How To Create a Perfect Nursery

Talk to your sister on the phone. Tell her you are thinking that Winnie the Pooh might be the theme of your nursery, that you love the sage green in the sheets you saw. Answer the phone when she calls to tell you that she just bought all your crib bedding on sale at Target. Follow her instructions when she tells you that you should go to Home Depot and buy a gallon of Christopher Robbin’s Swing from the Disney paint collection. Pick her up at the airport and make sure she has her favorite pumpkin spice coffee creamer and blue painters’ tape available when she wakes up in the morning. Sit on the soft new carpeting in the nursery and lean against the stark white walls and talk to her while she removes the outlet cover plates and tapes off all the woodwork.Open the windows and close the bedroom door and sit in the living room with the cats while your sister trims the edges with sage green Christopher Robbins’ Swing. Blink your eyes awake when she comes in the living room and tells you she wishes she could have found your camera to take a picture of the 3 big bellies napping in the living room.

At the fancy baby furniture store, oogle over the first crib you see and listen when your sister tells you it’s the same crib she bought for her son 6 years ago, only in a different color. Walk through the store admiring all the other cribs and listen as she tells you what is good and bad about each. Be grateful that your younger sister has been through all of this before, that you don’t have to enter into it completely blindly. Tell her that you think you like the darker wood better and sigh in relief when she tells you that she thinks it would look much nicer against Christopher Robbins’ Swing than the honey-colored crib. Listen as the sales associate gives you the spiel on the different expensive safety features of all the mattresses they sell. Turn to your sister and say “Whatever you think.” Be relieved when she tells you that the $80 Target mattress is just as good as the $200 mattresses you’re looking at. “Mine is 6 years old and Sarah still sleeps on it,” she says.

Be suddenly overwhelmed with emotion when she tells you, after she has lifted and struggled to fit the unassembled crib box into your Subaru Outback, that you’re going back into the store to order the rocking chair you love. Be glad you are wearing your sunglasses and nobody can see the tears building in your eyes.

Look at fabric swatches and be relieved when she says direct things like “Oh not that one,” and then apologizes for taking over. Tell her you are glad to have her there, that it reminds you of the time she helped you pick out a couch at Dayton’s Home Store. Remember how you had both laughed at Dayton’s when the sales associate left the room for a minute and you speculated that she thought you were a lesbian couple. “We could kiss,” she had said and you had nearly wet your pants laughing.

At Target carry the mattress pads and covers (2 of each so you always have one clean) while your sister carries the crib mattress. Back at home nap in front of the TV while your sister rollers the nursery walls. Admire the perfect color and how you’d probably love that color for your own bedroom as your sister walks around the room and points out flaws in the paint job that you can’t even see. Tell her it’s perfect.

Sit on the floor and hold wood pieces in place and hand allen wrenches and bolts back and forth until the Amber Baby’s Dream crib sits solidly against the newly painted south wall of the nursery. Exclaim how much you love it. Be grateful that Mom is paying for it.

Pay attention as your sister explains how to place the bedding on the mattress, the importance of taking the mattress out of the crib to do it rather than bending over the railings and struggling. Listen as she explains when to use the bumpers and how to tie them.

Thank your sister once again for all her hard work, for everything she has done for you over these last six months.

Later that night after she’s gone to bed, sneak back into the nursery and stand over the crib and study the little Poohs and Piglets and Tiggers and imagine what it will be like when your little boy is laying there. Panic. And again be grateful that your sister will always be there for you helping you through each scary step of this incredible journey.

Pooh and Barb and Ann (and a nursery color that is much prettier than it is in this photo).

My Rookie Kicker

Since ignoring the photo requests doesn't seem to be an option!

I have been pleasantly surprised and impressed by the Packers' new rookie kicker this season, but Mason Crosby's got nothing on the little guy that has recently discovered that my bladder apparently looks suprisingly like a football. Ouch.

Becoming Miranda

Do you remember that episode of Sex & the City right after Miranda has her baby and the girls are all out together and then decide to go uptown and before Miranda can even say anything they hail her a cab and shuffle her off to go home alone with her baby? And then later Carrie comes by and Miranda has a little emotional meltdown (well, as emotional as Miranda ever gets) about how alone she is and how her single friends are deserting her?

I just had one of those moments as my writing group started planning the next workshop get-together. I feel so sad about missing them again. Maybe it's just because I looked at my profile in the mirror this morning and it suddenly became so incredibly real... how my life is about to change. Don't get me wrong. I'm very excited about how my life is going to get richer and fuller, but I'm sad about the way my friendships are starting to change already. I'm terrified of being abandoned by my friends.

