Sept. 22: It’s been a pretty good week. Bryan started his new job at OpGen on Monday. He’s been sometimes overwhelmed, but in general, as the week progressed, I think he was feeling increasingly comfortable…feeling like he’ll be able to do a good job working there. The past week, Bryan’s been posting to a blog about his new job. Check it out!
I really enjoyed being back at work this week. Monday and Tuesday, I felt like my brain was doing a lot of catch-up to remember how to do things like read and process information, but by Wednesday, I felt like things were clicking more. Gathering Waters’ land conservation awards celebration was on Thursday, and it went really well. It was nice to get dressed up (making a run to the Macy’s MAC counter to get my eyes done 🙂 and see many of our great colleagues.
I am traveling to Carleton on Thursday next week, but other than that, it should be a relatively normal, calm week in the office. I’m looking forward to it!
Half way done?!
Sept. 22: I feel like my belly is doing some major growth this week. Objectively, I don’t think I look any different, but it’s somewhat uncomfortable down there. I’m still feeling the little one kick…little blip-y feelings. The other night, it was actually making it kind of hard for me to fall asleep. Such a sweet and wonderful feeling.
My ultrasound is scheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 25. Hopefully we’ll find out the gender at that point. I just can’t wait to see the little munchkin…getting a sneak peak is such a treat!
From BabyCenter.com 20 week update
How your baby’s growing:
Your baby weighs about 10 1/2 ounces now. She’s also around 6 1/2 inches long from head to bottom, and about 10 inches from head to heel.
(For the first 20 weeks, we use measurements taken from the top of the baby’s head to her bottom — known as the “crown to rump” measurement.
After that, we use measurements from head to toe. This is because a baby’s legs are curled up against her torso during the first half of pregnancy and are very hard to measure.)
A greasy white substance called vernix caseosa coats her entire body to protect her skin during its long submersion in amniotic fluid. (This slick coating also eases the journey down the birth canal.)
Your baby is swallowing more, which is good practice for her digestive system. She’s also producing meconium, a black, sticky substance that’s the result of cell loss, digestive secretion, and swallowed amniotic fluid. This meconium will accumulate in her bowels, and you’ll see it in her first messy diaper (although a few babies pass it in utero or during delivery).
Alphabet madness
Sept. 15: I’m constantly amazed how little brains work. Once Andrew decides it is time to do something, it surprises me how he can just go ahead and do it. I don’t think he is any different from other kids in this respect, but it’s such a privilege to watch him in action.
In the past few weeks, Andrew has decided that he loves the alphabet. So we went to the library and got him several alphabet books. Since that time, he’s just been eating up letters. Today, he pointed at Bryan’s shirt and said, “B – A – Y – L..” Well, then he lost interest, but Bryan’s shirt said Baylor.
In other news, Andrew is still in love with stories about Robin Hooood. He’s not napping for us today. When he is feeling cooperative, he’s just the funnest person to be around. I trimmed his curls while he was in the tub last night. They were getting a little excessive, but I just love them so!
Not working much at anything!
Sept. 15: It’s been a really nice week. With Bryan and myself having the full week off and Andrew in daycare at Karen’s, the days were quiet and full of whatever we wanted to do. Sitting here now on the weekend, I’m feeling really glad that I was able to take this whole week to recuperate. I’m also a little shocked at how little I’ve gotten done. I pretty much divorced myself from computer this week, so not only did I not reply to the hundreds of loving notes I received throughout the month, but I am now behind on another 40 or so. Oh well!
I did get some productive things done. I paid Mom’s bills, did some clean-up of material from the funeral events, and at least now have a rather complete list of the thank-you notes that need to be written. I’m so grateful to so many people. In retrospect, this past week would have been an ideal time to write a lot of those thank you notes. It was, however, more fun and more restorative to be a slug:)
With life moving at a slightly slower pace, Andrew was in a much better mood this week. We had some lovely evenings together. Pictures from the last week including a nice apple-picking trip we took last weekend are in the gallery.
Updates on my siblings
Sept. 15: I’ve had quite a few people ask what Maretta and Joe are doing at this point, so here’s a quick update.
Maretta and Kyle drove back up to St. Paul on Sunday, September 9. Maretta had gone up for a couple days last week to get settled, buy books, and attend the first day of classes. After returning to her apartment at St. Kate’s on Sunday, Maretta spent a couple days lying low, and she started going to classes on Wednesday. Although she didn’t try out for the fall plays, one of the directors approached her earlier this week and offered her a part in a three-person show this fall. So even though she had been thinking about taking a bit of a slower semester, it looks like she’ll be working full throttle for the next month. I’m glad because she’ll be doing things that she loves. Maretta is a senior majoring in theater.
Joe flew back to Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine on Thursday, September 13. He’s planning on starting classes on Monday. He’s going to take a couple classes this fall, work, and play his English horn in a quartet. I imagine he’s going to have his work cut out for him the first few weeks since classes at Bowdoin started on August 30. Joe’s a sophomore this year and is planning on majoring in philosophy.
While Joe was home over the last couple weeks, he’s been staying with Michael, and Michael took off work Monday-Wednesday this week to recuperate and to spend time with Joe. I believe that Michael went back to work on Thursday at Excel Inns where he works as a computer guru.
