Belly shots

I realized the other day that I am so busy taking my picture that I never take my picture with Jon or Alysha and the belly. So, before we got out of church clothes Sunday, I had Alysha take some couples shots. My belly is so round and big. I am sooooooooooo ready to have this baby. Look at my sweet hubby!! ( I still did not get any of me and Alysha with the belly. sigh... oh well)



How sweet!! This little waiting game is killing me. I am not good with patience apparently. I am ready to have this baby yesterday. What is she waiting for?? How much bigger can a belly get? That is 19 pounds of baby in there.

contractions and doctors visit

It has been an exciting two days. Thursday night about 9:00 I started having contractions. They kept coming and they got to be 10 -15 minute apart for over two hours, so I called Jon at work and told him to come on home a little after midnight. The contractions kept coming, until about 3:00 a.m. and then they slowly tapered off. So disappointing!! I just knew we were gonna have little Shayla! It was just like when I had alysha.

I had my scheduled doctors appointment Friday. All is well, I had lost a pound. I think I am just fluctuating water weight. I do not believe I actually lost a pound, I eat to much. :) That means I have gained 19 pounds so far. Not to bad.

The doctor did an exam and I have not dilated ANYMORE. All those contractions for nothing, all that pain. sigh. Oh well. I did get great news though. He went ahead and scheduled my induction for May 5th. That is three days past my due date. Gives me time to go into labor naturally, but ensures I will not go to far past my date. I am very happy. It feels good to have a plan. Everything else was fine.

Unfortunately, my feet have started swelling really bad this week. Ouch! They hurt alot and I have to elevate them at night so they will not ache. I also have a pinched nerve in my right leg that is EXTREMELY painful. (called sciatica, I think?). It feels like someone takes an ice pick and jams it into my nerve, it stops you dead in your tracks. OH MY GOSH it hurts. I just stop -moving and yell, no matter where I am, in wal-mart or at home. The joys of pregnancy. My consolation is that it is almost over!! I am in the home run stretch!!!!!!!!!

pics of field trip

These pics turned out great. I did even think of bring a camera, but other moms did. I was lucky to haul my big old self out of bed and get there by 10.

Look at that belly sticking straight out. That is Alyshas behind standing there beside me. tee-hee.

These are all the homeschool kids with Steve Saint, the son of one the missionaries killed that day by the indians. Alysha is on the far right.

The yellow plane is replica of the plane the missionaries used and it is the actual plane from the movie. The go-cart looking thing actually flies. This is one of the things they build for indigenous people there at the company. This enables the tribes to get from one village to another in a matter of minutes or hours, as compared to days. It can hold four people. It flies with a parachute, which is not attached at the moment. So, it can ride on any roads, off roads and it goes in the air. Costs about 30,000 to make. Too cool!

Field trips and Breastfeeding classes

I took Alysha on a field trip yesterday. It was at a local place down here called I-tech. The company makes technology for Indigenous people. The owner is the son of Jim Elliot, the famous missionary that died, along with four other missionaries, at the hands of the Indian tribes they were trying to save. If you have not seen End of the Spear, or Through the gates of Splendor, you should watch them. http://www.endofthespear.com/. The story of these missionaries is remarkable. The plane from the movie was there, along with the plane that the Indian tribe actually destroyed. It was really awesome to meet the man, he has an amazing story, being raised in the same tribe that killed his father. Anyway, it was neat, but I am so pregnant and uncomfortable and there was a lot of standing involved. I managed to get myself a chair. Here I am in the midst of fifty or more people all standing in a group and I am sitting there like a fat little Buddha. I felt SO BAD yesterday. I never did get to feeling better, all day.

I came home from that field trip and took a nice long nap. Then we headed to a breastfeeding class. I was so excited when I found out about this class. Number one it was free and it was close by. So, even though I felt like death warmed over, I went. I am nervous about breastfeeding, hoping it will go smoothly. The class was really good, she said many of the same things I have read in the books, but some of the info was very useful. Watched a great video of how to and how not to breast feed. Unfortunately, Jon was at work, so Alysha had to go with me. She put on her headphones and sat at the back and played Nintendo most of the time. Later, after we left, she told me she looked up a few times and saw parts of the video. She sent a text to her meemaw that said, "help, I'm stuck in a booby class, rescue me!" That is hilarious. Those videos are graphic, nothing that would hurt her to see, not like those childbirth videos, but graphic just the same. LOL. She is too funny. She is a trooper. Here is a picture of her painting Shayla's dresser for me. (I cannot get Jon to do anything for me lately he has become SUCH a procrastinator). Alysha is also redoing her room, doing all the work herself. She kilz the room this week and we are going to buy the paint today, it will be done hopefully before Shayla arrives.

