Nursery Organization plus voting plus Birth Center tour

I was a beast today getting things built. It finally warmed up so while the snow melted, I built IKEA furniture.  Here's the Trofast with bins full of all of the baby toys and board books. After I got this all nicely organized Kaylee came through and decided she needed to play with it all.

The drawer system in the closet plus all of the clothes finally organized by size. I have up through 24 months in those rubbermaid bins and anything larger is downstairs, also in rubbermaid. Left hangers have dresses. Right hangers have coats. I will not need to buy clothes for Hazel. 

As I said, the snow is melting today. It was in the mid 60s. Yesterday it barely broke 40F!!! Gwyn was taking a nap.

She did not bother to get up when we drove by in the truck. She just kind of nodded and said "Hey." I think she really likes being here. It's probably a pretty awesome life.

Eric and I went to the hospital for the birth center tour tonight. There was a definite difference in hospital culture compared to the tour we did in Washington state. There, they were quick to label themselves Baby Friendly, the label of which has significant meaning (baby doesn't go to nursery unless requested, immediate skin to skin, breastfeeding promotion, you don't move rooms, lots of natural birth pain relief options encouraged).  Here, those similar things are available, but it felt like we were being sold them, almost as though the women in this area aren't as familiar and need to be convinced, especially on the skin to skin point.

Some of the things were encouraging to hear again as being routine now, some other things I internally was smirking and going "Uh huh, we'll see if I follow THAT rule"  (no eating, a bad idea if you're low risk since you need energy!)

The nurse did make a humorous offhand comment about some women coming in with birth plans and the nurses going "Oh, THAT one."

Eric murmured to me, "You're going to be that one." We chuckled together.

Since Kaylee was hanging out with her Aunt and Uncle, we took the childfree time to go grab a quick dinner after the tour. I hadn't really felt Hazel moving all day but I had been SUPER busy and active. It wasn't until I got home and took a bath that she reassured me to her presence. Kaylee had fallen asleep in the truck on the way home so I just left her in the car while I fed the critters. Eric helped too. It was a good day. Kaylee didn't even wake up when I got her out and I was able to put her right into bed. Easy peasy bedtime!

Eric is home tomorrow since I have a ton of appointments to go to. I've got an early ass ultrasound to check on Hazel's growth, then back to back midwife/MFM appointments, which are now going to include a non stress test. I'll be going to bed very shortly.

PLUS... IT'S PRIMARY VOTING DAY IN MICHIGAN!

I fully intend to exercise my right as a citizen.

FEEL THE BERN!

Atheist First World Problems

1.  Going to a grocery store on a friday in Lent, hoping to find your toddler some chicken tenders for a quick non McDs lunch.

Nope. Sorry. It's fish friday.

Oh.

Right.

Guess I should have gone to McDonalds.

2. All the adults asking your toddler if they're excited for the easter bunny. And your toddler gives the adults a WTF look and you feel obligated to offer "she doesn't know about that..." and you really wonder if that explanation improved the situation.

Information Filing

We have been trying to conceive for over a year now. There are about three months where the trying effort likely fell short of an actual attempt at conception but regardless, I anticipate being pregnant within the next 2 years. Since I do like to prepare, and research my options well in advance of actually needing the information (i.e. I am not currently pregnant to my knowledge) I've made a list of midwives who do homebirth here in the Detroit area.

This list is one side of the coin for me. I really don't have it in me to discuss what's going on in my headspace to make me compile such a list. Anyway. Listy list. Here we go.


http://michiganmidwives.org/directory/

http://www.mazzaramidwifery.com/index.php/home

http://www.nineshortmonths.com/index.html

http://www.michiganmidwife.com/

http://birthmidwifery.com/about/

http://www.birthandmorewellness.com/

http://its-your-birth.com/



I need to compile an OBGYN list next, and find a good forum to ask a few questions I have. Otherwise I'm likely to be doctor hopping because doctors and I don't... get along well. And I may need to pursue fertility treatments since it's been over a year with no results, not even a miscarriage.

I really miss my WA midwife, Elias, right now.

He rocked.

Taking baby Kaylee's measurements the day she was born while Eric looks on.

 

The tally so far

I've been keeping a mental tally of how Michigan is shaping up. I suppose it's because I'm skeptical that I will be as happy here as I was in Washington. Either way, here is the score as well as the points I'm judging on.

1. Recycling
Point against Michigan. All recycling facilities are privately owned. If you want to be environmentally conscious, Michigan wants you to work for it and drop your recyclables off yourself. Otherwise, everything goes in the same bin. This is awful, especially when you are a habitual recycler like me.

2. Appreciation of sun
Point against Michigan.  It is a gorgeous day today as I write this. We are the only people at the park. If this were Washington I'd be surrounded by kids grateful to finally have a nice day that's warming! But nope, yesterday was equally barren. It's strange. Where are the stay at home parents?

3. Maple syrup festival
Point for Michigan. I gotta say, this warms my moderately evil heart.  This Saturday I get to revel in delicious, boiled sap sweetness that has a festival devoted to it! Eric thinks that this means that I will no longer be a syrup snob but what he fails to realize is that my snobbery is not a regional thing. It is a fake versus real thing. Aunt Jemima is a fraud and shouldn't exist. My Maple syrup didn't need to be from new England, it just needs to be from an actual maple tree.

4. Board prices
Point to Michigan. It is far cheaper to board a horse here than in Washington, I will grudgingly give them that.

5. Pi Day
Point against Michigan. Only the teenage bagger boy at the grocery store knew it was Pi day. (This might be unfair, no one in Florida or WA state ever knew it was Pi Day either.
6. Meat
Point against Michigan. The Kroger that I rely on currently for groceries (a relative of Fred Meyer, a store I quite enjoyed in WA) has a sorely lacking meat department. I waited for 15 minutes to get service in seafood (with 3 pages in the meantime and I ended up having to go find someone myself) They also don't even have cases of meat, just packaged already waiting to go. This also means that there are no stuffed burger patties made on site, just frozen ones. FWP maybe, but I enjoyed having that luxury.
7. Middle of the week activities for young kids
Point against Michigan. None of the parks or museums have toddler activities during the week. Everything is on the weekend!!  NOOOOOOOO.  Additionally, there is very obviously a lack of stay at home parents in the area. I did find a moms group for stay at home parents but there's yearly dues and they're super organized, which kind of scares me away because the moms that gravitate toward REALLY well organized (like, having an executive board and committees kind of organized) are usually not the type of people I get along well with or feel comfortable around.
8. Maple Syrup
Point to Michigan. I'll be able to make my own!! I'm excited. The amount that I'll be able to collect and boil down will probably just about equal what I use through the year, so that's pretty awesome.