Hello 3rd Trimester!!

Well here I am...rounding 3rd base, heading towards home (aka baby). So excited!

I would be lying if I didn't admit to having my panic moments but all in all, I can't wait to hold my precious lil guy in my arms. I love carrying my babies in my womb and I love holding them in my arms, it's the process from point a to point b that gets me. Even though I've been through this once and had a basic text book perfect labor and delivery, all the unknowns get my heart racing. I'm confident everything will be just fine, yet it's still unnerving to think about the process to get my little guy in my arms.

During our labor and delivery tour we learned that we would be in "recovery" for 2 hours after delivery. Wow...we only had 1 hour with Ethan before they moved us to our post partum room. We know we want that first hour to be just the 3 of us. That time is so precious and can never be gotten back. We used that time with Ethan to nurse and just spend time being a family. I savored every minute we had and can still remember it like it was yesterday. Elliott deserves that same time. We decided during the 2nd hour we wanted Ethan to come in and us spend time as a whole family. They will not let Ethan in the 'recovery' room without another adult in the room, so someone can help with him and still allow hubby to tend to me and the baby. We figured there would be no way to pick just one person to come in with him, so family and friends will get to take turns coming in to 'help' and meet our new bundle.  Obviously if I deliver in the wee hours of the morning, Ethan will meet his brother after he gets up. :)

I have been feeling pretty good. I have completed my 6 weeks of physical therapy on my back and it feels awesome. I am truly amazed at the difference it made. My nose bleeds are better, minus the one I had yesterday, but it wasn't to bad. I now have a head cold so that is making things interesting. I refuse to blow my nose on the side that is prone to the bleeds but thankfully the congestion and pressure hasn't been to bad. I had some fairly painful round ligament pains earlier in the week. Followed by a pain in my groin that hurt so bad I couldn't hardly walk. I'm guessing he is having a growth spurt and my body is just trying to keep up. Who knows!?! I also started having braxton hicks, which I am not to excited about. I didn't have them this early with Ethan and since my body knows what to do already, I don't like having them at this stage. Just one more thing to think and worry about. I increased my fluid intake and it has seemed to help. Of course that means I've increased my trips to the bath room too. lol.

We had our family/maternity pictures taken. Things didn't go exactly as planned but I am loving how they turned out. Here's a few:

Buzz Buzz says the Bee...

Where has the time gone? This pregnancy is going by so fast. I can't believe I am 24 weeks already. With the holidays and several birthdays coming up, the time is going to go by even quicker. :(

We had our monthly doctor appointment yesterday and everything went well. Of course we waited longer then we actually saw the doctor but that's ok...that translates into healthy momma and baby in my book. I had, what I would call, another jump in weight but the doctor said she wasn't concerned and said it was probably just a growth spurt. I'd say so. lol. She said I wasn't on target to gain as much as I did with Ethan, so we shall see.

My only concerns right now are (1) pain in my lower right belly when I walk for any length of time, other then around my house. If I go shopping, I almost always barely make it in the door before I have to all but stop and then walk every so slowly. My doctor thinks it's just muscle spasms so I am going to go with that. She told me to just slow down and stretch before I leave the house. I hope that helps because with all the Christmas shopping I've got to do I don't have time to 'slow' down. And, (2) my darn nose bleeds. I have been doing the saline spray and humidifier, which sits on my night stand. I didn't have one for 3 weeks and was so excited then BAM out of nowhere on Saturday, during my shower no less, I got a pretty good one. Of course I didn't know I was having one until I went to dry off and realized it was all over everything. Not fun! Then got another one the next day. So my OB said to try the saline gel. Well today, before I could go get some, I had a doozy of a bleed...the worst so far. It was so bad that my rarely reactive husband says, "Maybe you really need to suck it up and just go to an ENT". What??? That definitely didn't help my nerves. I told him I wasn't ready to take that avenue just yet. I went and purchased the gel before lunch and decided after lunch I would try it out. Well...that wasn't soon enough, I ended up with another bleed before I even got through lunch. UGH!!! Since using the gel this afternoon, I haven't had one and it's rather soothing because it has Aloe in it. Just hoping and praying it works!

