** Jennifer uses this format frequently, and I like the fact that it gives me a quick view of everything that’s going on in her life way up there in the godforsaken land of the Yankees, so I’m going to give it a try.

Up: I have my 37-week checkup tomorrow, so Deacon could now be born anytime and considered full-term. Let’s hope he takes after his father and not me where punctuality is concerned!

Down: I never knew how horribly painful rolling over in bed could become.

Up: I will never take a good night’s sleep for granted again. Ever.

Down: Just this week, I have developed itchy stretch marks below my belly button, which are driving me crazy.

Up: Ben has this whole weekend off, and we’re going to finish building our new chicken coop. I am very excited about this. So are the chickens.

Up: After we finish the coop, we’re going to reward ourselves with a trip to Barnes and Noble for some reading material to pack for the hospital. This “up” counts double because we found two gift cards a few weeks ago that someone gave us and we never used, so it’s a free trip to Barnes and Noble!

Down: Did I mention the itchy stretch marks?

Up: I finally remembered to call the pediatrician and get Deacon’s hospital checkup lined up.

Up: Deacon’s room is all put together and ready for him to come live in it.

Down: The only time my ankles have ever been as swollen as they were last night was the time I was stung by yellowjackets on both legs. Icky.

Up: I have to get back into my “normal” clothes quickly because Ginny’s going to be needing her maternity wardrobe back ASAP! Yay!

Down: When did my “normal” clothes shrink so much?

The title of this post came from a letter written by Edith Vanderbilt over a century ago when she was eight months pregnant with her only child, Cornelia. I read a snippet of the letter while visiting the Biltmore House with my sister and her children last month, and this sentence jumped out at me and brought tears to my eyes. Not that that’s saying much, as there are very few things that DON’T make me burst into tears these days — toilet paper commercials, burning the edges of a frozen pizza, and don’t even get me started on that Trace Adkins song “You’re Gonna Miss This.”

As of this Saturday, I’ll be eight months pregnant, just like Edith. I’ve been very annoyed a few times recently when older women have asked me when I’m due, and when I say “April,” they get these absolutely horrified looks on their faces and stare wordlessly at my stomach. Fortunately, none of them have then attempted to touch said stomach, or she would have found herself drawing back a bloody stump! I figured out, though, that when I’m standing in checkout lines, which is where each of these women have approached me, I tend to shift my weight forward and arch my back just to take the pressure off, and somehow this posture makes my tummy look about twice as big as when I stand up straight. So I guess I can’t totally blame them for looking so shocked.

My checkup last week was great, partly because it was the first one Ben’s gotten to go to in a while. Hearing Deacon’s little heart beating is a thrill every time. Another thrill was the fact that I had only gained two pounds since my last visit — I’m not going to tell you how much I had gained at THAT visit, but it was enough to really freak me out! My back pain has pretty much subsided for now, but my ankles and fingers are still pretty swollen by the end of every day, and every time I put my socks on, it’s a little harder to reach my feet than the time before. But no matter how irritating the side effects are, I really do like being pregnant. And while I’m looking forward to finally meeting this little person bounces around constantly and makes me feel like a human pinball machine, I already know I’m really going to miss having him this close.

Anyway, enough pregnancy talk. I had the most brilliant idea while watching the inauguration festivities a few weeks ago. While the Obamas were reviewing the parade, I was admiring how ladylike and beautiful Michelle looked and how cute the girls’ outfits were. Then suddenly, down the street came a high school band led by a bunch of young teenage girls dressed head to toe in skintight Spandex. They gyrated down the street in front of the President, wiggling their butts and thrusting their hips in time with the music, and I couldn’t help being struck by the contrast between them and the Obama ladies. Apparently someone had decided that Spandex and striptease moves were the appropriate attire and conduct for what was supposed to be a dignified event. And then I started thinking how great it would be if Michelle Obama would use her influence over the next few years to fight the trends of skankiness being marketed to little girls.

I’m not saying we should dress girls like boys, or keep them in ruffles and lace till they’re 18, but it seems like sexiness is being pushed on a younger audience every year. Having spent a lot more time in the children’s clothing department recently, I’ve noticed that while little boys’ clothing still features trains, trucks, puppies, and bugs, an amazing amount of little girls’ stuff either seems to be designed to look like miniature versions of adult clothing or else is spangled with slogans like “Hottie” or “Available.” And I’m talking toddler sizes. It might seem cute and harmless, but where’s the benefit? A normal mother would call the police if a strange man walked up to her two-year-old daughter and told her she was hot, so why would she deliberately dress her child to advertise the idea to a world full of strangers?