I stopped in work at Gathering Waters Conservancy briefly on Tuesday and Wednesday, but other than that, I took off the whole week to recover and to spend time with Bryan since he was having his week off between jobs. After nearly four weeks of time off work, I’ll be back at work on my normal schedule starting on Monday.
I think for all of us, it was good to take off some time after the trials and events of the last few weeks.
In talking with Maretta the other day, we noted that we’re all learning to incorporate a deep sadness into our lives now. It’s a lot different than what we’ve been dealing with the last couple years. A sense of loss and a gaping hole has replaced a previous constant sense of anxiety or alertness. I am glad to not have to continue to worry about the results of the next test. When would bad news come? How would it come?
The last month was much more serious…how much pain was Mom in? Was she acting normally, or not? If she wasn’t acting normal, what did that mean?
So, bizarrely, I find myself experiencing a sense of relief on some level. I can still carry with me a constant, very low-grade worry that some accident will befall someone I love, but I don’t have that same sense of potential impending doom. Now that the worst has happened and we no longer have our Mom here with us in our lives, we instead need to work through our grief and learn how to make our lives OK with this new, undesired reality.
If anyone wants to drop Maretta or Joe a note, here are their addresses:
Maretta Babler
College of St. Catherine
#145
2004 Randolph Ave.
St. Paul, MN 55105
Joe Babler
Bowdoin College
33 Smith Union Hall
Brunswick, ME 04011-8400
Now in the produce aisle…it’s a zucchini
Sept. 15: The last week has flown by in a very calm way, and I was really shocked to see an update from BabyCenter.com in my inbox yesterday telling me that I am now 19 weeks pregnant.
A little over a week now until I have my ultrasound appointment, and I’m feeling increasingly pregnant. These days when I bend over, I’ve started to make an inadvertent “oof” grunt. I also found this morning that it was uncomfortable to bring my knee up to my chest to tie my boots.
Mentally, I think I’m also making a switch. I spent much of yesterday ogling baby clothes…an activity that hadn’t seemed that pertinent in past weeks.
Last night I almost woke Bryan up, because the baby’s normal soft “blip”-like kicks had become little thumps, and I thought I could even feel them from the outside. Still not particularly showing, though, except for a little bump and looking rather thick around the middle:)
Week 19 Update from BabyCenter.com
Your baby weighs about 8 1/2 ounces,
and he measures 6 inches, head to bottom — about the length of a small zucchini. The hair on his scalp is sprouting. If your baby is a girl, she already has 6 million eggs in her ovaries. This is a crucial time for sensory development: Your baby’s brain is designating specialized areas for smell, taste, hearing, vision, and touch. He may be able to hear you as you talk. Research shows that he’s learning to distinguish your voice from others, and he’ll soon show a preference for it. Let Dad get in on the act, too — encourage him to talk to your baby.
Moving around
Sept. 11: I had my third prenatal visit this afternoon. I actually had it scheduled yesterday, but I totally spaced the appointment. Good thing I’m not in charge of anything really important right now…I think my brain needs a break!
Dr. Flannery said that everything looked good. She found the heartbeat right away, and the little one’s heart was pounding away at about 160 beats/minute. Dr. Flannery thought that it was in the midst of a really active session…which would make sense since I felt it “plip” inside of me a couple times while I was in the waiting room.
I scheduled an ultrasound for Tuesday, September 25…two weeks from today. Bryan and I are so excited for that appointment. We’re looking forward to getting a glimpse of the little one inside and hoping to learn the gender. Hard to believe that in two weeks, the pregnancy will be around it’s half-way point!
So tired…
Sept. 9: I’m sure that times will come when I am more sad, but since the funeral on Friday, I’ve just been tired. So very sleepy. I feel like the pool that is my well of energy had the plug at the bottom pulled out, and I am calmly feeling the water pour out. I’m almost looking forward to it all draining out, leaving me languid and limp. Or maybe that’s already happened. In any case, it’s going to take me a little while to physically, mentally, and emotionally recover from the last month.
I already miss Mom lots. I just changed my American Girl, Kirstin’s, clothes from her summer to her fall outfit, and I have a painful pit in my stomach knowing that I can’t talk to Mom about it. She always liked hearing about what clothes Kirstin was wearing. On the other hand, maybe now I don’t have to tell her. She just knows in whatever way she is right now.
Maretta’s future mother-in-law, Marilyn Zilic, sent me the following prayer when we were at HospiceCare. I had heard it before, and it is a nearly perfect interpretation of where I feel like Mom is right now:
Hopi Prayer
Do not stand at my grave and weep.
I am not there.
I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on the ripened grain.
I am the gentle Autumn’s rain.
When you awaken in the morning hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush
of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there.
I did not die.
Thoughts about Thursday and Friday’s events
Sept. 9: I feel so relieved and peaceful now that the various visitations and church services for Mom are complete. As we drove home from the cemetery on Friday afternoon, I felt limp and relaxed and so very relieved and emotionally drained…quite a mix of emotions.