I've been busy like a bee: the nursery is almost completely done, making different projects, been busy with photography sessions and almost got Ethan's big boy room done.

When I originally started working on the 'main' wall in Elliott's room, I thought oh this is going to be fun. Well that didn't last long. In my opinion...stripes suck! lol. They look awesome afterwards but the process is such a pain. Then, because I saw the wall tree mural that I couldn't live without but couldn't bring myself to spend $120 on it so I got to pain it. It is by no means perfect but what fun would that be. ;) I wanted to do something different other then wooden letters for his name, so I printed off the letters and framed them. Thankfully I'm a scrapbook junky and I already had the ribbon on hand. BTW...the frames are the $.95 frames from good ole Walmart. :) I love how it turned out and in the end it was worth all the frustration.

After getting the painting done, I of course had to start filling up the rest of the room. We inherited the glider from my husband's grandmother and used it in Ethan's room. The cushions are originally a hunter green, which was fine in Ethan's room but just wasn't going to work in Elliott's room. So...next project, recover the cushions. lol. I wanted something that was thick and going to withstand the wear and tear of hours of nursing and rocking. I found the material, which is almost like a soft denim, at Walmart on clearance for 1.75 p/y. YAY!! Considering this was my first attempt at covering cushions I'm pretty happy with how they turned out. 

Onto my next crazy idea. We got Ethan a 'tag' "lovey" before he was born and he loves it. So I wanted to get one for Elliott too. One problem...they don't sell them at Walmart anymore. In fact they don't sell them hardly anywhere except online and they want $40+ for them...no thanks! Let me back up...they don't sell them with the satin tags in retail stores, now all the tags are ribbons. So I made one. lol. Again, not perfect but should do the trick and stand up to the weekly washes. Plus, I already had the minky material on hand so I just had to purchase the satin.

Then my final project right now, was the recovering of the lamp shade. I just wanted a simple little lamp to use as a night light. I didn't want to spend a bunch of money but wanted it to tie in and match the room. I'm a tight wad and couldn't find anything reasonably priced that I liked so...you guessed it...I made one. lol. I just purchased a cheap $5 lamp at Walmart and then took an old yucky shade we already had and covered it in the minky material I already had. Presto! Since taking this picture I added a 'ball' fringe around the bottom of the shade. Since his bedding has caterpillars in it, I thought the ball fringe looked like a caterpillar so I had to add it.

I can't wait to get the last few things done and post pics of the completed nursery. Not to mention, I'm ready to start washing clothes and stocking his dresser drawers and closet. :) Oh yea...I almost forgot...I ordered his 'bringing home' outfit and just got an email today saying it shipped. Eeekkk...I can't wait to see it.

 

I have gone on enough but want to wrap up this entry with a video I took the other night, showing Elliott 'excerising'. :)

A moment to brag...

Ok..I just have to post about some awesomeness I've stumbled upon lately.

I mentioned the video monitor we got such a great deal on ($70 to be exact) in my last post, well I got the extra camera, that will go in the nursery for $20.50! I couldn't hardly believe it. Not only was the price amazing, but it's brand new and comes with a warranty.

