Family Night

We decided to implement a family night. Not that we need to call it a family night to be together and do fun stuff... but it serves as a good reminder and a good president if you will. So we made a fort between the couches with a blanket over top, popped some popcorn in the air popper (also known as the "air freeze pop" by Emberly) and rented a Veggie Tales movie. Except the Veggie Tales movie was too intense for my sweet child, so we turned it off and just played in the fort and watched a little Curious George.

Then we went for a stroller ride and tucked Em into bed.

First family night was a success.




Actually, it was kind of just a big family weekend, because we have had all kinds of family fun, including a bike ride to the park, dance parties for no reason at all, playtime outside, adventures to the Y, a visit to the pet store, a trip to the zoo, and just all around cuddles and stories and fun. I love it when J has long weekends. It feels like a vacation.

Packed

Today I packed the hospital bag. Finally. It just feels like such a big task. Plus you don't want to be that mom that waltzes into the hospital with everything but the kitchen sink... but you also don't want to be underprepared. Such a dilemma. Anywho - it is done, complete with a list of last minute things to grab.

Now if we could just convince this baby to give me an idea of when/how she might like to make her debut...

This planning mama would greatly appreciate it. I'm maybe stressing just a tiny bit about what to do with Emberly when labor strikes.

Oh well. Countdown is +\- 18 days. I'm hoping for the minus, and preparing for the plus.

In some ways I'm feeling huge and so over being pregnant, and in other ways I'm just feeling very content. It is so hard to imagine what our lives will be like as a family of four. I selfishly feel so comfortable as a family of three. The unknown is scary.

But I trust that I'll fall just as deeply in love with this baby as I did with Emberly. And I'm so excited to meet her. And I *think* we've settled on a name again (a different one!). And I made some newborn hats and washed the swaddle blankets. And life just feels right.

So bring it on, baby.

Today at 37 weeks and 3 days I'm:

Feeling: huge

Excited for: newborn cuddles

Nervous about: getting to sleep ever again

Craving: hot baths and cookies

Noticing: lots of baby hiccups

Loving: when Jordan is home to help with all things Emberly Ann

Highlights

Highlights of my day (and it's only 1pm):

- breakfast in bed made by J himself
- dance party with my two favorites
- family bike ride (at 37 weeks plus, mind you!)
- Alfredo pizza
- long bath enjoyed by Em, complete with a freeze pop
- impromptu book reading cuddle session on the couch
- catching up with a friend I haven't seen in ages
- listening to my child sing herself "twinkle twinkle" to put herself to sleep at nap

Love.My.Life.

Granola Recipe

Mmmm. This recipe is so good. My favorite way to eat it is just like a bowl of cereal with a little milk on top... but I've also added mini chocolate chips, fresh raspberries, dried blueberries, raisins, craisins, and other dried fruits. You'll notice you make it exactly the same way though and just add in those things when you are ready to take a bite. Enjoy! (Oh and please forgive me for just posting pictures - I'm lazy and we are on our way out of town! If you can't see well, let me know and I will be un-lazy when we get back to Fargo!)







PS - I make a half batch each time because it seems giant... but that sure wouldn't be necessary. I also don't add the coconut because I think coconut is nasty. And finally, the Lyle's syrup is something I couldn't find, but my cookbook says you can substitute honey, which is what I do!

My Big Kid

This is my big kid. She started linking words and making sentences last week.

"Mommy sleep too."

"Big house over there."

"Emmy drink milk. Tasty milk mommy!"

And she's a story teller. We talk about going to see the "neighs" (horses) with Papa Bernie almost every day. Sometimes multiple times a day. And she always adds in a "shhh" with a finger by her lips to tell us how she had to be so quiet. And that they eat grass. And when we went to visit them she saw a "toooot tooot!" (train).

And we talk about going to the park and getting to go on the slides (wheeee!). And going to the Y and getting to bounce on their trampolines and seeing friends. And going to the lake with our friends Sam and Kayla and getting to play with their dog Rosco (aka "taco") and how when he said "arf arf" they said "no no taco, no no!"

So much communication. It's a little unreal.

Her favorite thing in the whole wide world is to be outside. She would be outside all day and skip eating and sleeping and all other important things if we let her. But then she'd turn into a giant crab... and sometimes even with us reminding and convincing and forcing these things to happen it still goes a little beyond the point of no return.

