This is just a very, very quick update to let everyone know what’s going on. I was finally able to come home from the hospital on Wednesday afternoon. It took some experimenting, but we seem to have finally found the right combo of blood pressure meds, and I’m getting doses at 6AM, 9AM, noon, 6PM, and midnight. Still, it’s better than having to be woken up every two hours for blood pressure readings!
The girls and I stayed at my parents’ house Wednesday night and Thursday night, but Nick brought us home last night, at least for a couple of days, which was wonderful. I love my parents, but it was honestly really stressful just spending that much time with them and the kids in the same house. Yesterday my dad took me back to the doctor, and things still look good on the ultrasound. My amniotic fluid is back to normal, the baby looks good, and the blood flow to the placenta is still improving. I have to go back again on Monday for another ultrasound.
Last night before we went home we had Christmas at my parents’ house, so I spent a few hours after my doctor’s visit working on the unfinished gifts we had to give last night. Nothing terribly strenuous, and my bp stayed within the acceptable range, but I’m glad to be done with that part of it.
I have a few more to finish today, so I’ve got to go, but I wanted to say thank you so very much for all the wonderful thoughts and prayers (and a very special gift from a dear friend on here – thank you L!).
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Saturday, December 17, 2011
So here’s what’s up…
Okay, so it’s been a couple of weeks since I posted. I’ve been crazy busy trying to get all the Christmas presents made (and a few of them bought). Unfortunately that of all came to a standstill a few days ago, but more on that in a minute.
Nick ended up buying the truck from my dad. We used part of the insurance money to pay off some bills, which got rid of some high interest stuff and freed up more than enough to cover taking out a small car loan at a low interest rate to pay for the truck. It also had to be registered and have new tires (the others were seriously dangerous), and it will have to have a new fuel pump, but the rest of the insurance money has pretty much covered that.
Now, baby news:
At my doctor’s visit on the 1st, I had gained 10 pounds (from a starting loss of 3). She had wanted me to start gaining some, but I was a little unhappy to see 10 pounds in one month. Still my doctor was fine with it, so I decided to be too. My blood pressure was up a little at that visit, but I had forgotten to take my pill that morning, so we assumed that was why.
Wednesday I went in for my next visit and an ultrasound. My weight was up another 11 pounds (in 13 days time!) and I kind of freaked out. There was just no way that I had gained 21 pound in 6 weeks. It turns out it was all (probably including the first 10) fluid. My bp was very high, despite having taken my pill that morning.
We discovered the high bp after the ultrasound. Nick had come with me to the visit, and we anxiously watched the monitor to see how much the baby had grown and how my amniotic fluid level was. As it turns out, things were not ideal. My fluid level was pretty low, somewhat concerning, but even more so coupled with the fact that the baby was showing smaller than he should be. At the last ultrasound 4 weeks prior, he was in the 35th percentile on the growth chart. This time he had dropped to the 15th percentile.
The ultra stenographer had me go out to have my bp taken and to talk to the doctor. I was kind of worried at this point, but Nick was saying, “Look, don’t freak out, I’m sure it’s no big deal.”
Then my doctor came in. Now I LOVE my doctor. I’ve had her for all three babies, and besides being just an awesome practitioner, she’s also got an amazing bedside manner. She’s very low key and laid back, so when she came in with a grave look on her face and said, “Okay, we need to turn this around. I want you to go check in and we’ll get you on the baby monitor and hooked up to an IV”, well, I really started to panic. Even then though, I assumed she was talking about a 3 or 4 hour procedure, after which I would go home.
Nope, this was to be at least an overnight visit. At this point Nick was looking a little pale himself, but we grabbed my purse and headed over to the women’s pavilion part of the hospital to check in. We called my mom on the way to let her know what was happening since she was watching Daisy, and she assured us they would get Morgan after school and keep the girls overnight.
I got checked in and put in a room on fluids and a baby monitor, and they gave me a steroid shot to help mature Jack’s lungs in case he needed to be delivered.
They did some blood work to see if it looked like I was in danger of needing an immediate c-section, but fortunately that all came back okay for the time being. After a bit my doctor came to check up on me and let me know that I would be in there till at least Friday to give the amniotic fluid time to build back up and my blood pressure to get under control. She tripled my bp meds dosage and told me she would come do an ultrasound Friday morning.
Friday morning there was absolutely no change in my fluid level after about 30 hours of being on an IV as well as drinking plenty of liquids orally. The placenta shows some damage from the combination of the low amniotic fluids plus the stress from the high blood pressure. At this point it’s not unrecoverable damage, but it’s very important that the fluid levels come up and the bp stay down so that the placenta can grow and recover. Right now it’s showing a diminished level of blood flow, which is why the baby is so small. They’re measuring him at about 3 lb 1 oz.
She told me after the ultrasound that the very, very, very earliest she was willing to even speculate that I might be able to go home will be Monday, and that’s only if everything looks great on the ultrasound she will do then and my bp is consistently low. If there’s not been a marked improvement by Monday, then she will most likely induce labor or do a c-section.
I’m 32 weeks and 2 days now, and she’d ideally like to get me to 36 and 1/2 weeks. She said that with the steroid treatment (I had the 2nd shot 24 hours after the 1st) that at that point I should be able to take him home with me. But if he comes now, we’re looking at several weeks in the NICU, possibly up to 8.
This has been such a crazy surreal experience for me, mostly I guess because it just happened with no real warning. I never had any sort of problems with Morgan’s or Daisy’s pregnancies, at least not to the point that it would have caused them to have to be born too early. Morgan came 3 weeks early on her own, and Daisy was induced 2 weeks early because I was halfway dilated and she was fully developed and considered full term.
Nick stayed overnight with me Wednesday and Thursday, then went to work the next day, but tonight I’m by myself. There was a family Christmas celebration tonight (which I was pretty sad to miss), and he attended and took the girls home with him to give my parents a break. They did stop by to see me for a few minutes, but it’s killing me to be away from them so much. Prior to Wednesday, Daisy had never been away from us overnight. She did okay that night, but Thursday night she got to missing us really bad.
I would really appreciate all your prayers on this situation, most especially that I can hang onto the pregnancy long enough for him to not have to go to the NICU.
Nick ended up buying the truck from my dad. We used part of the insurance money to pay off some bills, which got rid of some high interest stuff and freed up more than enough to cover taking out a small car loan at a low interest rate to pay for the truck. It also had to be registered and have new tires (the others were seriously dangerous), and it will have to have a new fuel pump, but the rest of the insurance money has pretty much covered that.
Now, baby news:
At my doctor’s visit on the 1st, I had gained 10 pounds (from a starting loss of 3). She had wanted me to start gaining some, but I was a little unhappy to see 10 pounds in one month. Still my doctor was fine with it, so I decided to be too. My blood pressure was up a little at that visit, but I had forgotten to take my pill that morning, so we assumed that was why.
Wednesday I went in for my next visit and an ultrasound. My weight was up another 11 pounds (in 13 days time!) and I kind of freaked out. There was just no way that I had gained 21 pound in 6 weeks. It turns out it was all (probably including the first 10) fluid. My bp was very high, despite having taken my pill that morning.
We discovered the high bp after the ultrasound. Nick had come with me to the visit, and we anxiously watched the monitor to see how much the baby had grown and how my amniotic fluid level was. As it turns out, things were not ideal. My fluid level was pretty low, somewhat concerning, but even more so coupled with the fact that the baby was showing smaller than he should be. At the last ultrasound 4 weeks prior, he was in the 35th percentile on the growth chart. This time he had dropped to the 15th percentile.
The ultra stenographer had me go out to have my bp taken and to talk to the doctor. I was kind of worried at this point, but Nick was saying, “Look, don’t freak out, I’m sure it’s no big deal.”
Then my doctor came in. Now I LOVE my doctor. I’ve had her for all three babies, and besides being just an awesome practitioner, she’s also got an amazing bedside manner. She’s very low key and laid back, so when she came in with a grave look on her face and said, “Okay, we need to turn this around. I want you to go check in and we’ll get you on the baby monitor and hooked up to an IV”, well, I really started to panic. Even then though, I assumed she was talking about a 3 or 4 hour procedure, after which I would go home.
Nope, this was to be at least an overnight visit. At this point Nick was looking a little pale himself, but we grabbed my purse and headed over to the women’s pavilion part of the hospital to check in. We called my mom on the way to let her know what was happening since she was watching Daisy, and she assured us they would get Morgan after school and keep the girls overnight.
I got checked in and put in a room on fluids and a baby monitor, and they gave me a steroid shot to help mature Jack’s lungs in case he needed to be delivered.
They did some blood work to see if it looked like I was in danger of needing an immediate c-section, but fortunately that all came back okay for the time being. After a bit my doctor came to check up on me and let me know that I would be in there till at least Friday to give the amniotic fluid time to build back up and my blood pressure to get under control. She tripled my bp meds dosage and told me she would come do an ultrasound Friday morning.
Friday morning there was absolutely no change in my fluid level after about 30 hours of being on an IV as well as drinking plenty of liquids orally. The placenta shows some damage from the combination of the low amniotic fluids plus the stress from the high blood pressure. At this point it’s not unrecoverable damage, but it’s very important that the fluid levels come up and the bp stay down so that the placenta can grow and recover. Right now it’s showing a diminished level of blood flow, which is why the baby is so small. They’re measuring him at about 3 lb 1 oz.
She told me after the ultrasound that the very, very, very earliest she was willing to even speculate that I might be able to go home will be Monday, and that’s only if everything looks great on the ultrasound she will do then and my bp is consistently low. If there’s not been a marked improvement by Monday, then she will most likely induce labor or do a c-section.
I’m 32 weeks and 2 days now, and she’d ideally like to get me to 36 and 1/2 weeks. She said that with the steroid treatment (I had the 2nd shot 24 hours after the 1st) that at that point I should be able to take him home with me. But if he comes now, we’re looking at several weeks in the NICU, possibly up to 8.
This has been such a crazy surreal experience for me, mostly I guess because it just happened with no real warning. I never had any sort of problems with Morgan’s or Daisy’s pregnancies, at least not to the point that it would have caused them to have to be born too early. Morgan came 3 weeks early on her own, and Daisy was induced 2 weeks early because I was halfway dilated and she was fully developed and considered full term.
Nick stayed overnight with me Wednesday and Thursday, then went to work the next day, but tonight I’m by myself. There was a family Christmas celebration tonight (which I was pretty sad to miss), and he attended and took the girls home with him to give my parents a break. They did stop by to see me for a few minutes, but it’s killing me to be away from them so much. Prior to Wednesday, Daisy had never been away from us overnight. She did okay that night, but Thursday night she got to missing us really bad.
I would really appreciate all your prayers on this situation, most especially that I can hang onto the pregnancy long enough for him to not have to go to the NICU.
Saturday, December 03, 2011
Crazy, busy, blessed life
Gosh, I can’t believe it’s been 11 days since I posted! Ah well, it’s been a busy couple of weeks. The last time I posted was right after Nick’s car accident. Let’s see…
The next day (Wednesday) we had an appointment to have an inspector come look at our roof. There was no real reason for this other than that the company called offering free inspections and there have been some pretty bad storms in the area in the last year. We really weren’t expecting any sort of bad news, but it turns out that we had an actual hole in the roof about 6 inches in diameter, along with various other damaged spots. The roofing guy made it sound like it was the worst roof he’s ever seen, which naturally worried me a bit. I called my father-in-law (who is head of construction at a large hospital in our area), and he came over to check it out after the guy left.
The hole in the roof does indeed exist, but it’s on the edge of the eave. While it does need to be fixed, it’s not as urgent as the roofer made it sound. My FIL did a temporary repair with sheet metal, and we’ll have to see if we can get the insurance to pay for a new roof. The issue there is that we had to get a new insurance company a couple of months ago. The damage on the roof seems to be clearly from prior to that time, so we’re going to have to try to get the old company to pay for the repairs/replacement. Just another thing we’ve got to leave in God’s capable hands.
Thanksgiving was that Thursday. Ours was nice. We spent it at my parents’ house, as we do most years. Afterwards Nick and my brothers went hunting while Morgan, Daisy, Kelly, Faith, and I went to a local Christmas tree festival. This is something I’ve attended a number of times over the years, and my mother-in-law’s co-worker got us free tickets, which was very nice. It did turn out to be pretty exhausting (the perils of hauling a two year old around while 7 months pregnant), but it was a good way to get into the Christmas spirit.
Thursday was also the day I was supposed to get the final payment for the wedding Nick and I shot in October. We were actually supposed to be paid the previous week, but the bride asked if we could wait till she got paid again on Thanksgiving, and I agreed. This was the money I was counting on to pay our electric bill. Because it was Thanksgiving day I texted the bride and told her I’d be happy to wait till the next day if she needed me to. She texted me back saying that she would be out of town till Friday night and asking if she could pay me the following Thursday when they got paid yet again. Unfortunately I had extended our electric bill final notice as far as possible after the bride couldn’t pay me the first time, and the coming Monday was the last day we had to pay before disconnection. I explained this to her and she said she would try to come up with the money by Saturday.
