Massages

Jennifer and I went to get the massages that she planned for us for Valentine's Day last night. They were supposed to happen a week ago but we got snowed out. Mine was mediocre, perhaps I am spoiled by having a sister-in-law that is excellent when it comes to giving a massage but Jennifer felt really good afterwards and where we went is one of the few places around that specializes in pregnancy massages so I am glad she was able to get one and it felt so good. Anyway, in the spirit of my role of entertaining Jennifer whenever we are out, as I was going through the questionnaire I blurted my parenthetical thought below out loud. Jennifer laughed so hard she cried because she thought I was serious. I was at the medical/physical history part.....

Have you ever had any of the following?
Headaches - Yes
Connective Tissue Disorders - No
Liver Problems - No
Heart Disorders - No
Neck Pain - Yes
Sprains/Broken Bones - Yes
HIV/AIDS - No
High Blood Pressure - No
Diabetes - No
Accidents - (Um... car wreck or pee your pants? Well, both apply even if I was only 2).- Yes, They did said have you EVER......

He is my son

So today’s Dr appt and non-stress test was not the most joyful news to hear. My BP is up 138/92. The Dr took it again after the NST and it was better, but it is still something that I need to keep an eye on. She had a hard time getting the NST hooked up and going and it wasn’t too pleasant a position for me. I had 2 contractions in the ½ hr I was hooked up. Didn’t even feel them though. Dr. W kept asking me if I felt them but I didn’t. I did feel the one on the way back to work though.

The worst news is that he is still breech. Dr. W said it is a good thing that he can move him around so he can still flip, but it is making me nervous. I have an ultrasound in 3 weeks to check his position. If he is still breech then we will schedule a version which is where they externally rotate him into the head down position. I have heard it is very painful. I am hoping to avoid that so sending me flipper vibes would be good. If the version doesn’t work then he could still flip before I go into labor. Otherwise I will be having a c-section. Not the end result I had hoped for, but a healthy baby is what matters most. At least that’s what I’ll keep telling myself through this emotional hysteria.

This child is most definitely my son though. I think he will flip when he is ready. That is so me and my attitude. I didn’t learn to swim until I was like 28 or 29. I just had no desire to do it. Then when Rich & I were on vacation in Myrtle Beach I told him that I wanted him to teach me to swim. So now I know. I am not an Olympian by any means, but I know the basics and can swim laps if I want to. You can’t force me to do things. I have to do them when I am ready and willing. So I think Cletus is getting this attitude of not flipping yet from me. Maybe he just isn’t ready yet and no one can force him, not even me. Me of all people should understand this.

Three coats and we are done

The stars are done!!! We are so excited. They look incredible!!! Better than I expected. Rich did such an awesome job!! I am so happy and thankful that he went along with my vision and made them look so neat!! We are so happy to be done painting. Now onto the unboxing and setting up the furniture. I can't wait to organize the room and put away his little things.

Back to School

OK, not really. But tonight I was presented with a situation that illustrated just how much of an education I am in for. We were at the store and to satisfy a curiosity, Jennifer wanted to look at nur.sing tanks. So I follow behind with the cart past all the fun skimpy underwear to the nu.rsing bras and nursi.ng tanks. The nur.sing bras were exactly what I expected. There is a clasp on the strap that holds up a panel of fabric that covers the br.east. When you release the clasp and let the panel down, the cup beneath the panel has a hole in it. That makes sense, how else is the baby supposed to get to the nip.ple if there isn't a hole? Then there were the nu.rsing tanks. They had the same setup with the clasp on the strap holding up a panel of fabric. But with the tanks, when you release the clasp and let the panel down, there is another panel behind it, but no hole. So, you drop one solid panel, only to reveal another solid panel which Jennifer informs me you just push off to the side or down and lift your br.east over it. I'm lost, if you still have to push your garment down or to the side, what's the point of the removable panel. I'm sure there is a perfectly good reason. I have a lot to learn.

Dr Appt Fun

So the fun never stops does it? Cletus is doing well. He is transverse. His head is down on my right hip and his body is curled up on my left side in a C shape. The Dr today was the other dr in the office. He felt around for him. Boy was that uncomfortable. I had a couple Barton-Hicks contractions yesterday walking across campus to pick up checks. Dr. W said that was totally normal.

I will start the non-stress tests (NST) next week. For now just 1 per week. I talked to work about it and they are totally fine. I will also see the Dr next week depending on the outcome of the test. I will also get an ultrasound in 2 weeks to see if he is in position yet. I hope he turns. If not we will talk options then. I am not looking forward to that chat. I am not opposed to a version, but I have heard they are very painful. I would like to avoid a c-section, but whatever happens will happen I guess.

Thanks for all the comments on the stars!! I think it looks so cute! I can’t wait to get it done and start unpacking the furniture.

