The Last Days of Pregnancy

Well, these past months have been spent visiting with family and friends near and far, getting ready for baby, and working (with limited success) on staying out of the hospital. We're nearing the end of a 4-week stint of me being in or near the hospital- I haven't been home since we left in the middle of the night with some bleeding. It was terrifying, but not entirely unexpected, so we are more or less ready at home. We have (a few) little clothes, premie and newborn diapers, wipes, and a cradle ready for baby H. We even got the crib set up, and I bought a wrap to carry baby H around. This is so I can carry them around and pretend they are still inside, to ease my guilt for dragging baby H out before he or she decides they are ready (though, really, this is a life-saving necessity for both of us- so I don't feel too guilty!) While this isn't at all what we expected or hoped for, we are so looking forward to meeting little H and having everyone safely at home.

Some thoughts from the past few weeks.....

On surviving the hospital:

I wore my own clothes. I felt better, and the nurses treated me like I wasn't sick. Also, I was allowed to walk around the hospital, and I felt much more comfortable wearing clothes!

I didn't ask too many questions. If you ask if you can do something, they might say no. If you go ahead and do it, they are less likely to say you can't. (Of course, I used common sense here, and did ask about things I thought might not be a good idea.)

I ordered extra food! I had a small fridge in my room, and I would order cereal and milk for the next morning the day before. The food took 45 minutes to arrive, and my pregnant self and baby H couldn't always wait 45 minutes after waking up to eat. I also ordered extra butter, jelly, snacks, etc. And sometimes I'd order extra food just in case some of it was gross. Though by the end I had the menu pretty well figured out!

I didn't wake up when someone came in the room. Or at least, I pretended not to. Nurses frequently would leave and come back later, though I don't think this would have worked as well if I had been sicker. I also wouldn't wake all the way up for the residents' rounds- they typically asked the same questions and I gave the same answers every day. Rolling over was a definite no-no- there is a lot of me to roll over, and it would wake me up way too much. I did wake up, sit up, and put on my glasses when the whole group rounded.

I took walks and found every mildly interesting hospital destination. I'd try to get outside or at least walk through some well-lit skyways.

I was also blessed with many visitors, including my Dad's visit from back East, and E's frequent company.

On the last days of pregnancy:

With all the emphasis on getting baby H out safely, E and I have almost forgotten these are our last days as a two-person family! We are so, so excited to be entering a new season of life, but definitely mourn the passing of many good times "just the two of us," and are sad we didn't get to do a few things one more time before a small, needy person arrives.

I love feeling baby H squirming, and will be sad when I'm a single entity again. Especially in the last month of so, I feel them move much more regularly and I will miss having them so close and knowing they are safe. E can even hear the heartbeat now! Since we aren't actually in the hospital right now, we joke that he is the new fetal monitor.

I'm looking forward to rolling over and becoming a more familiar size, and I'm hopeful that my heartburn will disappear. I'm really, really looking forward to being able to move about the world on my own, without mentally keeping track of how far away the hospital is and how I would get there in an emergency. I'm also looking forward to being less physically careful as I recover- I'm pretty tired of "resting!" Perhaps most of all, I'm looking forward to meeting, holding, nursing, and getting to know our first child!

On parenting:

All of these experiences have brought home that parenting starts a little earlier than we had anticipated. One thing that has helped me keep a good perspective is reminding myself that baby H will have their own whole life- their own difficult circumstances, their own circumstances that work out unexpectedly well. And, many of those things are outside my control. My job is to parent them as well as I can, given the circumstances of their life. After all, I think of my life as my own, not something totally engineered by my parents (though they certainly contributed to it, in many great ways- thanks Mom and Dad!). And, knowing that baby H will (I imagine) think of his or her life in the same way helps relieve the guilt of having to make decisions that are between less-than-ideal and even worse.

On gender:

No, we still don't know if baby H is a boy or a girl! It is a big surprise to look forward to in the middle of the C-section (which I'm not particularly looking forward to), so I'm so glad we didn't find out. If anyone reads this in the next few days- it's your last chance to have your guess recorded for posterity before we know for sure! At different times I have hoped for either a boy or a girl, for various reasons, but I really can't decide which would be more exciting. It's fun to know I will be thrilled either way!

