First days of summer (and an 8 month bump)

 Today has felt like the first REAL day of summer.  It was hot and sunny... and the only way to really feel comfortable at 8 months pregnant has been to head to the beach!  The is the beach at my grandfathers place and is where I spent most of my summer holidays as a child.  The great thing is that it's difficult to get to (unless you go through his property) so most of the time there is nobody else there.  This of course means that you get to spend the whole summer running around in the nudie (or at least without a bikini top) which is a pretty great feeling!  I can't wait until we get to bring our little one here next year.

So we've hit 8 months, WOW!  By now I'm starting to get impatient, not because pregnancy is so awful, but because I am so excited to meet this little belly dweller!  It spends an awful lot of time wriggling and trying to get comfortable (much like its mama).  It also has a very strong sense of what it likes and dislikes, for example if I'm lying in a way that it doesn't like I get booted in the side until I roll over!  Demanding much?!  It loves listening and jiggling to music, gets very excited if we go somewhere noisy and it hears lots of new voices, seems to enjoy the sound of the shower (and starts moving as soon as I get out) and doesn't appear to appreciate me over eating (ermm sorry there has been rather a lot of that in the past week).  I'm not getting much sleep at the moment, although that has more to do with the heat, constant mosquito attacks and very frequent toilet trips more than the baby itself I think.  Otherwise I really can't complain too much.  We have another midwife appointment this coming week, but because our usual one is on holiday it will be with somebody else. Let's see how that goes!

Overall it has been a great but very exhausting week and I really feel like I need to take it easy for a while.  So I'm planning to eat lots of salads and fruit (because this constant over eating from Christmas is giving me a belly ache), plenty of swimming and generally just plenty of relaxing.  I try to have a little lie down every afternoon when it really gets too hot and spend most of my time reading some great books on childbirth.  In particular I am loving Ina May and her stories from The Farm and one that the antenatal teacher lent me on hypnobirthing.  Both are very inspiring and offer such a beautiful, unique view on birth.  I've got to say that at this point I am actually looking forward to the whole process!  I'm very curious to see how I handle it and I'm kind of looking forward to the challenge.  Ha ha but ask me again in a couple of months and I may be singing to quite a different tune!
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