Last Monthly Prenatal Appointment

I see it's been a week since I updated. Still "on break" from blogging but you may have noticed I popped in on Tuesday for Toddler Tales with pics from our cherry adventure! I figured it was time for a real update. I'll try to pop in for Toddler Tales again on Tuesday the 20th and here's a pregnancy/everything else update smashed all into one post for you in the meantime. Oh and thank you for all the lovely comments on my blog! ♥♥♥ I will get around to responding and/or visiting your blogs back eventually... really! :D I'll at least try my best... and I'll try to do that within the next week so they don't get buried or eaten by the internet monster that likes to eat my email notificatons sometimes. 

This week I had my last monthly prenatal appointment! From here on out it's every 2 weeks between appointments for a bit, then every week... and somewhere along the line around mid September-ish a birth story will be forthcoming. ;) Baby sounds good, I'm healthy, no concerns. Oh and she's head-down! YAAAAYYY!!! I knew that from the placement of the squirms and kicks and the way I suddenly can't breathe very well already though. ;) I am happy she's decided to get into position now. Bug was sideways (transverse) for so long that by the time he started trying to get into the head down position he kept slipping back into transverse. I know, I felt it. He would squirm with all his might and get head down and then I'd feel him slowly slip back down down down until he was again laying sideways. I think he got my uterus stretched out too much side to side and then it was hard to get enough leverage to stay head-down thereafter! Lol! He finally was able to stay mostly head down by my last appointment before his birth. Chicklet however was ever the impatient one like her mother, and was head down from 6 months on. This baby's about 2 weeks behind her big sister in going head-down. I'm just relieved because it was kind of nerve wracking to have Bug transverse for so long. I remember thinking, "Come on little fellow, you have to do this! I can push you out breech but I can't do sideways!!!"

In other news...
My tea drinking kind of got forgotten over last weekend and most of this week (but I'm about to have a cup right now! Water's heating!) and I haven't started back up walking again yet. A friend was going to come walking with me Saturday but couldn't come after all so I didn't go either. I should have. It's just been SO HOT out that every time I set foot out the door I feel like I can't breathe and need to puke so I keep putting it off even though my pelvic region is feeling pretty much totally recovered in the injury sort of way and more back to sore from weak muscles and lack of walking now. If only there were a nice air conditioned mall near here. Not so though- the nearest one is an hour away. So I need to just go later at night or something because I NEED to walk and I don't want the heat to stop me.

SO- tea here I come! And walking, watch out! This weekend I'm getting back on the bandwagon! ;)

On the nesting front, I think the nesting is rubbing off on my husband or something. :) He sorted some stuff in the kitchen, did a bunch of dishes, and cleaned the bathroom for me last weekend! I told him he's my hero! ♥♥♥ I haven't had any strange nesty urges this week. Oh wait... I collected and am in the process of washing clothes and toys and bedding that was technically "clean" but just stale from disuse or I decided it must be dirty from being drug around by the kids too much... Does that count? It does? Oh okay then I admit it I have been laundry nesting then. And I've been feeling the urge to sort the baby clothes into the changing table drawers, which I'm months overdue on doing. Maybe I'll go do that right now... WAIT! Must finish this post first! Okay sorry, got a little sidetracked there.

What was I saying? Oh yes I was going to tell you about Buggie's misadventure at the beginning of the week. My poor little Bugling! He was running through the kitchen and his sister was chasing after him and I opened my mouth to tell them not to chase each other over the slidey throw rug in front of the kitchen sink but mouth open was as far as I got on that because he was already falling, the rug sliding out from under him. Our upright freezer is on a platform so it doesn't block the vent in the kitchen and poor Bug's head hit the corner of the platform I guess. It's the only sharp thing in the vicinity so that's what I assume he hit, but it would take some fancy falling to have connected since it's pretty much flush with the front of the freezer and I had a rubbermaid box in front of it so his head would have had to have fallen into the space between the rubbermaid box and freezer at just the right angle. By the time I got to the other side of the island to see what was going on he was just laying on the floor screaming. I thought I saw some blood spatters on the floor as I scooped him up and his hands were reaching for the back of his little head. My heart skipped a beat in dread and I thought, "No no no..." I had one hand on the back of his neck/head and when I moved it, there was a bloody wound in the back of his head and I saw blood pumping glug glug glug out of it with each of his little heartbeats! I think I almost died when I saw it because I knew what it could mean. I was so afraid for him! I prayed and it literally slowed to a near stop as I was praying! And Bug stopped screaming when the blood stopped pumping out. The bleeding and screaming probably lasted a whole 20 seconds before it slowed to nothing but it was the longest 20 seconds of my life. I put an ice pack on it and Chicklet handed him his sippy cup and he started sucking on it and just laid in my arms for a while drinking his milk as I held the ice pack wrapped in a washcloth on his head. Hubby got home about 15 minutes after it happened and Bug was all happy to see Dada. We checked for concussion and looked at the wound. It looked about 3/4 of an inch long and was right in the middle of a large bump. But he was alert and there was no bleeding. A wee bit of oozing yes, but it was not bleeding outright. He was happy. Calm. No concussion. Extra cuddley but normal other than that. I didn't want him running around with a fresh head wound so I put some salve on it and hubby held him while they watched a DVD of farm animals. The kids rarely watch tv so having a DVD in effectively kept him still for half an hour. After which he was running around, stomping, dancing, spinning, flinging himself at me, and babbling on in his slurry baby version of English. You know, acting like a normal 23 month old. I of course being his worrying mother, hovered over him the rest of the evening and checked on him during the night. He was fine. He ate more than normal for dinner, slept like a log, and woke up feeling bright and chipper and ready to pester his sissy. A check of the wound revealed he still had a big knot on his noggin but... I could have sworn that cut was longer the day before! It looked amazing! Well it looked like a sore head wound, but in comparison to the day before it looked great! And again the next day it looked even smaller and better. And now a week later it's a little bitty bump with a little bitty scab on it. It's healing up so well it really is amazing. An I know just Who to credit with that... When he was laying in my arms with an ice pack on his head, Chicklet asked me, "Mama did his head get broken and the blood is coming out of it? Can you fix him?" I told her yes, but *I* can't fix him, God can! So we prayed together for God to 'fix baby Buggie's head owie' and so He has. It could have been so bad. As the blood was gushing out with his heartbeats he could have bled to death- it wouldn't take long for a tiny child. And I felt terror that my son was hurt and I didn't know what would happen. And in my terror the first thing I thought was to call out to the Great Physician to heal my baby, and He did. Starting with stopping that blood right as I was asking. And then healing up that head wound in record time! I could cry with thankfullness every time I think about it. My life has been full of so many miracles! Another precious miracle to add to my list of how amazing God is! And as I type this, my little Bug is sharing his Duplo blocks with me, bringing a smile to my face. :) He *should* be in bed but hubby worked late and when he got home and Bug was still awake ... well how could I say no to my two men giving me puppydog eyes. So Bug is hanging out with the adults tonight, much past his bedtime. I think this is the first time he's been allowed to stay up but somehow I don't think he realizes the significance. ;) He's just happy to be hopping from Dada to Mama and back again, sharing Duplos and taking an occasional drink from his sippy cup.