Current Stats

Notable updates from the 18th week:

Energy: Good Days (working, dinner, errands, social activities, productive member of household and generally functional adult) and Bad days (sleeping, eating, perhaps shower OR dishes OR fold a load of laundry) pretty much alternate.

Favorite foods: Chocolate milk. I've already moved on from whipped cream- that was so two days ago. I've also been lusting after peanut butter and Ritz crackers, but alas, we don't have any Ritz crackers. Yet.

Least favorite foods: Anything leafy and green, much to E's (and my) dismay. Don't worry, parental units, I'm still choking some down, so your grandchild will in fact be well nourished. Sadly, this is much less variable than the favorite foods.

Weight gain: Undisclosed. Did you really think that would be a stat?!? But I will say it is a FREQUENT topic of conversation and occasionally tears. (And yes, I know you need to gain plenty of weight during pregnancy, and it's not something to obsess about. Maybe if you tell that to my hormones, they'll believe you.)

Baby H's weight gain: Much more blog-worthy. According the extremely reliable babycenter.com, baby H is currently the size of a bell pepper (5 1/2 inches long from head to bottom, 7 ounces).

Next doctors appointment: In about two weeks. At which time we'll schedule the ultrasound.

Current "finding out" plans: Right now, I think we will attempt to be surprised about the gender. But, I won't be 100% sure until we walk out of the ultrasound still not knowing.

Picture (from last week) :

We first tried to take a picture in a shirt I had used before for pictures- but it has horizontal stripes. When I saw those pictures, we had to delete them. Also, I feel like I still suck my stomach in for pictures. Maybe I should start sticking it out instead? =)

Yum

If only my extra 300 calories per day could be ALL, ALL, ALL whipped cream!!!!!

That is all I have to say.

Seen, but not Spoken

Otherwise titled "Yes, we're alive"

Well, I'm pretty sure we've told everyone who reads this- but here is something we saw quite a while ago and kept to ourselves:

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There are two because I had brought a test, but NOT the instructions, when we went "home" for Christmas. So, when I took the test at about 3am New Years Day, I didn't know if it was positive or not. Hilarity ensued, culminating with some creative lies, a fruitless trip to 7-11 and a more productive trip to an actual grocery store, and a little bit of lateness for meeting our friends for brunch. During which we lied through our teeth (Sorry, A&D!)

"Morning Sickness" hit precisely upon walking into the airport for our trip home, and continued through the 10 or 12 week mark. In fact, I'm still not feeling great, to the amazement of casual acquaintances who assure me I'll feel better when I hit the second trimester. At 16 weeks, I'm not too convinced about that whole "super-woman second trimester" thing. But you never know, that could be just around the corner. In the meanwhile, I'm making the best of "super tired, but not throwing up."

Meanwhile, my 16-week-pregnant self and E are beyond thrilled that 1: spring has come to Small Town, Midwest, and 2: we are sharing it with our baby-to-be H. We are so, so excited, even if he (or she) is slowing me down a bit, leaving E to be doing approximately three times his fair share of dishes and laundry. And pretty much everything else.

Blizzard

In addition to the catch-up post below, here are some pictures of our blizzard today (actually, this is just a lot of snow- the blizzard is just getting started. I think it will mostly be a lot of wind blowing all this snow around so you can't see. We're still learning these new weather terms).

E is giving an exam and hopefully walking home for a late lunch. My school is closed and I have a cold, so I'm taking it easy here. The wind is picking up, and it's actually a little sunny!

So I've been delinquent...

The problem with blogging, is that if there is something interesting going on, you're too busy doing it to blog about it. And if you have time to blog, chances are you have nothing to say. The good thing about blogging, is, there aren't very many rules, especially if you have a guaranteed reader base (i.e., parents).

Here is an alphabetical (but not chronological or even comprehensive) update on happenings here in Small Town, Midwest:

A is for the Art Festival we went to on Main Street the other month. We live in a postcard.

Also, A is for Advent. We have a wreath and readings from Isaiah.

B is for Biology. Which is loved by one of us. Guess which one! Some people at the local community college might even be learning some.

C is for Christmas! We bought a $25 tree from Target, and we can’t wait for our long trip home. Being that we live in a postcard, it is getting very pretty around here.

D is for driving. We know how to get several places now, and it’s felt great to know where a few things are. We sometimes seem to spend a lot of time driving.

E is for eggplant. Remember that pizza from the other post? We had it again last night, when we had some people over for dinner. Still yummy.