Seeing Stars

So here are some pics of the stars. Rich didn't get a chance to get the second coat on so it is still in progress. The big boxes in the corner are the furniture.

Stars on the wall

One coat down, one to go. I meant to get pics last night but the camera battery is dead. I am hoping to get some tonight. The stars look really nice. Rich did an awesome job!! I was just there to supervise which I guess I did an ok job. We had to switch paint brushes after a few stars because the sponge brush just didn’t look right. Also I wasn’t happy with the pain at first, but luckily it dries darker. I think it will match perfectly when it is done.

I really want to get this done so we can get the furniture unpacked and settled. I am seriously starting to want to nest and get everything organized. I am sure it has nothing to do with the fact that he will be here in less than 2 months.

We have been talking more recently and reflecting on the fact that we are going to be parents soon. Most of the time I am not sure we are mature enough to be parents. We are both still big kids at heart and I don’t think that will change. We still have goof ball ideas and sometimes even act on them. Hard to believe we are going to be responsible for someone else soon enough.

Shelby has been doing so awesome every night we are in Cletus’ room working. She sniffs around for awhile and then just lies down on the floor. We are hoping this stays a habit once Cletus gets here. I just laid on the floor with her last night while Rich was finishing up the first coat. Unfortunately I will not be doing that again anytime soon. To painful to get back up again.

Things are going pretty well for me. I am getting so tired physically and mentally. The other night I tried to take my contact out of my ear. I have gained some more weight, but I am telling myself it is the baby and not all the Reese peanut butter eggs I have been eating. I love Easter time for that reason only. I have had some minor swelling as well. I am trying to increase my water intake to counteract the swelling. Hopefully that will help.

Also because pregnancy brain overtook me when I sealed the invitations, I am registered at Babies.R.Us. They didn’t do the print off cards for me and I forgot to add it to the invitation.

My SIL shower is this weekend and then mine is the next. Yikes!!! That means it is almost March. When did that happen?!?!?!?

One down, One to go?

The stars are painted. Two hours of up and down the step ladder, moving it around, and meticulously painting inside the taped off lines and one coat is done. The color looked more pink than burgundy at first, but it dried and darkened just right. The light colored wall is still showing through so more coats are needed. I say one to go with a question mark because I'm thinking one more might not be enough. We got the "1-coat" paint, and it is noticeably thicker than any other paint I have used, but it will still have to be applied with multiple coats. We started out using one of those cheap foam brushes. They were great for putting a lot of paint down quick, but they were leaving deep grooves across each stroke from the unevenness of the foam tip. In Jennifer's words, "It looked like a kindergartener had done the painting. " Luckily we had some standard brushes leftover from previous projects and we were able to smooth over where we used the foam brush before it dried. Jennifer was a big help moving the ladder around the room since I had this nice bucket with a handle strapped to one hand and a brush in the other. She also sat in the room keeping me company and keeping the pets out of trouble. Tonight Jennifer has plans, so for at least the start of the second coat I will be on my own. Hopefully we won't end up with any red dogs or cats.

Make Room for Baby

Or is it make the baby's room!? I enjoy being rather handy at using tools and creative at making things, but the enjoyment stops when being handy becomes a chore. One summer during my time off from work, I designed and built a firewood shed, for fun, that holds about 1/2 chord of wood. It's 4-5 years old and still standing strong. I should give credit to Jennifer here who helped in the assembly and painting. I've made cornhole games, turned old shipping crates into garage storage, and built shelves out of scrap prefab ceiling joists, all more for fun than necessity. However, when it comes to painting walls, fixing faucets, stripping wall paper, I lose interest in being handy really quick. However, we have begun working on the baby's room in earnest and I have yet to experience that feeling of dread. Instead, I was getting my lazy butt up off the couch during commercial breaks and intermissions between periods of the hockey games to finish stenciling and taping the walls in preparation to paint. Tonight we are hopefully going to paint and I am actually looking forward to it. I am excited about how it will look, and I am excited to see the room starting to take shape. The more ready the room, the closer Cletus' arrival. I know his schedule is not affected by the room, but rather our progress towards preparing is a visual indication of just how close his arrival is getting and that is exciting to see. I will be jealous that everything in his room from the furniture, to the paint on the walls and carpet on the floor, and clothes in the closet will be nicer than mine.

Tagged

I was tagged a while back by Mrs Spock for 6 weird things about me. So here they are:

1. When I order at the drive thru window of a fast food place I constantly stomp my foot. Rich gets a big kick out of this one. It is totally subconscious in that I don’t know I do it until he points it out.

2. I am super competitive in everything I do, particularly sports. I have pushed people and tripped them. Once I almost got in a fight with a girl at an indoor soccer game as an adult!!!

3. When I was little I wouldn’t buy anything with my allowance if the numbers on the bar code didn’t come out in even pairs. Can anyone say OCD for that one?

