37 1/2 Weeks

I cannot believe how soon it is until we will have a baby. I am getting very excited. Knowing that it could happen any day is crazy. It's bizarre knowing that your life is about to change and never be the same, but not know when. As I have told the baby, I would not like to be in the hospital on Christmas. We will see though. The most important thing is that both the baby and myself are safe.

I met with the girl who will be my long-term sub after I have the baby and explained everything that I do today after school. So now I can leave anytime and not worry about it. :)

The baby has been CRAZY lately. I feel like it is constantly moving (I'm not complaining...it's fun sometimes). Sometimes it hurts really bad too! My stomach also ends up lopsided because of the way the baby is pushing on me. It cracks me up. It looks like a little alien belly. heh

We had such a great Thanksgiving! Chris' parents, my mom, his sister, and her husband all came down to our house. It was wonderful. 1. Because we didn't have to drive over the holiday. 2. Because we got to spend time with family. 3. Because we made lots of delicious food. 4. Because I have so much to be thankful for. The people who left apparently forgot about stuff left up in the attic that the inspector told us about. There was a ton of outdoor Christmas decorations, which is sweet! We didn't have to pay for them, but still get decorations! Chris decorated outside and it looks great. I love the holidays. I will try to take a picture of it soon. 15 days of school left until Christmas break. 13 until my due date. Nervous, but extremely excited.

4 more weeks!

Things have been going really well! My due date is four weeks from today and I have been getting really excited! (I think Chris has too.) We are pretty much ready. We are still waiting a little while longer before we wash the baby stuff and put it all away, but other than that...just waiting for baby to be fully cooked! We got our pack-n-play from people at my school, which was the last big thing we needed...seeing as how the baby is going to sleep in that in our room to begin with. I am so thankful for that! :)
I had my doctor's appointment yesterday, which begins when I have to start going weekly. That means it's getting close! Chris came with me to my appointment so that we could go over our birth plan and ask questions that we had. So we are going to a group of midwives and the lady that we had yesterday is my favorite. We are hoping that she is the one that delivers the baby. She made me feel so comfortable and was so helpful yesterday. She agrees with what we are wanting for our birth and was very supportive. She got very excited with us, which made me even more excited!
As far as school goes, I am feeling much better about it all. The intervention specialist has been in my room part of the day to help out and pulls my small groups. We have been planning together so that she could help my sub. However, my principal said that she might take over for me and then we would have the sub for her position AND that I don't have to do plans for my leave since she knows what I do. So I've been planning with her and we are SO ahead, it's awesome! We have to plan four more days and then we are planned up until Christmas break! This doesn't take into account all of the lessons that we won't get through before Christmas, so realistically..it will probably cover the first week of January too. This just puts my mind so much more at ease. One more reason I'm not stuper stressed! :) I am loving it!
We are having Thanksgiving here and we bought a bunch of the stuff yesterday. I am super excited! I have energy (at least until like 6:30 p.m.) and I'm feeling better than I was a week or two ago. I can't believe how soon we will have a little baby here with us! Hopefully before Christmas day! :)

35 Weeks...and counting!

Well, today marks 35 weeks, which is crazy! Everyone at school is talking about how big I'm getting and keeps asking my due date again because (based on how I look) they assume it's soon. One lady asked me about it one day and told me that she doesn't think I'll make it to my due date. The next day I saw her and she said, "You're still here!" I was like geez...I better not be THIS early! So while part of me is SO ready to be done with school and have our little baby here, I also want it to be closer to my actual due date so baby can be nice and healty and I can take off more time after Christmas break, rather than before. I also have had many people comment about us not finding out the sex of the baby. For a long time, I didn't think I'd be able to wait. There were also times throughout my pregnancy (like when other people find out what they are having) that made me want to know. But now, I am so excited that we didn't find out! It's also fun to see what people think it will be and have to wait and find out who was right. Oh! We got our monitor from Chris' grandpa which we played with already and figured out how it works. I was a little bit worried about the range, but it looks like it will work just fine! So thanks to Grandpa Bibb! (Soon to be great-grandpa)

As for how I have been feeling...I feel very pregnant. :) I've had some stomach issues, but nothing too severe. Most of my problems seem to bother me for a while, but then go away. However, I have been SUPER tired. Here is a glance at the nights in our household this past week: After school Chris and I have dinner and sit down to watch a TV show or something because I am exhausted. He makes a comment to me at the end of the show(which wakes me up) and I realize that I fell asleep. This usually happens around 6:30. Then, I go up to bed and within an hour am asleep. Then I wake up at 5:30 and do it all over again. I like sleeping though, so I'm ok with it..I just laugh about how ridiculous it is. So many of my coworkers and kids are sick though, so I figure my body is very busy right now...you know, trying to grow a baby and stay healthy and all that so I might as well let it rest! Last night, however...makes me almost feel like the baby is here. Every few hours I woke up and was awake for 30 minutes or an hour before I was able to fall back asleep. Don't worry, I was still in bed for almost ten hours, not to mention the sleeping I did during the TV show. :)

We have completed a lot of the necessary things, which is good because now I'm too tired to do anything. We did our childbirth class, which was 5 weeks. We are preregistered for the hospital and have written our birth plan. We are just waiting to wash the clothes until it's a little bit closer so they don't get all gross before the baby is here and I have to pack my hospital bag. That's about it though! We are excited and are thankful to have friends and family who are excited with us! So thanks! :)

Oh! I almost forgot...at my last doctor's appointment, I asked about the Braxton Hicks that I mentioned last time and they said that the baby is facing down, so it was probably the baby sticking their butt up. Hehe, I thought that was funny. So I guess I haven't really felt Braxton Hicks...

33 Weeks

Last weekend, my mom decided to come visit semi-last minute. It was awesome. We had such a great weekend! We got some great deals on some of the baby things that we still needed. I'm feeling like we are almost ready to go, with just a few more things that we still need. We got baskets and a hamper for the baby's room, a bouncy seat, and some other smaller things. My mom is awesome at getting deals. We went to a used store and ended up getting the bouncy seat brand new for $2 more than it was at the used store! I am feeling huge. My belly is getting harder and I think it's sticking out a lot more too. The baby is filling up all that space! This weekend, we got to relax, we did a lot of shopping, took some pictures, and my mom even made me pumpkin bread! I LOVE her pumpkin bread. We are so thankful to be blessed with such a wonderful family and have so many great friends.

I have tried to be on top of things for school. I have been getting my lesson plans done each Tuesday (so, yes...my lesson plans are done today for next week!) and I am also staying pretty caught up with my grades. This is a big deal because grades are due soon and it's the first time I haven't freaked out because I was so far behind. Today I felt (what I think was) Braxton Hicks a lot. The top and middle of my belly got REALLY hard and stayed that way for quite a while. This makes me feel like the baby will be coming so soon and makes me try even harder to stay on top of things. But, honestly...like I'm going to care when I'm in labor/have the baby. Still, it's nice not to have to worry about it.

We saw some really great costumes yesterday and some adorable kids when they came around trick-or-treating for Halloween. Chris and I sat out on the porch and passed out candy, which was enjoyable. I love passing out candy. Now, I'm really looking forward to Thanksgiving! (I know, already...) Family is coming down and I am very excited to have it at our new house and have some great time with some of the family too!

Here are some pictures from this past weekend.



Relaxing with the baby!







Chris listening to baby!



So excited for the baby to come! On the left is our new bouncy seat!



A big belly is rough on my back!

Look how big my belly is getting!

Woah! Look at that thing!



She will be such a good big sister! She is being so gentle with my belly!