So I'm going to go snuggle up on the couch with my man and my mini-man for a bit, drink some of that tea I'm supposed to be drinking, and then put the Bugster to bed and organize some baby clothes. Sounds like a great way to spend an evening to me! ;)

Cherry Picking - Toddler Tales Tuesday

6/29 We went Cherry Picking!!! It was extra exciting because it was Buggie's first time. We took Chicklet when she was Buggie's age for the first time and I remember that we were trying to teach her how to pick one and then put it in the bucket. She reached up and grabbed one and started to reach to put it in the bucket... slowly... then suddenly she slammed that cherry into her mouth and took off RUNNING away like she was a cherry snitching outlaw on the run from Sherriff Dada and Officer Mama. She would have been about 21 months old at this time and it's a fond funny memory. So we were quite excited to take Buggie for his first time and see what he would do. :)
Buggie (22 months) ate his first one, but thereafter he was just sooooo excited to be helpful that he kept picking them and putting them in the bucket. He got quite a few in there actually!

He was saying, "Catch 'em! Catch 'em!" at first. I told him, "Pick them! Pick them!" so then he started saying, "Pickit! Pickit! WEEEEECH!!!!" (as in reach) as he was picking delightedly.

He would occasionally snitch a little bite and then put the bitten cherry in the bucket with the others. ;) Just taste testing to make sure it's worth saving! LOL! At one point he dropped one in the grass and almost started crying! He kept saying, "Oh no! Oh no! Uh-oh! C'you weech? Ooooh nooooo! C'you weech?" Until I reached into the grass and fished it out for him. He was getting quite upset at the loss of a delicious cherry until I retreived it.
Meanwhile Chicklet couldn't seem to get the cherries to survive from the tree to the bucket. They kept finding their way to her mouth somehow. ;)

Sometimes temptation is just too much for Chicklet. Despite warnings and consequences there are some things in life she can't seem to resist. Juicy fruit fresh off the tree is apparently one of them. I wonder if that's how Eve felt in the Garden of Eden...

So despite her having nearly 2 years on him, Buggie outpicked his sister! He probably picked a cup or two of cherries himself!

We were there all of 15 minutes because it was SOOO hot out and we didn't want to get too many cherries and have them go bad, but we came away with some juicy sweet memories and a purple-lipped daughter. ;)

Excuse my lack of a smile- I didn't know hubby was snapping a pic and the sun was blinding me so I was squinting to see where I was going!


-+-+-
If you have a sweet, cute, or funny Toddler (or baby/kid) story, I'd love it if you'd share it! :)
If you would like to post a Toddler Tales Tuesday on your blog, please leave a link to your post in my Linky below, AND post the code for this blog hop in your Toddler Tales Tuesday post! Commenting on at least one of the other linked posts would delight the writer of said post I'm sure - hint hint! ;) The linky will remain open for 2 weeks following the date of this post in case you want to add a post late.
If you don't have a blog or would prefer it, you may share your baby/toddler/kid tales here in the comments.

A Condensed Update...

I'm hanging in there. :D Still not going to officially come back to blogging just yet... I'll try to post once in a  while though.
I need to get pics up of what we did 2 Tuesdays ago. Fun fun! I should have done that before I "went on break" but you know how these things go... My brain on hcg is more like a strainer and everything that is not immediately dire drains right through the holes. So that's my next objective if I get a chance to blog again soon.
But speaking of chances to blog- I DESPERATELY need a nap today so I'm not going to be long so lets get this show on the road. ;)

1. Independence Day was great! We watched fireworks from the car because I don't do mosquitoes. Seriously though, who does do mosquitoes? Ick. I didn't escape unscathed though because one followed me home and met his end the following evening after draining the blood from my foot and then attempting to taste test my hubby's bicep. He actually asked for a baby wipe and I turned around with a funny look wondering why on earth he needed a wipe and there was the remains of that mosquito. And yeah, he needed a baby wipe for that one. Very ew.

