^{Originally published on BabyCenter.com April 13, 2013}

Earlier this month, my wife and I got this picture of a new jelly-bean sized critter currently taking up residence in her uterus.

There are naturally a lot of challenges ahead, but for the time being my preference is to focus on the fun stuff about expecting a new baby. We’ve already been through Act One, where everything was new and scary, and now we’re heading toward Act Two – hopefully without the increased antagonism and danger of an actual three-act play.

Anyway, literary analogies aside, here are some of the things that I’m looking forward to as a parent the second time around:

Not worrying about everything. Partly because we had experienced a miscarriage before our firstborn, I spent a lot of the first pregnancy and the resulting birth worrying about almost everything. When my wife had a stomachache, I got worried. When our son had jaundice during his first few days, I nearly lost my mind in panic. Now that the rookie experience is over, I can save my worrying for the stuff that is actually worth panicking about.

Teaching my son about being a brother. He’s already understood that there’s a baby in Mommy’s body, although he hasn’t quite understood that it’s in the belly. Our son is getting better at both speaking and listening, and the closer we get to the birth of the second, the more he’ll learn what it takes to be a big brother.

Prepping a new baby room. Living in an old house means that there’s a lot of room for improvement. Sometimes that’s a pain in the butt, but it’s a blessing in times like these. This pregnancy means that I get to pretend to be handy during the summer in preparing the baby’s new room. (In other words, it means that I get to lure my father-in-law to my house and make him show me how to do things competently.) The baby room is one of the first gifts we can give to the new arrival.

There are, of course, hard times ahead as well, but early on it’s about the anticipation and the chance to bring our son a new brother or sister. And, now that I’ve seen that kids aren’t quite as fragile as I originally feared they would be, I can relax and enjoy the ride a bit more.