Sigh. It goes so fast. I worked on Emberly's baby book today (first year baby book, mind you. I'm a little behind) and it felt like forever ago and just yesterday all at thr same time that I was rejoicing over those first nights of 4 and 5 hours of sleep at a time and convincing her to eat rice cereal and waiting for her to roll over and watching her take her first steps. And now she's almost TWO. Seriously, who let that happen??

36 weeks

Today's Date: June 18, 2013

Weeks: 36

Trimester: 3

Countdown to due date: 28 days!

Baby is the size of: a head of romaine lettuce (and about 6 pounds)

Milestones: Baby will gain about an ounce/day to the end - about a half a pound a week!

Symptoms: Going potty all.the.time, restless legs, some sciatic nerve pain, slightly swollen feet, and no desire to bend over at all!

Cravings: granola! :) mmmm
Aversions: any sort of big meal - no room for meals in this tummy anymore, so lots of snacking is taking place!

Best moment/thankful for: getting air conditioning hooked up in our house finally! I was just a little on the "too pregnant" edge to be without it!

Also feeling thankful I still have my wedding ring on at this point in my pregnancy! I don't remember when I had to take it off with Em, but it was surely well before 36 weeks!

Oh! And after my doctor appointment yesterday I purchased a few new swaddle blankets, a newborn hat, and a baby book!

Looking forward to: going to the lake with J and Em this weekend and having some R&R

Emotions: back in full swing! Finding out yesterday that I'm only measuring at 32 weeks makes me feel worried about this baby... but I'm trying to remind myself that this baby will be exactly the way God designed it - big or small :)

Movement: lots! Doctor says that the movement will slow down now that baby is running out of room, but I sure haven't experienced that yet! (Probably because baby is measuring small??) Anywho - she is very busy and very much up in my ribs and down on my bladder. I often feel (and see) little appendages sticking out on my sides, and she has the hiccups at least once a day. Usually in the hour or so after I put Em to bed (8:00ish) she has a little party in my tummy... or maybe I just notice it more then because I'm not distracted by my busy almost two-year old.

Names: We had a name picked out for many months, but now I'm wavering. I *think* we have it narrowed down to three top first name choices, and the middle name all depends on the first. But I think I'll just need to hold this baby to decide for sure.

Big sister: If you ask Emberly where the baby is she *might* point to my belly. Or she might point to her belly. Or she might say to you "baby. Wahh!" (Which translates to "babies cry.")

She does know where the baby's room is though, and often wants to play in there or rock her baby in the rocking chair, or tuck her baby into bed in the crib.

Sleep/Dreams: Sleep?? What is that again? I'm excited for this baby to be outside of me keeping me awake instead of inside of me keeping me awake. Between my restless legs and frequent trips to the bathroom, I don't sleep a whole lot. But I do enjoy an afternoon "rest" most days, even if I can't fall asleep.

Labor and delivery and water breaking dreams have officially started. SO weird to wake up and wonder if you've already had your baby or not!

Nesting/Preparations: Always. Baby's room is almost "ready" and since moving into our new house we have been trying to finish house projects left and right. My mother-in-law helped me to paint Emberly's room this weekend and it is finally starting to come together, and Jordan has been working on getting our yard ready to put in grass.




Labor guesses: feeling like this baby will come late, especially with my small measurements and the fact that Emberly came late too. Trying to remind myself that I won't be the only pregnant lady that stays pregnant forever, and that this baby will be "on time" according to God's plan.
(Unfortunately this is not always so easy!)

Once upon a time...

Last week my great grandma turned 94. Do you have a 94 year old great grandma? Didn't think so. I'm pretty sure that makes me cooler than school.

So we went to Hatton to visit her and see my grandma and grandpa too. It had been waaaaay too long since I'd been there. Over a year probably. And that is just very bad. We had an all around awesome day, and Emberly had a blast.

We started with visiting Grandma Clara in the nursing home. (The nursing home has birds in it, and that pretty much made the trip awesome for Emberly... but then it got even better...)

Then we went to grandma and grandpa's for lunch. Grandpa grilled delicious burgers. I ate one and a half because they were so tasty. And that is impressive considering there is zero room for food in my belly these days.

And then we went to the park (in their backyard) and hit the swings (or "wheeeees!" as Emberly calls them).