And then there was the girl I saw at the Poultry Festival a few years back. She might have been 12 years old, just barely into puberty, and she was walking down the street in a six-inch skirt and a tight T-shirt with “How ‘Bout Them Apples?” scrawled across her breasts. All I could think about was the fact that someone had let her walk out of the house dressed like that. Back then, it was shocking. Now, unfortunately, I see little girls dressed that way all too often. Ben calls them “prostitots,” and I think it’s a pretty apt description.

I’m not a big fan of dress codes — I know how easy it is to fool yourself into thinking that conforming to a set of external rules makes you “good,” no matter what you’re hiding from others or from yourself on the inside. But doesn’t teaching our little girls to present themselves as sexual objects and to dress and act provocatively from the very beginning cheat them out of their innocence?

Not every parent is falling for the trend, of course. I read a letter in Family Circle a few months ago from a woman who had taken her little girl shopping for a Christmas dress at a major department store. After sifting through the entire girls’ clothing section, they finally found what they wanted — a red velvet jumper with a white blouse. It was perfect except for the fact that the blouse had an ink stain on it, so the woman asked the department manager if they could order another one for her. The manager said no, she couldn’t, and they wouldn’t be getting any more of the dresses in because nobody wore dresses like that anymore. The mother then asked why, if nobody wore dresses like that, it was the only dress in the place that seemed to be sold out, while the racks of skimpy, clingy dresses were still fully stocked? The manager didn’t have an answer.

So I was just thinking, since Michelle Obama is a young, intelligent, and stylish woman with daughters of her own, she would be perfectly suited to take a stand on this issue. I heard one of the commentators on inauguration day say that Barack Obama makes a great role model for young black men who think that dressing and acting like gangsters is the only way for them to get through life, and I agree 100%. I just also happen to believe that his wife could be an equally great role model for young women of every race who think that being stick-thin and wearing as little clothing as possible will bring them happiness and success. Seems like a fabulous opportunity for Michelle to have a lasting impact on our culture.

It’s the second day of the New Year. Yesterday I took down my 2008 fairy calendar and put up a shiny new 2009 fairy calendar. That was exciting, of course. I also continued painting in what will soon be “the baby’s room.” Right now, it still has the look of a cluttered storage space, mainly because my elliptical machine had to spend the holidays in there to make room for our Christmas tree in the living room. Soon, though, the tree will go to the stream to make nice little fishy hiding places, the elliptical will go… someplace else, and the baby’s room will actually start to look like a room for a baby.

Since yesterday was January 1st, we went to my parents’ house for my mom’s traditional New Year’s Day meal of pork roast with dumplings, cooked in sauerkraut. It’s what she had every year growing up in Pennsylvania, and it’s as much a part of the holidays as the standing rib roast and Yorkshire pudding she makes every Christmas.

January’s arrival also means that we only have three more months before another small someone arrives. A small someone who reminds me of his presence every day with a floor routine that would certainly rival the ones we saw at Beijing 2008. Ben and I sit on the sofa most evenings and laugh as we watch my tummy bounce this way and that, and I think Deacon hears us laughing and bounces harder in response.

Even so, there’s a certain feeling of unreality about it all. How on earth did I suddenly get to be almost seven months pregnant? And hey, I love having a basketball tummy and feeling good about it, but I’m not quite as crazy about the case of the disappearing anklebones. And this whole labor and delivery thing — can’t I just skip that part and have UPS bring the baby instead? They’re good at delivering things, right?

Still, this little boy gets bigger every day and constantly closer to his very real entrance into our lives. We’re eager for his arrival, but we’re also enjoying our last few months as “just us” — going out to dinner, cuddling on the couch, sleeping through the night — who knows when any of these things will be this easy again?

I really haven’t made any resolutions for the New Year, mainly because I have a feeling that in just a few months, life will be so completely different that the things I might have felt were important right now will seem tiny and very far away. Don’t get me wrong — I’m still working on the same things I’m always working on, like becoming more patient and less selfish. Motherhood will probably provide me with a swift kick in the butt in those areas, so I expect to make astounding progress this year.

