The Morning After

My feelings have ranged from elation, disbelief, sadness, overwhelmed over the past few days. It hit me how much I have to figure out. But it's very exciting. And I'm very lucky. And I love being busy and stressed out anyway it seems ;)

To do list (abbreviated):
1. Sell house (w/o agent, while living 180 miles away)
2. Give birth
3. Find home in Chicago
4. Move to Chicago

We still have much to do in the baby realm. My mom is visiting this weekend and requested to look at baby stuff today. It was a lot of fun although everything seemed way too expensive so we didn't buy anything. ($60 on a onesie?! ... that they'll outgrow in 3 months) I need to register at Babies R Us. I also have a bunch of bdays this month I need to shop for and a friend who is having a baby in the beginning of May. Another friend's dad just died (poor thing) - heart attack out of the blue - so I need to send her a care package or something. I mean, what can you really do for someone who's suffered such a terrible loss? Hard to be much comfort long distance.

We also need to keep working on baby names, we sort of lost steam there. The baby moves so much now. I lie on my back in the evening before bed and we like to watch it wiggle around and push this way and that. It's so incredible. I never realized you could see babies move in utero.
My mom is so excited which is fun to see because she's always acted so indifferent to whether I had children or not (she's firmly in the 'the world is overpopulated, why make it worse' camp) which is good. It's nice to not have family pressure.

So I want to try to sell my house without an agent. I need every penny I can get out of that house to pay off this crazy tuition bill I'm taking on. But that does make things a little more stressful. It will be a good learning experience. Ha. I just emailed my renters that I am planning to sell. I feel so guilty about making them move so soon. They really like the house and are great renters. But it will be such a relief not to be a landlord anymore. I've been a landlord for almost 7 years and I'm just ready to be done with it! I'm a little bit tempted to buy in Chicago which is ridiculous because we don't plan on staying there afterwards and need all the flexibility and the fewest headaches possible. I was surprised that the consensus on the discussion boards among admits is that Hyde Park is not the place to live. It's our first choice and have trouble believing it's as bad as some say. Y and I are giving ourselves some time to check it out when we go there for Admit Weekend. But also, we aren't really in need of night life and prefer funky to trendy. We shall see.

I finished my taxes! Well, just federal, not state. I'm still happy about it though.