2. Been trying to get my red raspberry leaf tea down. I have not been able to stomach much beyond mild meat, almonds, some noodles and breads, some veggies, water, and lemonade for most of this pregnancy. It's taken me until the 3rd trimester to be able to keep down any pills (herbs or prenatals or any other vitamins) except for Mommy's Bliss Morning Sickness Magic. Thankfully the Morn. Sickness Magic has Vitamin B-6 and Folic Acid in it in addition to Red Raspberry Leaf and Ginger. So my wee one got at least that for the first 6 months while I couldn't keep anything but meat and nuts down. Now that I'm in the third trimester I can swallow pills again so I'm on a prenatal (although I can only get 2 of the daily 6 pills I'm supposed to take. Seriously these things are like horse pills and do NOT sit well in my tummy. I can't handle 6 in one day!) and a liquid calcium supplement (*GAG* oh *gag*) and sometimes before bed if I'm wound up I take Valerian Root capsules to help me sleep. So now that I've been taking those, I have been thinking it's like 7 months past time for me to be drinking Red Raspberry Leaf tea. My stomach has NOT handled tea well at all so far this pregnancy so I'm starting out with Earth Mama Angel Baby's Morning Wellness Tea! I SO LOVE EMAB products! I couldn't tolerate even this during the first or second trimesters but I'm trying to tolerate it now. My poor tummy cramps up really bad when I drink tea, and this one has been no exception. Go figure I can drink an occasional cup of decaff coffee but give me some herbal tea and my innards are staging a revolt. It's crazy... So anyway, I'm making myself because the Red Rasp. in the tea is good for my uterus. My plan is to work up to being able to drink the EMAB Third Trimester Tea which has a slightly higher Red Raspberry Leaf content. This is day 2. I got 2 cups of Morning Wellness down yesterday and my tummy freaked out and threatened to explode. Oh boy. That was a fun few hours. But it did stay down. Today I drank a cup this morning and then it's noon so I had another cup and as I was almost done the last sip my tummy freaked out again with the pressure and the cramps and other things you don't wanna know about... BUT hey it is still staying down. Uncomfortably so, but it's in there. Stay, tea, stay!

3. I NEVER use Spell Check- could you tell? :p I turned it on just now for the first time ever and then had a laugh. It freaked out over "prenatals" - apparently I can write prenatal but not prenatals. It also had a cow about "Folic Acid" - apparently it thought I was trying to write Felix or Fold or Folk. Um yeah... And of course EMAB for Earth Mama Angel Baby because that's just way too long to type out repeatedly. And now in my previous sentence where I typed "of course" it is highlighting just the se at the end of course. Um... Riiiiight. It's asking if I meant to type Sue or See. Now this is why I never use Spell Check. It bugs the daylights outta me. Did it actually catch any spelling errors? Not so much. Just ridiculousness. Speaking of which, it's now highlighting ONLY diculousness in the word ridiculousness and asking me if by diculousness I actually meant to type Ridiculousness. Which I did. It just has chosen to be BLIND to the first 2 letters of the word. Ugh! I'll just go turn that off now and go back to misspelling things my way, TYVM! :p Sorry, I guess you'll just have to deal with my typos.

4. So over Independence Day weekend we dogsat my friend's dog. The kids adored having her here. :) It was alot of fun. Poor dog was probably worn out from all the pestering of well-meaning toddlers while she was here. :) She's such a sweet dog! Very well behaved and good with the kids.

5. My walks were going really good. I was managing to get out about 5 days a week. Then I got hurt on the 3rd and haven't gone for a walk since then. I was walking the dog and she saw a squirrel. I have strong arms (I have toddlers- 'nuff said) so my arms weren't even sore from it, but the jolt somehow pulled both hips, groin, and tailbone all at once. It didn't hurt alot when it happened but later- ZOWIE! I was expecting some pulling but man that squirrel really must have looked juicy! LOL! Anyway, I do plan to resume walking once I'm healed up. I was just thinking last night that if I didn't feel so crummy from the tea I might try one lap around the block as a test run to see if I'm good to go again or not. So maybe tonight I'll get to do my test run and start the walking back up again. I'm scared that after not walking for 5 days in a row that I might feel like I'm starting all over again. IT took 2 weeks of it to stop hurting afterward before. Hope I can get back up to 8 blocks again in less than 2 weeks this time. That home-stretch panic has set in and I keep having this feeling of too much to do and too little time left to do it in.

6. Last night I cooked up 6 pounds of ground beef. I burned one of them and couldn't even blame it on my broken oven! Lol! Anyway, 5 of them, the non-burned ones, went into the freezer in ziplocks for after the baby is born. It's about time I started stashing away some meals. I have no relatives anywhere nearby so nobody to help me prepare. I'm on my own. When Bug was born, my sister and one of my friends sent us some meals to help out a couple times, which was such a blessing! I had not prepared anything in advance at all. So this time I am thinking if all I do is cook the beef and bag it, at least that's a start! LOL! It's better than being in that tired mom of a newborn and toddlers phase and I look at the clock and it's a quarter to 6 and I haven't even thawed the meat yet. Precooked it will thaw fast once I throw it into the hot rest of the meal! Haha...

