Making room

Steph and I have been running around like crazy since we found out she was pregnant. Suddenly, our child’s due date (7/28) became a deadline to finish (and in most cases, actually start) all of the projects around the house.

So we* painted rooms. We painted ceilings. We painted a crazy argyle pattern on the nursery wall. We’ve painted the molding around the house. When we weren’t painting, we were rearranging, assembling and organizing. There are sheets of graph paper in every room of the house with corresponding tasks to be done. The baby’s due date became a deadline to get our lives in order.

Now the due date is slowly creeping closer – no time to think, just get stuff done. Then this week, Steph’s co-workers threw her a baby shower. Unpacking a wave of gifts, we had to find space for everything.

It hit me as we were reorganizing the bathroom. The baby isn’t going to remember his or her beautifully decorated nursery. Surely the child won’t think less of us because the trim going up the stairs is off-white, while the trim in the hallway is ultra-pure white. And that’s the thing: the baby isn’t going to remember, but we will. We will remember all the time and work and love we put into welcoming this child into our lives. Yeah, it doesn’t really matter that the soap and shampoo will be in a different spot because we had to find room for bath toys or baby towels. The only thing that matters is that we are making room to welcome our little baby boy or girl into this world on July 28 (give or take).

* use of the word “we” doesn’t necessarily indicate that I actually participated.