"Don't Worry Twice"

It's a phrase repeated often in the Burgher house.  It came to us from one of my yoga instructors who rationalized that worrying doesn't serve much of a purpose because often that thing you are worried about never comes to be and if it does, your worrying didn't prevent it from happening and thus the whole act of worrying ends up being a waste of time and the cause of a lot of unnecessary stress.

Anyway, I am having a hard time following this advice lately as I have one significant worry that I just can't shake... 'how Olin is going to be when I go into labor'  It's an irrational concern because we have a list of wonderful friends that have offered to take him when the big day arrives and I know he will be safe and most likely even have a wonderful time with any of them.  But as his mommy, just the thought of him being worried or scared or sad or all of the above when Josh and I aren't around makes me burst into tears lately.

After years of working as consultants in our twenties and thus traveling and spending so many days and nights apart, Josh and I swore that when we had kids that we would put our family first ensuring that travel and long hours were a rarity.  We have stuck to this promise and it has been wonderful that Olin has never spent a day or night without at least one of us and most of the time our whole family is together.  It's great until times like these when it's necessary for us to be apart and I just don't know how he will react.  

The good news is that this little one always seems to amaze us as he handles new situations with such ease and I just need to remind myself of that and continue my mantra.  Sorry to go on, but this seems to be all that is occupying my thoughts lately and it's somewhat therapeutic to get it all out! 

On a separate note, this morning Olin gave us the opportunity to see what I think might be a challenge with having a little girl in the house.  We have his end of the year school picnic this afternoon (although there are still 2 more weeks of school left) and his teachers asked that all the children wear their school t-shirts.  Plus, it is going to be over 90 degrees here today and humid so along with his t-shirt, shorts and sandals are in order.  Well, the boy that usually wears whatever we put on him, threw an all out tantrum this morning about his outfit... he didn't want to wear his school t-shirt (he wanted to wear a different one) and he wanted to wear pants, socks and his green shoes.  He was still yelling "green shoes" when I said goodbye to him and Josh at the elevator this morning.  The last thing Josh said to me as the elevator doors were closing was 'please keep her in a little bit longer!'  My goodness, it wasn't our most serene morning.

Photo from Sunday when the temperature was still lovely (read: cool)...

After School on a Rainy Day

Yesterday was "wear yellow" day at school so Olin was a figurative and literal ray of sunshine as we played with cars and read books while the rain poured down outside that afternoon.  This guy really loves his cars and he particularly loves to put "trash" (i.e. scraps of paper, lint, etc.) inside those which have doors that open, line them up, and count them.  He can do these same things over and over for a surprisingly long period of time and it's just so entertaining to watch.  It has really been amazing to watch his imagination grow over the last several weeks... he is such a little sponge right now and I feel like he picks up and remembers everything! 

By the way, another friend had her baby yesterday.  That makes four in the past three weeks... surely I have to be next, right? 

 

Bath Time

Just a couple of photos of Olin enjoying his evening bath to brighten your Tuesday morning... oh, I love that smile.  Have a great day everyone!

Memorial Day Weekend

We are now officially on baby watch so we didn't want to venture too far from home, but still managed to have a wonderful weekend around town.  We shopped, cleaned (I have definitely been overcome by my nesting impulses lately), cooked at home, had a picnic in Central Park and some great burgers Saturday night at Landmarc.

And to facilitate our resolve to use our real camera more and our phones less for taking photos, we also invested in a better lens for our camera and I have to admit that I am kind of in love... if it is in fact possible to love a camera lens.  We spent this Memorial Day morning in Soho for a little shopping and a mid-morning snack at my beloved Chobani.  Here are a few photos of my boys at Chobani, taken with the new lens...

And while for the lucky among us, our family included, Memorial Day is often considered primarily just a long weekend to celebrate the start of summer, I would be remiss if I didn't acknowledge the true reason for this day and for all the brave men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice for us and our country... to them and their loved ones, we are truly and forever grateful.

Full Term

Today marks the 37th week of my pregnancy, which means that this little lady of ours is officially full term and we can expect her to arrive at anytime now.  And over the past few days, I have convinced myself that the big day was imminent as I was sure that I have been having contractions and even laid in bed on Monday night unable to sleep convinced I was going into labor and worrying about all of the things that we haven't done yet.