7. So I'm still taking a break because I only have 2 kinds of days right now. The first kind is like today. I'm so tired and/or sick and/or sore that I just can't even handle the normal day to day things. I need a nap and Chicklet rarely stops talking long enough for me to get a good drift. Lol! I'm sure gonna try though. The second type of day is where I wake up on some sort of psychotic nesting hormone surge and something in my house gets seriuously majorly rearranged. Last Friday I spent all day cleaning my dining room. We haven't used the table in there for ... oh forever. Like a year. Because the leaves are broken and it's not big enough for the 4 of us without the leaves. So I started using it as a sewing room and sewing junk took over the room and it looked like a total disaster in there and I couldn't even find my sewing machine for all the mess. Friday I went to town in there. Threw out 3 garbage sacks, assorted cardboard boxes, and some fabric scraps. Washed the windows, walls, baseboards, windowsills, curtain, floors, chairs, table. Watered the forgotten aloe plant that I hadn't watered in a few months. Good thing it's a cactus... Planted some beans in a pot for kicks (to my amazement they have sprouted... LOL!). Put away the fabric and hangers and sewing machine. Cleared out some random junk that wound up in there. It took me from waking up until about 1:30 or 2pm to do all this and then I took a shower and collapsed into bed for a wanna-be-nap while Chicklet colored and talked at me. Then I can't remember if it was Monday night or Tuesday night my hubby moved the changing table dresser into the bathroom for me. I've been wanting it in there for a a while now but I didn't see how it was possible. Our bathroom is tiny and the only way to get that heavy beast of a changing table in there would be to pick it up and drop it into the barely-big-enough hole behind the sink. And my Superman hubby, after much maneuvering, managed to get it as far in as it would go and then did precisely that- he picked that thing up and lowered it into the hole. Oh my! Be still my heart! :) So the following day I had a nesting burst and spent the morning sweeping, mopping, and rearranging. It's very very very very very crowded in there now but somehow despite that it looks... well it looks cute and functional! LOL! It's going to be nice to have the changing table in the bathroom so I can use it for the new baby. It wouldn't fit in our room no way no how (our room's teeny too) and if it was left in the toddlers' bedroom I wouldn't want to go in there in the middle of the night with a crying baby and turn on the light to change her, KWIM? So now I can use the changing table in the bathroom. Hooray! And THAT little nesting bit has prompted a cloth diapering streak. I haven't really cloth diapered my son much. Barely ever. I lost most of the very few cloth diaps I had in the move the week he was born. So when my mom bought us some clearance Bum Genius for the new baby, and they arrived last Wednesday, I of course washed them up right away. And then when there was our bathroom with the changing table in it's new place, I couldn't resist putting the diaps together and using them on Bug. Now he wets WAAAAAAYYYYY too much to use them at night, but I've been using them during the day. I asked hubby if, if I keep track of how much I save by using cloth on Bug, we can take that amount and buy more cloth diapers with it. And then when the new baby comes I'll keep track of how much we save with her too, and we'll just go on buying cloth until we have enough to diaper our two in cloth fulltime (well except for Bug at night). So that's the plan. Oh and on the side, now that the changing table is in the bathroom, I put Bug on the potty every time I change him! He loves it! He hasn't peed in there yet, but hey, at least it's now become easy to get him sitting on the potty several times a day. Since I'm not motivated enough while pregnant to do the all or nothing, one day and we're done approach. Not that I have any potty training experience anyway. Chicklet was 3 years old and still making potty training my biggest nightmare when I got fed up after one awful afternoon and took away her diapers and told her NO MORE DIAPERS EVER. And she started peeing in the potty that very night and kept right on at it. Not to say there weren't accidents or testing me but for the most part she was done and she has not worn a diaper since that afternoon. So unless I want to wait until he's 3 and cut him off cold turkey, which I'd rather not wait personally, I have to start doing SOMETHING with Bug, preggo or not, and this having the changing table moved has just made that very doable and easy! Hooray!

8. So that's what my life is looking like. I'll update once in a while but for now I feel like if I'm having nesting days I need to take advantage of them and go for it, and if I'm feeling too crummy to do housework, I shouldn't spend my naptime opportunity blogging, I should just take a nap so I can hopefully feel alive enough to cook a nice dinner and finish out the day like a normal non-zombie human being. So here I go off to take a "nap" and de-zombie-fy. I'll catch ya in a few days! Thank you and **HUGS** to everyone who has been thinking of me and praying for me! You're the best! ♥

Taking a break

Okay my friends, I'm going to be out of blogging comission for a few days. We're not going anywhere special and I'm not in the hospital having preterm labor (at the moment) but honestly the hot weather has just set in here as of about a week ago and I'm absolutely miserable. I can't sleep because it's too hot. What sleep I do get is because I'm literally wrapped around an ice pack straight out of the freezer and when it melts I have to put it back in the freezer and wait for it to freeze again. We have central air, I just apparently cannot tolerate being pregnant in the summer heat. So I am EXHAUSTED and I usually blog during Bug's first nap while Chicklet plays with play-doh but I have been so exhausted I am having trouble just keeping up with the kids. Dishes and laundry are falling by the wayside. I can't concentrate. I'm still dealing with morning sickness.
So here's the deal, I have to pare it down to bare minimum. You know, survival mode. As much as I love blogging I will have to put it off for a bit until I can figure out a solution for how to get some sleep so I can function. :( I hope I'll feel better in a few days. It really really bugs me when I don't have any energy. It's the most irritating thing for me. It puts me in a really bad mood to have my brain wanting to do all this stuff and my body just won't GO. So it really rankles to have to back-burner my blog, but ya know how it is. Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do until something else falls into place. Hopefully that will be SOON. I'm hoping for a few days. :D See how optomistic I am? Now I suppose it could be as long as a few months- until after the baby's born and the newborn adjustment phase is ending. But no, I don't want to think about not blogging for that long. The thought makes me sad! So hopefully I'll be back soon. Very very soon. ;) Have a great weekend! Or a great summer! (Just in case it's longer than I hope before I'm back.)

UPDATED: 29 weeks is not a good time to be in labor

Toddler Tales totally slipped my mind yesterday. Why? I'm only 29 1/2 weeks but I've been having contractions all night and in pain and they're starting to worry me. So if you'd say a prayer for me that would be great. I need to go call my midwife. Oh and if you have any tips for getting the contractions to stop I'm all ears. I've tried sitting, standing, walking sleeping, ice pack, and sipping water the whole time. About ready to try a heating pad. Prayers & Ideas appreciated.


