All Right, Baby...

I have been waiting a long time to be able to relax and just say "Okay baby, you can come anytime!" For so long it has been because of Eric's school that we've hoped baby would stay put. No sooner had Eric completed his schooling, though, than Hannah got very sick. High fever, stomach ache, ear aches...and it did not get any better by the second day as we'd hoped, only worse! And in the midst of her illness I started having contractions. Very hard to feel "nesty" and anticipate the birth of baby when your firstborn is so ill. Thankfully the contractions subsided, and one trip to the clinic later, 2 doses of antibiotics, a good night's sleep, and we have a Hannah that is somewhat back to normal. An ear infection and possibly strep (which we won't find out about until later today), but whatever it is, she's feeling better and that's a relief to this mother's heart.

Not only did I hate the thought of leaving Hannah behind (in the event I should go into labor), but I hated the thought that if baby came while she was so sick Hannah would be unable to visit or snuggle with her new sibling. No fun! So we're very happy she's better and baby is still baking away!

In the meantime I've progressed quite a bit. As of my doctor appointment yesterday I was 4cm. The doctor exclaimed so much about my progress that we did not get exact numbers on effacement or station, just that the baby's head was lower than it had been (so in a positive station--yikes!) and a warning that it could be at any moment. She was wary of checking me any further for fear of setting labor off, which we didn't want yesterday since Hannah was still so sick! We go back in tomorrow to be rechecked and then she'll strip my membranes to see if she can't get labor going on its own. We'd love to have my own doctor on call so that is the reason we're willing to try. And nothing will happen if my body isn't ready yet and it certainly seems to be. The idea is just to stir things up a bit...sometimes baby just needs a nudge :-) I would rather have baby before this weekend than to go into labor on Easter when my doctor isn't on call...blah.

In the meantime I am literally waddling about feeling like baby is about to fall out anyway (as if it would be so easy!). And I'm tentatively allowing myself to feel excited about the prospect of our baby joining us so soon, although I will be fine if he/she chooses to wait a bit, too.

37 Weeks

Not much to report on the baby front and I guess that's a good thing. Had a good doctor appointment today and while there hasn't been much more progress, my blood pressure is great. That is really encouraging since I've never made it past 37 weeks without some issue arising. With Elaina they had just begun to express concern when I went into labor...which prevented it from becoming a problem! I monitor it daily and have been pleased to see the low trend.

I've been sick on an off all last week so even my weight gain was minimal! That's a first!!

Eric is hoping to have most of his schoolwork wrapped up tonight and once that's all submitted we'll be free to concentrate on last minute preparation. Almost everything is done at this point but we do have a few little things left. Particularly practice our breathing...something that has fallen by the wayside with Eric's last big push to get done!

This pregnancy has been a delight as far as the girls' go. When I was pregnant with Grace, Hannah was just too young to really understand what was going on. She seemed to get it a bit more with Elaina, but was still fairly disinterested. She participated by having babies in her own belly :-) At that time Grace was really too young. This time around, however, Hannah has been excited from the beginning. Grace is just naturally more into babies and that sort of thing, so she's also been very interested. Elaina is absolutely oblivious and has, after all these months, finally started pointing to my belly and saying "baby". Does she get it? I'm guessing not.

Hannah won't leave for school without her good-bye kiss to the baby, and they both love to kiss the baby goodnight. I told them a few months ago that the baby could hear them so they should talk to the baby, read books, etc. It was only a few days after that, while I was painting the baby's room, Grace came running in with a pile of books to read to the baby, sure that the baby was bored! I hope their enthusiasm continues once the baby is actually here!

Just Be Glad

We've been teaching Hannah a Bible verse each week before bed. We go until she gets it and then start a new one. Her latest is Psalms 118:24 "This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it."

She's pretty much got it down, but gets hung up on the Psalms part. We try to incorporate not only the verse, but explain in 3 year old language what the verse means so she can understand what she is learning. It is always good to see that she is absorbing what we teach her.

Yesterday Hannah and Grace were playing in a clothes basket while I was in the kitchen. Hannah was being quite bossy telling Grace to "Sit down" and I heard a lot of "No, Grace". I was getting irritated with her and reminded her several times to stop being so bossy, that Grace doesn't always have to play the way Hannah wants to. Needless to say, I was surprised when I overheard what Hannah's next command was.

"Just rejoice and be glad, Grace."

Now that's memory verse application. I think we should probably work on it again!

August Happenings

I've been woefully bad at updating. Looking back at this last month it seems like there should've been plenty to write about and yet nothing had struck me as particularly blog-worthy at the time.

We've been hoping for some house news, but unfortunately the kind we have is not the kind we were hoping to share. The home we made an offer on didn't play out. At. All. They counter offered without lowering their price one penny, and on top of that they added 5 or 6 more conditions. It felt like we were negotiating with them so that they could do us the favor of letting us buy their house from them. In this market that was absolutely ridiculous and so we passed.

