Nesting

Throw me a twig if you’ve got it; I’m nesting. For anyone who is reading this and doesn’t know a lot about those 40 weeks that lead up to having a baby, nesting is one of the symptoms. I’m big, tired, out of breath, and wake up 10-15 times a night but still I spend my days with this drive to get “things” in order. Most of my efforts have been vented towards turning our guest room into Pace’s “Big Girl Room.” I moved furniture, scraped, caulked, sanded, taped perfectly straight lines, and finally painted Pace’s new room. I am no great painter, but I took my OCD and applied it with vigor to those four walls. That was my Thurs, Fri, Sat. Then, on Sunday my in-laws came to the rescue. We had six people all painting trim at one time. Do you know how long it would have taken me to paint that trim by myself (or actually paint it while constantly telling Pace, “No, no. Paint is yucky! Don’t touch it. Did you hear me? I’m going to pop you…)?! At least 3 days (you see this old house has 3 doors, 1 closet, a huge window, crown molding, and base boards–if you’ve painted at all you can imagine what a headache all those straight lines would be).

So, I was saved by our family on the painting, but that doesn’t mean that my nesting beast has been satisfied. Why can’t I just sit the nick-knacks on the new dresser without scrubbing it clean first? Why can’t I just hang the new blinds without Windexing the windows? Why can’t I just put the bed-spread on the bed without first taking it to the dry cleaners? Why can’t I just hang the curtains without ironing them first? I’ll tell you why–I’m a crazy, hormonal, lady, who is growing a baby and feels like the world might fall to pieces if I don’t get this room just right. The rest of my house is a shambles (at least it feels like it to me), but I have at least got this one room under my control.

I did this same thing with Pace’s baby room 2 years ago. It also has 3 doors and a closet, but I decided I wanted to paint stripes on her walls. It was my parents who came to help last time, and I think that I drove my Dad so crazy that he finally sent my mom and I to bed and stayed up most of the night finishing the room himself. My other obsession was the base boards. I’m not sure why, but I thought if I brought Pace into the world without having our base-boards scrubbed, she would surely perish of some mysterious infection she would acquire by her contact with them. Now, think about the physics of crouching down to clean baseboards when you have a watermelon protruding from your gut and your’e toting an extra 20-something pounds. I fretted over it so much that Ashley finally showed up at my house one Saturday and asked me to give her a bucket. She is such a good cleaner and as we both scrubbed those base-boards she helped me to laugh at the permanent grime that wouldn’t come off, but at least had been thoroughly Cloroxed.

Well, Thursday is going to be the grand opening of Pace’s new room. She has some new pajamas for her new bed, and she acts pumped to move over into her “Big Girl” space. Jeremiah keeps saying, “Pace, where’s your new room?” Then, she squeals and runs into it, with her pointer finger waving madly about, and screaming, “Pace’s room!” through her squinted-eye grin. I’ve found myself lingering over her crib every morning since I started this project and trying to savor the last glimpses of her curled up in a sweet little ball with her head securely nestled in a corner of her crib. Why is change so hard? (Talk about a whole nother blog! as I sit here and weep) So, I’ll post a picture of her in the new room on Fri morning. Until then, I’ll be here cleaning something irrational.