**EDIT:**
Okay so yesterday I felt just not right all day. I brushed it off as lack of sleep because Monday night I felt like I was roasting alive all night and couldn't sleep. 8:55pm I had a really strong contraction and it made me suck in my breath and moan. I looked at hubby in shock and said, "Wow, I think that's the strongest one I've had yet!" Then another at 9pm, one right on top of another for a while, probably an hour, and then they started getting farther apart and some were less intense. I was guzzling cold water hoping that would slow them down but they took their sweet time to slow down. I was still having the occasional less painful one by bedtime but that's not unusual for me. I have been contracting almost daily since 20 weeks. Just not this many extra painful ones at once. Well all night last night I felt crampy and then this morning I woke up serious pain from another one of those doozie contractions. No sooner had it ended, than another began. Just like that hour from 9 to 10 last night. I stood up and paced around the house a bit. Didn't help. Sat down and drank some ice water. Didn't help. Put an ice pack on my belly- the ice pack I'd been CUDDLING in bed because I've been so overheated at night - and the ice helped one contraction but became seriously less and less effective super fast so forget that idea. I called hubby at work and told him we might have a problem. Now, I had to call him at work and prewarn him "just in case" with Bug a few times too, but I never had to have him come home and take me to the hospital to get it stopped. There was this one time that I was laying in bed and the contractions were like they were this morning and last night and I was pretty scared, but I prayed and they finally stopped after about an hour. So that's what this reminded me of only I was scared because I'd had them all yesterday evening and then been crampy all night with an occasional contraction, and then woke up in the middle of a nice painful one this morning and they started in with the one on top of each other thing right off the bat. So it scared me. So I called hubby. And then I tried to call the midwife but the office was closed and I feel so bad calling the emergency number in case the contractions are going to just magically stop as soon as I dial, so I decided to try one more thing in the half hour before the office opens. I put my poor Bug back in his crib and asked Chicklet to get him some toys and I went and had a 10 minute hot bath at 8:30am and you know what? It stopped those contractions in their tracks! :) Hooray!

**UPDATE** almost 10am
Okay another update... It's been an hour since I got out of the tub and I had another contraction. I am going to go find my heating pad. I tried to call the midwife office again and no answer. I don't want to call that emergency number. I don't wanna. Makes me feel like a hypochondriac or something. I'll call the office again in a few minutes and see if they answer. I need some fresh ideas for how to get these contractions under control.

**UPDATE AGAIN** about 12:30pm
Okay I've had about 5 contractions total since I got out of the tub and they are only annoyingly painful- which is about my "normal" rate and degree of contractions. Yay! I'm still drinking water like a camel and going to go lay down for a couple hours while Chicklet colors soon. Buggie went down for a nap late; at noon today which means he may or may not sleep straight through until 3 or 4pm! I heard him squeaking alot during the night so he didn't sleep too soundly. Maybe that means he'll be nice and tired and have a good long nap for me. I hope the contractions stay in "normal" range now. I would hate to go lay down to rest and have them start up again. You wouldn't think that a nap would make them start up again though... would you? :-/

**LAST(?) UPDATE** 8pm
Just got the tots to bed. Why is it that the sweetest kids act HORRIBLE when Mommy's under the weather? :p
Halfway through my nap the contractions picked up a notch. They have been coming and going, a few at a time, all evening. They seem to be slowing down again now, thankfully. I tried to call the midwives' office several times today and they never answered. They don't go in on Wednesdays if there aren't enough preggo mamas to have appointments every day that week. Usually the secretary is there though so I wonder why she didn't answer? Hmmm...
Praying I don't start contracting again tonight! Right now baby is moving around in there like crazy. It tickles and sometimes hurts when she's squirming. :) I love it though!

Thank you for your prayers today! ♥ It meant alot to me that someone dropped by and read what I was going through, said a prayer and left a comment.

Our Schedule & Chores (A day in my life)

I've been considering posting our schedule. Not that it's a very scheduled schedule right now. So I kept procrastinating, thinking maybe I should wait until after the baby is born to post it because when I have a newborn, after the adjustment phase, things become very scheduled around here as a matter of survival. At least they have with my previous 2. :) But then I thought, our un-schedule is working pretty good for us right now while I'm pregnant so maybe I might like to look back on it next time I'm pregnant and take a few ideas. Or maybe just for your personal enjoyment you might like to see what a day in our life looks like and raise some eyebrows or laugh at us or whatever. ;)

