WEEK 39

One week to go and Maria is feeling the physical strain. She uses odd phrases such as 'heffalump' and 'gi-normous' to describe how she looks. I giggle inanely, but it doesn’t make her feel any better.

For a normally active person, who hates sitting around doing nothing, this stage of pregnancy is hard to bear. I breeze around the house trying to help, but I can tell that Maria just wants the whole saga just to end.

This is a special time, though. We enjoy being with Sam and try to explain to him that, in a matter of days, the three of us will become four. He struggles to take the concept on board and makes us laugh by arguing that because Mummy has a baby in her tummy, he must have one in his as well!

We agree that we need to make the transition as easy as possible for Sam to avoid any jealously creeping in. The first stage is moving him out of the baby’s room and into our spare bedroom.

At first he seems unsure – we can visualise his mind ticking over ("Umm, so this new kid on the block is pushing me out of my domain"). We try to placate him by lauding him as a 'big boy' who can’t sleep in a baby’s room. He seems satisfied with this and helps us move his things with relish.

Out goes our spare bed and off we go in search of futon so we can still accommodate guests if we need to. What a nightmare this becomes: a tortuous trip to a scandinavian, build-your-own-furniture, superstore; the traffic is horrendous, the crowds are suffocating, the queues – get me out of here!

I spend an evening of teach-yourself-carpentry as I follow the instructions, use 90 (yes, 90) screws and eventually put together what looks like a sun lounger with a very long pillow on top. "It looks lovely, was it difficult to put together?" enquires Maria. I sigh…

Read week 40 of Adam's pregnancy diary >>