From Saturday, September 1 through the morning of September 6 I had been working harder and more focused-ly than I usually consider possible. We all so wanted the events on Thursday and Friday to do Mom justice. We wanted to honor and celebrate and mourn her in a way that would help people get a whole picture of the person she is (was…I’m still working on the past tense thing).
Pictures of the Bethel visitation and prayer service and the reception at Terry’s are in the gallery.
Pictures of the St. Peter’s visitation, funeral, and the burial are also in the gallery.
On Thursday, I think we were all surprised at how many people poured through Bethel for the visitation. The room was absolutely full of beautiful flowers (see many of them in their own album in the gallery). Several teachers from DeForest were there, many, many of Mom’s relatives, friends from far and near, oodles of Mom’s co-workers from American Girl, even more of Dad’s colleagues from the Republican Party…it was stunning. And exhausting.
I thought the prayer service that Pastor White was nice. Mom would have really liked the cloth that was used to cover her casket. It was Williamsburg-esque.
After the prayer service, we headed back to Terry’s for a yummy dinner prepared by Lisa. It was nice to have more of a social opportunity to interact with some of the people who had traveled to town to help remember Mom. And the delicious desserts were an added bonus.
I drove home that night exhausted and in some degree of disbelief that we had the full actual funeral to get through the next day.
Friday morning dawned gray and rainy. We met at St. Peter’s at 8:30 and saw that Ryan Funeral Home had again done a nice job of setting up all the tables of memorabilia to showcase Mom’s rich life. Mom’s casket was again open and set up in the center of St. Peter’s church. It was quite strange to be in a space that was so very familiar and yet doing something that felt so bizarre and in some ways so terribly wrong…saying goodbye to our mom.
Just a note on the open casket concept. I think it’s nice that people get an opportunity to see a person when they are dead. I can imagine that it is hard to really accept that someone is dead when the last time you saw them they were fully alive and healthy. But I really am weirded out by the artificialness of the embalmed body. For me (and I know that I’m a weird biologist-who-likes-the-grittiness-of-life-and-death), I’d much prefer the old fashioned parlor viewing that occurred right after the death. And for a burial, I’d love to have a green burial. I like the idea of washing and tending to a body when the person has died, but I didn’t at all like seeing Mom the way she was made up and posed in her casket. It just didn’t look or feel like her. And I found that to be pretty disconcerting. It also made it a little easier to let go, though. I don’t feel like any of Mom is left in her body. What made her her has gone elsewhere, so saying goodbye and burying her was easier that way.
I thought that the funeral service was really nice. I keep finding myself humming the hymn “How can I keep from singing,” which we sung half way through. My favorite aspect of the whole set of events was the time of sharing that came after the Catholic mass. My sweet brother Joe helped to MC, and several people spoke. I plan to get electronic versions of their comments so I can share them on this website. Dad started it out, followed by Mary Read, Nancy McElmurry, Paula Kopp, Terry Haller, Heather Lerner, and last, Joe. For me, it was incredibly moving (I went through a pile of Kleenex), joyful, and painted a full picture of my wonderful mom. I hope that those who attended left feeling like they knew and loved her better.
We had a luncheon at St. Peter’s following the reception. I had asked that some of Mom’s crowd-pleasing dishes be made, including tatertot casserole and macaroni & cheese & tuna & peas. I also figured that Mom would have really liked lemon squares made with real lemons, brownies, and Minute Maid lemonade. After the sad and joyous funeral, it was nice to wander around and talk with some of the many people who had come to pay respects to my mom.
Sometime during the funeral, the sun came out, and the day turned beautiful. A somewhat smaller group processed from St. Peter’s Church, up Highways CV and 51 to the Windsor cemetery. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky above us when they moved Mom’s casket from the car onto the grave site. I stayed until the casket was lowered into the ground and the vault was lowered down as well. Dad stayed until she was all tucked in.
It’s a beautiful cemetery. There are photos in the gallery from our visit out there earlier in the week. It will be a nice place to visit.
Bryan is starting a new job
Sept. 9: Bryan speaking, here… I wanted to share a piece of exciting news: I’m going to be starting a new job next week. For some time I’ve known that my job at Widen hadn’t been the most fulfilling thing I could have been doing with my career and that I’d like to be doing something a little more meaningful to me. I was very pleased to find a job opening that appealed to me and even more pleased that they called me back and, after a couple of interviews, decided that I would be a good person to join their team.
The new company is called OpGen, which is a small, startup bio-tech company located on Madison’s west side. I’m very excited about this opportunity for many reasons. First, the company is looking to create a diagnostic devices and software that could be used to make significant improvements in the detection of diseases in patients, This is precisely the “more meaningful” type of work that I’ve been looking for. Second, I will get to be a part of a small, core team that helps
build this company. Currently there are approximately 8 people in the company and I will be the second person in the Software Development group. Finally, I get to be invested in the company through some stock options.
In summary, I’m going to start working as a core member
of a new project, developing biomedical software that will improve peoples lives and, if successful, stand to make some good money out of it too. In all, this is about the ideal situation for a software developer. I’m very excited about the potential that I see in this new job and I hope that it pans out to be as good as I hope will be.