Saturday she texted me and asked me to meet her to get the money at 2PM the next day. But the next day she called me and told me that she wasn’t going to be able to pay me that weekend after all. At that point I told her that I understood and that I would just be praying about it, and I asked her to please call me if she was able to come up with the money. A few hours later she called and said she had $200 (of the $300 due) and asked me to meet her. While it wasn’t quite enough to pay the electric bill, it was certainly better than nothing, so I headed out to meet her. When I got there she had the whole $300. I don’t know how or where they came up with it, but it was certainly a relief to be able to put it in the bank and pay the electric bill the next day!
The next hurdle on the horizon was the house payment. The very last day it could be paid without being late enough to go on our credit report was this past Wednesday. You know, there have been many times in the last couple of years especially that we’ve been in a relatively desperate situation financially, and God has come through for us. Every. Single. Time.
But this time, although I knew He would provide, I was completely stymied as to how He was going to do it. There just seemed to be nothing at all on the horizon, especially considering Nick’s car wreck, the whole roof issue, and the fact that his next paycheck looked to be shaping up to be pretty short due to the holiday (and resulting lack of customers at his job).
On Tuesday the car insurance guy came out to do the adjustment on Nick’s car. He not only totaled it out (the best possible outcome for us), but he gave us about $2000 more for it than we expected. This allowed us to pay the house payment as well as supplement Nick’s paycheck as we needed to for the rest of the bills. We still have some money left to put down on another vehicle for Nick. My dad recently bought a used truck at auction for a good price, and he’s told us that he’s willing to sell it to Nick for what he has in it. We’re still praying about whether or not this is the direction God wants us to go, but He has been so amazingly good to us, and I know He will lead us the right way!
On Wednesday my friend Elizabeth had her baby – a beautiful, perfect 5 lb 12 oz girl! She’s tiny, but oh so beautiful with tons of gorgeous dark hair. Elizabeth was just 8 weeks ahead of me, and I can’t believe my own pregnancy is getting so far along!
Thursday I went in for my 30 week appointment, and I’ll go back on the 14th for another ultrasound. Friday I went in to see Elizabeth and the baby and took her hospital pictures for her. It was so awesome to get to snuggle that precious baby girl, and it just made me ache to have little Jack in my arms!
Tonight was Nick’s company Christmas party. This was the first year he didn’t win any prizes, but it was so much fun to get to dress up and have a date night with my hubby! We also got to go see a movie this past Sunday. We hadn’t been to see a movie in a theater since May of last year, so when my mom offered to watch the kids, we jumped on the chance. We still had the movie gift card Nick got for his birthday in 2010, so it was completely free except for $4.00 toward the drink we shared (seriously – $5.75 for a drink! You’d better bet we got a refill!). We saw Hugo in 3D, and it was a really neat movie.
Anyway, this has been a crazy long post, so I’ll save the ABC’s of Gratitude and the pregnancy update for the next one.
The next day (Wednesday) we had an appointment to have an inspector come look at our roof. There was no real reason for this other than that the company called offering free inspections and there have been some pretty bad storms in the area in the last year. We really weren’t expecting any sort of bad news, but it turns out that we had an actual hole in the roof about 6 inches in diameter, along with various other damaged spots. The roofing guy made it sound like it was the worst roof he’s ever seen, which naturally worried me a bit. I called my father-in-law (who is head of construction at a large hospital in our area), and he came over to check it out after the guy left.
The hole in the roof does indeed exist, but it’s on the edge of the eave. While it does need to be fixed, it’s not as urgent as the roofer made it sound. My FIL did a temporary repair with sheet metal, and we’ll have to see if we can get the insurance to pay for a new roof. The issue there is that we had to get a new insurance company a couple of months ago. The damage on the roof seems to be clearly from prior to that time, so we’re going to have to try to get the old company to pay for the repairs/replacement. Just another thing we’ve got to leave in God’s capable hands.
Thanksgiving was that Thursday. Ours was nice. We spent it at my parents’ house, as we do most years. Afterwards Nick and my brothers went hunting while Morgan, Daisy, Kelly, Faith, and I went to a local Christmas tree festival. This is something I’ve attended a number of times over the years, and my mother-in-law’s co-worker got us free tickets, which was very nice. It did turn out to be pretty exhausting (the perils of hauling a two year old around while 7 months pregnant), but it was a good way to get into the Christmas spirit.
Thursday was also the day I was supposed to get the final payment for the wedding Nick and I shot in October. We were actually supposed to be paid the previous week, but the bride asked if we could wait till she got paid again on Thanksgiving, and I agreed. This was the money I was counting on to pay our electric bill. Because it was Thanksgiving day I texted the bride and told her I’d be happy to wait till the next day if she needed me to. She texted me back saying that she would be out of town till Friday night and asking if she could pay me the following Thursday when they got paid yet again. Unfortunately I had extended our electric bill final notice as far as possible after the bride couldn’t pay me the first time, and the coming Monday was the last day we had to pay before disconnection. I explained this to her and she said she would try to come up with the money by Saturday.
Saturday she texted me and asked me to meet her to get the money at 2PM the next day. But the next day she called me and told me that she wasn’t going to be able to pay me that weekend after all. At that point I told her that I understood and that I would just be praying about it, and I asked her to please call me if she was able to come up with the money. A few hours later she called and said she had $200 (of the $300 due) and asked me to meet her. While it wasn’t quite enough to pay the electric bill, it was certainly better than nothing, so I headed out to meet her. When I got there she had the whole $300. I don’t know how or where they came up with it, but it was certainly a relief to be able to put it in the bank and pay the electric bill the next day!
The next hurdle on the horizon was the house payment. The very last day it could be paid without being late enough to go on our credit report was this past Wednesday. You know, there have been many times in the last couple of years especially that we’ve been in a relatively desperate situation financially, and God has come through for us. Every. Single. Time.
But this time, although I knew He would provide, I was completely stymied as to how He was going to do it. There just seemed to be nothing at all on the horizon, especially considering Nick’s car wreck, the whole roof issue, and the fact that his next paycheck looked to be shaping up to be pretty short due to the holiday (and resulting lack of customers at his job).
On Tuesday the car insurance guy came out to do the adjustment on Nick’s car. He not only totaled it out (the best possible outcome for us), but he gave us about $2000 more for it than we expected. This allowed us to pay the house payment as well as supplement Nick’s paycheck as we needed to for the rest of the bills. We still have some money left to put down on another vehicle for Nick. My dad recently bought a used truck at auction for a good price, and he’s told us that he’s willing to sell it to Nick for what he has in it. We’re still praying about whether or not this is the direction God wants us to go, but He has been so amazingly good to us, and I know He will lead us the right way!
On Wednesday my friend Elizabeth had her baby – a beautiful, perfect 5 lb 12 oz girl! She’s tiny, but oh so beautiful with tons of gorgeous dark hair. Elizabeth was just 8 weeks ahead of me, and I can’t believe my own pregnancy is getting so far along!
Thursday I went in for my 30 week appointment, and I’ll go back on the 14th for another ultrasound. Friday I went in to see Elizabeth and the baby and took her hospital pictures for her. It was so awesome to get to snuggle that precious baby girl, and it just made me ache to have little Jack in my arms!
Tonight was Nick’s company Christmas party. This was the first year he didn’t win any prizes, but it was so much fun to get to dress up and have a date night with my hubby! We also got to go see a movie this past Sunday. We hadn’t been to see a movie in a theater since May of last year, so when my mom offered to watch the kids, we jumped on the chance. We still had the movie gift card Nick got for his birthday in 2010, so it was completely free except for $4.00 toward the drink we shared (seriously – $5.75 for a drink! You’d better bet we got a refill!). We saw Hugo in 3D, and it was a really neat movie.
Anyway, this has been a crazy long post, so I’ll save the ABC’s of Gratitude and the pregnancy update for the next one.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Blessed nonetheless…
It’s been a stressful few days. Sunday the baby was very, very inactive. As in I didn’t feel him moving for about 22 hours. Now this happened with Morgan too, and they had me go in for monitoring. I’m nearly 29 weeks along, and I’m at the point where I should be able to count kicks a few times a day and get 10 movements within an hour. So I called my doctor, and sure enough she sent me down to the women’s pavilion at the hospital for monitoring. As it turned out, he was just fine, and once they hooked up the monitors he woke right up, so they sent me home pretty soon. Yesterday and today he’s been quite active, and in fact is rolling around in there right now.
Yesterday I realized that the function keys on my laptop were no longer working. This wasn’t a huge big deal since there’s a work around for almost all of them, but the major problem was that I had no way to disable my touchpad. This was a real issue because my cursor had developed some crazy level of sensitivity, jumping around constantly during typing and making it a huge pain in the butt to write an email or blog. It kept jumping back to earlier on the page and causing me to type in the middle of a word or even highlighting sections and causing me to type over and delete them.
I wanted to be able to disable to touchpad while my mouse was plugged in, or at least decrease the sensitivity so that it wouldn’t read every little accidental brush as a click, but the computer repair guy had not reinstalled the controls for my touchpad when he reinstalled Windows 7. I gave him a call and he asked me to bring it back down. I took it back in this morning on my way to get Daisy’s hair cut, and they called me before the end of the day to say that it was done. I picked it up and he had reinstalled the touchpad controls and set it to disable the touchpad only when the mouse is plugged in, which is what I wanted.
He also opened up the keyboard to make sure all the cords inside were properly seated and discovered that someone (cough, Daisy) had spilled something on the keyboard. Not sure what it was, but fortunately it had missed all the critical parts and dried quite harmlessly. There was again no charge for this trip, and I really think I’m finally done with repairs.
We also had them look at Nick’s laptop the other day, and they were able to get it operational again, but we will have to wait to pick it for a few weeks because we don’t have the $149 to cover the repair fee.
Tonight Nick called home about 6:00 to tell me that he’d been in a car accident. He’s okay, thank God, but it wasn’t a pretty picture. No one at all was hurt, but his foot apparently slipped off the clutch and he slammed pretty hard into the car in front of him, causing a chain reaction of rear-end collisions including 5 cars counting his.
My parents were due to pick Morgan up for church soon when he called, so I called and asked them to come on down so I could go pick him up. Daisy was asleep, and we left Morgan in charge of her for the 10 minutes it took my parents to get there while I headed out to get him. It was a really awful rainy night, and I’m just so thankful it wasn’t worse. He was pretty shaken up, but it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. When I got there the wrecker service had already arrived for him, and the wrecker driver was one of his good friends from high school, which gave him a bit of a distraction.
We do have full coverage insurance, and the cop didn’t ticket him for anything, probably due to the awful road conditions. I know the accident will be written up as his fault, but his tags were also expired, and the cop didn’t seem to notice. It’s not something we were neglecting – in fact we had planned to get them renewed last week, but we ended up having to pay for my computer repairs first so that I could finish the wedding photos.
Car accidents always feel like the end of the world to me for some reason, even when they aren’t serious, but I know that God is still in control, and He certainly had His hand on Nick’s safety. And we’re fortunate to have two vehicles, so it won’t be a problem for Nick to get to work and back until his is repaired (if it can be repaired). Actually, it might even be better if they would just total it out. We own it outright, so that way we wouldn’t have to pay out the $500 deductible, but could instead just take the payment for it (less the deductible) and put it toward getting him something else. In fact, he’d been seriously considering selling it to get a pickup truck for a while. Since the Xterra was too small to fit all three kids in, we’ll be taking the Sequoia everywhere as a family anyway once the baby’s here, so it makes going with a much needed pickup for him to drive daily a feasible prospect.
I guess this post is just to remind me that even in the middle of all these little and big crises, God is still right here taking care of us. In fact, since I’ve been such an awful slacker about it, it would be a good time to list a few more things I’m thankful for:
O, P, & Q:
Your Baby in Week 29 of Pregnancy
How big is your baby this week? She weighs nearly three pounds now and measures about 17 inches. Though she's getting pretty close to her birth length, she still has to chub out a bit. In fact, over the next 11 weeks, she'll more than double — or even come close to tripling — her weight. And as she grows and the room in your womb gets tighter, you'll be less likely to feel those big kicks and more likely to get poked by an elbow or jabbed by a knee.
Learn more about your baby in week 29 and baby fat.
Yesterday I realized that the function keys on my laptop were no longer working. This wasn’t a huge big deal since there’s a work around for almost all of them, but the major problem was that I had no way to disable my touchpad. This was a real issue because my cursor had developed some crazy level of sensitivity, jumping around constantly during typing and making it a huge pain in the butt to write an email or blog. It kept jumping back to earlier on the page and causing me to type in the middle of a word or even highlighting sections and causing me to type over and delete them.
I wanted to be able to disable to touchpad while my mouse was plugged in, or at least decrease the sensitivity so that it wouldn’t read every little accidental brush as a click, but the computer repair guy had not reinstalled the controls for my touchpad when he reinstalled Windows 7. I gave him a call and he asked me to bring it back down. I took it back in this morning on my way to get Daisy’s hair cut, and they called me before the end of the day to say that it was done. I picked it up and he had reinstalled the touchpad controls and set it to disable the touchpad only when the mouse is plugged in, which is what I wanted.
He also opened up the keyboard to make sure all the cords inside were properly seated and discovered that someone (cough, Daisy) had spilled something on the keyboard. Not sure what it was, but fortunately it had missed all the critical parts and dried quite harmlessly. There was again no charge for this trip, and I really think I’m finally done with repairs.
