Yesterday we had our “almost 28-week appointment.”  I’m up a whopping 18 pounds from my pre-pregnancy weight!  My blood pressure is super awesome at 102/58.  Baby is wiggling and kicking on a regular basis.  A couple of days ago, he/she kicked me so hard in the diaphragm that it took my breath away!  All good signs of a healthy little critter.  Tomorrow I go for the third trimester glucose tolerance test and blood work to check for anemia.  I blocked out my schedule for the afternoon and will be happily leaving work at lunchtime to get this stuff out of the way.  We will also be meeting with a pediatrician soon.  Our midwife recommended that we set up an appointment with a prospective doctor to establish a relationship with him or her prior to the baby’s arrival.  I also just signed up for childbirth classes, which we are scheduled to complete just 10 days before my due date.  Yikes!  On top of this stuff, I am starting to see the midwife once every 2 weeks instead of once each month.  All of this extra stuff on my calendar is going to force me to cut back on work—which frankly cannot happen soon enough.  Ever since we got back from vacation I’ve been really ready to throw in the towel.  I am feeling a little tired, and I can’t seem to find the motivation to work on stuff for the two classes I am teaching, let alone work on anything related to what is left of my very inactive research career.  I only have 6 weeks left of work, and believe me, I am counting down the hours.  Luckily, my beautiful and amazing friend Deborah will be here to keep me company after I am done with work; she will provide much-needed girl bonding time before my life assumes a drastically different form!    So that is where we stand these days—we are getting increasingly excited, and it’s starting to become more of a reality as we get closer.  It has already been a transformative experience in a lot of respects, and I am so lucky and happy to be able to share it with Rob.  It’s so obvious how much he loves his little baby already—he is going to be a super awesome papa!