I know what helps is to start building new friendships with other women who are in the same stage as me, and I've been so grateful to all of the Minnesota Single Mothers By Choice women who have reached out to me over the last year or so. They are wonderful and sweet and generous and thoughtful and brave women. I appreciate every word of kindness and reassurance and support they've given me, and I'm hoping I'll continue to stay in touch (thanks to Rhonda's offer to put me up for a night when there are SMC meetings in the twin cities). But I have moved to western Wisconsin, and at this point I need to start finding local mommies.

I’m freaking out.

Just a little.

You would too if you woke up one day and looked in the mirror and saw a profile that included a basketball-sized bump and stretch marks and little spider veins and swollen ankles.

I know what I'm feeling is totally normal (after all, it happened to Miranda), but still... it's scary, and this blog is all about sharing all the parts of my journey with you.

On a more positive note, I love my new house where there are no streetlights, and the sky is lit with a zillion stars, and the wind blowing in the leaves of the neighbor’s poplar trees is the only sound I hear as I watch the sunrise turn the sky pink while I eat breakfast on my back deck. I really feel like I’m home for the first time in a long time, and that is going to be a great way for me to feel when I bring this little boy home from the hospital in just 11 short weeks.

Coming soon… .a photo of the growing belly. And it IS growing. Baby is now over two pounds and 15 inches long, and my belly knows it. (As does my lower back.)

I can't wait for Annie's visit this weekend. It's time to start working on that nursery and she's been a godsend in planning for this baby. What would I do without her!

Inspirational Auntie PAMFA

Part of our group on Jarosa Mesa, September 2005

This week I have to give a nod to the wonderful women of my writing group. PAMFA. When my mentor and friend Pam started this group 5 years ago (wow, has it really been that long already?) who would have known that we would continue beyond our original goal of a two-year commitment, that we would grow into a loving community that is like family?

This week as my writing group gathers in the beautiful mountains of Colorado (oh, how I wish I could be there), I am sad to be missing them all. I can picture Pam coming out into the living room in the morning, her hair still wet as the rest of the group mills around the solid wood table and spoons sugar into lattes and raisins into steel cut oatmeal as the sun heats the linoleum floor and twinkles through the stained glass Dante hanging near the window. I can feel the chill in the air as everyone slowly meanders out to their cars at the end of the night, the bright moon glowing over the ranch and the dogs circling to tell everyone how much they have enjoyed the company. I can hear the laughter as Tami tells a story about her adventures with Pam or Katherine somehow manages to make everyone laugh about breast cancer. I can see Lesley’s graceful motion as she reaches into the salt bowl and douses her salad with white crystals several times without letting it interrupt the story she is telling. I can see the excitement in Heather’s face as she takes the first sip of her latte and comes alive in the morning. I can smell the garlic wafting out from the kitchen as Pam instructs someone to stir her famous mashed potatoes as she adds the cream. I can see Karen kicked back on the couch, her Smartwool-covered feet resting on the coffee table as she reads through a manuscript or one of the many books piled on the table. I can hear the individual sighs and exhalations as everyone takes their first bite of whatever fish (Copper River Salmon?) Pam has baked… a dish that everyone will swear is better than ever before. And I can almost feel the tickles and cuddles and leaning bodies of those wonderful Irish Wolfhounds. But most of all, even without being there, I can feel the love and support within this group.

This wonderful group of brave women has been an inspiration to me for years, and they have all been supportive and encouraging of me in every aspect of my life, not just my writing. They were there when my world was shattered by an unexpected break-up, and they have been there ever since telling me that I am going to be a great mother, that this is the path I’m supposed to follow, that they are excited for me. They are surrogate aunts to my little boy, and even if motherhood and babies are not regular subjects among us as a group, these brave, strong, smart, beautiful women have made me a better person and given me so many great gifts. Just like everyone else, I am bumping through life, making mistakes and hopefully learning as I go, and I am so grateful to have these women in my corner whether I succeed or fail.

Lisa once said to me that PAMFA challenged her in so many ways and made her not only want to be the best writer that she could be, but the best Lisa that she could be. I couldn’t have said it any better myself, and I thank God for these women who have inspired me to be the best Barb that I can be, who have taught me through example about the importance of taking risks and putting myself out there and having the courage to follow my own dreams. It is largely because of them that I had the courage to make this little boy growing inside me, and as they gather together this week to talk about writing and boys and traveling and life, although we are separated by the miles between here and Colorado, I can feel the love as if they were all right here in this room.

Thank you all for everything you have taught me!!!

Not Just Gas

My 24-week belly poses in front of the lake in Winona

Once again, a moment I have to share. Baby is so strong and solid now that his kicks feel like real kicks, and I’ve been feeling him a lot during the last week. I can really feel that it is him in there making those movements and not just gas. But he's still small enough (about a pound an a half) that he's got plenty of room to move around, so there is lots of kicking all over the place.