We also had them look at Nick’s laptop the other day, and they were able to get it operational again, but we will have to wait to pick it for a few weeks because we don’t have the $149 to cover the repair fee.
Tonight Nick called home about 6:00 to tell me that he’d been in a car accident. He’s okay, thank God, but it wasn’t a pretty picture. No one at all was hurt, but his foot apparently slipped off the clutch and he slammed pretty hard into the car in front of him, causing a chain reaction of rear-end collisions including 5 cars counting his.
My parents were due to pick Morgan up for church soon when he called, so I called and asked them to come on down so I could go pick him up. Daisy was asleep, and we left Morgan in charge of her for the 10 minutes it took my parents to get there while I headed out to get him. It was a really awful rainy night, and I’m just so thankful it wasn’t worse. He was pretty shaken up, but it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. When I got there the wrecker service had already arrived for him, and the wrecker driver was one of his good friends from high school, which gave him a bit of a distraction.
We do have full coverage insurance, and the cop didn’t ticket him for anything, probably due to the awful road conditions. I know the accident will be written up as his fault, but his tags were also expired, and the cop didn’t seem to notice. It’s not something we were neglecting – in fact we had planned to get them renewed last week, but we ended up having to pay for my computer repairs first so that I could finish the wedding photos.
Car accidents always feel like the end of the world to me for some reason, even when they aren’t serious, but I know that God is still in control, and He certainly had His hand on Nick’s safety. And we’re fortunate to have two vehicles, so it won’t be a problem for Nick to get to work and back until his is repaired (if it can be repaired). Actually, it might even be better if they would just total it out. We own it outright, so that way we wouldn’t have to pay out the $500 deductible, but could instead just take the payment for it (less the deductible) and put it toward getting him something else. In fact, he’d been seriously considering selling it to get a pickup truck for a while. Since the Xterra was too small to fit all three kids in, we’ll be taking the Sequoia everywhere as a family anyway once the baby’s here, so it makes going with a much needed pickup for him to drive daily a feasible prospect.
I guess this post is just to remind me that even in the middle of all these little and big crises, God is still right here taking care of us. In fact, since I’ve been such an awful slacker about it, it would be a good time to list a few more things I’m thankful for:
O, P, & Q:
- Orgasms – enough said on that one!
- Orange Italian Ice – yes, I know I listed this one under “I” too, but I really love it!
- Old friends – like the one who drove the wrecker tonight, and the one we had a visit from last week. That one was one of Nick’s best men when we got married (he had 2), and we hadn’t seen him in ages, so it was great to get to catch up. I also got to visit with one of my old friends from high school about a week and a half ago, and it was such a fun day of girl talk and crafting!
- Ordinary days – where nothing much happens, but nothing much goes wrong either
- Pasta – I know, I know carbs, carbs, carbs. But I do love it, and it generally makes dinner a snap.
- Pinterest – Holy Inspiration, Batman! I’m ridiculously obsessed.
- Precious two-year olds – Daisy has reached the stage where we have a hard time even wrapping our heads around how cute she is. Example: watching her do the sign language motions along with the host on her night time toddler program. They also run a montage of all the characters on the network sleeping every night, and she tells every single one good night as they play across the screen. I mentioned before that when she wants something, she says “Hin me (hand me)_____.” The other day she said “Hin me fiss bum.” I didn’t understand her, so she rolled her eyes and said with great patience “Hin me five.” Turns out she wanted a fist bump and then a high five, lol.
- Photography – I’m so blessed to have a good camera and to even be able to make some money with it sometimes!
- Quiet – sweet, sweet silence when I can get it lol.
- Quilts – I love blankets of all kinds, but I especially appreciate a nice, heavyweight quilt.
- Qi – Wikipedia tells me this means life force or life energy, but I just like it because it’s almost always a high score on Words with Friends, the game Nick and I play with each other via phone all day every day!
- Morgan brought home an A/B Honor roll report card today, as well as a certificate showing she was promoted to the next reading group level.
- Morgan also cleaned out the freezer for me the other day (something I had been dreading), and she helped me clean out the fridge.
- A guy Nick works with gave us a huge trailer full of free firewood a few days ago.
- My mom found a good deal on diapers and bought us a box out of the blue yesterday.
- Last week my mom also bought me this awesome double jogging stroller for an amazing price. I found it at the Goodwill. It was priced at $50, a great deal since it was in perfect shape and retails for about $225, but to make it even better it was half-off day, so we got it for $25! I actually just called my mom to see if she knew anyone who needed it since it was such a fabulous deal and I knew we didn’t have the extra money for it, and she had me just get it for us and gave me the money for it.
- Nick has had a few side jobs lately that have helped with bills, and I should get the rest of the wedding photography money on Thursday. That will pay the electric bill, although we’re still waiting on God to send the house payment.
- My brother James who has been in L.A. on assignment for a few months just bought a house about 3 minutes from us. He’s still in California till January or so, but my parents are closing on it by proxy tomorrow. As part of the deal, the current owners agreed to put on a new roof with my brother only responsible for half of their insurance copay.
Week 29 of Pregnancy
Your baby's packing on the pounds, which look so cute on her. If only you could say the same for your varicose veins….
Your Baby in Week 29 of Pregnancy How big is your baby this week? She weighs nearly three pounds now and measures about 17 inches. Though she's getting pretty close to her birth length, she still has to chub out a bit. In fact, over the next 11 weeks, she'll more than double — or even come close to tripling — her weight. And as she grows and the room in your womb gets tighter, you'll be less likely to feel those big kicks and more likely to get poked by an elbow or jabbed by a knee.
Learn more about your baby in week 29 and baby fat.
Week 29 Pregnancy Tip: Counting Baby's Kicks
Have you counted your baby's kicks today? Once you've passed week 28, you should be counting them every day. To make sure that you do — and to make sure that everything's A-OK in your belly — make a habit of counting your baby's kicks twice a day, once in the morning and once at night. Best to do your counting lying down (since babies are more likely to kick up when Mom's lying down — a pattern they tend to continue after they're born). If you can't lie down, sit. Count any and all movements (even swishes and rolls) until you hit ten. If you haven't reached ten within an hour (your little Rockette may just be on her break right now), have a light snack and try again — that blood-sugar rush is likely to get baby on the move again. Just remember that fewer than ten movements within two hours warrants a call to your practitioner. Chances are everything's fine, but it's always better to be safe than sorry.Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Laptop, sweet laptop
So, It’s been a while since I posted. My laptop started running REALLY slow about a month ago. I tried all kinds of things, including of course multiple virus scans, but nothing helped. Finally, about a week and a half ago, I was having a terrible time wading through the editing on the pictures from the wedding Nick and I shot. Nick told me to take the computer in to be serviced, and they told me I would have it back within a couple of days. Unfortunately it took them a full week, but they did get it all fixed. There were several viruses on board, so we just had them back up all my files and reinstall Windows 7 completely. Apparently I had over 10 times the amount of files to as the “average” user, heh, which is what took so long. Sadly I missed this years Love Our Lurkers Day in the meantime.
Anyway, I’m very glad to have it back, and when I get a chance I’ve got some very cool new toys I want to tell you about.
Nick and I had a conversation about DD the other day. It was very low key, which was good, and he admitted that he’s just not comfortable with spanking while I’m pregnant, but that he’s still on board with the rest of it. That was very welcome news to me since it’s been a few months since there was any spanking.
Baby Jack is doing well. I had an ultrasound a week ago, and he’s about two pounds now. I gained the 3 pounds she wanted me to plus (gulp) 7 more. BUT, I made the mistake of going to my appointment directly after eating a pretty heavy lunch at a Mexican restaurant with Nick, so I honestly think about 3 pounds of it was due to enchiladas. Either way, a net gain of 7 pounds is not terrible for being almost 7 months pregnant, and my doctor is actually quite happy with my progress. Still, it’s hard for me to watch the number on the scale go up, but I just have to remember that it’s good for the baby. I go back for my next appointment on December 1.
Anyway, that’s what’s been going on with me. Hope you guys are doing well!
Tuesday, November 01, 2011
November already!
Gosh, I can’t believe it’s already November! This whole year has honestly just flown by! So, a few gratitude items:
ABCs of Gratitude:
L,M, & N since I missed a few weeks…
Love – it almost seems to trite and obvious, but how could I leave it out?
Lemons – I love just about anything lemon flavored (Nick made me a lemon cake with cream cheese icing for my birthday), and I love how fresh and clean they make things smell!
Lips – Nick has the most amazing lips, and I love everything they do!
Laptops – Right now we’re having some problems with both of ours. Mine has something wrong with it that no virus scan seems to be able to find, and Nick’s is currently in pieces waiting on us to be able to order a part it needs. But even if I can only use mine in safe mode right now, I’m so glad I have it!
Making things – this year is going to be by and far a handmade Christmas, but I’m pretty confident that the projects I have in the works are suitable and gift-worthy, and I’m grateful to have the skill to make them!
Marriage – I’m so very blessed in the marriage God has given me. Like any couple, we have our disagreements, but I truly believe that ours is a great love story.
Nick – Of course this is the guy that makes that last one so great.
Naps – I don’t get to take them all that often just because life is so busy these days, but I sure do enjoy the luxury when I get the opportunity! In fact, I came home today from a super stressful trip to Wal-Mart and Target with both kids, just ready to pull my hair out, and Nick sent me upstairs to take one and just decompress. It was wonderful!
Nikon – I love my camera, and I’m so glad I went with the one I chose!
Recent blessings- The wedding Nick and I shot the day after my last post went very well. It was Nick’s first time shooting, and he was really nervous, but he did great, and we had a lot of fun working together! Also, when Nick’s sister came to pick her camera back up, she refused to take the $50 payment for letting us use it!
I passed my glucose test! I was VERY excited about this. Diabetes runs heavily in my family, and every time you have gestational diabetes it increases your likelihood of developing the disease later on down the road. Since I had it with Daisy despite keeping my weight gain strictly under control, I was pretty resigned to finding out I had it with this baby too. And beyond dreading all the extra precautions and sugar testing and special diet, I was really dreading having to shell out an extra $40 a month or so for blood sugar test strips, so it was a big relief to find out I passed!
Nick was on vacation last week, and I loved having him home! We did the wedding on Monday, then just kind of had a relaxing week together. He got to go spend one day playing golf with one of his friends and one of my brothers, and on Thursday he was able to go haul off some more scrap metal, which gave us some much needed extra money to make a couple of payments (including the house payment!)
The kids had a good time last night trick or treating. Morgan had just kind of a random costume going on with heavy zombie looking eyes and fake blood all over her face. Daisy had the CUTEST lady bug costume, but she HATED it! I ended up just sticking her in her warm fuzzy footsie pajamas and wheeling her around the neighborhood in her stroller with Morgan. She was amazed at the whole thing though - she couldn't believe all the candy she got (and neither could I!).
I’ve gotten a few Christmas gifts knocked out already. I’m making some zipper pouches for some of the women in the family. I have one of those done, as well as a couple of bird feeders made from thrifted tea cups and saucers and copper pipe. They’re really pretty! I’m also giving out 7 sets of these nativity sets, and I’ve got all of them done, along with a set for us.
Source
I’ve also made a set of coasters for James, and I’ve got the painting done on 4 of the 6 recipe card holders I’m making. I also made a heat bag/neck warmer for my parents. And I got a free bottle of nail polish with a coupon at Target today – stocking stuffer! But I still have a ton to do, so I’ve got to get going on it! Less than 8 weeks till Christmas!
Baby Update:
Week 26 of Pregnancy: Baby's Eyes Open
Look who's looking. Your baby's eyes — which have been closed for the past few months (so that the retina, the part of the eye that allows images to come into focus, could develop) — are beginning to open at 26 weeks pregnant. What this means is that your baby is able to see what's going on now (unfortunately the view in your uterus isn't all that exciting). But do try this at home for kicks (baby's that is): Shine a flashlight at your stomach. Your baby might kick in response (as in: "Get that light out of my eyes!").
The iris, the colored part of the eye, still doesn't have much pigmentation (that'll fill in over the next month or two), so it's too early to start guessing your baby's eye color. Even the color your baby will be born with might not be the permanent shade; so you may be kept guessing until your baby is close to six months old.
Look what else is going on this week: Your baby's brain-wave activity is kicking in at this stage in fetal development, which means your little one can not only hear noises but can now also respond to them. Not in so many words, of course, but with an increase in pulse rate or activity.
And talking about activity, at your baby's current height and weight (about nine inches tall and two pounds), and at the rate he or she is growing, your baby will soon be feeling a little cramped in your uterus. Not to worry, there's still plenty of room for your baby to grow. It just means your gymnast will have less room for those somersaults, cartwheels, and other Olympic feats.
ABCs of Gratitude:
L,M, & N since I missed a few weeks…
Love – it almost seems to trite and obvious, but how could I leave it out?
Lemons – I love just about anything lemon flavored (Nick made me a lemon cake with cream cheese icing for my birthday), and I love how fresh and clean they make things smell!
Lips – Nick has the most amazing lips, and I love everything they do!
Laptops – Right now we’re having some problems with both of ours. Mine has something wrong with it that no virus scan seems to be able to find, and Nick’s is currently in pieces waiting on us to be able to order a part it needs. But even if I can only use mine in safe mode right now, I’m so glad I have it!
