Well I guess I should have started a pregnancy blog round Week 1, but I didn't think of it! Hey ho.
Anyway, this is just an attempt to keep y'all updated with Karin and Babiche's progress. And it's easier (and less intrusive) than a mass mailout!

OK, so for those of you that don't know, Karin is now 39 weeks pregnant.
The due date is Wednesday 21st May 2008 or thereabouts – first babies are more likely to be late (so I've read).
Ironically, of the 8 couples in our NCT class (National Childbirth Trust - the UK's equivalent of the NZ Plunket Society) five have now had their babies – 3 of them before their due dates. So who knows!

So anyway, a brief rundown of what's been going on, plus some photos (to try and make up for 273 days of missed blog posts!).

Buying a House
Following the realisation that Karin was pregnant in September 2007 (we can even date the night of conception to camping in a field in Wareham, Dorset!) we decided that living in a top story flat in London wasn't the best place to have a baby.
So we decided to start looking for a new place to live.

We have been living in Lewisham, London for the last 18 months, in a lovely top-floor flat.

Living room in Lewisham (after we moved out)

After a brief fling with the idea of living in Bath, and then Brighton, we settled on the Reigate/Redhill area of Surrey (just south of London).
It offered the best combination of countryside/access to London/house price for us.
We started looking in the area in December, and put an offer in on a place in early February. However, due to the 2008 Credit Crunch the surveyor valued the house at much less than what the offered price was - and since the bank would only lend to the valuation, it left us struggling to either find the shortfall, or negotiate a new price.
In the end we managed to get the vendor to come down a bit, and made up some of the shortfall ourselves.

So as of April 18th 2008, we are the proud owners of a 3 bedroom mid-terrace house in the village of South Nutfield, 4 miles East of Redhill.
You can see the village on a map here.

We're about 200 yards from the local train station, with direct services to London.
As it's a village station, there are very few trains, which is great from a noise point of view, but crucially there are enough direct trains in the morning/evening so that we can get into London if need be (37 mins by direct train).

Because we only completed 5 weeks before the due date, we didn't think we'd have time to paint or renovate the house - Karin wanted a clear month before the baby to be settled in the house.
However, after moving in, we decided that we should at least paint the house, so that it felt fresher than it did - so we got a local painter (Sheik is his name - I can highly recommend him) to come in the evenings - he did every room other than the loft room, which I did.

We finished the painting last week (which involved a lot of late nights for me!) and the majority of the furniture and boxes are unpacked - the exception to this is a whole bunch of "to unpack later" boxes that we stuffed in the ensuite bathroom upstairs, I'm not sure if we'll get to deal with those before the birth.

We've had some great help from family - my Uncle Tony came up for a day, Karin's dad came for 3 days, and Karin's mum has been a star - she came for two 3-day stints, and did a lot of mucky painting work without a single complaint - we're so thankful for all the help we've had.

The house itself is a standard English 2-up 2-down terraced house, but it is a wider than a normal terraced house which makes a massive difference. Additionally, it has a kitchen/bathroom extension added out the back, and has had a loft conversion.

Although the back yard is fairly small (by NZ standards) it's big enough for a shed and patio and, more importantly, a paddling pool and slide!
Just *having* a garden is a relief - although we loved our flat in London (Granville Park) and were very sad to leave, it does make a difference being able to walk outside into your own back garden.

We're having a home birth, using a Birthing Pool.
After a few false-alarms last week, we finally setup the Birthing Pool on Sunday (although we have yet to fill it):


(click image to enlarge)
The pool is currently sitting in what would be our dining room, which is attached to the lounge.

A virtual tour of the house so far...

Front of house


The lounge (click image to enlarge)


The nursery (click image to enlarge)
Karin has done a great job of getting in all the supplies/clothes that we think we'll need.
That wardrobe is full of very cute tiny outfits - hard to believe there'll be a baby in them soon!


The master bedroom (click image to enlarge)



The loft room (used as a guest bedroom/office) (click image to enlarge)
This is the last room to be completed, and still has a few boxes lying around.
I managed to assemble the guest bed last night though, so we're in much better shape.
We just have to clear the ensuite of boxes, and we'll be ready for anyone that wants to come and stay!