However, I saw my doctor today and virtually nothing is happening so perhaps it was all wishful thinking on my part because my back is still killing me, the humidity in the city has been unbearable the past couple of days, I feel gigantic and most importantly, I am just so darn excited to hold her.  I am not complaining though because I know the longer she stays put, the better she is able to grow and be fully prepared for life on the "outside".

And I will say this, New Yorkers sure love a baby or at least a very pregnant lady, which makes these final weeks a little nicer.  Everywhere I go, people are smiling at me, telling me how great I look, jumping up to give me their seat on the bus, running to open doors for me.  I went to the hospital this morning to drop off my pre-registration  paperwork and everybody there seemed to think I was perhaps in labor and were doing everything they could to help me get to where I needed to go.

So for now, it looks like I will be pregnant awhile longer, but let's just hope this little girl isn't as stubborn as her brother, who came a week late!  I am fine today, but I don't know that I can handle 4 more weeks!

Here we are at 37 weeks, I kind of think we have a big baby on the way...

 

Tea and Cake

A couple of weeks ago, Olin and I weren't quite ready to go home after school, so we decided to take a detour for an afternoon tea at Le Pain Quotidien.  Olin chose mint tea (this little guy really loves tea, which makes me so happy) and an apricot tart (which he referred to as "cake, apricot cake!").  He sat there like such a big boy on his chair, said his "pleases" and "thank yous" and even gave the waitress my credit card when it was time to pay.  Towards the end of our snack, I told him that once we were finished eating, we could go to the Petco next door to look at the animals.  Well, that got him so excited that he immediately grabbed the last of the tart, nearly shoved it in my mouth and said "here mommy, big bite!"  I thought he was pretty funny before, but as his vocabulary expands this little one keeps getting funnier.

Olin loves Petco because he goes there often with his class on their morning walks.  He showed me all the animals that they look at and he was particularly fond of the guinea pigs, which made me a little nervous given Josh and my total aversion to anything in the rodent family.  And speaking of rodents, I was surprised (and disgusted) to see that this Petco sells rats... honestly, what New Yorker is buying rats?  Kind of makes that guinea pig look not so bad after all.

It warms my heart that since this day, Olin continues to say "tea and cake, tea and apricot cake" when I pick him up from school.  Oh this little one makes even the most ordinary things feel so special and I love him so much for that.

I tried to get some photos, particularly of the two of us and was unsuccessful in getting any good ones, but here they are anyway...

Getting Ready For a Baby Around Here

Yesterday, I did something that I have been looking forward to doing for awhile now... I washed all of the baby's clothes.  I have been so excited that I even agonized over which baby detergent to use... oh, poor Josh.  These clothes were not sorted by colors, but by color, singular, with the first entire load being pink!

Next up, we need to pack my bag for the hospital, pack a bag for Olin, make extra meals to freeze and try, try, try to wait patiently.

It's starting to look like a baby girl is on her way...

Happy Monday

It was rainy and cloudy this weekend in NYC and the baby has seemed to have taken up residence on a nerve in my lower back, which has been incredibly painful, so we didn't do a lot the past couple of days.

Here are a couple of pictures of Josh and Olin after church yesterday morning.  We were stranded on the Upper East Side for quite awhile unable to get a cab in the rain, but Olin loved the rain and was very excited when we got to take two (!) buses to get back home to the Upper West Side.  That's the great thing about toddlers, they are always able to spot that silver lining.

"I Love You Ducks!"

We spent a lot of time in Central Park on Mother's Day and one of the things we did there was feed the ducks in the Boat Pond.  I am kind of embarrassed to admit that this was Olin's very first time feeding ducks in the park - I really don't know why we haven't been able to get him out to do it sooner, but better late than never!  Anyway, once he figured out the pieces of bagel I was giving him were for the ducks and not a snack for him, he really got the hang of it.  There were only male ducks in the pond that day, but they were beautiful.  Olin loved to hear their "quack, quacks" and would get so excited when they would swim up to us.

Once the ducks had their fill and started to swim away one after another, Olin so cutely yelled after them in his little voice "I love you ducks!"  My gosh, that little guy always knows how to make his mommy smile.

P.S. The illness of the week is... a double ear infection.  My new mantra is "he will be just be that much healthier when he is older" - I say it over and over to myself as we are in the doctor's office, the pharmacy, administering antibiotics, etc.  He is such a trooper though and happily went off to school this morning.