mermaid envy...

yesterday ben and i went swimming at a nearby lake. it was uber funsies; the weather has been humid and muggy, and it was another hot day, but the sky was a little overcast, so it wasn't too sunny, and the water was the perfect temperature - not too cold but still refreshing.

and i remembered how much i love swimming, but i love it even more now that i'm so bulbous and awkward. where i waddle on land, i glide in the water. where my maneuvering is clumsy around solid objects, i can leap, prance and twirl with such grace when surrounded by that all supporting yet ever moving atmosphere. on solid ground, bound by gravity, i am limited, strained and rigid; simple movements require great effort. but elevated and lifted up within that realm of fluidity, i am a ballerina butterfly.

i even told ben this, that i was inventing a new form of dance - aquatic ballet. he in turn partnered me wonderfully with twirls and dips and lifts and such.

i would live in the water for these last two months of pregnancy, if i could. and thus i have mermaid envy. i bet pregnancy is very easy on mermaids. ariel wanted nothing more than to live on land. i would like to be under the sea, at least while i'm with child.

in baby news today, i am exactly 31 weeks along, and baby is still the size of a squash. i have 2 months and 2 days to go, which means that in 3 days, i'll officially be in my 8th month of pregnancy. and only 10 more days until my next appointment with the new doctor.

i'm also learning that what i thought were braxton hicks contractions (ie - fake contractions that are basically practice for the real deal later on) have actually just been the baby jamming his/her head/butt/arm/what-have-you into various different organs of my own. (i would feel pressure in different areas of my torso, and assumed it was the fake-tractions, until i learned that the braxton hicks variety - and its real-deal counterpart - are felt across the entire span of the abdomen, and sometimes even radiating to the back, so not just pressure here and there as i was feeling it.) so that's been pretty fun to realize that i'm feeling this baby move a lot more than i thought i was, and that i can feel the baby when he/she has decided to lodge him/herself into the various corners among my ribs, stomach, bladder, etc...

it's getting more and more real each day, and yet it's still so hard to believe there's a baby in there. all i can imagine is some 3D style cartoon-ish figure, like the ones in all the pictures of "what your baby looks like at x number of weeks."

but the closer we get to the due date, the more anxious i am to get into our own space and have it settled and ready for this little one... only a month to go (hopefully).