Hello, friends! I’m totally slacking on blogging–more than usual, I know! J is almost done with his first month of residency; his first rotation was in the ER. We thought it was going to be a fairly mild rotation hours-wise, as it is made up of 10-hour shifts with a seemingly fair amount of days off (at least 1 per week…I’m not joking when I say I was excited about that…ahh, how precious and rare ANY days off are during residency!). HOWEVER, what I wasn’t accounting for was the CRAZY schedule and post-night-shift days…those aren’t really days “off” per se, as he is home sleeping all day after getting off at 8:00 that morning. In a handful of days, he will have a mix of day shifts (9A-7P), swing shifts (1P-11P), evening shifts (4P-2A), and night shifts (10P-8A). 10-hour shifts are nothing to complain about during residency, but keep in mind that that doesn’t include his going in 45-60 minutes before a shift to drive/walk there, find a parking spot, walk across the hospital, drop his stuff at his desk, change into scrubs, go down to the ER, etc….and then he’s never actually off on time (usually waiting on labs for patients so he can either admit or release them…or transition them to someone else if it’s going to take many hours), so add another 1-2 hours after that. It’s really nothing to complain about considering what next month will look like (all I can say is Y-I-K-E-S!), it’s just been a bigger adjustment than we thought it would be. In addition to that, his days off rarely fall on a weekend, so MY schedule is completely messed up as a result. Since I don’t work your typical M-F 9-5 job either, my schedule ebbs and flows with his. One morning, around 11:00, I realized with disbelief that it was SUNDAY and I had missed church! He had had the day before off, so in my mind, it was Monday. One Saturday, I was perusing facebook and was totally confused by all of the activity…”Is today a holiday?” I thought. You see, it was a Saturday morning, but again…I thought it was a Monday. Weekends have no real meaning to me right now (and won’t for a long time, I think). It’s a crazy thing to get used to! J’s last day off was July 22 and his next day off is August 12. Because of this, I get lost in this sea of work days and don’t know how to put some structure in my week without losing the flexibility for his schedule.

Anyway…all of that to say: I’m still here. I’m busy learning this new place and getting to know new friends. I’m still trying to get my house in order (so I can photograph and share it with you all). I’m just a little lost in this awkwardly-structured lifestyle we’ve just begun. **If any of you have stood where I stand and figured out a way to impose some structure in your own life while remaining flexible for your spouse’s schedule, please tell me…I’m all ears! And no, we don’t have kids (yet), so school starting soon won’t help!**

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Now for part two of this post! On Sunday, I’ll be 27 weeks pregnant. (ALREADY?!) Some apps/books/articles/web sites say that the third trimester starts at 27 weeks, some say it starts at 28 (there’s the same confusion over where second trimester starts…week 12, 13 or 14). Early on, I decided I would break it up as 13/14/13 weeks…so for me, the third trimester starts on Monday! 😀 Totally crazy. I feel kind of prepared, yet totally unprepared. I have the opportunity to go back to Kansas for the last two weeks of August to meet one of my best friends’ first baby and to spend some time with family (and they are throwing me a shower, which is fun). That’s in a little less than three weeks. Since we’re having some maternity photos done when I get back, some of which will be in the nursery, I’ve given myself a mental deadline to finish the nursery before I leave. Since I’m focusing on that for the next few weeks, and then I’ll be gone for two, that means I’ll be almost 32 weeks when I get back! Ummmm….I suppose we should get signed up for those childbirth classes at some point?! My dear husband is going to have to ASK for a day off to do a silly class with me since they are only on Saturdays (and there’s chance he won’t even make it to the birth on time…apparently, it’s a common thing to be an on-staff physician and not be released in time to walk across the hospital to see your own child being born…and I’m not talking about super fast labor & delivery here). So, again, his schedule makes things a little more difficult.

::I’m totally rambling here…even my thoughts lack structure right now::

ANYWAY, I knew I wanted to make a quilt for my wild baby’s nursery. As you may recall in my last post, the nursery is navy/white/gold (not nautical, as there seems to be some confusion on that). If you follow me on Instagram (which you should, because, let’s face it: it’s the only thing getting updated these days), you saw that the heavens opened up for me a few days ago: within ten minutes of walking into the first store, I’d found navy/white/& [shimmery] gold fabric. Shimmery gold printed fabric is so, SO rare…but in my exact color scheme of navy/white/gold?! And none of it cost more than $10/yard?  It was meant to be.

I knew I wanted to do a herringbone pattern, and I liked how this lady’s 60* angles looked, but other than that, I pretty much decided on my own sizes (I cut a piece of computer paper down to a size I thought I wanted so I could visualize it), added white strips between my rows to give a visual break between busy prints, and added white sashing around the edges. Basically, what I’m saying is that I totally winged it. I spent the afternoon on Wednesday doing the math and doing my cutting. After taking a break for a few hours to make some phone calls, I spent part of that evening piecing it. Yesterday, I finished cutting the white strips/sashing and piecing the top and then quilted it. So, all in all, I think I spent around 12 hours on it. It was my first time to piece or quilt anything, so I’m pretty excited about how it turned out! Want to see?? OK. 🙂

(Does this count as a sneak peak into the new house, too??) 😀

All in all, I’m pretty darn excited about it. Not only did I check a life goal (making a quilt) off of the list (err, only a year late! But I’ve officially finished last year’s list!), but it gave me the opportunity to sit, process and pray in a very focused way about this baby and this quickly-approaching journey of labor, delivery and motherhood that the Lord has placed in front of me. Sewing always does that for me. It also made me remember and appreciate my great-grandma who is quite possibly the world’s most amazing quilter (we’re talking massive quilts all quilted by hand in the most beautiful way possible). I’ll have to tell you more about her sometime. 🙂

I think I’ll use this quilt as a backdrop to photograph this baby every week or month (because you know the first baby gets that kind of treatment!). It’s also the perfect size for a lap quilt, and I’m excited about being able to cozy up in it with my fall/winter baby for all of those feeding sessions. (I’m seriously getting so excited to meet this little one! He/she is extremely active in my belly and I’m giddy to meet this big personality face-to-face.)

So, that concludes my “quick” update (I really don’t know how to do those, do I? Maybe if I blogged more than once a month…). Since my goal is to complete the nursery before I leave, I’m hoping to photograph and reveal it before (as well as the rest of the house!). I mean…you probably know not to hold your breath for that, but you MIGHT hold onto some hope. 🙂

Hope you’re well, my friends!