Are you nesting?

The question in the title is one I get all the time now. Apparently, everything you do in your last three weeks qualifies as nesting. It is too hilarious. When strangers come up to me now 90% of them asking me if I am nesting. People just think this is a really neat thing, this "nesting". I researched it on the internet because I had really not ever heard of this before. I remember vaguely reading about the "nesting instinct", but what is it really? According to the internet, "nesting" can start as early as five months. There is no real definition except that they all agreed is was a time when mom gets everything in order for the baby. hmmmm..... interesting. Some sites said it was linked to a sudden burst of energy, like I had that one day. That was an amazing day. I never got tired, ALL DAY long. It was great. That to me was nesting.

In general, I clean on a daily basis. When family and friends call me and ask me what I am doing, I always seems to be cleaning up this or that and their response is always, "your nesting". Someone called the other day while I was folding Jon's clothes and commented that I must be nesting! Doing the laundry is not nesting, neither is emptying the dishwasher. lol. Now, when I had that burst of energy and I scrubbed baseboards, that was nesting. But, everyone believes everything you do at this point falls under the nesting category. Too funny. I think it is a little silly. Here is a good example. Ok, I get the daily newspaper, have for a few months. I do not want to just throw all those papers in the garbage, goes against my nature to be wasteful like that. So, I have been storing them in the garage in a big big box. My hubby tells me the other day to get them out or throw them away, it is messing up his 'space'. (Its a man thing). I have no idea where to recycle newspapers, so I post a message on my homeschool email loop asking where the recycle centers are in the area. Low and behold, what is the first response I get? "You must be nesting!" No, sherlock, I just wanna recycle my newspapers. Give me a break!

What I find funny when I think about it is if I had Shayla on Thursday and Saturday I was at home folding clothes or cleaning, no one would accuse me of nesting. Suddenly, I would just be cleaning the house again. Cinderella no more....

Advice for fathers

This was so funny, when I read it I laughed out loud. Number three is a major husband-ism. I like number six, all men should heed these little lessons learned the hard way.


Fatherly advice from one whose been there:

1. Settle on the name beforehand. At the hospital, you're emotional, you're tired, you're taking "Mr.-Marlatt-I've-never-quite-seen-a-baby-held-that-way-before" lessons from the aftercare nurse. This is not a good time to choose the name that your child will live with until the day he or she can legally change it. And no, don't count on a miracle: that on first view your child will so resemble some beloved relative / celebrity / friend that you will instantly know which name to use. Frankly, if parents named their children after that first visual impression, there would be a plethora of youngsters out there named "Congealed Tomato Soup."

2. Make sure the house is stocked with the postpartum essentials: milk, microwave meals, mother-in-law.

3. During the actual delivery, it is not prudent to bring up the subject of successive children. You'd be astonished at the reaction this gets.

4. The car seat: Have an experienced parent put it in for you. You can't take the baby home without a car seat, and after the sea of showers, you've probably got six to choose from. But unless you've practiced, don't try to figure it out yourself on Going-Home Day because they won't let you drive the baby off in a seat secured by duct tape and fishing wire.

5. The Celebratory Cigar. The Celebratory Drink. Here's a better idea: the Celebratory Nap.

6. Stay in touch with your physical condition. If you begin to feel ill, back off. Don't moan about it. Don't stew about it. Don't, in other words, put your wife in a position where she feels compelled to present some rather graphically persuasive evidence as to why she should feel worse than you do. Just go home.

38 weeks - feeling great

Ok, I had another amazing burst of energy today!! I cleaned my Florida room, went for a 1.5 walk, and took the wallpaper off the walls in alysha's room. I also cleaned up and organized some stuff. It was awesome. I love these little 'highs'. I hope these little surges of energy mean I am close to going into labor. It is kinda exciting. I am trying not to overdo it, but I little cannot sit still, I am "pinging" off the walls. It is a really wild feeling, like I must clean or DO something or I might explode. haha

I posted my 38 weeks picture on the right, with my same red shirt. Can you tell she has dropped? It feels so good to carry so low. It is just a waiting game at this point. Nothing new going on, she moves and kicks and hurts me most of the time. Here is a pic of me where I spend most of the time - On the couch. That is the pregnant princess eating one of her favorites, sugar free applesauce. (the granny smith apple kind, yummo!)