And then we went to the Rockin' R Ranch where I spent just about every other weekend of my entire childhood and got to see the horsies. Emberly got to "pat their noses" and feed them a snack (of grass) right out of her hands.

Small child heaven.

And pretty heavenly for me too. :)

Long.Lovely.Day.

Today was one of those crazy good days.

Jordan treated me to a sleep-in day while he scooped Em up and took her out to run errands. I got to read my bible (in bed!) and get up gradually and eat breakfast uninterrupted and shower leisurely and do a little picking up and putting away. Plus he came home with a perfect, cozy rocking chair for baby's room... one of the last finishing touches we needed to feel "ready" for this baby.

Then my dear friend, Heather, and her three kiddos came and visited (from far away Minneapolis land). Em thought they were here just for her and played hard while Heather and I got to have a lovely conversation.

And only 10 or so minutes after they had to depart, my sweet sister-in-law and her husband stopped over on their drive through Fargo, and we got to see them one last time before they move to Kentucky.

And THEN, my dad came over for a birthday supper celebration (his 60th!) right as Taryn and Ben were leaving.

Phew!

So at 7:30 when dad and Jordan decided to make a quick trip to Costco, I put Emberly in a quick bath and tucked her in (all kinds of over exhausted from the day's activities). And now I am just chilling in my new rocking chair in baby's room, listening to Em decompress for the day and thinking about the new crazy that is right around the corner with baby #2 on the way.

So glad we get to do life with all of these lovely people. And so thankful they don't mind joining in our messiness.

And now, at 9:00pm, I am all kinds of tired and ready for bed.

Hiding

Sometimes there are days like today where all I'd like to do is mix up a pan of box brownies, crawl into bed, pull up the covers, and alternate between sleep and chocolate deliciousness.

Yummy

I have a new obsession.

Homemade granola. With milk. So kinda like cereal. But way better.

I can't stop thinking about it. It is so nutty and delicious and filling and yum.

Granola + raspberries and chocolate chips

Granola + raisins

Granola + dried blueberries

Granola + Heath bits

Granola + insert your suggestion here

I've already made two batches and I just want to share it with the world. Maybe this is a pregnancy thing, because I have a hard time believing granola is really that tasty. When I was pregnant with Emberly I ate raisin bran a million times a day. This is way beyond tastier.

34 weeks

I feel like a bad mama in the documentation department for pregnancy número dos. In fact, I feel a little bit like I hardly have time to remember that I'm pregnant most days. (Minus the bending over thing and peeing every 30 minutes thing and no longer being able to comfortably rock my almost two-year old because there is no room on my lap thing.)

But tomorrow marks 34 weeks. Today I had a routine OB appointment and all still seems peachy keen. I am measuring 31 weeks... but baby is still growing at the right pace, so I am told to not worry. I'm not worrying. In fact, I hope that just means this baby will be peanut sized. (And come early, but what pregnant mama doesn't hope that??).

Dr. V said that we need to keep this baby in two more weeks and anytime after that is fair game. That freaked me out a little. Two weeks?! I have a lot to do.
But let's be honest. This baby will probably hold out until 41 weeks or something wildly beyond. I am not even going to get my hopes up for an early delivery.

Still. I have a lot to do. My list is kind of long. And this time around, I am most interested in packing my hospital bag. Because going to the hospital is how you get the baby. So I'll probably do that first.

Good news is that it has been unseasonably cool, which means I'm not a hot mess yet. I'm fairly certain I was hot and uncomfortable and retaining a lot of fluid at this point with Emberly. I for sure had my wedding ring off... which did nothing for my pregnancy blues. But my wedding ring is still comfortably on, I'm only up 20 pounds, and I have gained less than a pound in the last month thanks to my pathetic appetite and lack of room for food plus baby in my belly.

Again, doctor is not concerned, therefore I am not either. In fact, I'm kind of pleased. It feels good to not be a walking balloon quite yet. That time is surely coming.
So now we just play the waiting game I guess. Except... it feels like time is just going so fast. And I want to enjoy every moment with just Emberly that I can. Not that I'll be sad for Emberly when baby comes, I just want these weeks to be special. I can't really explain it.

That's my story. Happy 34 weeks to me!




This was my helper at my appointment today. Cute, isn't she?