2009 and the 00's in Review

Well here we sit at the end of the year. I was looking back at the posts from the beginning of the year looking for that "Here's what I'm going to do this year post".

So let's see. I said I was going to learn photoshop. Done and Done. I find the program very useful and have gotten pretty good at taking good pictures and just touching them up to give them that bit of pizzaz and also using it to fix pictures that are totally screwed up due to bad exposure settings or what not.

My Dad, Jason and I had all planned on reading "I'm a Strange Loop". Didn't so much happen. But we can put that on the burner for this year.

Go to the YMCA ALL THE TIME! Yeah...seriously went like 5 times.

Travel to Zurich. Done and Done.

No where in that post did we talk about the the "Let's Try and Make a Baby" plan. Turns out that is what 2009 ended up being and go figure we made a pretty awesome little girl. The whole year ended up being somewhat consumed by preparing for her arrival. In the "Here's what I'm going to do this year post" I say, "Our little family unit is 180 from where we were last year" and I think I can safely say that again this year. This time last year Jason and I found ourselves seated at Sheffields most evenings for delicious beers and bbq, or out with work crowds downtown. Now we just find ourselves staring at the little one and wondering what the hell she is thinking and looking at and learning and it's just amazing!

And what will become of 2010? Who the hell knows but I can only hope that it's as exciting as the last few years have been. I like the being 180 from where I was the year before...although...you keep going 180 don't you just end up back where you started two years previous? Wait...what the what? Anyways.

2009 is also the end of quite a decade. I was talking to Jason and I was like...wow, at the end of the last decade I was 20. I mean..wow I can do math right? But seriously I was at a New Years Eve party in Chicago with friends from Indiana.

I was still an undergrad and only in my junior year of a physics degree. 10 years later and I have a PhD in the subject and had a ton of fun getting it. We got to work at the biggest lab on the planet at the time and I measured something more precisely than anyone else had (and it still stands as far as I know).

Jason and I weren't even dating 10 years ago. We were very good friends, but didn't start dating until May of 2000...wow that's so weird to think about. Now we are married and have this wonderful little person that is half of each of us.

During the decade we never really had any money but didn't let it stop us from traveling to Europe and the Caribbean and living in Chicago even though we were working out in Bativia. Of course if we hadn't done those things we probably wouldn't have been quite as poor...but I would never ever give up those days. We laugh now at the shithole apartments we lived in because we didn't have a choice, but I mean really the Iowa Street apartment? What the fuck were we thinking?

We grew up in the 00's. We dated, we broke up, we dated, we got married and along the way became even closer friends than I could have imagined. How many people marry their best friend? I mean really! I am so lucky. And little Lucy? Well she's going to grow up with two wacky ass parents. We of course aren't finding ourselves at Sheffields every night for beer and bbq, but we are still planning on a trip to Europe this coming year and because we can we are planning on Little Miss Lucy coming with us. Just because you have a baby doesn't mean that *everything* has to change. Of course....as long as Miss Lucy is under the age of two her seat on the flight is free....so that might have something to do with it.

And so we close out the decade miles and miles from where we entered it. I'm thinking the 10's are going to be just as amazing.

And So We Start

Jason just left for work after being off for about 3 weeks. He's back to work full time although this week he gets Friday off for New Years Day so at least he's going back to a short week. I have mentioned how much I hate that we don't work together any more and so I'm not going to mention it again...except that I just did. Damn. Ok well I miss him and this will be a tough transition to make.  I think a lot more difficult than when he started working separate from me in the first place. Ok that's it. Going to stop talking about it now.

And it being winter and gross out I have no plans although I have to get out of this apartment today as I've been inside for the last two days. My Dad is coming by late morning and I think we are going to take Lucy to Bernies which should be a nice walk. And then we can put her first steps in to a bar at less than 3 weeks. Which is nice and classy I think. Hopefully it's not too too cold out, we'll see. So far not a big fan of having a winter baby.

