Of houses and forts

Part One:  The Ugh

We had our home inspection today, and it did not go well.  It turns out that a house can look perfectly fine from the outside and yet have current water leakage from a brand new roof, dry rot, a faulty electrical system, a self-done plumbing system with no permits and not up to code, and so on.  Sacha spent the majority of the day out there, dealing with the inspection and the lead and asbestos testing.  We should get the results of everything tomorrow:  the test results and the final inspection report. 

Our realtor is suggesting a new, much lower bid on the house and, if it is not accepted, that we run away as fast as we can.   If we get the much lower price, we'll have the money we need to fix everything and have a great house in a great neighborhood.  If not, we don't need to buy an expensive money pit. 

We're both pretty sad about it, because we loved it and all the possibilities we saw there....but if it's not meant to be, then I guess the right house for us is waiting out there somewhere.  If this falls through, which looks likely, we'll plan to stay in our house until Sacha establishes a regular paycheck history again (her maternity leave is going to mess with this) and then start looking again.  If nothing else, we're learning a lot about real estate and this neighborhood in particular.   In some ways, I'm glad we're really getting to know the area before buying, even if that is the silver lining in a cloud of disappointment.

Part Two:  The Fort

Except for the kids' music class and an ensuing trip to the coffee shop near us, the kids and I spent a lot of the day playing inside.  They have been entertaining themselves so well lately that I can hardly even believe it.   Loretta's blocks, which I referenced in an earlier post, have come into favor again, and Mateo built some really cool forts with them today. 

They also did painting, bike riding, playing in the basement, and finally consented to go out for a walk with me in the early evening, because they had been inside for way too long.  Here's a photo of Mateo and his fort.  Hey, if we can't land our dream house, at least he can build his!

36 week project

Today, I turned 36 weeks! Yah! Alayna took a picture of me posted here. I am feeling pretty good and actually felt some downward pressure for part of the day.



The other thing I did today was remade two of my terrariums, and created a new one. I love terrariums. Unfortunately, when I keep them at school, my students tend to either over-water them or under-water them. Either way the plants end up dying :(

Now that they are at home, hopefully they will stay alive. Here are some pictures of each of the three terrariums that I made today. The last one came out a bit blurry, but here they are anyway.

Why Bubby and I smell like pot

I kid you not. But, we were not doing anything illegal. We were using a Chinese herb called Moxa to help turn the baby.

This afternoon I went to acupuncture for an hour to help get the baby move to a head down position. After the appointment (and a fabulous dinner) Bubby and I spent a lovely 15 - 20 min. outside in the cold, smoking my feet. You put the moxa on the baby toe and it somehow moves the baby. While it doesn't make any sense to me, there appears to be some research showing that it can actually work. The moxa has a very potent smell, so we didn't want to do that in the house!

Before the moxa treatment, I tried doing an inversion - which had me with my knees on the couch and my head on the ground face forward. After holding that yoga like pose for a minute, I was to crawl around on the ground for two more minutes. I then did the inversion treatment again after the moxa.

So, I'll be trying this for the next few days. I did find some good news. If I have to have an external version, they have a 90% success rate with transverse babies (unlike full breech babies, where the success rate is 50 - 60%). The moxa supposedly has a 50 - 75% success rate. So, it's worth a try!

Turning east and west

While Sacha and her mom are having a quiet weekend at home, the kids and I are out visiting my brother in eastern Oregon.  Megan again traveled with us, which was wonderful for both the company and the help with the kids.  It's really cute to see how much the kids LOVE to come out here.  They love Uncle Galen, they love Megan, they love his house, they love the parks around here, and they never want to leave.  The parks are actually surprisingly awesome.  We went to one today that was better than most Portland parks and clearly had been a huge community effort to finance and build.

And, wow!, I just got the news last night over the phone that Drizzle is going to be a March baby!  We have some good friends whose daughter was born on March 27th, so maybe they will share a birthday.  We are really, REALLY hoping to avoid an external version, which is where they try to turn the baby at the hospital.  We're going to try a lot of the things our friend Erin tried, successfully, when her baby was transverse, and hope that little Drizzle goes head down and stays there.  She has definitely been head down before, but she just doesn't stay that way.  She likes to be wrapped around Mommy instead. :)

Not surprisingly, it's really starting to hit me that we are going to be having a baby, and soon!  I can only hope that it will be smooth sailing and that we'll roll with the punches when it's not.  I can't wait to meet little Drizzle and welcome her to our family, chaotic as it will be!  Also, I'm just hoping for a smooth and relatively pain-free birth for Sacha.  She sure deserves it after the last time!

Here's hoping that the baby turns like she's supposed to and that we have a few more weeks to do last minute things like, you know, buy a house, before she comes out!

A "Go Not Past" Date

I went to my OB yesterday and now have a "Go not past date." I think this date is much more important than the due date - especially after Natalia's delivery. What is my end date? March 26th!

Little Drizzle continues to be transverse. Next week I am going to go to acupuncture and try treading in the water. My OB said that treading in water sometimes helps. Who knew. If the baby has not turned by Friday, they are going to send me in to the hospital to try and turn the baby.

Yesterday was my last day of work. The students wrote me all of these really nice thank you letters. They also wrote letters to next year's students. They seemed to really enjoy learning math and science this year.

