You'll cut my pony for free??

What a wonderful day! The first good thing that happened today was that the moving company came back today to remove the dozens of empty boxes and trash that has been on our mail floor for the last two weeks. Things are already looking a thousand times better! Then I headed out to my midwife appointment, and instead of taking the bus I walked the whole way there. At 8:30 in the morning it was breezy, cool, and perfect for a 25 minute walk. I was happy to meet with Susan today, who speaks great English, and I was able to get in a lot of questions and talk about lots of fun baby stuff with her. She also examined Liam and me, and found that his head is "engaged" in my pelvis, meaning he is in position and ready for what's to come! That made me really happy. : ) She also estimated that he will be about 3.5 kilos at 40 weeks, which is about 7 1/2 pounds. Obviously that number changes if he comes earlier or later. She's basing it on what she sees and feels, so we'll see if she's right!

After leaving the midwifery, I needed to go to a diagnostics place to have my blood drawn for the midwifery. So I grabbed Bus 17 to Eindhoven Station to get on another bus (Bus 22) out to the diagnostics place. I had never been there before so I wasn't sure where to go once I got off the bus, but lucky for me I saw the building right across the street from the bus stop once I got off. I was in and out (with a few vials less of blood in my body) in about 10 minutes. I hopped on Bus 170 back to Eindhoven Station to get on Bus 1, which brought me back to the Winkelcentrum Woensel. Four buses in an hour and it was a complete success! I felt redeemed after our many bus mishaps yesterday!

Back in Woensel I walked around the winkelcentrum, made a hair appointment, bought a little lamp for Liam's room, and headed back home for lunch. After a quick nap, I headed back to the winkelcentrum for my haircut, and that was interesting . . .

Getting a haircut was one thing that I have been putting off since we've been here, frankly because I was nervous. But all the baby books and websites have been saying that I need to do things now that I probably won't have time for immediately after the baby (hence, a haircut). That, plus the fact that my bangs were practically sitting on my nose, motivated me to go ahead and get this over with. So I ended up at Cosmo in the winkelcentrum, and everything was going fine until the very end -- she held up a layer at the front of my face and says something (in English, but still difficult to understand), and I say, "Yes, it looks great!" Before I can blink she now has one of those razors in her hand and is razoring my front layers so that they "frame my face" . . . I walked out of there with a feathery, very "European" look that I had not been counting on! My bangs basically blend in with the hairline around my face, and it just cracks me up every time I look in the mirror! I am hoping that once I wash and style it myself I can maybe fix it a little. But I figured, well, my bangs are cut, and hair grows, so I'm not too worried about it. Oh, and when I left she said I can always come back to have my "pony" cut for free -- huh?? Turns out "pony" = bangs, so I get free bang trims. : )

Today was definitely one of my best days here so far (even with my new European haircut), and I am feeling good about everything to come!

~Jessi

PS -- 26 days to go!

The great lamp I found for next to the glider

The adorable tiny galoshes I saw at Hema today --
Liam will need these soon enough!