Lucy continues to be a great kid and is sleeping in her own room and waking up one time during the night to eat. She goes down for bed around 9:30-10 and gets up around 2:30-3 and then wakes up between 6 and 7. It could totally be a lot worse and so I'm happy we have such a good sleeper. What's awesome is that after she wakes up in the middle of the night she goes right back to sleep as if she knows it's 3 in the morning and not time to be up and on it.

We are not even talking about the Colts in this household, but we are hoping that the Bears can pull of a win tonight. Favre is old and it's cold in Chicago so you never know. Miracles can happen.

No pictures of Lucy today but my Uncle recently scanned this one in of me at about 3 I think.

Ok...well just a few pictures of Lucy:

She does this often with her right hand, right up by her ear like that

When she gets these eyes we know it's going to take some work to get her to sleep

Her eyes are still blue. I've done the genetic tables (yes. It's the only part of freshman biology that I was good at) and she has a small shot at getting blue eyes because Jason and I both have grandparents with blue eyes....maybe it's like a 1/16 chance. I did find out that her Great Grandmother Lucille who she was named after had blue eyes....so we'll see

First Time Parent Syndrome, Christas Eve, Jason Back to Work and Pictures!

So ok. Lucy had some congestion. I mean the child was racked with pain with said stuffy nose. How am I supposed to know that IT'S JUST A STUFFY NOSE. Sigh.

Yesterday Jason and I were convinced that the stuffy nose was something more than a stuffy nose. We realized we had a shitty thermometer as it was giving us readings that varied by over a degree in a 10 second span. So we called the doctor who said, stuffyness was very common in newborns to which I yelled, "THE CHILD IS SCREAMING. IT'S MORE THAN JUST A STUFFY NOSE." So they told us to bring her in and we did. And then of course Lucy just sat there and cooed and was cute and yes had some congestion. The doctor we saw was pretty funny. He's an older guy and I think he said he had 6 or 7 kids and so yeah. He said...ah first parent syndrome, usually I don't see that until at least week four. I told him that's probably true but I'm clearly neurotic. He said, well I can see that.

So yeah, Lucy is fine. And we are going to try and calm down a little bit. We've been trying to keep her on a pretty strict sleeping/eating schedule and so we are going to back off that a little bit just because she seems to do better when we let her dictate what she wants to do. She's already sleeping 5-6 hours at night and actually last night went 6 hours between feedings which is awesome. My parents told me that I was sleeping through the night at about 2 weeks so hopefully this kid is following that same plan. It's horribly frustrating though becasue all the books are like, newborns have to eat every 2-3 hours so you have to wake them up. Lucy is probably the hardest sleeper that I have ever seen and it's really hard to wake her up so I hate doing it. Plus she's not exactly the size of a newborn. So yeah....in short we are figuring it out day by day and probably making tons of mistakes along the way. But like the doctor said, she'll let us know when she's hungry and uncomfortable and so maybe we should try listening to her instead of books....or probably more accurately a little bit of both.

Our little niece who is just 5 days older than Lucy is having a hard time these days. She caught a respiratory virus and is in the hospital hooked up to all kinds of tubing. Jason and I cannot even imagine what his brother and wife are going through and hope that she turns the corner soon.

I was planning on making a big Christmas Eve dinner and then I thought...wait...we live by lots of restaurants that deliver. So we are ordering a nice Christmas pizza. But I'm baking cookies today so we got that going for us.

Today was Jason's first day back at work. If he takes Christmas Eve off he has to take a full vacation day but if he goes into work he only has to work a 1/2 day so he went in for the morning today. He goes back full time on Monday. After him being home for the last almost 3 weeks it's really hard for me to see him go back to work. I miss working with him and seeing him all the time and him just being home reminded me of those times when we would see each other all the time and work together and I fucking miss it. Not many people get to be in love with their best friend and have gotten years to work with them. We'll get back into a rhythm soon enough I know. Although we'll have a new rhythm that involves the baby. But anyways. It's tough to see him leave for work and I'm sad. Good thing we all get presents tomorrow. Presents makes everything better.