I got the double curtain rod I needed for the nursery earlier in the week. I got it on sale for $35.00 and thought that was a great price. Well, I get an ad in the mail from another store (the day after I bought it) and they have the exact same rod on clearance and the ad included a $5 off coupon. So I returned the original one I bought and purchased the other one for $15.00! Cha-ching!! :)

Ok, so off we go to my favorite hardware store to get the paint for the nursery. I am doing two different colors and then because I'm a tight wad and don't want to pay the $120 for the wall mural I fell in love with, I'm just going to paint it by hand myself. Which means we had to get an additional color of paint. My husband was not at all excited about having to purchase 3 gallons of paint when there was no way all of it would get used...but he was supportive. I had put in my order for the 2 colors I knew I wanted and was still up in the air about the mural color (thinking maybe I should get a color that could be used for something else, just so I wasn't wasting all that paint). As I was standing at the counter contemplating, my husband is roaming the area to not bare witness to my madness. I catch him waving his arms in the air from across the counter, trying to get my attention. I walk over and he points to a discounted gallon of paint and says, "Isn't this the color you were talking about the other day?" Oh. My. Gosh. there it was in all it's glory...the paint color I wanted already mixed in a $37.00 gallon of paint...marked down to $10.00! Check please!!

So, we get home tonight and start working on dinner. I had found what looked to be yummy recipe on Pinterest the other day so we decided to give it a whirl tonight. It's called Firehouse Chicken Cordon Bleu Pasta and here's the link to the recipe. It was so good! I'm hoping to get it digested before bed so I can have more. lol. My husband has had a lot of dishes in his days and can be hard to impress but he hasn't hardly stopped talking about how good it is. It's that good. ;)

After dinner was done, I checked my email to learn that I "won" a pair of shoes I had bid on for Ethan. According to the description they were only worn a few times and are in EUC. $9.00 for basically brand new Nike Reax is crazy!! Especially since they run +$50.00 brand new.

I feel like I should go buy a lottery ticket! :)

We're having a....BOY!!

We are over the moon with excitement with expecting another boy. He was being a little booger and we were beginning to think we weren't going to get to find out. He is so active and moving non stop and had his legs crossed almost the entire time. The tech was quick and noticed they were separated and went in for a peek and was able to confirm his male parts. At first I wasn't 100% sure because it was so easy to tell with Ethan but not this time. However when they handed us our pictures, there was a shot of it and it is very obvious. This one is already showing signs of being like his momma. :)  The ultrasound showed everything was great and baby was right on track, with a heart beat of 148bpm and weighing in at 13 oz.

20 weeks 4 days

 

We decided on names back during our trying to conceive process. Our boy name was easy, we knew we wanted to name him after some pretty amazing people. We came up with the perfect name, Elliott Levon. I get teared up every time my husband says his name during prayers. The name Elliott is my husband's late father's middle name and is also his grandmother's maiden name. The name Levon is my late grandfather's middle name (which was the name he went by).

Cute as a bug

I had been looking at bedding ideas for almost two weeks and I was so excited when my hubby looked at the 'options' today and said, "Lets get that one...and go ahead and order it". I couldn't believe it, since he is usually the "there's no hurry" type. He said, if we know what we want, we might as well just get it. He knows me so well. :) I love it!! The walls will be light blue and I will be painting a mural on the wall. I can't wait to get started.

Since I can't leave Ethan out we are also upgrading his room into a 'big boy' room. He is so excited, especially since it will be a baseball theme. Ever since we talked about it and he decided on what he wanted to do, he has asked if 'today' is when we are putting baseball bats in his room.

Speaking of his room...we found an amazing deal on a video monitor and since it was on my wish list we went ahead a bought it. I wanted one specifically for his room so I can tell when he's out of bed (I had several times mistaken his kicks against the wall as being up playing and went in only to discover he was still in bed...DOH!!!). Well, we got the monitor today and I love it. Better yet, we can add a camera in the nursery and use the same monitor for both rooms. Winning!!! :)

20 wks

I will finish off this post with my 20 week belly pic. I'm feeling great and couldn't ask for more. I gained more weight this month then I would have really liked but the doctor didn't seem concerned about it so I guess I won't be either. We did go have breakfast right before my appointment but I didn't eat THAT much. lol. Oh yea...and we scheduled our family/maternity pictures. I told the hubby, these moments need to be captured by a professional and not by the timer. So excited!

Busy busy busy!

