almost 26 weeks

Taken this morning. I was a bit bleary-eyed.
I've been up much, much later than usual. No good reason. I've just been awake longer. These days I'm watching tv in bed from about 9:30 until 10:30 or 10:45. Coupled with one or two bathroom runs a night (usually one at 1am or 2am, whenever that first REM cycle is done; and one around 5am), this makes Monday mornings a bit difficult. Beyond that, I'm still sleeping relatively well. I'm hogging the bed with my body pillow, which I use when I'm lying on my side; it helps to keep my legs apart, which keeps my back and hips from hurting, and gives the belly a little more support. Of course, I usually kick it out of bed a few times a night and then have to go looking for it an hour or two later.

We made significant progress with our baby-related home improvement/organization projects this past weekend. We hit IKEA on Saturday night, looking for additional storage for the other upstairs room and lighting for both rooms. It was pregnant lady central. We were waddling all over the store. The trip was pretty successful and we managed to find a shade for the skylight in the baby's room, which I installed yesterday in a fit of industriousness.

Tomorrow night we've got our hospital tour "and so much more". It's an official class offered by our hospital and it's really called "Grand Tour and So Much More". This "so much more" stuff had better be good, because it's scheduled for 2 1/2 hours on a school night. Anyway, I'm really looking forward to checking out the facilities. We haven't been to the hospital other than for our infant CPR class, which was in the basement, and it'll be good to get to know what to expect.

In other news, I'm waiting for official feedback on my maternity leave request. I had submitted my request a couple of weeks ago, and it's taking awhile for management to figure out how they want to handle it. (It's a bit complicated as I'm asking for additional personal leave and a temporary flexible work schedule once I get beyond the 13 weeks of state/federal FMLA time that they're required to give me.) But at least it's in the works now. Hopefully we'll have some definition soon, so we can figure out when we'll need daycare.