All through Thanksgiving and Christmas, we’ve been saying, “This time next year….” Of course, we really have no idea what this time next year will be like, but it’s fun to make predictions anyway. Since this was our last “just us” Christmas, Ben was supposed to get a really good gift, because in the past he’s always spoiled me rotten with great, creative presents while I’ve given him sweaters. There was a laptop computer at the store that he said he wanted this year, and I was excited that for once, he was going to have something he was really enthusiastic about. He was supposed to buy it before he left work one day, but he kept putting it off and coming home without it. I finally asked him about it on Christmas Eve, and he said he had decided not to get it after all. Turns out he never intended to get it. He just didn’t want me to be suspicious if I noticed a big charge at the store when he bought me the digital Rebel we’ve been drooling over for years. So he still managed to outdo and surprise me, but I’m taking comfort in the fact that at least it’s something he can use and enjoy, too. And he says that my real gift to him is the fact that I’m giving him a son. Which is a pretty good gift, I guess…

So last year is gone. This year, so far, is pretty good. And this time next year is looking even better.

October — my favorite month. By February I’ll be swearing I never said this, but in October I actually like being cold when I get out of bed in the morning. I’m ready for a trip to the apple orchard, pumpkin carving, and some cider doughnuts (if I ever get around to making them).

October means it’s time to scale the mountain of sweaters on the closet shelf and fold and restack them all neatly. Right now, pull on the wrong one and you’ve got yourself an avalanche. And I know that no matter how nicely I organize them now, I’ll soon be right back to tossing them up to the top of the heap and hoping they stick the landing.

In October, spring is usually the last thing on my mind. The only thing I’ve ever really liked about spring is wisteria. Around here, it’s either wisteria or azaleas, and while I don’t hate azaleas as much as I used to, they’re still nowhere near the top of my list of favorite flowers. Technically, I don’t have a list of favorite flowers, but if I did, azaleas would be way down at the bottom, below paperwhites (which smell like a nursing home) and whatever that flower is that smells like rotting flesh.

Anyway, though, this year is different. Spring seems much too close for comfort, because come next April, we’re having a baby. We’re. Having. A. Baby.

Holy crap. I still have a moment’s panic when I see those words in black and white. Yesterday morning, I actually forgot for a while. About three hours after I got up, I suddenly remembered that I was pregnant. It was both funny and terrifying.

My first ultrasound a few weeks ago finally made it seem real — before that, I just couldn’t connect the plus sign on the pregnancy test with the idea of bringing a baby home. But watching him wave his arms and do little froggy leaps with his legs, not to mention seeing and hearing his heart beat… well, I understand much better now why pro-life groups want women to undergo an ultrasound before committing to an abortion.

And I’m even more clueless as to how anyone could look at those images and claim that the child they reveal is somehow less than human and will remain so until he actually leaves my body. It’s like suddenly deciding that the sun revolves around the earth just because you want it to. Say it loud enough and get enough people to agree with your position, and what? It suddenly becomes truth? I don’t think so.

Lies don’t turn into truth just because you choose to believe them, or even because the Supreme Court rules them so. Truth is not the meaningless mass of relativity we like to pretend it is, and our deliberate ignorance of absolutes does not absolve us of responsibility.

It amazes me that with all that we have learned and discovered in the past century, we’re more blind than any age has ever been. Wouldn’t it have been easier to believe that an eye simply happened to develop when all people knew was that eyes were round and allowed them to see? But now that we know all about rods and cones, how images are received, and which part of the brain processes what we see, we decide that all of this randomly fell into just the right place to give us sight, and anyone who believes otherwise is dismissed as backwards and unscientific.

From elementary school through college, I heard about the scientific method and put it into practice in little classroom experiments. It’s based on deductive reasoning, meaning that conclusions are drawn from evidence, which is collected through experimentation that yields consistent and thus predictable results. If an event cannot be demonstrated or reproduced through experimentation, then it cannot be considered scientific. It is, at best, a theory.

So how, then, can we set these principles aside simply because we’ve found an idea we like but can’t prove? Not only that, but we call this idea scientific fact, teach it exclusively to our children, and mock anyone who dares to point out our hypocrisy.