Busy is the only word  I know to describe the past few weeks. Busy with photography sessions, trips out of town, doctor's appointments, a remodeling project in our kitchen, and just life in general. It's so hard to believe it's already October.

We received a free standing stove/oven so that is what got the remodeling project rolling. We had a 30+ year old built in stove/oven so we had to cut out cabinets to be able to fit our "new" stove in. Since we had tile laid when we moved in that meant there was no tile under the stove now. So, since we would hire the tile guys again to come in we figured we might as well do the other project in the same area so they could tile everything at the same time. The stove part was easy...the other project has been quite the undertaking. Our utility/laundry "closet" was in the kitchen/dining area so we decided to open up space we would move the laundry to the basement. We had to knock out walls, rerun electrical, plumbing and venting. My husband made a trip up into the attic to determine where the new lighting would be mounted and quickly discovered a LOT of spiders. So all work stopped until we could get pest control out to take care of our 'friends'. Work begins again tomorrow to finish up lighting and then the sheet rocker comes Tuesday...and will come everyday for 4 days. UGH!! Then time for the tilers to come in. It will be so worth it when it's done. The best part...I get to repaint the dining/kitchen. :)

We are hoping to get everything done in the next week and a half because once we find out the sex of the baby at our appointment on the 18th it's go time for the nursery. When I was picking out paint for the kitchen, I went ahead and picked out the paint for the nursery. I can't wait to see the ideas I have come to life. Eeeeekkkk...so excited just thinking about it.

I've really been struggling with the care for Ethan when baby gets here but after an unexpected long talk, I'm relieved to know that I can trust our wishes and requests will be respected...and he will only be a few minutes from the hospital. It is such an answered prayer and I'm so thankful I can finally relax and enjoy this pregnancy without that worry. Since I'm so OCD and like everything planned out, I'm confident that between plan A, B, C, D and E we've covered everything. ;)

On a very exciting note, papa bear got to feel baby the other night. I was so shocked, as was he. I had mentioned to him earlier in the week that I was surprised I hadn't felt the baby anymore often then I had been. I'm guessing it's just because I'm so busy and don't have a ton of time to just sit and pay attention to every little quick and quiver. After my dessert the other night, which consisted of a butterfinger fun size candy bar, baby was going crazy so I put my hand on my belly and couldn't believe I could feel it on the outside too. I told papa bear so he had to get in on the fun. Within a few short seconds he looked at me and said, "Oh my gosh, I felt that...oh and again...etc". This went on for a couple minutes. I love his excitement and desire to be a part of my pregnancies.

On a sad note, Ethan has decided he is to big to call us "Momma or Dada", he only calls us "Mommy or Daddy" and corrects us if we say the other. :( It makes me so sad that he is growing up so fast. No matter what he calls us, I will always call him my baby!!

Time is flying...

Wow 4 months already. :( I can't wait to hold our precious baby in my arms but since this will be my last pregnancy I'm sad that it's going by so fast. I love being pregnant, even on the bad days. I love doing what my body was meant to do.

I have been feeling great, other then the never ending pain in my back. After having a massage and it not helping I went to the chiropractor. It wasn't until then that I realized that there was a cause of concern for my pain. I was shocked when the chiro informed me the pain was due to the fact that my right scapula (aka shoulder blade) was turned outward, causing it to stick out almost and inch farther then my left. How does that happen?? I know your body adjust, muscles relax, tendons stretch all while pregnant but what in the world causes this. Thankfully I know a PT and she recommended getting a referral from my doctor to be treated. After discussing the situation with my OB and explaining the different things I had already tried, she agreed PT was definitely the next step. She was not happy that I didn't call her earlier to talk with her about it and explained that some things don't need to wait for my appointment. Oops...lesson learned. lol. I'm looking forward to starting treatment next week and finally getting some relief.