F is for new friends. I think we’re up to three point five.

G is for green. Which is now gone from our landscape.

H is for hiking. We went with our new friends who have three kids four and under. We like them (and their parents, too). They are the winners of our church friends, because they only live 15 minutes away, in another little town, as opposed to in the “city,” forty minutes away. There were lots of trees and a river, and it reminded us of home.

H is also for Halloween- we had some of E's co-workers over for a little Halloween Party.

I is for incisive. That would be E’s students. In my case, I stands for present. That’s where my students are at. But, that makes them very rewarding to teach.

J is for the name of almost every person in our small group. It’s eerie. We break the mold. Who’s surprised?

K is for Keen. We both just got “matching” winter boots as our main Christmas present. They’re rated down to -30 degrees.

(the camera was fogged up because I just came in from outside!)

L is for bowling Lanes. We went to with another couple from church the day before Thanksgiving! They just moved here in June, so we considered ourselves the transplant bowling league for the evening.

M is for the Night of Christmas Magic. Oh, yes, it was magical. With elves, and cookie decorating, and cookie eating, and horse-drawn carriage rides. In the magical snow.

N is for New Moon, which I made E go and see with me when it came out. He was a good sport and now is owed one big favor.

O is for outside Christmas lights. It’s pretty cold when you put them up December 5^th! Now we know why everyone here puts them up the day before Thanksgiving. They are white, per E’s opinion. Our inside lights are colored, per R’s.

Phone calls from home are soooo phun! As was this awesome surprise package I got from K.

Q is for Q-tips. Which we are currently out of, and it’s a long way to T*arget.

R is for racquetball! We’ve been playing (each other, sadly for E) once a week at the college gym. Soon we’re supposed to play doubles with a student and his girlfriend! Hopefully I’ll be able to hit the ball by then!

S is for Sam Seaborne. We’ve been watching West Wing from the library, since it is cold and dark when we get home. We never saw it while it was actually aired.

T is for teaching, which we’ve been doing a lot of. E more than me!

U is for uphill, which is how E walks to work every day. Sometimes I give him a ride, but not today.

V is for visitors! We had our good friend K come visit over Labor Day, and my mom came out for a few days in November. A good time was had by all. Our guest room officially has a guest bed, so.... come on over!

W is the woodpecker I can see outside right now (which was several days ago, before our blizzard started.) At least, I think it’s a red-bellied woodpecker....

X is for xerox. I was babysitting our friend’s kids the other day, and the oldest asked what his box of paper said, and then how I knew. I said I knew because it was spelled x-e-r-o-x.

Y is for yogurt, which we still like to eat with granola for lunch. I’ve been experimenting with making my own granola- I think this last batch came out pretty good.

(that's the granola, in case you couldn't tell)

Z is for zero, which the forecast predicts we’ll be 2 degrees below tonight, with windchills down to -20.

Tuesday

I thought I would be bored only working three days a week, but it hasn't happened yet! In addition to taking on the lion's (lioness'?) share of administrative duties that come with a move (tags and title, internet and phone, finding a grocery store, gas station, date night activity- some duties are more fun than others!), I've been enjoying having some more time for a few home activities. Tuesday I did a lot of cooking, using up food we got from our CSA (community supported agriculture- aka "farm cult"), mostly to freeze. I hope all three of our readers enjoy this photo essay:

First of all, our home as it looked before we had dinner guests the other night:

I made potato soup with the potatoes from the CSA:

I listened to NPR podcasts while I washed and chopped. I ran out of chicken stock for the soup, so I ran across to the store to buy more. If you could see out the window behind my laptop, you could see the store! I almost left the stove and podcast on- but I didn't.

Mums on our front porch on my way out the door:

While the potato soup was cooking.....

.... I cut up peppers, onions, and garlic to be processes for chili later this week! Probably tomorrow.

Mmmmm, chili. I left one pepper to actually eat fresh (We had eaten one the night before, too). We had some lettuce this week, and the salads have been amazing.

Then I did some planning for school- yesterday we had a science demonstration and some other review activities.

(see the rug, Mom?)

And, our fish P got some fresh clean water.

Though not as fresh and clean as the water will be soon, when our fancy water filter arrives! Pierre sends his love to my sister, who transported him here to Small Town in style and safety.

One last picture of our house, 'cause I know the parents like that kind of thing:

Peace out, y'all!