And as usual because everyone just likes pictures, here we go:

I don't quite fit yet! But when I do this looks like it'll be a rockin' good time. Thanks all grandparents!

Those are my toes! And I kind have the fat man boobs and belly....but I'm loving my first bath!

Strange, Wonderful, Perfect and then Overtired

Being a new parent of course is very strange but it's helping that Little Lu is apparently the perfect child. She doesn't really cry, she eats, sleeps, looks around a little bit and then goes back to sleep. I know she's looking at Jason and I and thinking, "Oh great, I got a bunch of rookies. Just put the fucking tshirt on already, this shouldn't take you 5 minutes. Can't you see I'm pretty much naked? LET'S GO ROOKIES, GET YOUR HEAD IN THE GAME"

Jason and I have settled into parenthood like champs although it helps having the support staff of the Gods. My Mom has been staying with us and cooking meals for us and cleaning up which is so awesome. She thought that it would be the crazy house with the baby and would have to help more with her, but since Lu is so perfect and Jason and I have a lot of that under control there hasn't been much to help with there. If she wasn't here though...it would be D'Augs or Penny's Noodles every night and our living room would be covered with baby blankets, diapers, pacifiers, pillows and god knows what other treasures we would find there. So that has been such a huge help. My Dad and Sue of course are here all the time and my Dad has been able to run some errands for us when we need stuff and so on. I don't know how calm we would be without the three of them around.

So all was perfect and Lu slept and she ate and she slept and she looked around quietly. Then last night we did our tree decorating and my Mom made dinner and there was just a ton going on. Poor Lu couldn't quite get to sleep between two of her feedings and then the poor kid was so overtired that she was awake for many many hours. She was fussy and just could not close her eyes. Well she would, but then they would snap open like a baby doll and we would have to start trying to calm her down all over again. She stayed awake till her next feeding and then for a few more hours after that. Finally finally, she fell asleep on my chest. She did wake up an hour later to eat, but then we put her right back in the bassinette and she drifted right off for a nice 4 hour snooze. This morning she hung with Jason and I in our room after eating and is now back asleep. Before she went to sleep she was making some pretty spectacular faces which was fun to look at. She makes one face and she looks just like Yoda which of course Jason the Star Wars King loves.

Today Jean and her baby Ethan are coming to visit so that should be fun and then tomorrow we are having a Holiday Party/Come poke the baby open house deal so that should be fun....hopefully not too much stimulation :).

As far as me, I'm feeling great. I'm not going to be one of those people that is all talking about my weight and if I'm back to my pre pregnancy weight and yadda yadda. I know I'll get there soon enough but I will say that the weight was a whole lot of baby and fluids I think because I just have a little pooch left. I can start running again in like 4 weeks and I'm really looking forward to that. I'm going to coach my Dad and I think with me coming off of abdominal surgery he'll be able to go a lot farther than me, but he better get ready for the coach from hell that's going to come knocking on his door with the temps at 2 degrees. LET'S GO RUNNING!

And of course since no one really cares about all the of above and just wants to see pictures of the little one. Here you go. There will be lots and lots of pictures at this location which is updated daily if you are interested: http://leahc.smugmug.com/Children/Lucy. Enjoy!

 

 

 

It's Baby Lucy!

So Leah's already recounted her epic experience from the perspective of the lady in the hospital gown, but I thought I'd chime in on the view from the sidelines.

Heading in to the hospital to get started with the induction was a pretty simple process. The admission process was easy and the early induction steps were a piece of cake as Leah was just strapped into an IV and the pitocin started dripping. No problem. Easy peasy. La di da. I just hung out over on the day bed and we watched TV together, too tired and excited to go to bed. The baby was almost here! Yay!

Sure, the nurses cautioned us that it could take 18-24 hours for induction to work its magic. Our first resident even warned that it could take as long as 48 hours, worst case.

Yeah, okay. Sure. I think we'll be fine, thanks.

And so the pitocin kept on dripping and we kept on hanging out. We tried to get a bit of sleep that night, but it wasn't really possible. Every half hour Leah's automatic blood pressure cuff would start pumping and wake us up. But no big deal if we didn't get sleep because, really, the baby would be here soon!

