So, no, there is no baby yet. He tricked me on Saturday… he got me good. I started having contractions that were 4 minutes apart. I got excited. These were painful contractions, so, you know, naturally I thought this was the beginning of labor. That paired with horrific back pain really got me thinking that this was it. I was going to have this baby SOON. So, around 7:30 we called the hospital and they told us to come in. They monitored me for an hour and by that time my contractions were coming almost every minute, but they weren’t lasting long enough to be as productive as they needed to be. So, when they checked me after laboring for 4 hours and I was only a centimeter dilated. WHAT? I couldn’t believe it. I was so frustrated. The nurse was really optimistic and told me all kinds of things like “It may take a while, but I really think you’re going to have this baby today or tomorrow” and I filled my silly little head with all these thoughts of having a baby that night. They let me labor there for another two painful hours before she checked me again, around 10:30pm. And I had only dilated half a centimeter. Which, in other words means “Go home.” So much for that full moon Saturday night…

So…we went home. I was pretty much heartbroken, but was trying not to think too negatively, because I was still having tons of contractions and was still laboring really hard. There was no way I could sleep through these, and my back was still aching really badly. We tried to watch some tv, but the pain was bad enough that it was just annoying me more than anything. I told Paul to go get some sleep, because I wanted him to be somewhat awake and sane if he had to drive me back to the hospital. So I stayed up and tried to distract myself on the computer. Around 1:30am my mom pulled into town, having driven straight from Tacoma, and we went on a walk around campus to see if that might speed things up, but it didn’t… (boo) so I decided that I should probably at least TRY to sleep, so around 2:30 or 3:00 I laid down in bed, but couldn’t get comfortable and could NOT sleep, so I got up around 6:00am to try to eat something, but immediately threw it up. And then I kept throwing up and wasn’t able to keep anything down at all, so around 9:30am we called the hospital again and they told me to come in and they’d monitor me for a bit and give me some fluids. So, they gave me some IV fluids and some anti-nausea drugs, after that I felt much better, but was still contracting pretty regularly, so she checked me again and I hadn’t dilated at all since the LAST time they checked me 13 hours earlier. By this point I was starting to finally think that this baby is definitely not coming today and he’s just teasing me. Mean little boy. So, I got home around 12:30pm yesterday and took some Unisom and actually managed to fall asleep for 3 1/2 hours, and felt a whole lot better. And since then I’ve still been contracting regularly, but just not super painful contractions. So that’s where we’re at. No baby, but still lots of contractions… which means he could come tomorrow, or he could wait another few weeks.

BUT, on the bright side, I got another project finished! Actually, it’s two projects, but they go together so nicely, so I will show you them both today!

It’s a new little sweater for my baby Togglebuttons! Paul picked out the colors and the yarn.

I’m not thrilled with my button choice. I am wishing now that I had found some wooden buttons. I think it would have looked nicer… but I am not going to worry about that now. These will do for the meantime.

But… I also made some booties to go with it!

I thought about making a hat also, but I thought that might be a bit too matchy-matchy and end up looking silly.

I really like this pattern for booties, (I didn’t like it the first time I made it, because it was a complicatedly written and not very clear) but now I think it’s the best. Also because it’s nice and stretchy around the ankle so they can’t slip off little baby feet.

And so there you go. That’s what I’ve been up to instead of popping out a baby. BUT it’s been blissfully cool today, and we even got a bit of rain yesterday, so if this is an indication that the hot weather is gone and fall is on its way, that is OK by me! I also don’t mind having my mom come out early because if the baby was here, she’d just want to play with him, but instead right now right now she’s mopping my floors (they’ve been sadly neglected during the pregnancy…) and cooking and cleaning and organizing my cabinets, so, you know, that’s awesome. She’s nesting for me, I guess! I pretty much just sat on a chair as she went through my cabinets and sorted items, and we got rid of a ton of things I never use anymore. I just had to sit there and say “keep” or “toss” and she took care of the rest. And now I have a clean and well organized house. And I didn’t have to do a thing (except for go into false labor).

So here we are. Still waiting for baby. If anyone wants to come hang out with me or distract me that is totally welcome, since my mom is leaving tomorrow morning (unless the baby decides to make an exit tonight? Not likely, but who knows!) And all of you who have offered your distraction services so far, I am definitely going to take you up on that this week. And don’t worry, I’ll let all of you out there in blog-land know when Togglebuttons decides to make his grand entrance!