It was very cute. Almost all of the boys wrote in their letters about the classroom management plan. Practically every boy wrote, if you don't pay attention, you get your name on the board. If you talk back or do something else you get a check. Then you have to call your own parents to explain what you did and miss recess. If you get another check, you don't get to be in the classroom. (I would like to point out that I only gave maybe 5-10 checks the entire year, and never a second check.) Apparently, though, the plan made quite the impression.

After they wrote their letters to next year's students, I put a few to work packing up my personal belongings for the classroom. I ended up with 10 or so packed boxes that are all labeled (and will stay at the school for next year). I just brought home four little things, knowing that we might be moving.

I didn't lift a thing. An adult volunteer was in the room all day. For the first three hours she helped one or two kids packing (they wanted to). At 11, when my day officially ended, I had 5 kids helping the two of us pack up. Seven students even asked to give up their recess so they could help me pack. I love 5th graders! I'll miss them, but I'm also glad that Friday was my last day.

What's a domestic partner?

I've been teaching sex ed. this week at school. At the beginning of the week, knowing that it was my last week with the students, I made a big list of all of our unfinished business. I then let the students vote on their top four choices.

What made the list?
1) Sex Ed. - they let me know that they would really prefer I teach it over a sub.
2) Literature circle time - when they read novels. This is amazing, because at the beginning of the year they could barely sit for 20 minutes to read, and now they wanted to do literature circle time where they read for 45 minutes at a time.
3) Math test prep - our state changed the standards this year for math, and increased the cut scores for passing the test dramatically. Did we have different materials to prepare students for the test? No.
4) Thank you notes to people that have helped them out.

I was actually surprised, and pleased, by their choices. I really don't mind teaching sex ed. Obviously, I'm not doing the whole curriculum in 5 days. We have covered ground rules, puberty, crushes and pregnancy. I spend about 30 minutes teaching something, and then the students have 30 minutes of Q & A time. They write their questions anonymously, and put them in envelopes by topic. I try to answer all their questions.

Today, we were talking about pregnancy. The questions ranged from, "What is the egg?" and "How does someone get pregnant?" to "Is there a difference between if a woman gets pregnant at a sperm bank or with a man?" and "If someone is raped, will they get pregnant?" Some of them no next to nothing, and others know a bit more. A few have been exposed to way more than I would hope any 10 or 11 year old would ever be exposed to.

Today, while we were talking about pregnancy, the kids wanted to know who would take care of the new baby. I replied that my partner would stay home and take care of the kids.

Now, I've never said to my class, "I'm a lesbian." I have, on the other hand, modeled writing an "I have a dream" essay about gay and lesbian parents. I explained that I knew kids at my school had been bullied (it was dealt with) because people thought that they had two moms or two dads. My kids actually did have two moms. I shared the dream that my kids could go to any school and not have to worry about being bullied.

Did the students understand what I meant? Nope. No clue.

Back to today. After I said that my partner would take care of the kids, there were a few other questions. About five minutes later, a girl asks, "What is a partner?" So I explained that in many states two women or two men can not get married to each other, but they can become domestic partners. . . etc. I also explained that there were some states where my partner and I could marry, as well as many places outside of the US where that was the case, like in Canada and Mexico City. The only response I got was, "Well, that's not fair." Wow.

And still, some of my students didn't get it. Amazing. But most of them did this time.

BFFs, plus new news

Mateo has all but given up napping, by which I mean that he doesn't nap in his bed, but instead falls asleep on the couch every day while I'm working out in the living room.  Some days, he stays awake, but mostly he falls asleep.  His sister, on the other hand, always naps and she does so in her bed, in her room.

Today, neither one of them fell asleep.  She chattered to herself for about an hour until Mateo decided he had to use the bathroom, which led him into her/their room, and then they were both up and around.  I always tell Mateo that I don't care if he naps or not, but that naptime is still quiet time and, more importantly, it is my time to do my workout.  So, he can play or read or sleep or do pretty much anything except lie there and watch me exercise.  When Tali came trotting out of her room today, I decided to go with that for her, too.  She could play or look at books or whatever, but no standing and gaping at the tv.

The amazing thing is, it actually worked!  She and Mateo started playing together in their room and Mateo emerged periodically to say, I kid you not, "thank you for still working out, Mama!"  I couldn't understand it until after I finished, when Mateo was absolutely crushed that his "special time with Natalia" was going to be over.  It was just about the cutest thing ever, like all my hopes and dreams for them as siblings coming true.  Ok, that might be a bit of hyperbole, but it was great to see them getting along so well and enjoying each others' company so much.  With a bit of encouragement from me and Sacha, who was home by that point, they continued to play and have special time together for several more minutes, which is a lot for them.

Then, after a quick snack, we went out to see a house that we are strongly considering buying out in a nearby city.  It's near the school we hope the kids will go to, near my grandma, near a lot of walkable places, which is a rarity for the suburbs, and it's a great house.  We're at the point where we've made an offer (several days ago), they countered (this afternoon), we accepted (this evening)....and now we wait to see if we'll get approved for the loan and be able to close this month, because obviously things are about to get crazy with Drizzle's arrival.  We weren't really planning to buy now, but we've looked at a lot of homes in that area and felt like we had to jump at this one when we found it.

We're lucky, so lucky, to have the resources to buy before selling our current house, so we won't have to work out moving a new baby, moving, and selling our house all at the same time.  Instead, assuming we get the loan, we'd probably close on the new house, have the baby, get used to having the baby, move, get our house ready to sell, and hopefully put it on the market in June, when the garden is really blooming.  So, we'll see where this takes us.  We have our fingers crossed that it works out!