Making things – this year is going to be by and far a handmade Christmas, but I’m pretty confident that the projects I have in the works are suitable and gift-worthy, and I’m grateful to have the skill to make them!
Marriage – I’m so very blessed in the marriage God has given me. Like any couple, we have our disagreements, but I truly believe that ours is a great love story.
Nick – Of course this is the guy that makes that last one so great.
Naps – I don’t get to take them all that often just because life is so busy these days, but I sure do enjoy the luxury when I get the opportunity! In fact, I came home today from a super stressful trip to Wal-Mart and Target with both kids, just ready to pull my hair out, and Nick sent me upstairs to take one and just decompress. It was wonderful!
Nikon – I love my camera, and I’m so glad I went with the one I chose!
Recent blessings- The wedding Nick and I shot the day after my last post went very well. It was Nick’s first time shooting, and he was really nervous, but he did great, and we had a lot of fun working together! Also, when Nick’s sister came to pick her camera back up, she refused to take the $50 payment for letting us use it!
I passed my glucose test! I was VERY excited about this. Diabetes runs heavily in my family, and every time you have gestational diabetes it increases your likelihood of developing the disease later on down the road. Since I had it with Daisy despite keeping my weight gain strictly under control, I was pretty resigned to finding out I had it with this baby too. And beyond dreading all the extra precautions and sugar testing and special diet, I was really dreading having to shell out an extra $40 a month or so for blood sugar test strips, so it was a big relief to find out I passed!
Nick was on vacation last week, and I loved having him home! We did the wedding on Monday, then just kind of had a relaxing week together. He got to go spend one day playing golf with one of his friends and one of my brothers, and on Thursday he was able to go haul off some more scrap metal, which gave us some much needed extra money to make a couple of payments (including the house payment!)
The kids had a good time last night trick or treating. Morgan had just kind of a random costume going on with heavy zombie looking eyes and fake blood all over her face. Daisy had the CUTEST lady bug costume, but she HATED it! I ended up just sticking her in her warm fuzzy footsie pajamas and wheeling her around the neighborhood in her stroller with Morgan. She was amazed at the whole thing though - she couldn't believe all the candy she got (and neither could I!).
I’ve gotten a few Christmas gifts knocked out already. I’m making some zipper pouches for some of the women in the family. I have one of those done, as well as a couple of bird feeders made from thrifted tea cups and saucers and copper pipe. They’re really pretty! I’m also giving out 7 sets of these nativity sets, and I’ve got all of them done, along with a set for us.
Source
I’ve also made a set of coasters for James, and I’ve got the painting done on 4 of the 6 recipe card holders I’m making. I also made a heat bag/neck warmer for my parents. And I got a free bottle of nail polish with a coupon at Target today – stocking stuffer! But I still have a ton to do, so I’ve got to get going on it! Less than 8 weeks till Christmas!
Baby Update:
Week 26 of Pregnancy: Baby's Eyes Open
Your baby's eyes — which have been closed for the past few months — are now beginning to open. Your baby's brain-wave activity is also kicking in at this stage in fetal development, which means your little one can not only hear noises but can now also respond to them.
Look who's looking. Your baby's eyes — which have been closed for the past few months (so that the retina, the part of the eye that allows images to come into focus, could develop) — are beginning to open at 26 weeks pregnant. What this means is that your baby is able to see what's going on now (unfortunately the view in your uterus isn't all that exciting). But do try this at home for kicks (baby's that is): Shine a flashlight at your stomach. Your baby might kick in response (as in: "Get that light out of my eyes!").
The iris, the colored part of the eye, still doesn't have much pigmentation (that'll fill in over the next month or two), so it's too early to start guessing your baby's eye color. Even the color your baby will be born with might not be the permanent shade; so you may be kept guessing until your baby is close to six months old.
Look what else is going on this week: Your baby's brain-wave activity is kicking in at this stage in fetal development, which means your little one can not only hear noises but can now also respond to them. Not in so many words, of course, but with an increase in pulse rate or activity.
And talking about activity, at your baby's current height and weight (about nine inches tall and two pounds), and at the rate he or she is growing, your baby will soon be feeling a little cramped in your uterus. Not to worry, there's still plenty of room for your baby to grow. It just means your gymnast will have less room for those somersaults, cartwheels, and other Olympic feats.
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Randomness
Ok, clearly I’m terrible about keeping up with the Thursday posts. But anyway…
So here’s what’s been going on in my life lately. First up, the 3 hour glucose test I took last Tuesday: um, I don’t know. My doctor’s office still hasn’t called me with the results. I think that’s kind of weird, because the results should have been in Wednesday at the latest. I’m sure I’ll hear from them tomorrow, and if not I’ll call them Tuesday. To be honest, I haven’t called them already because I threw a baby shower for my friend A yesterday, and I just didn’t want to have to know about it before then if I failed.
Despite some problems getting funding, I think the shower was a success! Originally I had hoped to get donations from 7-10 people of $15-$20 each, hopefully totaling around $150. That’s about what my mom and I figured it would take to cover food and decorations, and If we had anything left over we would just give it to A and her husband as a gift. Unfortunately we were only able to collect $70 total from 4 people, and it looked like we weren’t going to be able to do very much for her. I knew that I just didn’t have any money to put with it, and I was really praying that God would help us pull it off within the budget. We found some really good deals on some of the food, and A's SIL came through and picked up some favor boxes and a few extra tablecloths. We ended up serving chicken salad sandwiches on french bread, a veggie and dip tray, cowboy sushi, cupcakes, cream puffs, snack mix wrapped in pink napkin diapers, and the BEST coffee punch (I’m having it at my shower in a few months). For the favors we had little clear plastic boxes topped with pink bows and filled with pink candy pearls. I also got her a balloon bouquet, and for the centerpiece on the table my mom brought her antique silver tiered plate stand to display the cupcakes. We managed to get everything for right at the $70! I didn’t have a whole lot for her in the way of a baby gift, but the night before I was cleaning out Daisy’s closet (I’m working on turning her room into a boy’s room!) and I found 5 or 6 little dresses and sweaters with the tags still on them! They were things that my mom or I had bought on sale but that Daisy had outgrown by the time the appropriate weather rolled around, so they rounded out the gift bag nicely! I’m so glad I was able to throw the shower for her, and I’m especially grateful for all the help I got from my mom and A's SIL!
Tomorrow Nick and I are shooting a wedding together. I'm both dreading and looking forward to it. I’m looking forward to the fact that the money from it will finally mark having made enough to pay off the initial investment for the camera (and then some). We also really need the money this week (and will still need about $300 besides). But weddings are just very, very stressful, not to mention a ton of work. I’d much rather do portrait work any day, but I’m very, very grateful for the income!
We have had one hiccup already that could have been a real problem, but thankfully turned out okay. B, the wife of one of Nick’s best friends has the exact same camera as I do. Months ago when I booked the wedding (and they wanted two shooters), Nick asked her if she would be willing to rent us her camera for a few hours for $50. Nick’s sister also has a DSLR, but hers is a Canon, not a Nikon, and it’s an older model. We thought it would be best to use B’s camera if we could, just because that way I would be completely familiar with it, and all the images would be of the same quality. Anyway, she agreed, and in fact Nick brought it up with her several times, as recently as two days ago, at which time she very specifically assured him that she was still on board with it.
Tonight he texted her husband several times to tell him we needed to come get the camera, but it was taking forever to hear back from him. Finally (18 hours before the ceremony), he texted back saying that she’d changed her mind and didn’t want to rent it to us after all because the fee for the rental wouldn’t buy her a new one if we broke it.
First of all, of course it wouldn’t – if we were spending that much we would have just gone and bought a second one for ourselves. The whole reason you rent a camera is because you can’t/don’t want to invest the money to own it. Plus, she agreed to the $50! Second of all, if anything were to happen to it we would replace it, even if we had to take out a loan to buy her a new one or (gulp) give her mine (which is actually a few months newer). And lastly, it was a really crappy thing to do to someone at the 11th hour. If she had said this 2 weeks ago, or a week ago, or even 3 days ago, I would have still been irritated that she was backing out after agreeing to it at first, but I wouldn’t have been really mad about it. But to do it on a Sunday night, less than 24 hours before the wedding was just incredibly rude and inconsiderate. There is not a single place in our city where you can rent a DSLR (I checked before we even thought of asking her), and this obviously left us with no time to rent one via an online provider.
Fortunately Nick’s sister graciously agreed to rent hers to us for the same price, so I made a 10:30 PM trip to her house to pick it up and shower her with gratitude. If you happen to think of it, Nick and I would really appreciate your prayers that things go well tomorrow. Also, Daisy and I were both feeling really lousy this morning at church, and I was really afraid we were coming down with something. But we stayed home from church and rested this evening, and it seems to have helped us both.
I’ll get caught back up with the ABC’s of Gratitude, but I need to head to bed, so I’ll leave you with my baby update for now:
At nine inches and more than a pound and a half in weight, your baby is taller than two juice boxes stacked one on top of the other, and almost as heavy as four of those little boxes (an analogy you'll find particularly apropos in a few years, when those juice boxes start taking over your refrigerator, your pantry, your car.…).
The lungs aren't the only system that's gearing up for air intake. Your baby's nostrils, which have been plugged up until now, are starting to open this week. This actually allows your little one to begin taking practice breaths. (Of course since there's no air in there, your baby is really only "breathing" amniotic fluid, but it's the practice that counts, right?)
So here’s what’s been going on in my life lately. First up, the 3 hour glucose test I took last Tuesday: um, I don’t know. My doctor’s office still hasn’t called me with the results. I think that’s kind of weird, because the results should have been in Wednesday at the latest. I’m sure I’ll hear from them tomorrow, and if not I’ll call them Tuesday. To be honest, I haven’t called them already because I threw a baby shower for my friend A yesterday, and I just didn’t want to have to know about it before then if I failed.
Despite some problems getting funding, I think the shower was a success! Originally I had hoped to get donations from 7-10 people of $15-$20 each, hopefully totaling around $150. That’s about what my mom and I figured it would take to cover food and decorations, and If we had anything left over we would just give it to A and her husband as a gift. Unfortunately we were only able to collect $70 total from 4 people, and it looked like we weren’t going to be able to do very much for her. I knew that I just didn’t have any money to put with it, and I was really praying that God would help us pull it off within the budget. We found some really good deals on some of the food, and A's SIL came through and picked up some favor boxes and a few extra tablecloths. We ended up serving chicken salad sandwiches on french bread, a veggie and dip tray, cowboy sushi, cupcakes, cream puffs, snack mix wrapped in pink napkin diapers, and the BEST coffee punch (I’m having it at my shower in a few months). For the favors we had little clear plastic boxes topped with pink bows and filled with pink candy pearls. I also got her a balloon bouquet, and for the centerpiece on the table my mom brought her antique silver tiered plate stand to display the cupcakes. We managed to get everything for right at the $70! I didn’t have a whole lot for her in the way of a baby gift, but the night before I was cleaning out Daisy’s closet (I’m working on turning her room into a boy’s room!) and I found 5 or 6 little dresses and sweaters with the tags still on them! They were things that my mom or I had bought on sale but that Daisy had outgrown by the time the appropriate weather rolled around, so they rounded out the gift bag nicely! I’m so glad I was able to throw the shower for her, and I’m especially grateful for all the help I got from my mom and A's SIL!
Tomorrow Nick and I are shooting a wedding together. I'm both dreading and looking forward to it. I’m looking forward to the fact that the money from it will finally mark having made enough to pay off the initial investment for the camera (and then some). We also really need the money this week (and will still need about $300 besides). But weddings are just very, very stressful, not to mention a ton of work. I’d much rather do portrait work any day, but I’m very, very grateful for the income!
We have had one hiccup already that could have been a real problem, but thankfully turned out okay. B, the wife of one of Nick’s best friends has the exact same camera as I do. Months ago when I booked the wedding (and they wanted two shooters), Nick asked her if she would be willing to rent us her camera for a few hours for $50. Nick’s sister also has a DSLR, but hers is a Canon, not a Nikon, and it’s an older model. We thought it would be best to use B’s camera if we could, just because that way I would be completely familiar with it, and all the images would be of the same quality. Anyway, she agreed, and in fact Nick brought it up with her several times, as recently as two days ago, at which time she very specifically assured him that she was still on board with it.
Tonight he texted her husband several times to tell him we needed to come get the camera, but it was taking forever to hear back from him. Finally (18 hours before the ceremony), he texted back saying that she’d changed her mind and didn’t want to rent it to us after all because the fee for the rental wouldn’t buy her a new one if we broke it.
First of all, of course it wouldn’t – if we were spending that much we would have just gone and bought a second one for ourselves. The whole reason you rent a camera is because you can’t/don’t want to invest the money to own it. Plus, she agreed to the $50! Second of all, if anything were to happen to it we would replace it, even if we had to take out a loan to buy her a new one or (gulp) give her mine (which is actually a few months newer). And lastly, it was a really crappy thing to do to someone at the 11th hour. If she had said this 2 weeks ago, or a week ago, or even 3 days ago, I would have still been irritated that she was backing out after agreeing to it at first, but I wouldn’t have been really mad about it. But to do it on a Sunday night, less than 24 hours before the wedding was just incredibly rude and inconsiderate. There is not a single place in our city where you can rent a DSLR (I checked before we even thought of asking her), and this obviously left us with no time to rent one via an online provider.
