googiemomma

yesterday, on my way to work, little #5 did some kind of a weird flip/turn/wiggle thing in my belly. it was rather wild, and definitely unusual.

and then that was it.

i thought it was odd. but i figured she would start bouncing around soon and it would be fine.

10, 11, noon...nothing. by 1 i was starting to stress a bit. so i downed a quick cup of coffee and some dried fruit, figuring a little burst of sugar would get her going.

still nada.

as i got ready to head home at 3, i asked googiedaddy what he thought. should i call the midwife?

yes.

by the time i got through to her i was on my way home. she listened to my concerns, listened to my hemming and hawing about how stupid i felt and how it was probably nothing.

and then she told me to just on head up for a quick ultrasound.

gulp.

apparently, she didn't realize she was supposed to tell me i was crazy, it was nothing to be concerned about, give it until tomorrow...

so i turned around and headed back to work to pick up googiedaddy. we drove home to drop off little bear at mom-mom's with the rest of the googies, and headed up to the hospital.

i can hear you all...moms yourselves...stressing and whimpering right now. it's coming right through my computer screen. so i'll make it clear right now: EVERYTHING WAS AND IS FINE.

as soon as the technician put that ultrasound wand thingy on my belly i strained my neck--i could just make out the tiny flicker of a heart beating away.
there were some tears. she is fine.

and then the tech continued to scan...she finally cocked her head to one side and started chuckling.
"do you see how she's laying?" she asked.

five had managed to wedge herself completely sideways in my belly, and completely folded in half. her toes were at her nose.

now, in case you're more of a visual learner, i've done up this handy drawing to help illustrate what i mean:

no wonder i felt a rough wild movement.

and no wonder i didn't feel much more after that.

phewww...
deep breaths.

all's well that ends well.

no matter how many you have, it never becomes routine. and they each have the ability to cause your heart to skip a beat...or ten.
no matter whether in the womb or out.

so now i'm off to work on my next project--a maternity tee...

another week, another snow day.
that’s pretty much how it feels—at least here in the northeast.
but it’s okay, because i use my snow days to get important things done.

wait, what? were you thinking things like deep cleaning and reorganizing?

haha.

you’re cute.

no. when the googiedaddy is stuck home due to snow, i hop out of bed and say “pull the bed out. today i’m painting the wall behind it. i saw it on a blog.”

this wall:

stop laughing at my elephant. it’s a cool mist humidifier and it saves my life nightly. i have pregnant nose for cryin’ out loud.

needs something, right? (besides having the bed made. but when i get an idea in mind i GOGOGOGO. no time for such trivialities.)

so i knew when i saw this tutorial from centsational girl it was the perfect thing. it’s been in my “ideas” file forever. i’ve even had the paint forever. it was time to get ‘er done.
she used poster board to create her stencil, then traced it in pencil and free-hand painted the entire thing.

but i had something else in mind…
i found a pattern i liked and printed it out:

i do all my best planning in bed. a blessing on whoever invented wireless printers.

then i took my printout and put it behind my “stencil medium” and traced.

you’re wondering what it is, aren’t you?

shhh…come ‘ere…closer…
it’s a flexible cutting board from the $1 store. actually, they were 2 for $1, so it was really only 50 cents. it came to me in a burst of inspiration.

it was perfect—cut easily with an xacto knife…

and cleaned up easily too.

so now, through the magic of internet, you don’t have to see the 45 minute “break” i took from my project to clean behind our bed. let’s just say: a bag of miscellaneous trash, enough dust bunnies to start a dust bunny farm, and at least 20 hairbands that slip off my hair every night while i sleep and i can’t find in the morning. and here i thought i was a relatively clean person. i should have known better. i’ve been down this road before.

ahem. so, moving on:

once my stencil was ready and the bed pulled away from the wall to reveal pristine spotlessness, i began the process.

my other supplies: a wet rag for cleanups, a decent paint brush, masking tape to hold the stencil in place, and the paint. i used a 50/50 blend of these 2 colors:

decoart dazzling metallics champagne gold, and folkart metallic pearl white

next followed some suggestions from googiedaddy: “maybe you should measure the wall and/or stencil before you start so you know where it will end. or how big to make it.”

what.eh.ver.

let me just tell you something right now. any fairly consistent reader of googiemomma probably already knows my feelings on this, but i’ll break it down for ya.

as are levels. and band-aids. and sewing patterns. and the whole concept of ‘planning ahead’ in general.

this is for you, my friends. words to live by.

but then again, i’m all about keeping a happy marriage. so i get a tape measure, measure the wall in both directions, measure the stencil in both directions, get a calculator, and fill an entire page with numbers. and division signs. and multiplication signs. and maybe some square root thingys and some things squared exponentially and i googled the pythagorian theroum just to see if it applied.

then i leave the paper in an obvious spot, where googiedaddy will see it and be all impressed by my vast mathematical skills and forethought.

then i go back to what i was doing--namely, i little thing i like to call “eyeballing”. except now my brain hurts.

i started at the bottom. there is a learning curve, and this area is hidden by the bed.

and i stenciled. and i stenciled. and then i took a break.

and then i stenciled some more, and cried about my pregnant back, and stenciled.

then i ran out of paint.

day 2, new paint, i got into a groove:

stencil an entire row, wash the stencil, let everything dry. take a few minutes to throw in a load of laundry or load the dishwasher or check email or just sit and whine about my aching back.

then rinse and repeat.

in this way i worked slowly up the entire wall. i skipped areas where my stencil was too big to fit. when i got done all the big areas, i cut my stencil up into little pieces:

and filled in the holes.

i’m not gonna lie—it was pretty time consuming. and in retrospect i kind of wish i had made my stencil a bit bigger—closer to the size of centsational girl’s.

but the end result~~well, i’m pretty proud of it:

STOP LAUGHING AT MY ELEPHANT. I CAN HEAR YOU.

okay, okay…i’ll put my best foot forward:

better?

{i’m still searching for a nightstand for my side of the bed. until then i have one of those old sewing machine tables that just about everyone has. and no, we don’t have baseboard or trim in this room yet. hey, it’s only been 5 years. DON’T RUSH US.}