“There’s only two months left!” said my very pregnant wife one Saturday night. That’s when I realized I was staring into the eyes of a woman who was Not. Messing. Around. Our second daughter was due to make her entry to the world in two months and the nesting phase was upon us.
I knew the state of affairs. The new nursery had to be put together and the house sorted with plenty of time to spare. The birth was a planned C-section, but you never know if the little one will decide to show up early.
“We need to move all the furniture, paint the room, have the carpets cleaned, install a ceiling fan, hang up some curtains, and buy new bedding.” She had rattled off a list in a single breath I knew I wouldn’t remember half of.
For our first daughter’s birth, I was on top of it. I painted her room in the second trimester and assembled the crib with the eagerness of a Justin Bieber junkie at a meet and greet. Maybe I was delaying the process this time because it would fully cement my life’s transformation from bachelor to family of four.
Nine years ago when I bought the house, the room assigned to #2 was my first office. I painted it dark blue and put up a cool light fixture. I listened to my music loudly and spent many nights looking out the window onto the suburban street asking what my life would look like in the future.
The answer was pale purple.
Making a Room
I’m a software developer so it’s no surprise that I’m always trying out new software and gadgets. I’ve been a fan of OneNote almost since its beginning in 2003, using it to take notes during client software meetings, plan my grocery runs, and stash blog post ideas as they come. Ever since OneNote integrated into SkyDrive with its in-browser editing and cross device syncing, I’ve been hooked. I knew the only way my wife would ease up was if she knew that at I was at least thinking about things and planning on doing something about it.
“Why don’t you write up a list in OneNote on SkyDrive and share it so I can see what the plan is?” I asked.
“Oh, there’s already a list,” she said. “And it’s growing.”
I pulled out my Windows Phone, tapped the SkyDrive app tile, and swiped over to the shared panel. Sure enough, there it was. She had created a folder and shared it with me.
Inside was a OneNote notebook, images of bed skirt samples, a rough budget in Excel, and a list of possible baby names.
“What have I gotten myself into?” I wondered.
The next day, we headed to the home improvement store to pick up a ceiling fan and paint samples. She stashed a photo of our first daughter’s ceiling fan in OneNote so we could make sure the new one matched. I also checked the “Things to Buy” list while we were there to see if we needed to buy anything else. The weekend after, we left town for a weekend-pre-baby-alone-together-vacation. I envisioned peace and quiet sitting by the hotel pool. Instead, I listened to the screams of toddlers inside Land of Nod while my wife debated between crib skirts. Since we had photos of the crib sheets in the folder for reference, picking out a crib skirt was easy and drama free.
After installing the fan and deciding on pale purple paint, some of the products I saw in the SkyDrive folder starting showing up on our front porch: curtain rods, blackout curtains, and a changing pad cover. We had the room painted and started moving furniture. Things started to feel real. I could finally feel some of my wife’s anxiety draining. Or… at least making room to worry about something else.
I’m glad that SkyDrive is always available wherever I am. Busy parents don’t always have time to sit down and talk about the process, so a modern tool like SkyDrive — where everything’s all in one place — helps us stay in sync at home, work, or even away at a conference.
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