Fortunately Nick’s sister graciously agreed to rent hers to us for the same price, so I made a 10:30 PM trip to her house to pick it up and shower her with gratitude. If you happen to think of it, Nick and I would really appreciate your prayers that things go well tomorrow. Also, Daisy and I were both feeling really lousy this morning at church, and I was really afraid we were coming down with something. But we stayed home from church and rested this evening, and it seems to have helped us both.
I’ll get caught back up with the ABC’s of Gratitude, but I need to head to bed, so I’ll leave you with my baby update for now:
Week 25 of Pregnancy: Baby's Lung Development
At nine inches and more than a pound and a half in weight, your baby is taller than two juice boxes stacked one on top of the other, and almost as heavy as four of those little boxes (an analogy you'll find particularly apropos in a few years, when those juice boxes start taking over your refrigerator, your pantry, your car.…).
Don't look now (as if you could), but your baby's skin is turning pinker. No, not because he or she's getting overheated (in fact, the amniotic fluid is perfectly climate controlled, keeping your baby at an always comfortable temperature), but because small blood vessels, called capillaries, are forming under the skin and filling with blood. Later this week, blood vessels will also develop in your baby's lungs, bringing them one step closer to full maturity — and one step closer to taking that first breath of fresh air. But at 25 weeks pregnant, those lungs are still very much works in progress. Though they are already beginning to develop surfactant, a substance that will help the lungs expand after the baby is born, the lungs are still too undeveloped to sufficiently send oxygen to the bloodstream and release carbon dioxide when he or she exhales.
The lungs aren't the only system that's gearing up for air intake. Your baby's nostrils, which have been plugged up until now, are starting to open this week. This actually allows your little one to begin taking practice breaths. (Of course since there's no air in there, your baby is really only "breathing" amniotic fluid, but it's the practice that counts, right?)Monday, October 17, 2011
Birthday Musings
Warning: some admitted whining ahead, followed by my normal sunny outlook.
Today was my birthday. Honestly, it didn’t start off very well. I stumbled out of bed this morning and got Morgan off to school, then went back to sleep for a couple of hours. I was woken by my doctor’s office calling to tell me I failed the glucose tolerance test I took on Thursday, and I’ll need to come in this week to take the three hour test.
If you’ve ever had this, you know how much it sucks. You start off by fasting for 8 hours or so. Then you go in first thing in the morning and have your blood drawn. Then they make you drink this awful syrupy glucose drink that tastes like flat orange soda that’s been sitting out for a few days. And they want you to drink it really fast. Then you wait around for an hour. Then they draw your blood again. Then you wait around for another hour. Then they draw your blood again. Then you wait around for another hour. Then they draw your blood again. Of course during all of this you feel really crappy, because you’ve been fasting, then you have to down the gross drink, and you’re dealing with all the fun of hanging out in an uncomfortable waiting room in between getting repeatedly stabbed with a needle. So basically you’re tired, bored, hungry, sore, and usually a little nauseated.
So anyway, I called my mom to see if she could watch Daisy one day this week (because that adventure is not happening with a two year old in tow). She and my dad were on their way somewhere and just seemed really distracted and irritated to be bothered with the call, but she said, sure, she could watch her, but only tomorrow. So, I get to end my birthday by fasting. And neither one of them remembered that it was my birthday. I know that’s a really immature thing to complain about, but it kind of hurt my feelings anyway.
Also (and this is way petty, but I’m absolutely venting here, so just overlook me), Kate told Nick a few days ago that she was putting my birthday gift in the mail that day. Since all my gifts were opened at the family fall birthday get together a couple of weeks ago, I was really excited about having something to open on my birthday, something that rarely happens. Then she texted me this morning to tell me that she’s absolutely going to go to the post office tomorrow to mail it out. Honestly not a big deal (it’s not like she had to give me anything at all, and I gave her hers over a month late, when we went to visit them), but it was just something that added to the disappointing way the day started. But that just means I get to open a gift in a few days, extending the celebration a bit!
Things really did look up after that. I went and had lunch with Nick (with Daisy along for the ride of course), and we had Jet’s Pizza, the absolute, hands down best pizza I’ve ever had anywhere. And after that I got to go do some light shopping, and I bought myself a very nice (and deeply discounted) purse, as well as knocked out a couple of Christmas gifts for Morgan and Daisy (using a coupon of course!).
Nick very sweetly made me a delicious birthday cake last night, and I found out that 34 candles makes for an impressive blaze, but I got them all blown out in one breath. He also made dinner last night and tonight, and a couple of days ago he let me do some thrift store shopping. He worked incredibly hard this past weekend hauling off scrap metal and doing some mechanical work for a few different people. God really provided for us, allowing us to pay some bills we otherwise would not have had the money for. And my mom did call later to wish me a happy birthday and apologize for forgetting to earlier.
Since I missed Thankful Thursday, here’s my baby update for the week. Also, we finally settled on a name.
I won’t post it here for privacy reasons (my girls go by alternate names here too), but I’ve decided to call him Jack on the blog. My last visit was this past Thursday, and everything is going well, although my doctor would like to see me gain a little weight. I’m about three pounds down from where I started when I got pregnant, and she’d like to see me gain those three pounds back by my next visit That’s hard for me to hear because I’m so used to hearing that I need to lose weight! I gained a ton of weight with Morgan and frankly never quite got back to where I was, so I was super careful about weight gain when I was expecting Daisy. With her I lost 10 pounds before I knew I was pregnant, then gained back those 10 plus 1 by the time she was born. She was perfectly healthy (in fact, her APGAR was 9), so I was really proud of doing such a good job keeping it in line (for the record, I’m um, voluptuous to start with, so it’s okay for me to gain less than average sized women). Anyway, since there’s a good chance I may be gestational diabetic again, it’s going to actually be a challenge to put weight on now (at least if I follow the diet like I’m supposed to!).
Your baby weighs more than a pound and a half right now and sports a crown-to-rump length of about eight and a half inches (standard letter size!).
Wondering what (and who) your baby will look like? If you had a baby cam at 24 weeks pregnant, you'd almost be able to tell by now. That beautiful face (though still tiny) is almost fully formed. What's still missing from the picture is the fat that will be piled on under baby's skin. Until those fat deposits are made, that very tender skin is still very transparent, which means a close look would let you see clear through to all the organs, bones, and blood vessels. Fortunately, that see-through look won't last much longer. Babies at this stage of fetal development are gaining about six ounces each week — with much of that gain coming from fat, in addition to growing organs, bones, and muscle.
What's been playing on your little rocker's stereo system these days? All kinds of sounds can be heard by your baby in your womb: from air exhaling from your lungs (deep breath now), those gastric gurgles produced by your stomach and intestines, your voice and your partner's (which your baby will be able to recognize at birth), and even very loud sounds such as honking horns, barking dogs, or a wailing fire truck.
Today was my birthday. Honestly, it didn’t start off very well. I stumbled out of bed this morning and got Morgan off to school, then went back to sleep for a couple of hours. I was woken by my doctor’s office calling to tell me I failed the glucose tolerance test I took on Thursday, and I’ll need to come in this week to take the three hour test.
If you’ve ever had this, you know how much it sucks. You start off by fasting for 8 hours or so. Then you go in first thing in the morning and have your blood drawn. Then they make you drink this awful syrupy glucose drink that tastes like flat orange soda that’s been sitting out for a few days. And they want you to drink it really fast. Then you wait around for an hour. Then they draw your blood again. Then you wait around for another hour. Then they draw your blood again. Then you wait around for another hour. Then they draw your blood again. Of course during all of this you feel really crappy, because you’ve been fasting, then you have to down the gross drink, and you’re dealing with all the fun of hanging out in an uncomfortable waiting room in between getting repeatedly stabbed with a needle. So basically you’re tired, bored, hungry, sore, and usually a little nauseated.
So anyway, I called my mom to see if she could watch Daisy one day this week (because that adventure is not happening with a two year old in tow). She and my dad were on their way somewhere and just seemed really distracted and irritated to be bothered with the call, but she said, sure, she could watch her, but only tomorrow. So, I get to end my birthday by fasting. And neither one of them remembered that it was my birthday. I know that’s a really immature thing to complain about, but it kind of hurt my feelings anyway.
Also (and this is way petty, but I’m absolutely venting here, so just overlook me), Kate told Nick a few days ago that she was putting my birthday gift in the mail that day. Since all my gifts were opened at the family fall birthday get together a couple of weeks ago, I was really excited about having something to open on my birthday, something that rarely happens. Then she texted me this morning to tell me that she’s absolutely going to go to the post office tomorrow to mail it out. Honestly not a big deal (it’s not like she had to give me anything at all, and I gave her hers over a month late, when we went to visit them), but it was just something that added to the disappointing way the day started. But that just means I get to open a gift in a few days, extending the celebration a bit!
Things really did look up after that. I went and had lunch with Nick (with Daisy along for the ride of course), and we had Jet’s Pizza, the absolute, hands down best pizza I’ve ever had anywhere. And after that I got to go do some light shopping, and I bought myself a very nice (and deeply discounted) purse, as well as knocked out a couple of Christmas gifts for Morgan and Daisy (using a coupon of course!).
Nick very sweetly made me a delicious birthday cake last night, and I found out that 34 candles makes for an impressive blaze, but I got them all blown out in one breath. He also made dinner last night and tonight, and a couple of days ago he let me do some thrift store shopping. He worked incredibly hard this past weekend hauling off scrap metal and doing some mechanical work for a few different people. God really provided for us, allowing us to pay some bills we otherwise would not have had the money for. And my mom did call later to wish me a happy birthday and apologize for forgetting to earlier.
Since I missed Thankful Thursday, here’s my baby update for the week. Also, we finally settled on a name.
I won’t post it here for privacy reasons (my girls go by alternate names here too), but I’ve decided to call him Jack on the blog. My last visit was this past Thursday, and everything is going well, although my doctor would like to see me gain a little weight. I’m about three pounds down from where I started when I got pregnant, and she’d like to see me gain those three pounds back by my next visit That’s hard for me to hear because I’m so used to hearing that I need to lose weight! I gained a ton of weight with Morgan and frankly never quite got back to where I was, so I was super careful about weight gain when I was expecting Daisy. With her I lost 10 pounds before I knew I was pregnant, then gained back those 10 plus 1 by the time she was born. She was perfectly healthy (in fact, her APGAR was 9), so I was really proud of doing such a good job keeping it in line (for the record, I’m um, voluptuous to start with, so it’s okay for me to gain less than average sized women). Anyway, since there’s a good chance I may be gestational diabetic again, it’s going to actually be a challenge to put weight on now (at least if I follow the diet like I’m supposed to!).Week 24 of Pregnancy: Fetal Hearing
Your baby weighs more than a pound and a half right now and sports a crown-to-rump length of about eight and a half inches (standard letter size!). At this point in fetal development, that beautiful face (though still tiny) is almost fully formed.
Your baby weighs more than a pound and a half right now and sports a crown-to-rump length of about eight and a half inches (standard letter size!).
Wondering what (and who) your baby will look like? If you had a baby cam at 24 weeks pregnant, you'd almost be able to tell by now. That beautiful face (though still tiny) is almost fully formed. What's still missing from the picture is the fat that will be piled on under baby's skin. Until those fat deposits are made, that very tender skin is still very transparent, which means a close look would let you see clear through to all the organs, bones, and blood vessels. Fortunately, that see-through look won't last much longer. Babies at this stage of fetal development are gaining about six ounces each week — with much of that gain coming from fat, in addition to growing organs, bones, and muscle.
What's been playing on your little rocker's stereo system these days? All kinds of sounds can be heard by your baby in your womb: from air exhaling from your lungs (deep breath now), those gastric gurgles produced by your stomach and intestines, your voice and your partner's (which your baby will be able to recognize at birth), and even very loud sounds such as honking horns, barking dogs, or a wailing fire truck.
Thursday, October 06, 2011
Thankful Thursday
Yesterday was my sweet little Daisy’s 2nd birthday. It’s so hard for me to believe that it’s been 2 whole years since God brought her into our lives! She has been an even bigger blessing and source of joy than we could have ever imagined, and it just fills my heart to see the happiness and love she has brought to our family!
God has once again really blessed us this week.
First, the ABCs of Gratitude:
Anyone who knows me knows I don’t leave the house without a drink, so I love it! Nick’s grandparents got me a bottle of Bath and Body Works lotion and a ring that looks like this:
Nick’s cousin A has the same birthday as Daisy, and she made me a delicious loaf of zucchini bread on a cute little loaf plate. Nick’s parents got me a divided organizer box for some of my craft supplies, a medium storage tote for some of my fabric, and a set of metal punch stamps for jewelry stamping (something I had asked for). Nick’s aunt and uncle got me a very pretty pair of earrings. Daisy got a number of neat gifts as well, and everyone loved the gifts I got them (all handmade except for a book for Nick’s papaw and a journal for my brother).
At eight inches and slightly over a pound, your baby is the size and shape of a small doll when you are 23 weeks pregnant. (But then, you already knew that you were carrying a living doll, didn't you?) This week marks the beginning of some serious weight gain. Your baby's weight in the next four weeks alone should double (and you may feel as though yours is too).