And then noon the next day started to roll around. Leah had been contracting for almost 14 hours and had nothing to show for it. A mere 1.5 centimeters and no pain. Boo to no pain! And so the doctor decided to break Leah's water and let nature's pitocin take over. Out doctor was pulled into a c-section and couldn't make it in for the water breaking, so a resident was sent in instead.

And then the breaking of the water began.

I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say it's the worst thing I've ever seen. The look of pain on Leah's face while the resident was on top of her, wielding her instrument of torture (which I swear to god was a meter long), was just horrifying. And all I could do was sit over on the sidelines and watch, doing nothing. In the end it worked, but it was distinctly not awesome. Afterwords, I remembered to breath again.

Eventually.

And I think I'm just about recovered from the trauma.

Almost.

But, in the end, the water breaking was a good thing as the contraction began to really kick in. Yay for pain! On a scale from 1 to 10, I believe she said her pain was a fortheloveofgodstopaskingmethatgoddamnquestion. We spent the next little while walking the halls and dilating (well, she dilated more than I did. I'm still at 1 cm) and the pain kept on increasing. Leah was starting to get really uncomfortable and then the time came. Get me the drugs! And some for Leah, too! Druuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuugggggggggggggggggs.

And so she got the epidural. And it was delicious. I remember walking back into the room (they make the fathers leave during this procedure) and I did a double take. Leah was sitting there on the best smiling and joking with the nurses, back to her pre-pain self. I was starting to feel pretty good about this. And, as a bonus, she was up to 3 cm dilated. Woo Hoo! The baby was on the way!

And then it was a lot of hanging out and waiting. We watched Monday Night Football then slept for awhile. During that time, Leah passed 6.5 and 7 cm and the night was starting to really drag on. Leah covered this pretty well and there's not too much to day about this time. Leah needed her medicine re-dosed a bit, but once the pain was well under control, we both slept a decent amount. Actually, we slept a lot more that night than the night before (when the contractions were very mild), because the real issue with sleeping was an uncomfortable bed. (Note to all the ladies: get the epidural when you *enter* the hospital. Otherwise your butt will keep falling asleep on the very uncomfortable bed and no sleep will be had).

And so, in some regard, nothing interesting happened. Leah just grew more tired and frustrated with the process and time began to slow. But what I remember more is her waking me up and having me come over because she had started shaking violently. Leah broke down with tears of frustration and fear, the big fear being that she wouldn't have enough energy to push when the time came. Her body had nothing left. All she wanted was a drink of water. And still, shaking violently. And through it all, there wasn't a thing I could do. I couldn't give her water. I couldn't help the shaking. Nothing.

Very frustrating.

I could see things were starting to spiral out of control, so I was very relieved when our amazing doctor came in and had a talk with Leah. It was time to consider a c-section. Or, at least, a c-section was now a viable option. Leah had given it her all and, after 32 hours of labor, had started to lose it. The contractions had lost their zing and her body was out of baby-having juice.

It as time for a c-section. There was really no choice. The doctor, although she wouldn't tell us what to do, gave me the impression that she really felt surgery was the only realistic option at this point. At this point it really appealed to me as I wasn't wild about the direction this was heading and a c-section meant we got to meet little Lucy much sooner.

After a bit of deliberation and waiting a bit longer, the decision was made. Let's make the cut! Yay! It's slicin' time!

And so Leah was wheeled out of the room and I was left to get dressed in my sweet-ass scrubs. The nurse came to get me and took me over to the other waiting room, where I waited for them to get Leah all prepped up. After 5-10 minutes of waiting (or more, I have no idea), it was time to head into the operating room and have a baby, Julius Caesar style.

My job during the procedure was to keep Leah calm. I just kept letting her know that this was a very easy surgery and that, in the end, we would have a Lucy. She must have actually been quite tired as she actually nodded in agreement with me a few times. And through it all, we listened to a live episode of ER unfold. Our doctor was in complete command of the operating room, calmly directing the procedure and explaining each step of the way. The best part was that it was a teaching hospital, so the whole time a med student was getting quizzed and, I might add, getting some answers wrong. Tsk, tsk, tsk.

