out to this family for a while since they have a newborn premie who just had to have surgery for three hernas. So, at the end of play group, I asked the facilitoar what types of things they needed and she said they are pretty desperate so they need pretty much anything. I spent some time that afternoon gathering up some things for them, both stuff for their kids and their house. Natalie enjoyed watching Sherk that afternoon.
  
• Tuesday we went to the library. Natalie did much better, even though we didn't spend mroe than half of the time listening to stories. She enjoyed listening to our new books during lunch and watched Winnie the Pooh that afternoon. I think this was also the morning I gave her dry cereal in a bowl with a spoon for breakfast and she did awesome eating.
  
• Wednesday we went for a walk early, but then got a slow start. About 1030 we went to the toy library, but Natalie fell asleep in the car. I felt bad about it feeling like we should have just stayed home. There were no other kids at the toy library, but Natalie still had some fun playing. She kept saying the same things over and over. Like pretending two toys were milk and cheese, and saying Momma out, which I think might have meant she wanted me to get up and play with her, but I couldn't figure out how to play kitchen with her when all the kitchen accessories were missing. We left after about an hour and she wound up going down for nap late again. I'm actually getting a bit worried that this is becoming a trend and thus pushing back when she thinks nap is supposed to start. This is bad because the old pattern was come home, eat lunch, take nap. If she starts thinking she isn't supposed to go to sleep until almost 1, that messes this up and we lose our pattern and nice cue that its nap time.
  
• Today we had our now weekly doctor's appointment before play group. I dropped off the items I brought for that family with our home visitor (who is also their home visitor) in the parking lot, which was a great stroke of luck for me because even with the stroller I didn't know if I was going to be able to carry everything up upstairs and get Natalie up stairs. Natalie had a good time at play group including enjoying gluing pom poms to a paper bowl to make a hat. I also enjoyed the facilataor saying how nicely I interact with Natalie, brought on by my looking at a book with Natalie. She said I'm a nice example for some of the other moms and that I'm so calm. I was thinking it was a nice complement, but couldn't help remembering a few times I've been out with Natalie and not felt so calm, such as the library a couple weeks ago. This afternoon was pretty ordinary. We watched a fair amount of TV, but Natalie also did some painting. The good thing about TV recently is that Natalie has been playing more while watching, which I really like.
  

I'm actually surprised that tomorrow is Friday. As mundane as the week was, it went by pretty fast. I feel like I should be savoring my time with Natalie and really enjoying company, but at the same time, every day still presents all the same challenges. I want to provide her with the best opportunists to play and explore and learn every day, even if William weren't about to arrive and turn her world upside down. But, there is only so much we can do. With restriction of time, money, weather, distance, the pregnancy, and her desires and attention span its hard to keep everything so engaging for both of us all day long. I'm happy that I get moments every day though, and I know I'll get those after William comes, too. I guess in some ways its good, because I've read that its bad to make everything extra special just before the baby arrives as well. So, we are mostly keeping this the same as always. Some of the highlights of today were some hugs from Natalie, tickling her some (which I usually leave to Daddy), snuggles while watching TV, diapering her doll and babying it in the infant seat, and painting in the kitchen.