You have probably heard your developing baby's heartbeat through a Doppler a number of times already (though you never get tired of hearing it), but by now you can also hear it through a standard stethoscope. What a heart throb!
Your baby's skin is reddish in color now because of the developing blood vessels underneath (remember, the skin is very thin still). It also hangs loosely from his or her little body at this point. That's because the skin grows faster than the fat develops during fetal growth. But don't worry. By the time your baby is born, he or she will be pleasantly plump and filled out — from chubby cheeks to chubby toes.
God has once again really blessed us this week.
First, the ABCs of Gratitude:
- Kids – I love kids, especially (but not only) my own. All I ever wanted to grow up to be was a wife and stay at home mommy, and thanks to God and my precious husband, I’m finally living out that dream!
- Kisses – from Nick, from Morgan, from Daisy, and still from my mom and dad!
- Kink – No, there’s not a whole lot of it going on these days, but I certainly still have an active fantasy life, and I look forward to the day when we have a bit of time to get back to it in real life!
- Kittens – we actually can’t have one because Nick’s allergic, but I’m thankful for the one Kelly got for her birthday last month. She and Grant have lost two dogs in the last year, one to illness and one to accident. Kelly was absolutely devastated by both deaths, and I’m so glad to see her with a sweet pet she can cuddle again.
- Remember the electric bill we didn’t have the money to pay last week? God brought the money for it in right on time! My parents gave me $100 for my birthday, and Nick was also able to haul off some more scrap metal from my papaw’s property, and his part of the profit paid the rest of it!
- About a week ago Morgan injured her toe while she was playing outside. By Sunday it was still very painful, so we decided to take her in to the doctor. She’d also been complaining about some headaches and dizziness recently. Now she can be a bit of a drama queen, and none of this had hampered her desire to play outside with her friends any, but the combo of the toe, the headaches, and the dizziness all together concerned us, so I got her in on Monday. Now I didn’t have the money for either gas or a co-pay, so I called my parents to ask if they would care to let me borrow $30 to cover both if no other money came in in the next couple of days. They not only agreed, but they insisted on giving me $50 flat out and having me buy me and the girls lunch too while we were out.
- The doctor’s visit went very well. The toe was just bruised, not broken. And the culprit for both the headaches and the dizziness was Morgan’s tendency to not wear her glasses if she could get away with it.
- We had another bill that had to be paid by yesterday to avoid a late fee, and Nick was also very low on gas. Tuesday he made $110 from another junk car haul. With that we paid the bill and got him gas, and had a little left over to go toward the rest of the week.
- Last Saturday we had our family fall birthday gathering, and I got some really neat gifts! Kelly and Grant got me some ribbon (they know me so well!) and a travel cup like this one (except mine has pretty pastel flowers all over it).
Anyone who knows me knows I don’t leave the house without a drink, so I love it! Nick’s grandparents got me a bottle of Bath and Body Works lotion and a ring that looks like this:
Nick’s cousin A has the same birthday as Daisy, and she made me a delicious loaf of zucchini bread on a cute little loaf plate. Nick’s parents got me a divided organizer box for some of my craft supplies, a medium storage tote for some of my fabric, and a set of metal punch stamps for jewelry stamping (something I had asked for). Nick’s aunt and uncle got me a very pretty pair of earrings. Daisy got a number of neat gifts as well, and everyone loved the gifts I got them (all handmade except for a book for Nick’s papaw and a journal for my brother).- This is a small thing, but still pretty neat. At the dealership Nick works at, a lot of times they will get in a used car that comes with a first aid kit. They have a certified used car program, and if they certify a used car, the first aid kit has to be replaced if it’s been opened at all, even if nothing has been used. The old kits just get tossed. Yesterday Nick came home with about six discarded first aid kits, full of the kinds of things we tend to constantly be out of (band-aids, gauze, tape, etc). Yay freebies!
- Tonight my parents had me, Nick, and the girls out for dinner, cake, and ice cream to celebrate Daisy’s birthday. It was a sweet time with family, and nice to not have to cook dinner!
Week 23 of Pregnancy: Fetal Weight Gain
At eight inches and slightly over a pound, your baby is the size and shape of a small doll. You've probably heard your developing baby's heartbeat through a Doppler a number of times, but by now you can also hear it through a standard stethoscope. What a heart throb!
At eight inches and slightly over a pound, your baby is the size and shape of a small doll when you are 23 weeks pregnant. (But then, you already knew that you were carrying a living doll, didn't you?) This week marks the beginning of some serious weight gain. Your baby's weight in the next four weeks alone should double (and you may feel as though yours is too).
You have probably heard your developing baby's heartbeat through a Doppler a number of times already (though you never get tired of hearing it), but by now you can also hear it through a standard stethoscope. What a heart throb!
Your baby's skin is reddish in color now because of the developing blood vessels underneath (remember, the skin is very thin still). It also hangs loosely from his or her little body at this point. That's because the skin grows faster than the fat develops during fetal growth. But don't worry. By the time your baby is born, he or she will be pleasantly plump and filled out — from chubby cheeks to chubby toes.
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Thankful Thursday
Hello, everyone! God has been so good to us this week! Let’s get started:
ABCs of Gratitude:
Guess what? At 22 weeks pregnant, your baby has finally broken the one-pound mark. How heavy is that? Hold a one-pound box of sugar in your hand the next time you're in the grocery store (and expect people to ask you why you're grinning from ear to ear). Is the box eight inches long? That's about the length your baby is too!
This week, your sweetie is making more sense of the world as he or she develops the sense of touch. In fact, your little one's grip is quite developed by now — and since there's nothing else to grab in utero, he or she may sometimes hold on tight to that umbilical cord (don't worry — it's tough enough to handle it). The sense of sight is also getting more developed. Your fetus can now perceive light and dark much better than before (even with those fused eyelids). But remember — unless you're shining a flashlight over your belly (which you can do, by the way), it'll be mostly dark for your baby inside that cozy womb of yours.
Moving up from the eyes, the eyelashes and eyebrows are well formed now — and even more hair is sprouting atop that cute little head. You'd be quite surprised, though, if you could see your little one up close and in color. Hair at this stage of fetal development has no pigment, so it's bright white.
ABCs of Gratitude:
- Jesus: He gave me the greatest gift ever in my salvation, then topped it off with an incredibly blessed life. I love you, Lord!
- Joy: I’ve found so much joy in my life lately, and it just humbles me with how much I’ve been blessed!
- J-my mom: My mom’s name starts with J, and I really couldn’t ask for a better mom. She can sometimes drive me crazy like everyone’s mom occasionally does, but if I can be half the mother she is, my kids will be doing pretty well.
- Jokari: Gosh, it’s been a while since it (or any of our implements) has been out of the toy chest, but it figures heavily in my imagination these days, and I’m grateful for the times it’s come into use in the past, even if I wasn’t too happy about it at the time.
- June: 26th to be specific – the day I married the love of my life! It’s proven to be a pretty special day in our family. Nick’s great-grandparents married that day, as well as his aunt and uncle. We actually didn’t know that when we set our date, but last year his cousin (the aunt and uncle’s oldest daughter) tied he knot on the same day!
- Jeans: Right now it’s the sole pair of maternity jeans that I have that fit me (fortunately all the others are too big and not too small!). But I live in jeans whether I’m pregnant or not. I really have more pairs than a reasonable person should, and I’m looking forward to the day I get to get back in the rest of them!
- Last week I mentioned that we had a number of large bills that we just couldn’t pay this week. We went ahead and made the car payment, but that still left the electric bill and the house payment as the two most pressing needs. Now we don’t have a huge house payment compared to most people. But it is over $500, and that’s just not easy money to come by for us. God blessed us both with some additional work. I had an engagement shoot where I received a down payment on a wedding for next month, and Nick was able to do some side mechanic work and also haul off some old junk cars on my papaw’s property and keep part of the profits. The mechanic job even brought in a $30 tip, and yesterday I was able to put enough in the bank to pay the house payment and have $26 left. Praise God! And we’re still trusting him for the electric bill.
- Last Friday night my parents stopped by with about 6 bags of groceries for us. They insisted that they were out shopping for themselves and just came across such great deals that they couldn’t pass them up, but it was a pretty transparent plan to bless us and help us through a tight week, and I love them for it!
- Monday Daisy said “I wuv you” for the first time and it was AWESOME!
- This morning I got to play baby dolls with Daisy for a while. It’s been so long since Morgan was at that stage, and I had so much fun just playing along and watching her mother her doll!
- Sunday my friend Denise gave me about 4 brand new bras that she had bought and then just didn’t like. The best part is that they are in several different sizes, so some I can wear now, and some I can wear later when my boobs quit going so crazy! And I can tell you that a few good bras was definitely something I needed!
- Saturday we get to have a family cookout to celebrate the fall birthdays. For years Nick’s grandmother has hosted a June birthday party up at the lake cabin because she, Nick’s dad, Kate, Nick’s great Aunt, and now Maddox all had birthdays in June. Quite a few of the rest of us have birthdays in August, September, and October, so last year I suggested we do a fall get-together too. Nick’s stepmom (an August birthday) ran with the idea, and I can’t wait to see everybody and enjoy some family time together. And because Daisy and I are both October birthdays, my parents are going to be there too!
- One thing I was worried about was the fact that Daisy’s birthday is on the 5th (before Nick’s next payday), and I didn’t have anything for her. We had been kind of doing the whole “maybe we’ll have enough money next payday” thing for a while now, but it was pretty obvious that it just wasn't going to happen. Now I looooove to go to thrift stores. When I was growing up there wasn’t always money for new toys or clothes, and we learned early that just because something had been previously owned, it didn’t mean that it wasn’t still useful, valuable, and/or lovable. In fact, there were many birthdays/Christmases when we opened up (well cleaned) previously loved toys, and we were just as delighted as if they’d been brand new. I’m proud to be able to say that Morgan considers thrifted clothes “vintage” and extra cool because they’re generally one-of-a-kind. Anyway, I stopped at my very favorite thrift store on Monday just to kill some time. This place is so informal that they don’t price anything, or even take checks or credit cards. They just eyeball your purchases, give you a ridiculously low total, and take your cash. I found Daisy four Webkinz, four Care Bears, three baby dolls, and two other stuffed animals, plus some vintage sewing trim for me, about 4 bottles for the new baby, and a couple of baby shower decorations. My grand total? Six bucks. I almost felt like I should apologize for getting out so cheaply! Now I have plenty for Daisy to open, and I know she’ll love it all!
- Speaking of baby shower decorations, those are for my friend Elizabeth. She’s about 8 weeks ahead of me, and this is her third baby. She and her husband are in pretty rough shape financially, and she doesn’t have very much stuff for the baby. She has two older kids, but this was one of those “as soon as you sell everything in a yard sale you get pregnant again” babies, and none of her family were planning to give her a shower. I know a lot of people believe that you should only have a shower for the first baby, but I disagree! Every baby is a celebration, and unless your last one is still a toddler and is the same sex as the one on the way, you probably need a few things too! I wanted to throw her a shower, but obviously we’re not really able to spend the money right now. So I contacted some of her friends and family, and it looks like everyone is willing to contribute financially so that she can have one after all! I’m so glad I get to be a blessing to her, and I can’t wait to put it all together!
Week 22 of Pregnancy: Baby's Hair Growth
Your baby has finally broken the one-pound mark. The eyelashes and eyebrows are well formed now — and even more hair is sprouting atop that cute little head. But hair at this stage of fetal development has no pigment, so it's bright white.
Guess what? At 22 weeks pregnant, your baby has finally broken the one-pound mark. How heavy is that? Hold a one-pound box of sugar in your hand the next time you're in the grocery store (and expect people to ask you why you're grinning from ear to ear). Is the box eight inches long? That's about the length your baby is too!
This week, your sweetie is making more sense of the world as he or she develops the sense of touch. In fact, your little one's grip is quite developed by now — and since there's nothing else to grab in utero, he or she may sometimes hold on tight to that umbilical cord (don't worry — it's tough enough to handle it). The sense of sight is also getting more developed. Your fetus can now perceive light and dark much better than before (even with those fused eyelids). But remember — unless you're shining a flashlight over your belly (which you can do, by the way), it'll be mostly dark for your baby inside that cozy womb of yours.
Moving up from the eyes, the eyelashes and eyebrows are well formed now — and even more hair is sprouting atop that cute little head. You'd be quite surprised, though, if you could see your little one up close and in color. Hair at this stage of fetal development has no pigment, so it's bright white.
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Thankful Thursday - Extra Edition
Sometimes I feel like I must be such a huge burden on God with my many constant needs. Somehow though, He always comes through. This week we’re facing some incredible obstacles financially. I won’t say that we’ve never been in this tight of a spot before, but it’s rarely been this bad. Nick’s work has been unusually slow, and we’re staring down the barrel of several pay-it-this-week-or-it-will-go-against-your-credit bills, among them the car payment, the house payment, and the electric bill. We just don’t have the money to pay them all. I have to remember though, God is bigger than all of our problems. He knows our needs, and His pockets are certainly deeper than ours. I’m not afraid to post this here, because I know that His promises are real, and He has promised to provide for us. With that in mind, I want to go ahead and do my next Thankful Thursday, early for once!