Also during our appointment we scheduled our "big" ultrasound, where we get to see our sweet 'baby boo' for 45 minutes, and hopefully find out if we are expecting a girl or a boy. Since we drive over an hour to our appointments I was begging to be able to have both (the ultrasound and our 20 week appointment) done on the same day. They must really love me, because they made it happen. ;) So we get to have our ultrasound done first thing in the morning. Which is super exciting because we had to wait till 3:00 in the afternoon to find out with Ethan. That was like the longest day ever. lol. The clinic doesn't allow minor children to be there so we are thinking of some fun ways to tell Ethan and then some exciting things to do that day as well.

I finally knew without a doubt on Sunday (exactly 16 weeks) that I was feeling quickening. I had wondered for a few days but was 100% certain on Sunday. I'm so excited for this phase and looking forward to seeing my hubby's face when he feels it for the first time. When the nurse was listening to the HB on the Doppler at our appointment, baby was going crazy. I love it!!

I'm slowly getting Ethan's "Big Brother" hospital bag filled with all his goodies. He's gonna make out like a bandit...with Christmas in December, his birthday in February and then his hospital bag in late February/early March. Now to start working on Daddy's bag...squee...this is so much fun!!

Some days I get very over whelmed and stressed thinking of all sorts of different things. When I get down and feel like I'm loosing control I'm reminded of a hymn my Papa Shuler use to sing to me when I was a kid. This is a more modern version of the old hymn I grew up on but I enjoy the contemporary twist. Enjoy!

Anxiety Building...

As each day passes I'm flooded with an array of emotions. First and foremost, excitement. Not one day has gone by where excitement hasn't described a part of me. I'm almost giddy at thinking about all the fun things yet to come. Yet, that excitement is dampened by fear and anxiety. Fear of the things I can't control. How early could I be this time? How will I handle it if my water breaks at home? (It wasn't until my water was broke last time that I was in tremendous pain.) How would I deal with that pain during the hour drive to the hospital? How soon would we be able to leave if it happened over night (like it did with Ethan)? How would Ethan react if he woke up and we weren't home? What would I do if it happens when my husband is working and on a call and can't get home or even answer his phone to know what's going on?

Then there's the anxiety of being in the hospital, away from Ethan. How do I make it possible to keep our promise as parents that one of us would always be home to do bedtime routine and tuck him in. I can't imagine my husband driving an hour one way to come home to do the routine and then return to the hospital, another hour drive, to be with me and the baby. I don't want to be at the hospital without him but our promise to Ethan is so much more important then that. Do we just have him at the hospital till bedtime and brush his teeth, read stories, say prayers and then have my mom bring him home and put him to bed? The hospital will allow him to stay over night with us but I don't think that's fair to him. There would be no way he would get good sleep. I want him to be at the hospital as much as possible and I know that's unreasonable for a what will be 3 year old. I know it's selfish to want him up there the whole time but I want us to be a family and for him to feel included from the beginning.

I thought this pregnancy would have less anxiety then the first but I was wrong. It's a whole new level of anxiety. I thought it would be easier since we don't have to move - twice. Yet instead I find myself worrying over silly things like: Should we be buying more diapers then we are...Nursery colors...my clothes don't fit...am I doing enough to prepare Ethan. I know it's doing no good and there's the saying, "Worrying is like a rocking chair, it gives you something to do but doesn't get you anywhere". Easier said then done.

Then as if all those emotions weren't enough I'm dealing with sadness. Sadness because this will be my last pregnancy. I know in my heart that I don't want more then 2 kids but there's a sadness in the fact that this is it. I love being pregnant. The highs and lows are so worth it. We have discussed the ways we will prevent pregnancy, without taking birth control for the rest of my fertile days. Even though I'm in agreeance I'm scared because, what if God forbid, something happen to either of my kids. What if we would want another? I know it's not permanent but it feels that way...especially with all the struggles we had with getting pregnant this time. How impossible would it be then?

I've spent lots of time praying with God and I know He will take care of everything and it will work out just as it's supposed to. I ask that you pray for me...for peace. Thank you!!