I don't sleep well normally, and less so while preggo, so I toss and turn most of the night but my official "day" usually starts at about...
6:30am- This preggo mama makes a bathroom trip as SNEAKILY as possible since the bathroom is right next to the kids' room. Then I collapse back into bed and doze in and out until...
7 to 8am- Anytime between 7 and 8, Chicklet sneaks out of the kids' room and whispers to me from the foot of my bed, "Mama! Can I go potty?!" To which I reply, "YES! Go potty, silly!" and wonder why she asks permission to use the toilet every single morning! Lol! Silly girl... Then she returns asking if she may color. Her coloring station is a mini table and chair in the corner right beside my side of the bed. I try to answer coherently as she peppers me with questions and statements in a whisper and colors and draws. Gradually I wake up. I'm not a morning person. I have never understood anyone who can open their eyes and then perkily bounce out of bed in a fully-aware state in under 5 minutes. My brain doesn't even begin to work properly until 10am and I have to plan my day accordingly or I'm fixing my pre-10am sleepy-head mistakes the rest of the day. :p I'm thankful for my kids because before kids I would just keep dozing for hours because I couldn't summon the oomph to move and there was nothing to keep me from falling back to sleep since I couldn't move yet. Now with kids, Chicklet just talks incessantly so falling back to sleep is impossible and I can get my limbs to work to get me out of bed after about 10 minutes of her chatter. ;)
8:00am- Bug wakes up and sings out from the crib, "Maaaaamaaaa!" or occasionally something to be funny like, "Marco!" or "Dada!" :-s Hmph! I sing back, "Buggie!" or something in kind with his silliness as I waddle down the hallway, use the bathroom, and make my way in to get him. I peek around the corner smiling and he falls down laughing hysterically with delight at the first sight of me. Chicklet meanwhile has put away her crayons and beat me to the kids' room. She usually jumps up excitedly at the first sound of her brother's voice and is putting away crayons at 90 miles per hour while I'm waddling down the hall to the bathroom. She sits on her bed with a bright smile as I get Bug up and changed and get everyone dressed.
8:10am- Two sleepy people stagger and one chipper Chicklet bounces out to the kitchen. ;) Bet you'll never guess which one of us is the morning person. I fix us some quick breakfast. I do not cook for breakfast. As I said I do not function before 10am and would probably burn my hand off or put the wrong ingredients in or burn something. So for breakfast we have cold leftovers, or something microwaiveable, or cereal.
9:00am- I turn on the computer and play some Facebook games- something mindless that doesn't require brain power like Farmville (you know, click click click on each plot of ground to harvest, click click click to plow, click click click to plant; no brain cells required) so that I can focus my gradually building brain power on my tots. Meanwhile behind me the tots have dumped out the toy box and are dragging toys all over the living room. There is an occasional squabble or misbehavior which I try to address immediately. By 9:30 I'm bored with the mindless Facebook games and my brain is starting to work properly and I'm having to get after Bug more because it's getting close to first nap and he's getting close to crab-mode. Sometime beftween breakfast and 10am we all wind up in the bathroom brushing our teeth.
10:00am- I offer the kids a snack of fruit or cheese or something. Bug isn't a big eater and doesn't usually want it unless it's a banana. I put him down for a nap. Chicklet finishes her snack. Mommy's got her brain functioning enough to feel human again so it's time to do chores! :) Since Chicklet has started doing them with me I have begun to look forward to morning chores.
Morning Chores:
-Empty kitchen trash?
-Unload Dishwasher
-Reload and run Dishwasher
-Start a load of Laundry
-Sweep kitchen
-Fold some laundry
So I put Bug down for his nap and then wash my hands and head to the dishwasher where my little shadow follows me. :) She puts away the clean silverware while I empty everything on the bottom rack that she cannot help with, and then move onto the top rack. When she's done the silverware she starts in on what's left on the bottom rack and I finish the top and then we reload it. I direct her for the reloading because she doesn't quite grasp that things go in certain places in the dishwasher to get them cleanest and make most efficient use of the space. When we're done she gets a kicks out of filling the soap. It goes everywhere but she's so cute... :) She can't snap the soap dispenser shut so I do that for her, then she closes the door and turns the dishwasher on. I usually wipe out the sink while she's finishing up if we've managed to completely empty it in our dishwasher loading. Then we move on to the laundry room. I turn on the water and add some detergent, then sort out a load of laundry. Chicklet puts the designated pile into the washer and we close the lid. Then I have her grab an armload of clean stuff from the dryer and I grab what's left and we take it to the basket in the living room. I know it would be easier to take the basket to the dryer first but I always forget. ;)
For a job well done we have a beverage break! This is our special thing we do after our together chores. We might have sweet iced tea or lemonade or coolaid or she might have a hot cocoa while Mommy enjoys some decaff. She chatters my ear off while we sip and I enjoy every minute of it. Then when she's done she puts her glass on the counter and gets out the play-doh while Mommy's has some ice water and hits the blog zone to read or write. Some days there's too much to read to get to writing anything in the mornings and it has to wait until later. If something takes a bit to load I fold the laundry in the basket beside me as I wait. I like to listen to a sermon online while I fold, read, and blog. Chicklet keeps up a running commentary on what she's creating out of the play-doh in the kitchen and I respond encouragingly. I also drink lots of water and snack on almonds or jerky to keep my blood sugars level. Multitasking is the name of the game! Haha...
When she's done playing with her play-doh I consider the degree of mess. She always puts away the dough and tools but there are usually play-doh crumbs all over the floor when she's done. Not to mention normal kitchen floor stuff. If the kitchen floor isn't very bad, Play-Doh and all, I let her sweep it herself and then give her a rag to wash the table while I linger at the computer a little longer. If it's in need of a serious sweeping I have her wash the table while Mommy sweeps the floor. The person who doesn't sweep holds the dustpan for the other and then dumps the crumbs in the trash. ;)
If the kitchen trash is full we empty that sometime in the course of things. Chicklet puts a clean bag in the kitchen trash can while I drag the full one out to the outside can. Sometimes if it's almost full but not quite, I give her a rag to wash the lid while I sneak around the house looking for other smaller trashes to empty into the space at the top of the kitchen one to make it full enough to take out.
Noon- Buggie wakes up! Sorta... lol. Sometimes it takes him a bit to wind down at 10am before he falls asleep and then he's grouch-a-rama when I get him up at noon. Or sometimes he falls asleep instantly and wakes up a bit before noon and by the time I get in there he's removed his pillow from it's case and sang his ABC's three times and begun to holler, "Maaaarco!" for me to hurry up and finish sweeping so I can rescue him from boredom in the crib. Lol! I take the kids' folded clean clothes in with me when I go to get him up. I make a light lunch. Usually it's PB&J or bagels or fried eggs. Sometimes soup. Depends how hot it is and what we feel like eating. Gotta have some protein in there somewhere for my blood sugars.
For the next couple hours we do all sorts of stuff and in no particular order and with no particular consistency. Kids play with toys, Mommy finishes listening to her sermon, work on catechism with Chicklet and/or a reading/writing lesson, roll around on the floor with kids, play learning games with Bug like having him point to the body part I name or asking him what color this or that toy is. By 1:30pm I'm dragging, exhausted. I probably look at the clock 20 or 30 times in that last half hour before nap.
2:00pm- Snack. Bug's 2nd nap. I forget as much as I remember or more but this is the time I like to take the meat out of the freezer for supper. Chicklet goes to coloring station while Mama takes a nap! Yahoooooooo!!!!! If Chicklet has been naughty with crayons during the previous day's nap, she must take a nap with me instead of coloring. If she was responsible with her crayons and only colored on approved surfaces, she may color while Mama naps. And I do use Naps loosely. Remember what I said about her talking incessantly? Lol! So sleeping doesn't usually come into it unless she winds up napping with me, but I do manage to doze off here and there between her chatter. ;)
4:00pm- Sometimes it's later if Bug-bug had a short morning nap or his noisy sister takes a nap with me and is therefore not waking the house with her incessant conversation, but usually 4pm is the magic wake up time. I get him up and then sit in the living room refereeing kids while struggling to fully wake up and function. I'm seriously a zombie when I first get up. By
5:00pm- I've usually got myself coherent again and switch the laundry over, start a new load, start cooking the supper meat. Bug gets grumpy near dinnertime and starts picking on his sister. It gets a little wild trying to keep them sweet while making dinner and this is the time of day the phone is ringing off the hook too of course. Sometimes it all goes out the window. Especially on sick days. If I'm gonna get sick on any given day, you can be sure that between 5 and 6pm is when the puking is worst. Might have something to do with the smell of cooking meat being one of my worst triggers? So there are days when hubby calls to say he's on his way home and I have to ask him to pick up dinner because I just can't do it tonight.
6:00pm or whenever hubby gets home- We eat dinner. Kids play with Daddy for a while or take baths if they need them after eating dinner.
7:00pm- Bug bedtime normally.
7:30pm- Bug bedtime if he slept late at nap or doesn't seem tired. Chicklet bedtime if she's grumpy.
8:00pm- Chicklet's bedtime if she's being sweet and had a nap that day.
After the kids are in bed, Hubby and I talk, cuddle, watch a movie, hang out, veg out. Eventually the food gets put away and we play some more brain-powered games on Facebook than my morning brainless ones. ;) I scrub the toilet and pick up a little in the bathroom. Laundry, more laundry. I do alot of laundry after the tots are in bed. Anything that didn't get done that morning or is leftover from earlier in the week. Sometimes I take a shower. Sometimes I listen to another sermon. Sometimes he watches TV. Sometimes I blog. Sometimes he listens to music. Sometimes on Facebook we think it's funny to chat with each other even though we're sitting right next to each other. Hehe...
"We" usually hit the hay around 10pm but sometimes it's later or sometimes I don't go to bed with him right away because I'm finishing something up or sometimes I toss and turn for an hour or three and then get back up. When I finally do get to bed and get my body to fall asleep, it doesn't like to stay that way for long. I'm up at least every 2 or 3 hours for at least 10 minutes each time. Sometimes I wake up and can't get back to sleep for hours. On a good night I only wake up 3 times. Then along comes 7am and my morning sunshine walks in asking permission to use the bathroom and starting my day off with a smile! :)

