One year as a working mom
Our baby BOY is here!

October, so far

  RISING*SHINING

Hey friends! And hey October (and almost November, eek!)! We made it through the summer and I am so excited to embrace the fall. Not that it's crisp and fall-ish quite yet here but it's definitely NOT hot-as-an-oven and the mornings are chilly enough for long sleeves and hot coffee.

Fall all seems to be the perfect nesting weather, doesn't it? Even though I feel drawn outdoors by the weather there's a feeling of focusing on being at home and with my family and making everything cozy as the daylight shortens. I'm thinking so much about bringing a tiny baby into the world, into our family, this winter - in just about nine weeks. I'm so excited to meet our baby and to be fully immersed in those demanding and sweet early months. At the same time I'm savoring our family routine as it is now, before it is sure to change.  

There's been plenty going on and I haven't prioritized working on blog posts. Instead I'm prioritizing family time and taking time for myself when I can get it - which usually looks like reading, a mug of ice cream and going to bed early. It doesn't seem that I'm going to get back to my consistent editorial calendar before I have the baby but let me catch you up on a few things happening lately:

+ Chris and I have been paying down my graduate school student loans like mad. As in $2,000/month in addition to moving some money out of savings to help us pay it off faster. Our hope is to have it paid off completely in early 2015 if not before the baby is born. I'm ridiculously excited to eliminate this debt, which was about $45,000 when I graduated with my master's degree in 2008.

+ Dash has been doing pretty well sleeping in his toddler bed for naps and we're planning to take the plunge and have him sleep nights in his bed...soon. He sleeps so, so well right now, going to bed promptly by 7 and sleeping through the night until around 5 am (or sometimes later!) so I'm nervous about introducing change but hopefully it will go smoothly. Cross your fingers for us!

+ Two weekends ago I attended the first professional conference of my career that I was actually excited to go to and it was awesome! I hung out with fellow science writers in Columbus, OH at the National Association of Science Writers conference. Who knew that there were not only so many people who also love to nerd out on science and writing but that there's a whole professional organization? It made me super happy.

+ On a related note, I've been enjoying work and loving my job so much lately. As I wrote in my earlier post about being a working mom for one year I'm feeling so lucky to have such a great work/life balance right now. I can imagine I'll go through a similarly difficult transition when I go back to work after the baby is born but I hope I'll be able to find this great balance again in the coming year.

+ With less than ten weeks to go in my pregnancy I'm feeling really good and this pregnancy might even be "easier" than Dashiell's, and that was also a pretty easy pregnancy. Heartburn continues to plague me but on most days my ankles are of normal size, hip hip! I think having a standing desk and spending the day standing/sitting is really helping. I am starting to feel pretty big and aware of my belly for a lot of the day, especially running after and picking up a toddler. The baby happily kicks away, especially during the night.

+ And finally, Sarah was so sweet to have me as a guest on her blog to talk about motherhood and creativity, so pop over to Positively Dreaming and check it out. Thank you, Sarah!

Hope you've been having a great October!

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