37 weeks

• Saturday was spent wandering around the brilliant China Design Now and Blood On Paper exhibitions at the Victoria & Albert Museum; buying assorted green teas and Indian chai tea and chatting away to the owner about, you guessed it, tea at Postcard Teas; eating masala dosa and nair dosa (filled with a mixture of potatoes, beetroot, carrot, onions and ginger) at Keralan restaurant Rasa W1 next door; shopping for soap at Liberty and food provisions on Brewer Street - Japanese at Arigato, Italian at Lina Stores, salads at Fresh & Wild; stocking up on armfuls of paperback fiction at Waterstone's on Piccadilly - Carol Shields, Mavis Cheek, Ann Packer, Jane Smiley, Saul Bellow, Penelope Lively, Nikita Lalwani and Rumer Godden - to read when breastfeeding, though I'm already engrossed in the Mavis Cheek novel.
  
  
• As lovely and stimulating a day as it had been, it was a relief to get back home, to be honest, and sit down to a lovely meal cooked by M of grilled mackerel fillets and zesty green and red salad. For by the end of the day I was exhausted and realised this was the last busy Saturday I can have until after the birth. Next week I'll be staying closer to home - ideally in my home. My pelvis aches more, I'm getting more frequent Braxton Hicks and period-like cramps, I'm getting looser motions, and frankly it's too hot for me now.
  
  
• As we came home, we chatted briefly with one of our immediate neighbours. They also work in the City and have a 16 month old toddler and the woman was recommending good local nurseries. The best one, apparently, is at the end of our road and though we are in the "catchment area", it has a "strict selection criteria". For nursery. Uh-oh, it's all begun. Now I am worrying whether we will meet the selection criteria, whatever that is, and Little Planet hasn't even been born!
  
  
• Sunday was spent sitting in the garden, reading and watching M do some gardening. We want to plant herbs and jasmine and vegetables so he was weeding and preparing the beds. M spends his weeks (and many a weekend) working hard as a lawyer in the City, but despite the little free time he has, he finds cooking and now gardening (and wandering around galleries) the perfect form of stress relief. Lucky for me. But I did my fair share of cooking last week - aubergines and chickpeas in a spicy tomato sauce, and a red lentil dahl. This week I plan on cooking risotto with borlotti beans, peas and courgettes, a spinach and paneer curry, and some orecchiette with rocket and walnut pesto and cherry tomatoes. To end the day, M cooked homemade pizzas - he even made the base from scratch - with toppings of mozzarella, artichokes, tomatoes and anchovies and we ate them in front of Heroes, Season 1.
  
  
• Now the weather is so lovely, I've been sitting in the garden a lot. I can't wait to spend time in the garden with Little Planet. I can't wait for her to discover the swishing leaves on trees and dappled sunlight for the first time. To see the world anew with her eyes will be such a treat.
  
  
• I realised the other day, that I have spent nearly 9 months building up a picture of Little Planet in my head - how she looks, what her personality is like, based on my scans and her activity within my womb. I have grown to love her antenatally. Soon she will be born and I will have to discover her and learn to love her afresh. Not just one time, I suspect, but over and over again for as long as we will be together.