A few years ago, when my airline miles were about to expire, I used a few of them to subscribe to National Geographic. I did not renew that subscription, in part because I like Smithsonian better, but also because of one article about some exciting new “evidence” of a missing link in human evolution. I laughed out loud when I saw their artist’s rendering of this newly discovered ancestor. The actual discovery, which consisted “mainly of jawbone fragments, upper and lower teeth, and a thigh bone,” was depicted in the drawing in solid black contours. Yet around these, in blue, was constructed a misshapen, hunched, vaguely human figure. To me, this pretty much summed up the “science” of evolution. Decide beforehand what you want to find, then make whatever you do find fit the constraints of that predetermined result.

But evolution’s appeal lies in the idea that if we simply evolved over billions of years from shapeless blobs into the amazingly complex creatures that we are today, then we owe our existence to mere chance and are accountable to no one. Like rebellious teenagers, we’ve decided that our Father is out-of-touch and old-fashioned, and that we don’t want Him interfering in our lives.

I wish that every professing Christian would sit down and watch “The Truth Project,” from Focus on the Family.

In a recent study, the Barna Research Group revealed a stunning statistic that continues to reverberate throughout the evangelical world. Only 9 percent of professing Christians have a biblical worldview.

Because of this, today’s believers live very similarly to non-believers. A personal sense of significance is rarely experienced, we spend our money and time on things that fail to satisfy and we begin to wonder what life’s ultimate purpose really is. We are, in short, losing our bearings as a people and a nation….

The Truth Project is a DVD-based small group curriculum comprised of 12 one-hour lessons taught by Dr. Del Tackett. This home study is the starting point for looking at life from a biblical perspective. Each lesson discusses in great detail the relevance and importance of living the Christian worldview in daily life.

I know that Christian liberty is a very popular topic these days, and I agree that the so-called fundamentalist movement has created an extra-Scriptural list of requirements that give Christianity a bad name and cause a huge number of unnecessary conflicts within the body of Christ. But separating our faith from our lifestyle simply isn’t possible. James says the only way we can demonstrate our faith is through our actions, and faith without works is dead faith. That doesn’t mean we have to dress in sackcloth and ashes and stand on a street corner waving a Bible. But people should be able to see a difference in our lives.

I remember a man a friend and I witnessed to a few years ago while we were on vacation — we didn’t initiate the conversation. I’m ashamed to say it hadn’t even crossed my mind. We were just talking with him when he suddenly said, “You’re Christians, aren’t you?” We said that we were, and he said, “I could see it in your eyes. I don’t know what you have that I don’t, but I need it.” We hadn’t noticed anything particularly unusual about our eyes that day. We weren’t dressed “like Christians.” We had been talking with him about secular music. There hadn’t been the slightest whisper of our faith, but he could see it.

I guess I’m thinking about all of these issues more since I’m contemplating the responsibility of bringing up a child. The world he (or she!) is coming into is so full of fear, ignorance, hatred, and greed that it’s an intimidating prospect. I want our child to live above all of that, secure in the knowledge that the Creator/Redeemer has ultimate control over everything, whether or not the sinful world acknowledges Him. And I want to teach him (or her!) that by example as well as by word. I’m so disturbed by the steps towards socialism that our country is taking — allowing government its first major foothold in the business world (which will not be its last, because when has the federal government ever retreated from a part of our lives which we’ve “temporarily” handed over?), demanding that the government provide free healthcare to all of its citizens, and simply relying more and more on our imperfect government to perfect our lives for us.

These problems won’t just cease to concern me, but I’m trying to realize that no matter how screwed up our government is, no matter who is elected president next month, and no matter how I feel about it, nothing in this world can happen unless God allows it. I really don’t like either candidate, but I believe that Obama’s combination of inexperience and arrogance are especially dangerous. Putting a newbie who’s unwilling to acknowledge his need for guidance in a position of leadership is s scary idea. Maybe he’ll surprise me with some innate qualities of statesmanship and wisdom I just haven’t seen yet. That would be great. Or maybe God plans to use him to remind Christians that the answers to our problems as a nation can’t be found in a sinful human being, no matter how many enticing promises he makes. By the grace of God, we’ve survived bad presidents before, and doubtless He can bring us through four more years if He chooses to.

So, while I’m hardly living a “que sera, sera” life these days, I am really trying to keep in mind that the same God who made October, sheep (for sweaters), and apples (for cider doughnuts) also made azaleas, evolutionists, and Obama. And far be it from me to question His purposes.