the nursery and planning

M is, as we speak, dismantling our guest room and carrying all of the furniture (by himself!) into the sunroom, where I suspect it will linger for months. He was planning on moving it directly to the basement, but I really don't like the idea of him carrying furniture down the basement stairs on his own, and I really can't help him. The plan right now is to attempt to fix the paneling with drywall mud and then paint over it--Renovation Expert Google says that's a valid plan, and it sure would be cheaper and easier than ripping out the paneling and hanging drywall (plan B), so that's where we're starting. I can't believe we have started taking the first steps towards creating a nursery. For like, a baby. M told me that a second Christmas present for me is that he will do whatever I want done in the nursery, even if it includes Precious Moments wallpaper. (He detests both Precious Moments and wallpaper in general, so it's a bold statement.) That's not going to be in the finished product, but it's hard to figure out exactly what we should do. I love the idea of a fully coordinated baby room, with a rocker in the corner and tasteful wall hangings--adorable but not too cutesy. And yet.. the more I think about it.. the less I can envision this final product being something in our house. I'm just not sure we're adorably coordinated nursery people. Also, do you have any idea how expensive this stuff is?

Seeing as how it's now January, it's also time for us to start making lists and planning what we need to buy and what we don't need. I think we might be making our first shopping trip this weekend, or sometime soon, anyway. We were going to wait until after the ultrasound, but it has come to my attention that my pants are very close to not fitting anymore. Oops! Is there anything I cannot live without or something that is a total waste of money? Because things that are little and cute are really, really hard to resist, and the more info I have, the better. I had a document of notes that I had been compiling for a long time on things of that nature, but I lost it in the hard disk fiasco last month.

Speaking of nothing, I would just like to revisit a few things I said this fall, during the time of the leaves falling and burying our yard and lots of things going on that we needed to get done. I made several jokes about how I wasn't going to be helping M because it sucked and I didn't want to. It made me feel like a bitch, so I tried to stop referring to it at all. Can I just add now that I was just barely pregnant and forbidden to do anything at that time, especially stuff like rake? I just couldn't say that at the time. This is a really obnoxious thing to say, but M has rather treated me like a princess the entire time I've been pregnant, but never more so than when we first found out and were scared that it would end badly. If he had had his way, I would have spent most of my day doing nothing more strenuous than napping. I would have felt better about that, too, but apparently they don't like it when people nap at work. Imagine that!

And, as if he knew what I was writing and wished to prove his point... I just completely ruined his little surprise. He went off to do dishes, and he came in here once looking for empty glasses. A few minutes later, I realized that his empty popcorn bowl from last night was sitting by his desk, so I took it to him before he came back in here and realized that he had missed it. I went in, failed to notice how he was trying to subtly usher me back out of the kitchen and had shady answers to all my questions, and then I finally ruined it all by asking what was in the oven. He has a batch of homemade potato chips sizzling in the oven as a surprise treat. Isn't marriage grand?