So that's a typical day in my life! In all of it's partially-scheduled and partially-random weirdness.

Updates on the pregnancy

Today marks 29 weeks pregnant! Wow! I have so much left that I want to do and it's FLYING by so fast this time. Oh how it dragged with my others; I never expected to be nearly 30 weeks and starting to get nervous about how much I still wanted to get done before she arrives. But I must say it's really such a blessing to have time flying instead of dragging. I was so miserable with my son by the end I was in tears in pain almost all the time, and then he decided to take his sweet time about coming out. So this flying time is strange but welcome. In fact I'm even grateful for the slight twinge of occasional panic about having too much to do in too little time because it only serves to keep the time flying. If I had everything done or close, it would slow it down I think. That's my theory anyway. ;) What do you think?
I have begin walking. I know, the third trimester is a bit late to begin an exercise routine! Lol! I don't really ever walk just for my health anyway, so it's ... um... not easy. Haha. I was inspired to start late rather than not at all by Kim over at Life In a Shoe! I'd venture to guess I'm a little (a lot) nore out of shape than she was before she started so I'm not really seeing any results yet, though she said she felt better almost immediately so I'm holding out hope- any day now!
Friday night I walked about 8 blocks. This was my first walk. I thought my hips were going to explode. Oh the pain! Ow!
Saturday we went to a carnival and a parade and wound up walking an estimated 12 blocks. I could barely move. I got home and sat down and the pain was radiating from my hips and I was contracting and guzzling water and sunburned and it was not pretty.
Sunday I walked 8 blocks again, knowing that the 12 had been overkill for someone who doesn't walk and having paid for it all night long. Well I think 8 may still have been overkill, or else I was living on leftover overkill from the previous day because I was again in alot of pain. So...
Monday night I went for a walk and only went 6 blocks. Still ow but I slept like a baby (SERIOUSLY WHOEVER THOUGHT OF THAT EXPRESSION NEVER HAD A REAL BABY...) and didn't wake up in agony the next morning! I'd have gone 8 but I wore different shoes than I had before and was getting a blister so I cut it short.
Tuesday and Wednesday due to hubby's schedule I was unable to walk alone. Thursday was looking to be the same deal and I really didn't want to go that long and wind up having to basically start over with the boot-camp period, KWIM? So Thursday I bit the bullet and took the tots out in the heat of the day in the double stroller and went 8 blocks. I should have just gone 4 or 6 but I pushed it, literally. And let me tell you pushing 60 pounds worth of adorableness in a double stroller on a broken up old sidewalk is a workout in itself and will induce contractions. I was in all kinds of pain that night, but oddly didn't have any more contractions after I got back home and I did not wake up very sore the next morning. I decided I need to keep at it because surely it will stop hurting quite so bad any time now, seeing as it's starting to be better by morning.
Friday however I was not ambitious enough to go out in the heat of the day with the double stroller again so due to hubby's schedule I skipped the walk.
Yesterday I walked 9 blocks. And even though I waited until 8:30pm to go... WOW it was so hot out! :p I coulda done without the roasty temperature for sure. During; contractions but strangely (for me) not painful ones. I rarely get the unpainful ones. Afterward; hips were not pleased. Very ow. Next morning; still very ow.
So that is my new ambition, exercise. Why am I doing it and why now when I never have had a walking routine before? Well you see I have had such intense hip pain already, and I remember how horrible the hip pain got at the end with my last pregnancy, to where I literally could not even sleep without waking up a dozen times a night crying in pain. I've already begun the stage where the hip pain occasionally wakes me this time. So my hope is that the walking will strengthen or loosen up or whatever those hips of mine need to stop being such a literal pain in the rump. It would be such a blessing to be able to be 8 months pregnant and not feel like just walking through WalMart my hips might explode. So that is my goal, and whenever I have an ache or pain it's my reminder and motivator to KEEP WALKING!

