ellenmillion | My biggest project yet...

I kind of suck at secrets. I can keep other people's secrets, no problem, but if I'm working on a project, I want to blog about it! I want to give more gritty detail than most people will ever care about and analyze all the little choices and brainstorm ideas and document my progress with all the funny (or frustrating) stories along the way. I've never been afraid of people stealing my ideas or derailing my progress. Heck, I even share my worlds.

So it's been tough this last week, embarking on my biggest, craziest project ever, and not being able to blog or chat about it at all. I keep sitting down to do a daily post and drawing a blank, because there is nothing to write about that doesn't center around this incredible news. (Well, really that's not true. I've finished two stories, my potatoes are growing like mad, my delphiniums are budding, I have a funny cat story, a bread experiment was a wild success, and there's a Muse Fusion this weekend.)

Finally, though, I've got all the immediate relatives informed, and I can stop worrying about accidentally mentioning my morning queasiness, my incredible new super-power of smell and the spidey-sense that is centered entirely in my nipples.

Anyone who's been there has probably already put the pieces together, but I'll make it official and clue in the rest of you: We're having a baby!

Just typing it feels completely insane.

I am just over 5 weeks now, which is generally considered too early to announce - I'm old enough that there's a non-insignificant chance of early miscarriage. But my little guppy has an actual neural trench (predecessor to a brain), and a liver, and the beginnings of some other organs, for all that she's only about 2 mm now, and I want to speak freely about that, and the freakish way I can smell things (the cat was grooming herself on my lap and I kicked her off because it smelled like cat spit) and the mad crazy remodeling we're doing because our house is wildly unsafe for a child.

I want to blog frankly about the change this will be for me, and what it means for my creative life (we've already moved most of my studio to an improved corner of the basement) and all my weird fears (some of them are VERY weird) and I am willing to chance being public about bad stuff, too. We'd try again, if that happened; we are both totally, incredibly happy about this, and have actually been trying for about a year.

Other questions I know I'll get:

Due date: Late February

Doctor/Midwife: I have four appointments over the next two weeks and I'm going to pick the one I feel most comfortable with. I don't have a regular doctor, and I want to choose wisely, because this is a pretty intimate, long-term thing. I'd prefer a natural birth, but safety and comfort are my first priorities.

What about my back: Good question. It hasn't given me trouble in a while, and I'm in good shape, but I did break my back. This could cause me a lot of pain. Or, it might not. I'm still going to the gym, and I'm going to really focus on staying flexible and strong. It's one reason we are in such a rush to get some of the major remodeling done now, because I may not be capable of much later, and there's a lot to do.

You are welcome to tell me whatever horror stories, crazy advice or personal anecdotes you like... I'm braced for it, and have been an enthralled (and occasionally disgusted) google-surfer for the last week or more.

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