I booked all of yesterday off, because the past few appointments I’ve had have taken more than all morning, and trying to squeeze scheduled work in after that and before the boy got home was just stressing me out. It was a gorgeous day, sunny and hot but with a decent breeze to offset the growing humidity. I dare say I’d have been less happy about it if the maternity wing of my hospital wasn’t air conditioned, but it is, so I spent the morning in relative comfort.

This time my wait was only an hour and a half long, and my appointment was very positive. Owlet has done some serious work, growing five weeks’ worth in two weeks (hello, 30-week growth spurt). She went from being three weeks behind to bang on target, all of her measurements coming in at an average of 30w5d (which was a day shy of where we were). She has shifted from a transverse position to head-down, and the placenta is in awesome shape and position. She weighs about 1658 grams, which is almost exactly what the boy weighed when he was born. My body is still showing zero signs of potential labour. “Congratulations,” my doctor said as she started to put the monitors away. “You are officially no longer considered a high-risk pregnancy. Keep doing what you’re doing, because it’s obviously working.”

I am no longer considered high-risk! WOO-HOO!

All the good vibes (thanks, everyone!), bed rest, progesterone treatment, and extra ice cream have obviously worked. This is wonderful news for me, because as of today I’m at 31 weeks, the precise point where things went wrong last time with the boy. The “keep doing what you’re doing” instruction is rather key, though, so I’m keeping to the reduced activity. She didn’t tell me light bed rest was off the schedule, so I’m not throwing myself back into running around with the boy and doing grocery shopping or extended errands again.

While I was there, I made an appointment for a hospital tour in three weeks. I’m excited about it, because this is one of those lacunae in my experience. I mean, I’m very familiar with the high-risk clinic, and the ultrasound rooms, the first contact emergency area, and their nursery where the boy was transferred after his stay in NICU, but nothing else. They gave me a choice of June 26 or July 24, and maybe it’s just me, but July 24 felt like cutting it a wee bit close for comfort. So I’ll finally get to see my hospital’s labour and delivery rooms.

I got home around noon and managed to get an hour and a half of work done before I had to stop. See? Scheduling the day off and getting work done anyway feels like a major bonus or score somehow, like finding billable hours where you didn’t think there were any. I also made myself sit down and do an hour of heavy work on all my cello recital pieces, since work and bed rest had my practice record rather, erm, spotty in the two previous weeks and my performance at the group class last Sunday showed it. And once the boy got home, I finished spinning the first half of the BFL/silk for the lace cap, too, and started the second half. So it was a remarkably productive day.

I also went to orchestra last night for the first time after missing two weeks, and it was a wonderful evening. We were in a different rehearsal location, and it was very pleasant. We could never afford it on a regular basis, but it would be nice if we could. It’s where the youth orchestra practices, and when our conductor called break he encouraged us to engage in one of their rituals, heading to the local parlour on the corner to indulge in homemade ice cream. It would have been lovely, but rushed, and my wallet was also empty. And besides, the celli were all comforting one of our section, who slipped on the stairs on the way up the stars to the rehearsal room and smashed his cello.

I’m achy this morning, which is totally understandable, since I did more yesterday than I have done in ages. I also didn’t sleep very well, because the windstorm that blew down trees and power lines yesterday (and our metal gazebo in the backyard, which I am fervently hoping is salvageable) rattled our bedroom window all night and there was a cat bent on waking us up at all hours with aggressive purring in the face. I think I can just about finish the copyediting assignment I have today, though, since I hit roughly the halfway point yesterday. I can certainly get close enough to the end that I can wrap it up and probably send it back tomorrow (yay, more invoicing), leaving me all of next week for the bird book rewrites. I may leave myself open for one more copyediting assignment, but then I’ll book off for a couple of months and initialize my QPIP maternity benefits (which became available to self-employed workers the year after I had the boy, thank you, Quebec… although they don’t make it easy to figure it all out if you don’t get tax receipts, which I don’t, as I’m paid freelance from the US; I’ll be using the last two years of net income as reported on my taxes as source numbers).

Today: Thirty-one weeks of pregnancy. Between five and nine to go.