Three days left until my maternity leave begins! Whoohoo!

Yesterday was nice and quiet. Just the way I like it. A little bit of running around at work, but not much. Went home and relaxed, and had Chinese take out for dinner, and took a shower, and Halled, and posted a silly blog entry, and went to bed.

Which is all good. But not really worth writing about. So I thought I'd mention a few things that I promise never to take for granted again, when I'm not pregnant anymore...

Getting Dressed. Putting on underwear isn't something that most people have to stop and think about. At most, if you have lousy balance, you want to make sure you can lean against a wall or dresser or something. But I've discovered, in the last couple of months, that to get that second leg in, you have to bend over a little and lift your leg at the same time - and I've got far too much belly to allow that.

Instead, I have to do this bizarre and intricate maneuver where I sit on the side of the bed and turn sideways to prop my leg up. Same thing goes for pants. If I ever go through this again, I think I'll just get a bunch of muumuus for maternity wear.

Petting The Cat. The cat walked up to me this morning while I was sitting in my chair in the living room, and looked up pathetically. Pet me! he begged. Once upon a time, I could have just leaned forward and scratched his ears. Now I have to scoot to the edge of the chair, lever myself forward, and try to bend enough to reach the cat.

Reaching Across Counters. I've got plants on the windowsill in the kitchen. To get to them to water them, I have to reach across the kitchen counter. (Well, sink, but that's the same width.) Your average kitchen counter is really not that wide. Two feet, maybe? I'm kind of short, and I have short arms. But before I was pregnant, I'd just lean against the counter and do whatever I had to do.

This does not work anymore. For one thing, even leaning against the counter, my arms are still an inch or so shy of being able to touch the far wall. For another, leaning against the counter is pretty uncomfortable. The belly does not squish nearly so conveniently as it used to. There's something in there with a lot of bumps and knobs and things that press against my stretched-out skin.

This has been a problem for a while. I think it was a couple of months ago that Matt thought I was being rude, making the Subway guy lean way across the counter to take my money, when in fact I was doing my best to get it to him.

Sleeping In Whatever Position I Want. This doesn't really need explaining, does it?

Circulation. I wake up at least twice a night to go to the bathroom, change the side I'm sleeping on, and massage feeling back into my fingers.

Most of this stuff is just an annoyance. Not really a big deal. Especially since I've only got a couple of weeks left to go. I just wanted to note them, for my own future reference, before those post-delivery hormones have a chance to wipe it all out.

--Liz