ABCs of Gratitude:
At about seven inches in length and almost 11 ounces in weight, your baby is about the size of a large banana.
By 21 weeks pregnant, your baby swallows at least several ounces of amniotic fluid each day — not only for hydration and nutrition, but also to practice swallowing and digesting — skills your baby will need as soon as he or she arrives in your arms. And keep this in mind: The taste of the amniotic fluid differs from day to day depending on what you've eaten (spicy enchilada one day, sweet carrots another). And that smorgasbord of tastes won't be lost on your baby. That's because your little one has very developed taste buds already. In fact, researchers have noted that babies who were exposed to certain tastes in utero via the amniotic fluid were more eager to eat foods with that same taste after birth. Want your baby to eat his or her broccoli later? Eat yours now!
Your developing baby still has a great deal of room in your womb — though like anyone who lives in one space for a long time, this tenant will soon begin to feel cramped. Until those uterine walls start closing in, however, there's plenty of space for twisting, turning, and even an occasional somersault (so that's what you were feeling last night!).
With all that belly dancing going on, it's hard to believe your baby gets any sleep at all. But believe it or not, your fetus sleeps as much as a newborn, perhaps 12 to 14 hours per day! (Now if only you could get some sleep!)
ABCs of Gratitude:
- Italian Ice – okay, this one is kind of silly, but the one and only thing I’ve craved with this pregnancy are Lindy’s Orange Italian Ices. I’m eating one right now, and it is soooo good!
- Innocence – It is such a privilege for me to be able to be home with my children, and I just drink in the innocence in them. I feel like I missed out on a lot of the baby years with Morgan. Even though I only worked part time until she was four, I was still away from home for parts of 4 days every week, and they just change so fast at this age.
- Ice Cream – right now one of Daisy’s favorite things to say is “Eye-keem, Mommy?” It’s cute enough to get me to share those precious Italian Ices with her.
- Insurance – I am so incredibly grateful that we have medical insurance right now. Although I’m having a serious issue with our homeowner’s insurance! Out of the blue they decided (after ten years with them!) that they don’t want to renew our policy. This wasn’t precipitated by anything on our part, but rather by new policies on acceptable home value set out by management. Apparently our home doesn’t meet their minimum replacement value threshold. Or actually it does, since our agent sent over updated numbers, but they then decided that because our roof has never been replaced (even though it’s in decent shape), we’re too much of a risk. Very frustrating since the next cheapest company is going to take our annual premium from $425 to $788. Plus we have to get new car insurance because it’s with the same company. But even this is a blessing, because I have to believe that God is guiding us away from them for some reason, so I’m trusting Him to lead us to a good company with good rates!
- Income – I’m so blessed to have a husband who was willing to be prayerful and follow God’s leading about going to a single-income lifestyle. It’s never been easy, but it has been rewarding, and the gift Nick has given me and the kids in allowing us this time together is priceless!
- Okay, first the big one: my dad had his heart cath test and it came back with absolutely no blockage! I don’t know if the stress tests showed false positives or if God just removed the blockage, but I am very, very grateful! They’ve put him on some new blood pressure medications, and we continue to pray that he won’t have any further episodes.
- Today I was so stressed out about everything from money to the insurance issues to housework. I went out to get the mail and found a package from Kate. It was full of precious little clothes for the new baby, and even a couple of outfits for Daisy! It was just what I needed to brighten my day! The things she sent the baby are soooo precious, and I can’t wait to get them on him. Included was this outfit (minus the bib), and I think I want to bring him home from the hospital in it!
- Daisy has been ridiculously cute the last few days. She’s started saying so much stuff! My favorites include “Yokay, Sissie?” (Are you okay, Sissy?) – said during the many occasions Morgan pretends to fall down to entertain her. “Pimmy-uh, pimmy –uh!” (Pick me up, pick me up!) – made even cuter by the come-here hand gestures. “Hin me a nanana” (Hand me a banana) – about eighty times a day! I had to cut her off after four the other day! “Hin me baby” (Hand me the baby) – said whenever she drops her baby doll. Today she was reaching for a scented rice bag and said “Hin me smell, Mommy!” Maybe the best was today when she said “Hin me book”, and when I handed it to her, “Good job, Mama!” She will also, if lying between me and Nick, put one arm around each of our necks and hug us both at once. Today I was scolding Morgan for something, and Daisy climbed up on the couch between us, put an arm around each of our necks, said “Guys…”, and pulled us in for a group hug. It was pretty hard to stay upset at anybody after that!
- Besides getting the clothes from Kate today, Nick also brought home a huge garbage bag full of baby boy clothes from a guy he works with.
- One big blessing is that even though we don’t have the money we need right now for bills, we do have most of the stuff we need for day to day living. We have plenty of diapers, wipes, dish and laundry detergent, fabric softener (actually I’m trying a homemade recipe right now, and it seems to work great), toothpaste, toilet paper, deodorant, shampoo, conditioner, Tums (life or death for a pregnant woman with crazy heartburn!), etc. And we may be a bit sparse on meat for the next few weeks, but we have enough for a few days anyway, and plenty of rice and beans for after that! The only things we should absolutely have to come up with are milk and bread and maybe butter.
- Wednesday as I was driving home from lunch with Nick this metal plate about 6 inches by 6 inches and maybe a quarter of an inch thick came bouncing down the interstate right at my car. There was no place I could go, and it hit the bumper and put a pretty nasty gash in it. Unfortunately the insurance company (them again!) will count it as an at-fault collision and charge us a $500 deductible if we want to report it. Honestly, we’ve never had so much as a hint of a problem with them in 10 years time, and suddenly all this stuff! I’ve never heard of a company that will count road debris as an at-fault collision! But the blessing here is that it didn’t hit higher up on the car and bounce up into my windshield. I honestly think it would have caused a very serious wreck if it had done so. It definitely would have cracked the windshield, if not broken all the way through it. Or if it had hit the road and bounced up under the car it could have done some serious damage mechanically.
- While there’s not been any real mention of DD lately, Nick has at least (at my request) given me one room a day to focus on for the last few days. I could really use some stress relief, or even some motivational help, but I’ll take what he can give.
Week 21 of Pregnancy: Baby's Taste Buds Develop
At about seven inches in length and almost 11 ounces in weight, your baby is about the size of a large banana. There's still a great deal of room in your womb — though your tenant will soon begin to feel cramped, so be prepared!
At about seven inches in length and almost 11 ounces in weight, your baby is about the size of a large banana.
By 21 weeks pregnant, your baby swallows at least several ounces of amniotic fluid each day — not only for hydration and nutrition, but also to practice swallowing and digesting — skills your baby will need as soon as he or she arrives in your arms. And keep this in mind: The taste of the amniotic fluid differs from day to day depending on what you've eaten (spicy enchilada one day, sweet carrots another). And that smorgasbord of tastes won't be lost on your baby. That's because your little one has very developed taste buds already. In fact, researchers have noted that babies who were exposed to certain tastes in utero via the amniotic fluid were more eager to eat foods with that same taste after birth. Want your baby to eat his or her broccoli later? Eat yours now!
Your developing baby still has a great deal of room in your womb — though like anyone who lives in one space for a long time, this tenant will soon begin to feel cramped. Until those uterine walls start closing in, however, there's plenty of space for twisting, turning, and even an occasional somersault (so that's what you were feeling last night!).
With all that belly dancing going on, it's hard to believe your baby gets any sleep at all. But believe it or not, your fetus sleeps as much as a newborn, perhaps 12 to 14 hours per day! (Now if only you could get some sleep!)
Thankful Thursday
Hello, everyone. I really should be in bed, but right now I just really need to focus on the things I have to be grateful for. About 14 years ago, not long before Nick and I got married, my dad had a serious heart attack. He actually had two, but the second one came on the heels of the first and was much less serious. It turned out that he had major blockage in the big vein they call the widow-maker. At the time he was just 52, and he made a full recovery, although he was out of work for almost six months.
Sunday before last my mom called me before church and told me that he’d had a nosebleed they couldn’t get stopped and had been in the ER all night. His blood pressure has spiked, and caused a ruptured vein, which was thankfully in his upper nasal cavity and not his brain where it would have caused a stroke. They packed his nose and gave him some medicine, and on the following Monday he was able to get the packing removed, and everything seemed fine.
This Tuesday morning he called me and told me that his blood pressure had spiked dangerously high again and that they were on their way back to the hospital. I called Nick and my brothers and let them all know, and after a while my mom called and let me know that his bp had stabilized, but that they were going to run some blood work. A bit later she called back to tell me that his blood work looked fine, but they wanted to keep him overnight and run some heart tests. I wanted to go see him, but she said that he was resting and would be checking out early the next morning, so rather than injecting my toddler into the situation, I just waited. I talked to him that night, and he seemed to be feeling well.
Yesterday morning (Wednesday as I’m writing this very early Thursday morning) my mom called again and they had run some stress tests on him, and they had come back with some abnormalities, but they were waiting on the cardiologist to come and tell him was that meant. It turns out that it meant that there was serious blockage again and that his heart was only functioning at 45%. Nick was home by then, so we all loaded up and went to see him.
There’s just something indescribably frightening about seeing the man who raised you, the very epitome of strength, lying tethered by tubes and wires to a hospital bed. In a few hours they’ll do a heart cath to see if they can put in a stent or if they’ll have to do open heart surgery. I covet your prayers.
Focusing on good things: The ABCs of Gratitude:
- Hospitals – they aren’t very fun places to be, but oh how grateful I am that we have access to them, and that the one currently caring for my dad is such a fine one.
- Husband – I am far beyond blessed to be married to such a wonderful man, one who didn’t hesitate to, without having dinner, pack up me and both kids and drive across town to take me to see my dad.
- Hugs – right now Daisy is a world-class hugger. I’m talking about those priceless little toddler hugs where she throws both arms around my neck and squeezes as tight as she can while saying “Mmmmm-mmmmm!”
- Halfway – as of today, I’m half-way through my pregnancy. Yay!
- Heaven – the place that I know I have waiting for me, and if you don’t know it too, you can!
- Heat – it’s starting to finally cool down around here, and there’s nothing cozier than the first time you turn the heater on in the fall!
- Home – these days our house is feeling a bit crowded, and it’s only going to get more so, but crowded or not, it’s our home, and I’m grateful for it.
Recent blessings:
First of all I’m grateful that my dad was sensible enough to go to the hospital when he needed to. He very nearly died with his first heart attack because he was too stubborn to go on his own. My mom found him in bed and made him go, and the doctor said that if she’d gotten home 15 minutes later we would have lost him.
I have a client who I’ve done a couple of photo shoots for. She always wants to buy the CD, but she has a hard time holding onto money, so she mails it to me a little at a time. A couple of days ago she sent me the last $20 on this order, and that paid for our hospital parking as well as our dinner tonight (since I didn’t have time to cook).
Daisy and I got to have lunch with Nick today. It was just sandwiches and chips from home, but we really enjoyed the time together.
I went to the used book store today and traded in a bunch of children’s books that the kids didn’t care for. I didn’t get much for them, but it was almost enough to pay for two books that I know my dad will love for Christmas.
Saturday I got to go to a car show with Nick. He finally got to drive his Fairlane, and we really enjoyed the kid-free time.
Night before last Nick’s parents had us over for dinner. Hooray for food someone else cooked!
I’m super excited that we’re having a little boy! Of course we would have loved another little girl just the same, but we’ve both always wanted a little boy.
Speaking of, when I went to the doctor last Wednesday to find out what we’re having, the ultrasound tech came out just before I went back and announced that the ultrasound machine was broken. I was terribly afraid that we’d have to wait another month to find out, and Nick had even taken the morning off to come to the appointment with me! Fortunately the doctor across the hall was out that day, so we were able to use his machine. The baby looks great, everything’s normal, and he’s growing right on schedule!
Saturday I have an engagement shoot. It’s a bit of a drive away, but I should get the down payment on the whole wedding package, which Nick and I will be shooting together next month. Yay, teamwork!
Baby Update:
Week 20 of Pregnancy: Boy or Girl?
You've got a heavyweight in your belly now (well, in baby terms, anyway). Your little champ weighs about ten ounces and has a height, crown to rump, of about six and a half inches. Think of your developing baby as the size of a small cantaloupe (and probably as sweet too). Boy or Girl? You'll also be able to see your baby's gender in the ultrasound by now!
You've got a heavyweight in your belly at 20 weeks pregnant (well, in baby terms, anyway). Your little champ weighs about ten ounces and has a height, crown to rump, of about six and a half inches. Think small cantaloupe (and probably as sweet too).
Is it a boy cantaloupe or a girl cantaloupe? You'll be able to find out your baby's gender via the ultrasound by this point. If you're carrying a girl fetus, her uterus is fully formed this week and her vaginal canal is starting its development (which means that in about twenty-five or thirty-some-odd years, she could be just where you're at, Grandma!). She also has primitive eggs in her tiny little ovaries now, seven million of them — though by the time she's born, that number will be down to two million (still more than she could ever hope to use). And interestingly, your baby girl will be born with all the eggs she'll ever have.
Have you got male? If your fetus is a boy, his testicles have begun their descent this week, though they're still located in the abdomen, waiting for the scrotum to finish growing so they'll have a place to drop into in a few weeks.