Local countryside
On Sunday we had some friends round, and went for a lovely walk though the local countryside.
In fact, sitting down on Sunday with a coffee at home was the first time I have sat down and relaxed since moving in - it's been that busy!

We had a great lunch at a local pub, and then went for a little ramble.
What should have been a 90min walk took 3 hours, partly because we're a bit slow, partly because we kept stopping to look at things and take photos.


Karin, Me, and Bump (click image to enlarge)


Walking in the countryside (click image to enlarge)


Karin and a garrulous goat (click to enlarge)


View of the surrounding area (click image to enlarge)

We ended up having ice-creams on the local village green - the perfect end to a lovely day.

How Karin has been
I think Karin has been incredibly lucky with this pregnancy (so far - touch wood).
Apart from some nausea in the first trimester, so hasn't suffered from too much swelling or other uncomfortable-ness.
In fact, she's put on no weight at all - from behind you can't even tell she's pregnant.
People keep commenting on how nice and compact her bump is - apparently the baby is very "inside" which means the bump comes out the front but not around the sides.

Additionally, she's been following a natural birth plan (The Gentle Birth Method by Gowri Motha) which says that you only need an additional 200 calories per day - according to Dr Motha, most women tend to do the "eating for two" regime, and put on a lot weight - which means a bigger baby, which is harder to give birth to.
Not sure how accurate this is, but I'm sure we'll know in a week or two - the perfect weight/size would be around 7.5 pounds according to our midwife.

Speaking of midwives - in order to have a homebirth, we've had to go with an independent midwife (i.e. a private midwife, as opposed to a free midwife under the public NHS system). Our midwife (Deborah from Birthing Solutions - we found her via the Independent Midwives website) has been fantastic - she specialises in home births, and has a very very good rate of intervention-free births. She also inspires confidence with her easy-going manner.

We went on a tour of the maternity unit at the local hospital, which was useful in case we have to go to hospital for any reason.

[Warning: start of rant!]
One thing that surprised me was just how many people seem to think that a hospital is an ideal environment in which to have a child... when we've told people we're having a home birth, most people say "how brave" or "that's different".
I don't understand this - the hospital seems like such an alien place for birth: a pregnant woman isn't sick - why should she need to be in hospital?
Surely a home birth is a natural birth, and a hospital birth is an "unnatural" or "intervention" birth, only needed if you need intervention.

However I think most people have been brought up on a diet of movies/tv programmes/books which portray hospitals as the normal place to have a baby.
I'm not so sure this is a good thing.
[end of rant]

Sorry about that...

The Birthing Pool
The birthing pool is a portable spa pool, pretty much.
In fact, some companies over here actually rent ou a portable spa pool, complete with lights and jets...
In our case, we went with a company in Brighton which customises the pools. The woman who runs the company used to be a midwife, so uses her experience of birth to modify the pools - the main changes are that the pools are shallower (so that your partner can easily put their arms over edges when squatting/sitting in the pool) and the heater/filter unit has a softer cover on it i.e. no sharp edges.

We decided to go with a rented pool rather than one of the inflatable pools you can buy (see BirthPool in a box) for two reasons:

1. We decided it was more environmentally friendly to get a pool which can be reused, rather than one which we'd just throw in a cupboard somewhere (and which the manufacturer would then have to replace by having a new one made)
2. I wanted a pool with a built in heater - although more expensive, this means that once labour starts I don't have to faff around trying to get the pool to the right temperature. If you're birthing in the pool, then it needs to be very hot (37-39 deg C). Keeping it at this temperature by filling it via a hose from the kitchen tap, or via the kettle is not what I want to be doing during labour - I want to be supporting Karin!

We set the pool up in the dining room, as it's out of the way and is also close to a water source and a drain.
We haven't filled it up yet, so I hope it doesn't leak.
Apparently, once filled you can keep the water in it for up to 7 days (they supply you with some Ozone chemicals, which are much friendlier than chlorine-based ones).

Hopefully we'll get a chance to use it as a spa pool before the baby arrives - it could be quite fun to watch a movie on the telly from the pool!

Righto, that's it for today.
Keep checking back for more news/photos.

This is where you'll find photos of the new arrival as they come to hand!