After a mere ten minutes, out doctor announced that she was making the incision on the uterus and that there would be some pressure (I'd imagine so as she was wrist-watch deep in Leah's insides) and, 1 minute later...a baby cry. I was told I could stand up and see the baby (I think that's what I was told, anyway, as I certainly stood up) and saw little Lucille held above Leah's belly, crying her little (well, "little") head off. Yep, that's what I'd been waiting for.

After that it was a bit of a whirlwind. She was brought over for me to hold along side Leah and then off to be warmed and cleaned. I was allowed to head over to the "giraffe" and watch her get all weighed and whatnot. I really couldn't believe how big she was. To me, she looked like a toddler. It was unreal. The nurse asked what I thought of the size and I threw out a guess of 10 lb 5 oz and, as it turns out, I wasn't off by much.

Yeah, I rule.

What I remember most was just that she was actually cute. I mean, let's be honest, most babies aren't when they first make an appearance in the world. Most are damn ugly. But ours came out full formed and ready to rule the world.

And so now here we are. At 9:12 today she turns a week old and she's already a completely different baby. We've started looking at colleges already (SAT flash cards are a great investment!) and it's pretty clear to me her #1 choice is IU. Go Hoosiers!

She's Here! And She's Spectacular!

As I get back to feeling to my normal self...still quite a ways off but each day gets better I can't believe that the little thing sitting next to me used to be inside of me. So here we go with how she got from in there to out here.  Get some coffee as it's not a short post for obvious reasons :)

On Sunday night we went to the hospital to start the induction process. It's a slow process and so they start at night. So went in and got all hooked up and the pitocin started started pumping.

And it pumped.
And pumped.
Then it pumped some more.

Then it was 12 hours later and although I was having contractions I didn't feel *anything* and I wasn't any farther along that I had been 12 hours earlier. Still only 1.5cm dilated and 50% effaced. They decided to take a break and let me eat some lunch and totally disconnected me from most of the machines so I could walk around more freely.

At 12pm on Monday afternoon they started again and at about 1:30pm they broke my water manually. When they were done with what I can only describe as hell on earth I looked over at Jason and the poor guy was literally as white as a ghost. I was worried because I had never seen him look like that. He told me that it was the most horrible thing he had ever seen and I told him that I thought childbirth was going to be even worse.

After they broke the water, things finally started moving. A few hours later I was 3cm dilated and 70% effaced. I started feeling the contractions. And then holy hell did I start feeling them. I had never planned on doing anything naturally as I don't really feel the need to feel the joys of childbirth and so I got an epidural. I'm not kidding it was the best thing in the world. I could have hugged that anesthesiologist and when Jason got back in the room he was like holy shit you are like light and day. I felt so much better, not only with the contractions but also with the bed. I had been so uncomfortable in the hospital bed and so being able to sit on it or lay on my side without there being instant pain in my butt and side was awesome. So I was finally able to get some sleep.

The nurse at this point was awesome and we discussed a mutual love of candy. She was then able to get me a grape popsicle which I swear has never tasted better.

At about 11:30pm I was 6.5cm dilated and 80% effaced. Things had sped up and so we thought that I might be doing some delivering around 2 or 3am. So we went to sleep. The contractions started to get worse and so we upped the epidural amount but we were on our way!

At about 4am they checked again and uh oh....I was only 7cm dilated, although 90% effaced and -1 station. Things were slowing down.

At 6:30am they checked again, and I was at 8cm dilated, 90% effaced and +1 station. So Ok. I was making progress but it had sloooooowed way down as this was 7 hours after being 6.5 cm dilated. So then I totally freaked out. I mean I was hysterical, my blood pressure rocketed and I couldn't catch my breath. The nurse got my doctor and I told her how tired I was and did she think I was ever going to get to 10cm. She said she couldn't tell me for sure but if I was done we could do a c-section and call it stalled labor. She left and Jason and I talked and I called my parents and I was just so exhausted. At this point I had been in labor for 32 hours. The first 12 might have been "easy" but my body was still contracting and I hadn't slept hardly at all.