Though the external genitals in both male and female fetuses still have a way to grow, you should be able to find out the sex of your baby (if you want to) during an ultrasound exam.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Thankful Saturday
Yes, I missed Thursday again, but it was a really busy week! Nick was out of town at school for most of the week, and I got to play single mom for a few days. But he’s home now, and I sure am glad!
ABC's of Gratitude:
Six inches long this week and about eight ounces in weight, your baby is the size of a large mango.
Your little action figure is able to choreograph Matrix-like moves at 19 weeks pregnant. Arms and legs are finally in proportion, neurons are now connected between the brain and muscles, and cartilage throughout the body is turning to bone. All these upgrades combine to give your baby more control over limb movements. Which explains all that kicking, stretching, and bodysurfing (or rather bellysurfing) you've possibly started feeling by now.
Something else going on this week: Your baby is getting a cheesy varnish. Say what? Yup — a protective substance called vernix caseosa (vernix is the Latin word for varnish; caseosa is cheese) now covers your baby's skin. It's greasy and white and is made up of lanugo (that downy hair), oil from your baby's glands, and dead skin cells. This waxy "cheese" may not sound too appetizing or attractive, but it's there for good reason: Vernix protects your baby's sensitive skin from the surrounding amniotic fluid. Without it, your baby would look very wrinkled at birth (sort of what you'd look like if you soaked in a bath for nine months). Some babies — especially those born early — will still be covered with vernix at the delivery, so you might get a look at your baby's first anti-wrinkle cream.
ABC's of Gratitude:
- Groceries – while we didn’t go hungry last week, we were definitely eating out of the back of the pantry, and it’s nice to have a few more groceries in the house this week.
- Gift-giving – I spent a good part of one day last week making up a couple of lists (I’m a big list maker). One was our Christmas list, and the other was a list of the supplies I’ll need to make all of those gifts. Yep, I’m going to do my best to make almost every gift we give this year. Last year I made a significant portion of them, and it really added a new layer to Christmas for me (not to mentioned helped the budget quite a bit!). Now I know that there will be a few things I can’t craft myself, but I was actually pretty impressed with the number of ideas I found online, and I even came up with a few all by myself!
- Grandparents – Tomorrow is Grandparent’s Day. I no longer have any living grandparents, although both of Nick’s on his dad’s side are healthy as horses. We’re so blessed to still have them, and we’re even more blessed that our parents are such amazing grandparents to our children. Both my mom and Nick’s stepmom were in the delivery room for both my girls’ births, and they’ll both be there for this baby as well, and it’s so important to me that they get to be grandmothers from the very first moment of the baby’s life!
- God – Wow, how on earth can I express how grateful I am for and to God? If not for Him, there would be nothing else at all.
- Grace – Grace is a concept that is so incredibly important in both marriage and parenting, and I’m so grateful God has shown so much grace to me.
- My parents safely returned from L.A. this past Tuesday. They also dropped off $50 with me just because they knew Nick was out of town and we were pretty tight for money.
- Nick safely returned from school on Thursday. He had a great time, and he learned a lot!
- Nick’s dad came over Thursday before Nick got home and mowed our front yard and cleaned out our gutters.
- I took advantage of this deal on www.moneysavingmom.com, and it’s going to get me a sweet little stocking stuffer for Nick, always a hard order for me to fill.
- A few weeks ago I also signed up for www.savemore.com and ended up getting a couple of kids watches for free, which will also make a couple of great Christmas gifts. They came in the mail a few days ago, and I love them! By the way, the link in the last sentence only is my referral link. If you would like to sign up through it, you get a $10 credit, and then I get a $10 credit if you make a purchase (but it will not tell me your name or email address, just in case privacy is a concern). I got the watches completely free because I signed up and got my $10 credit and used it to purchase the $7 watch deal, then referred Nick, and he also purchased the same deal with his $10 credit. And because he made a purchase (albeit one covered by his free credit), I got another $10!. Currently I’m hanging onto my remaining credit for the next great deal that comes along for a Christmas gift!
- Last year I signed up for an off-site storage account with Mozy. I lost my hard drive a couple of years ago, and it was a pretty devastating experience. Once I started doing photography professionally, I knew there was just no way I could risk losing client images. At the time I got a great deal with Mozy, and I’ve been very happy with them. Unfortunately they did away with their unlimited storage option a few months back and went to a new (much pricier) by-the-GB plan. My first year with them cost me about $46. Under the new plan I would be paying over $300! My contract with them was up August 31, and they were going to renew at the higher rate if I didn’t cancel. I knew I needed the service, but I also knew we just didn’t have the money to either renew with them or open a new account elsewhere that week. Fortunately a friend who’s tech-savvier than me suggested I try out Crashplan (not an affiliate link), and they were running a 30 day free trial special. I signed up with them, and I’m so excited to have an extra 30 days to come up with the annual fee (which is comparable to the one I started out with at Mozy).
- Pinterest – If you’ve never hear of Pinterest, you should really check it out. It’s basically a free bulletin board for you to pin up all the great ideas you find online, and to see other people’s finds as well. It’s where I’ve found a big chunk of my Christmas gift ideas. A warning though: it will suck you right in, and you might find yourself exploring there for hours at a time!
Week 19 of Pregnancy: Vernix Develops
Six inches long this week and about eight ounces in weight, your baby is the size of a large mango and is now covered in a protective substance called vernix. Arms and legs are finally in proportion, neurons are now connected between the brain and muscles, and cartilage throughout the body is turning to bone.
Six inches long this week and about eight ounces in weight, your baby is the size of a large mango.
Your little action figure is able to choreograph Matrix-like moves at 19 weeks pregnant. Arms and legs are finally in proportion, neurons are now connected between the brain and muscles, and cartilage throughout the body is turning to bone. All these upgrades combine to give your baby more control over limb movements. Which explains all that kicking, stretching, and bodysurfing (or rather bellysurfing) you've possibly started feeling by now.
Something else going on this week: Your baby is getting a cheesy varnish. Say what? Yup — a protective substance called vernix caseosa (vernix is the Latin word for varnish; caseosa is cheese) now covers your baby's skin. It's greasy and white and is made up of lanugo (that downy hair), oil from your baby's glands, and dead skin cells. This waxy "cheese" may not sound too appetizing or attractive, but it's there for good reason: Vernix protects your baby's sensitive skin from the surrounding amniotic fluid. Without it, your baby would look very wrinkled at birth (sort of what you'd look like if you soaked in a bath for nine months). Some babies — especially those born early — will still be covered with vernix at the delivery, so you might get a look at your baby's first anti-wrinkle cream.
Saturday, September 03, 2011
Thankful Thursday
Er, Friday. Okay, fine, SATURDAY. So yeah, I’m late again. But I’m here now!
ABC’s of Gratitude:
At 18 weeks pregnant, your baby is hitting the height chart at five and a half inches long (remember, that's crown to rump) and weighs about five ounces (the weight of that boneless chicken breast you're making for dinner).
And now for the skill of the week (drum roll please…): The art of the yawn has been mastered by your baby (someone's sleepy!). In fact, you might catch a glimpse of that adorable yawn if you're getting an ultrasound this month. You'll also catch a glimpse of all the fetal movement your baby's doing — twists, rolls, kicks, and punches. And would you believe your baby is finally big enough for you to start feeling those movements now (or anytime in the next few weeks). So get ready!
Something you won't see on the ultrasound, but you'll know is in working order, is your baby's nervous system, which is maturing rapidly at this time. Nerves, now covered with a substance called myelin (which speeds messages from nerve cell to nerve cell), are forming more complex connections. And those in the brain are further specializing into the ones that serve the senses of touch, taste, smell, sight, and hearing. Talking about hearing, your baby's is growing more acute, making your little one more conscious of sounds that come from inside your body (which means you could both be listening to each other hiccup — a skill that your baby has by now).
ABC’s of Gratitude:
- Family – you can’t choose the one you get, but Nick and I are both incredibly blessed with the ones we have. My parents have been married for 43 years; Nick’s mom and dad were married for just over 20 years when Nick’s mom passed away, and Nick’s dad has been married to Nick’s amazing stepmom for almost 12 years now. We are so thankful for the wonderful examples we’ve had of married couples in our family!
- Fathers – First of all, my own father is just an incredible dad. He’s taught me so much, and I’ve never for one day doubted his love for me. Secondly (but just as importantly), Nick is a wonderful father to our two girls – and I know he’ll be just as fabulous with our new little one. And the most important Father of course is my Heavenly Father. I cannot even begin to express how much I love God and how very much He loves me!
- Fathers-in-law – Nick and I both got lucky here. My dad considers Nick a son, and he truly treats him as such. Nick’s dad is forever coming over to help out with something we need fixing around the house, and my very first Mother’s Day he was the only person who thought to buy me a gift.
- Fixing stuff – Today I had something scary happen: the charger cord on my laptop died. It had been fraying right at the base of the end you plug into the computer, and it finally completely broke tonight. Right now we do NOT have $80 to go buy a new one, and I depend on my laptop for SO much. We do have a desktop upstairs, but all of my clients’ photos, as well has all my editing software is on this laptop, and frankly I would be lost without it. Fortunately, after a lot of prayer, soldering, and electrical tape, Nick got it fixed good as new! Now we’re dealing with a broken DC jack on his laptop, also a serious issue because he uses it daily for work. The part that will fix it (we hope) is really cheap on ebay, but it’s still not quite cheap enough for us to buy it this week. Anyway, we would really appreciate your prayers that we can get the part soon and that he will be able to fix it completely!
- Faith – these last two years our faith has really had to stretch with the switch from two incomes to one. But I am so glad to be able to say that not once has God failed us. Right now we’re definitely running on faith: It’s 6 days till payday, and I only have enough food for about 3 more days, plus Nick is completely out of gas, and I have just enough to get us to church on Sunday. But I’m not panicking. Matthew 6:25-34 tells me all that I need to know, and I can know it with such certainty because He has proven it over and over again:
Matthew 6:25 Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?
- 26Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?
- Freebies – It’s getting to be the time of year again when I start thinking about Christmas gifts. Last year almost every gift that went out of our house was something I got for free or almost free with various online deals and/or coupons. It was actually a lot of fun to be able to get Christmas gifts for everyone for so little, and it really helped us focus on the true meaning. I’m looking forward to a now holiday season full of great deals and freebies, not to mention lots of crafting and handmade gifts!
- Fabric – I’ve mentioned that I’ve really gotten into sewing and crafting over the last year, and I’ve found myself developing a real love of fabric. There’s just so much you can do with it, and I love how unique a project can be depending on the type and print you use.
- Fun – well who doesn’t like to have fun?
27Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?
28And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:
29And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
30Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?
31Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?
32(For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.
33But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
34Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.
- At my last doctor’s visit I had my quad screen. This is the blood test that checks for, among other things, indicators for chromosome abnormalities (such as Down Syndrome) and neural tube defects (like spina bifida). This is a common test, and one I’ve had with all three pregnancies, but it’s still nerve-wracking, especially since the results take a few days to come back. Toward the end of last week my test results came in, and they were all normal.
- Nick will be going to school for work next week. This is a mixed blessing for me, because I always hate being without him. But they feed him (quite well, actually), as well as pay for travel and lodging, so that means we wont have to pay for gas for him to go to work and back for most of the week, and we also won’t have to worry about lunches for him. This is also a necessary step for him in getting his ASE certification, an accomplishment that will mean more money for him. He also gets to go with one of his closest friends at work, which is nice.
- God has already stretched our food this week. More than once I’ve found things in the cabinet that I didn’t know we had, and our bread machine has really been a lifesaver, giving me the ability to put together things I would not have otherwise been able to. I also really appreciate my meat and potatoes husband sweetly eating whatever I put in front of him (and even taking it for lunch the next day!), even if it wasn’t exactly what he would have chosen.
- My parents are currently in L.A. visiting my brother, who’s there on assignment. They visited him in Houston last year and hated almost everything about the trip, but this year they’re having the time of their lives, and I’m so happy for them!
Week 18 of Pregnancy: Fetal Nervous System
This week your baby is about five and a half inches long, crown to rump, and weighs about five ounces. And fetal development has reached the stage for you to start feeling those movements some time in the next few weeks — so get ready!
At 18 weeks pregnant, your baby is hitting the height chart at five and a half inches long (remember, that's crown to rump) and weighs about five ounces (the weight of that boneless chicken breast you're making for dinner).
And now for the skill of the week (drum roll please…): The art of the yawn has been mastered by your baby (someone's sleepy!). In fact, you might catch a glimpse of that adorable yawn if you're getting an ultrasound this month. You'll also catch a glimpse of all the fetal movement your baby's doing — twists, rolls, kicks, and punches. And would you believe your baby is finally big enough for you to start feeling those movements now (or anytime in the next few weeks). So get ready!
Something you won't see on the ultrasound, but you'll know is in working order, is your baby's nervous system, which is maturing rapidly at this time. Nerves, now covered with a substance called myelin (which speeds messages from nerve cell to nerve cell), are forming more complex connections. And those in the brain are further specializing into the ones that serve the senses of touch, taste, smell, sight, and hearing. Talking about hearing, your baby's is growing more acute, making your little one more conscious of sounds that come from inside your body (which means you could both be listening to each other hiccup — a skill that your baby has by now).
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