Since then we've gone over our finances again. And again. And just realized that with some of our upcoming expenses this year, we really need to have extra money. Which we finally do...as long as we are living here in our pitiful starter home.

So we've decided that unless something shows up in our super-low price range in the next month, we shall just camp it out here for another year or more. Pay down more debt and work on beautifying our house even more. By the time we're finished we will be doing someone a favor of allowing them to buy our home. hehe.

We went to visit Eric's family in PA at the beginning of August. It was a very long trip (for us) and we were very glad to get home. We all caught colds (except Hannah) right in the middle of the visit and that made the whole trip very tiring. We had to cut it short because of the illness, and it just felt like it took forever to get home! It was a good visit, though, despite dealing with Hannah's typical attitude adjustment. She always becomes sassy when we visit family...we're not entirely sure why that is. Ultimately it was a good visit and we had a good time.

Our most recent news is that our firstborn, our kitty Aurora, met with an unfortunate accident. While I was at a woman's event she and Eric had an altercation. I'm still not completely clear on the specifics, but there was an exchange of biting and kicking that led to Aurora's hip being broken. It was all an unfortunate accident...and for the next three weeks Aurora is confined to a cage in the hopes that she'll heal. It never fails to break my heart!

To make up for lack of updates, I have a couple cute pictures from this last month.

Walking along Lake Michigan on our way out to Pennsylvania

Hannah did SO well in the car on the trip

One of the few times they shared nicely

One of my favorite pics of Grace. Oh how I wish it hadn't been such a "spur of the moment" shot which led to her head being cut off!!

Our Flowergirl

Hannah got to be the flower girl for her uncle Nathan's wedding this past Friday. She did a good job and had a lot of fun (I think). She felt like a beautiful princess for the day and I was so proud of her. Unfortunately she is probably too young to have too many memories of the occasion, but oh well...that's what pictures are for!


The saddest part was realizing that we would not be seeing Nathan and Mollie again until Christmas since they are moving to Texas. It wasn't like we saw them all the time anyway, but we attended the same church, and it was nice to at least see them in passing. We hope to make it down to Texas at least once while they are there, but with two little ones and the cost of gas, it really depends.

In other news, we are planning on putting our house on the market in September. The hope would be to get it on the market in time to sell before winter. It will probably take a couple months the way the market is now. Our only wish would be that there was a house on the current market that interested us. There are a couple that would do, a couple that are nice but a lot of work, but nothing "just right" yet. We are praying that by the time we are ready to sell, the right house comes along.

If you are interested in viewing a few more pictures of Hannah and the wedding, here is the link:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=49726&l=d9eb4&id=593949611

Future Politician

While outside playing today, Hannah found a plastic tube from one of her toys. She proceeded to use it as a microphone and deliver a speech. She lowered her voice and projected. I was really holding in the giggles as I watched her play the part.

Her speech follows:

"Marcy is a dog. Daphne is a cat. My car is a hippo. Grace is a baby. And I am just Huckabee. You can clap now."

And then she turned and expected me to clap and cheer for her, and to her utter delight, Grace joined in with the clapping, too.

I found it so cute that months later, she still thinks about Huckabee and pretends to be him. Obviously watching him speak a couple times had some sort of impact on her memories. What a girl!

Broccoli Saga Part II

As if I needed any further convincing, Hannah has continued to prove to me that she's crazy where broccoli is concerned. Perhaps I ought to try some frozen broccoli so I can understand what the fuss is about.

Last night as I stood by the stove cooking Chicken Alfredo, Hannah says to me "Can I have some frozen broccoli in a bowl, Mommy?" Secretly surprised, I quickly stifled any reaction. I let her think that it was a privilege, inwardly exalting that she's eating a vegetable!! I fill up her bowl and continue cooking.

A few moments later I hear Grace crying (which almost always means that she's fighting with Hannah over something she wants or something Hannah has taken). I ask Hannah was is going on, and sure enough, they are fighting over the bowl of broccoli. I ask Hannah if she can share, and she reluctantly does. Grace is a little less enthusiastic than Hannah, but even still she continued to protest if Hannah wouldn't let her have a piece.

The weirdest part? Hannah came to me about ten minutes later and asked me if she could have some new broccoli because the stuff in her bowl had become yucky. Upon examination, I realized that it had had not become "yucky" it had just become thawed. So broccoli itself? Not so much. But throw it in the freezer and you have a winner. Go figure!

Here is some proof. These were not taken last night, but on a prior frozen broccoli binge:

Caught in the act of snitching.

Mouths full of frozen broccoli!

Showing off a handful of the "good stuff"