In other pregnancy related news, here's my before-baby to-do list in case you felt like being bored to death. ;)
-Finish Bug's baby blanket. (Yeah I'm so bad I still haven't finished it and he's almost 2!)
-Start and finish Baby's blanket.
-Sew Chicklet's summer dress I bought fabric for (for EASTER) before it's not even summer anymore.
-Finish mending baby stuff.
-Finish the changes to my blog I started how many weeks ago now and have half-done still.
-If I feel terribly ambitious, clone my one dress that I can wear pregnant so I have a spare. ;) Oh and sew those pajamas I have had cut out since Christmas so I have another comfy pair to sleep in.
-FIND those 3 BumGenius that seem to have grown legs and run away to hid someplace!
-Wishing but not counting on this one. Procure supplies to try making Newborn sized cloth diaps to fit baby until she's big enough for the BG. If I ever find those BG... *sigh* Did I mention they've been lost since we moved 2 years ago? Yeah.
-Finish taking back my kitchen from the clutter monster. This one deserves a whole post of it's own... LOL!
-Put up some freezer meals or at least some pre-cooked and pre-measured ground beef and chicken breasts for meal starters for postpartum.
-June; Parades, carnival, and take tots cherry picking.
-July; take tots to firework show. Hubby's birthday!
-August; Buggie's 2nd birthday!
-September; BABY DUE! Chicklet's 4th Birthday! BIL's wedding which I will not be able to go to. :(
-October; Hunting season. Ugh! Need I say more? Lol! Hope I am recovered enough to go for a visit with my Mom while I'm hunting widow. ;)

Okay I'm done rambling on and on now. :) If you remember to ask me about my list later it might help me to stay on track and keep plugging away at checking things off. Keep me accountable! Help me to keep going!

A Parade of Sharing

I didn't have time to post this last weekend, it was so busy! But here's an update on last weekend's fun. :D I wish I had some photos but I don't because my camera battery was dead when I grabbed it and I have still not found the charger! :(

Last Wednesday marked the start of the local yearly carnival. I love that it's early in the year as compared to most other cities' August and September carnivals because it seems I have a habit of being pregnant and about ready to pop around those end of summer months. ;) Besides, we get PARADES so double yippie-skippy! :D The kiddie parade was on a weekday evening and the kids loved it. Made out like bandits with the candy supply, which I have put up to ration out to them. There was a super sweet little girl who was sharing with my daughter too and that made my day. So many times when you go out to an event with little kids you get bombarded with other people's reasons why they don't want any more kids. By which I mean wild uncontrolable brats making life miserable for the other eventgoers, and tired uncaring parents ignoring them. Which is presumably why, when we arrived at the main parade on the weekend, the young man with a toddler girl whom we sat by immediately looked less than thrilled to have company. Infact, when I smiled at him and sat down, he looked pretty close to hostile. I almost got up and left. But I didn't, we sat right there beside them and God's blessings -innocent children- turned everything around. After a while another family with a little girl came and sat on the other side. And then, while waiting for the parade to start, the shy and sullen little girl with the unfriendly dad started sneaking smiles at Buggie and then talking to him- until her presumed dad moved her to sit between his feet away from us. After the candy throwing started, I encouraged Chicklet that since she'd gotten such a big handfull of candy she should share a piece or two with one of the other little girls. She gave some to the girl with the unfriendly dad. You should have seen the dad's face. Instant 180. I wonder if he'd taken her last year and had to watch some bully child grab up all the candy and make his baby cry. I know the feeling and I too came to the parade with some fear and protectiveness bristling for my babies. When candy is involved it's easy to expect children to behave like animals with no restraint, because if their parents don't teach them and it's been done to them, they will learn it to be an expected behaviour and will repeat it because it's the only way they know of to get the desired candy. So when Chicklet shared a piece of candy with that girl, her dad looked at both me and Chicklet and thanked us with an open and shocked smile. And then when more candy was thrown, the little girl shared a piece with Chicklet and her dad watched with a proud smile instead of moving her away from us again. And then the little girl on the other side shared with Chicklet, and so next time Chicklet shared back with her. And an older girl from a few families down ran up the road closer to the middle, collecting the pieces too far out for the toddlers to safely get to, and then brought them in and gave them to the intended recipients. It was an experience that was heartwarming as a parent. You always wonder what other people's kids are going to do that you will need to do damage control with your babies for later. But I am so happy to say that this was a parade experience that all those little ones, mine included, learned how awesome it feels to share, and what a great chain reaction it starts. :) Everyone walked away loaded down with candy, but more importantly, with smiles and a warm heart.