A few days ago I couldn't believe all that activity was coming from just four limbs, and I asked him if he had invited some friends over for a party. It really is the coolest thing. Yesterday when I felt the kicks I sat at my desk and closed my eyes and put my hand on my belly. The kicks were hard enough that it was possible to feel them with my hand from the outside. Mom says she can remember when she was pregnant with me and she watched my fist pounding on her belly. I don’t have movements that graphic yet, but he’s definitely in there announcing to me very clearly that he’s happy and healthy.

12 more weeks.

Door County Part Two

Taylor, me and Uncle Ron at Cave Point Park

When I got to Door County Friday I did the usual hugs, and I even let Aunt Judy rub my belly. Just a little. We chatted for a little while, all of them giving me their input about names. (Uncle Ron suggested that I name my son Samuel with a middle name that starts with an A so his initials would be S.A.M. I told him that was exactly the joke Jimmy Joe would have told.)

Inside Taylor and I rolled our eyes and watched the circus of the three grandparents cooking, TT and her sister singing and debating over how to make Ann’s famous dill sauce while Uncle Ron escaped outside to grill the fish (your mother’s idea, Johnny). We sat down to a dinner that started with TT’s famous fresh summer salad and ended with Mom raving about the fish and the dill sauce over and over.

“And I don’t even like fish,” she said as she took her fourth piece of tender, pink salmon.

Mom, Uncle Ron, Taylor and Aunt Judy before digging in.

After we were full, we sat and picked at the remains on the serving dishes and mom continued to dip her finger in the dill sauce (“I could put that on the steak tomorrow,” she said). TT and I argued over who would sleep where. She insisted on sleeping on the couch and giving me her bed, telling me that last night she woke up to read at 11, 1, 3, and 5 anyway… and in between those times she got up to pee. “Odds I’d read. Evens I’d pee,” she said. I told her THAT was going on the blog. It seems we're on the same schedule.

The three of them laughed about how this family always enjoys talking about bodily functions and how much fun it’s going to be to teach that to my son. Taylor went to the living room to watch TV, and I rolled my eyes and started washing dishes.

After dinner we sat around a beach bonfire and played a round robin story-writing game that resulted in a tale of a spaceship coming down from the sky so aliens could urinate on our fire and compare the smell of morning breath to a skunk.

The evening ended with Uncle Ron and I sitting by the last embers of the fire while the moon that peeked through the clouds reflected off Lake Michigan. I could hear the waves slapping the nearby shore, and as Uncle Ron told me about the miracles of his grandchildren – the way Taylor focuses at basketball, how he knew how strong Jack was and everything with him would be okay, how Malia brings him to the big front window to watch motorcycles on Ravine Road—my own child put the flutter-flutter-flutter behind him and moved on to his first real firm kicks. Uncle Ron continued to tell stories of Julie and Johnny and Michael and how proud he was of each and every one of his children, and I sat content with my hand resting on my belly feeling the solid kicks that had me imagining a real knee bending and unwinding to connect a foot with its surroundings.

Earlier in the evening Mom and Aunt Judy and Uncle Ron had joked about who the matriarch and patriarch of the family were and who would be in the future, who would outlive who. And as I sat there feeling amazed by my son unwinding to punch and kick, I realized how much I love and enjoy these people, and how much I hope all of them are still around years from now so my son will get to love and enjoy them as much as I do.

Door Dounty 2007

Are these the cutest kids ever, or what?

Our family's annual Door County gathering is one of the highlights of my summer every year. I adore those kids so much, and life around them is full of fun and laughs and curiosity and imagination (and the word "poop"). This year's trip was no exception.


We played in the sun and went to The Farm. TT kept wanting to touch Aunt Barb's belly, and Ann warned the kids to be careful of the baby in Aunt Barb's belly. When TT tried to get the kids to touch it, Zack said, "Are you scared to Sarah?" Neither of them ever did touch my belly, but I got lots of hugs and laughs and memories that I'll cherish forever. Zachary and Sarah make it easy to be excited about being a parent.


See lots of pictures of the whole family on my website.

The Greatest Feeling

I know I just posted earlier this evening (and I won't make a habit of posting so often), but as I sit here watching all the local networks interrupt regular programming to tell us about thunderstorm and tornado warnings all over the area, I can't stop smiling. Baby is really active right now, and that little flutter-flutter-flutter is just the greatest feeling I've ever experienced. It makes me so happy that I have a big grin on my face and tears in my eyes, and since there is nobody here to see it, I just had to tell you all about it.