4. I love to listen to others talk about their issues and problems and I love to help them, but I hate talking about my own problems. I am very shy and like to keep personal things to myself. I think I am starting to get over this more, but until last year most friends and family had no idea everything we had been thru to get pregnant and keep pregnant. Also most didn’t know about the miscarriages either.

5. I absolutely love to watch NFL football and yell at the TV like they can hear me. I get very emotionally involved in the games, especially the Browns!!

6. When I was little my sister and I could always tell which Santa presents were hers and which were mine because I had all the legos, electronics and tomboy stuff in my pile while she had all the Barbies.

I think most everyone has done this, but if not consider yourself tagged and post about your weird side.

New Symptoms?

Our new symptoms even possible this late in the game? Evidently they are. Rich had to sleep on the couch last night for part of the night because I have started snoring. I knew this was a possibility down the road as he keeps getting bigger and pushing on my respiratory system, but I guess I wasn’t prepared for it yet. I apologized to Rich, but also told him it is just part of the territory. Guess he better get used to the couch.

Cletus is getting much more active. He is also moving around quite a bit. I can see him from the outside now quite often and I have even seen my badge move at work that hangs around my neck. It is a very bizarre but cool feeling.

I am starting to freak out a little bit with the amount of time that is left. We have so much to do and not a lot of time to do it in. Add to that the fact that I just can’t do what I used to be able to do and we are behind the 8 ball already. I just take comfort in the fact that not everything has to be done before he gets here. Although I would prefer it is.

My shower invites went out yesterday. Although pregnancy brain struck again and I didn’t put where I was registered. There is only 1 big baby store around here so I think everyone will know where to go and look. I am getting semi-excited about the shower. My sister and I got most of the stuff we needed this past weekend. The room is paid for too. My mom is getting on my nerves with the shower stuff. She wants to help and my sister and I don’t want her too. We don’t know how to tell her to back off without being mean about it. I tried to tell her a long time ago that Grandmother’s aren’t supposed to help with the shower, but she isn’t getting it. She just keeps talking about how she has all this free time because she doesn’t have a job and can do stuff. That’s one of the reasons we don’t want her to help. She doesn’t have a job therefore she doesn’t have as much money. Plus we want to do it our way and what I want. Rant over!!!

I am hoping that we can pick out the paint for the stars this weekend. Then maybe we can get them put up on the wall and painted sometime in the next week. I already know where I am going to get the letters from. We also found some cute wall stickers to put up as well.

The baby furniture is actually in our house!! After an hour wait we finally got it in the 2 trucks we had. I can’t wait to get it out and start organizing everything in it. I think that will make it a lot more real to see the room decorated and set up.

Tomorrow is the 1 year anniversary of finding out Autumn was gone too. Tomorrow I will be 32 weeks pregnant with Cletus. I have been looking at little girls lately when we are out and am sort of wistful of that at times. I am very thankful for our little boy that will be here soon enough, but I also miss our little girl as well.

Breach baby

Yep he is breach right now. The ultrasound yesterday confirmed it. He still has time to turn though so I am not worried yet. He wouldn’t show off the goods to confirm he is a boy, but I think the first time was enough for that. He was being shy and stubborn yesterday. Didn’t give us any fun shots, but he did cooperate for the measuring and things they needed. His head is measuring 1.5wks ahead and his belly and bones are measuring a few days behind. Nothing to worry about though as at this point is more guessing anyway. We just wanted to make sure he is still growing pretty much on track.

Cletus is really getting very active at night anymore. He is running out of room and letting me know it too. Rich hadn’t seen my whole belly move when he kicks and moves now so he got to see it last night. Cletus was very active during the Blue Jackets game so maybe we are going to have a future hockey player. I personally think with the cerv.ix kicks he will be a soccer player, but who knows. Rich also thought it would be fun to push on Cletus to see what would happen. Well what happens is Cletus gets pissed and pushes back hard. Rich thought this was hilarious and kept bugging him last night. I made sure to tell Cletus it was not me who was doing it and not to take it out on me. Rich suddenly realized that this probably was feeling pretty weird to me, um yeah you think? He is curled up nice and tight on my right side and hip. Not too comfortable today. Thanks Rich!

I am getting my shower invitations finalized and sent out soon. This is so unreal to me. I have been more emotional lately and everything is making me cry. I can’t believe our little guy will be here in 2 months!!!

The furniture is finally in as well. They forgot to call me so I called yesterday and they told me it is all there now. Good thing we have the new big truck as there is evidently a lot of boxes. I can’t wait to get his room set up. I think we are going to try and get it this weekend. The waterbed will hopefully be knocked down tonight or tomorrow too to make room for all the boxes. We need to clean the carpet and paint the stars before we start putting things in there and together.

Time is getting short for us. 9 more weeks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!