I told the doctor to check again in an hour. At that point I was exactly the same and I was done. There was no way that even if I made it to the pushing part would I have had enough energy to push for the amount of time it was going to take to get her out. I had gotten close, but in this game close doesn't cut it.

So we told her that were ready for the c-section and to just get it done. From that point they stopped the pitocin to get it out of my system and who knows, maybe my body would have kicked it into gear. They checked back with me at about 8am, I had still made no progress and so we were a go for surgery.

I was so scared. I have never been in a hospital let alone had surgery done.

I was shaking so hard when they took me to the room. The anesthesiologist was great and he kept me pretty calm telling me what was happening for all the things they were doing. When we got the room I was already totally numb and so they were like you move a little to get over to the surgery bed. And I was like sure. Then I didn't move anywhere, so I was like. umm...maybe not.

They got me moved over to the surgery bed, and started doing the prep work. And I was shaking a lot. And it was pretty fucking scary. But then they finished up that and suddenly Jason was in the room and things got started. We kind of felt like we were on a episode of ER because there was a med student in the room and they kept asking questions and going what is that or what would you do here. And I kept wondering what they were doing as I bet it would have been fascinating to see what was going on. Gross but pretty cool.

It didn't take long before they said, ok you are going to feel a lot of pressure here. And I did. And then a baby started crying. And the doctor said, "I'd say Little Lucy is here but she's not very little!" I started crying because I could hear her crying and I could hear everyone talking about her. Another doctor in my practice said, "You look just like your mom!".

Soon they told Jason they could come over to see her and told him to guess the weight. I couldn't hear what he said, and then they said, nope 9-6. And I said, "9-6?" and they said no....10-6! I laughed and said to myself, "Well I win!" Gotta love having the biggest baby among friends who all have big babies. Eventually Jason brought her over to me and I couldn't believe that she was finally here. She was wonderfully wonderful :).

From there we rolled into a recovery room where they tested their blood sugar. I tried to breast feed and while it didn't work it was nice for her to get a chance to know my skin. They said if her blood sugar was under 40 she would have to go straight to the NICU, if it was 40-55 we would want to give her a bottle of formula to pump it up, and if it was over 55 we were good to go. The nurse tested and it was 35. I was thinking, "Oh no!!! She just got here don't take her from me." The nurse said when it's under 40 they do two tests and she just had to get another nurse. This nurse tested it and she measured 42. So we did the formula and after a 3rd test her blood sugar was up in the 80s. Before we went to our room there was one more test and her blood sugar was 56, so right above the cutoff. The NICU said it was fine for her to be with us but we would be testing her blood sugar ever 3 hours for the next 24 hours.

From there they wheeled us upstairs, and she was with us. More stories from the hospital to come. But Miss Lucille Jean is here, she's wonderful and she's made Jason and I so flipping happy.

There will be lots of pictures of her at my smugmug account. This gallery will have all of her hospital pictures in it. Enjoy!

Little baby cuteness

Little baby cuteness, originally uploaded by LeahC.

We're going to the hospital and we're not leaving until they give us a baby

Alright, about an hour until we head to the hospital for what ended up being a very planned birth. At 10:30 we will check in to Prentice Day Spa and Baby Center. Sometime tonight they'll start pushing the pitocin and then sometime in the next 24 hours a baby will pop out.

Bing.

Bang.

Baby.

Or something like that.

For the last nine plus months, we've really been pretty much focused on getting the baby out of Leah's uterus happy and healthy. We haven't done a ton to deal with the baby when she comes out and becomes our responsibility. I mean, sure, we've bought all the stuff we need and prepared a very lovely room for her to sleep and poop in, but we haven't done a ton to ready ourselves for raising a real, live human.

How do we raise a young lady who's adventurous, clever, interesting, freethinking, active, fun, happy, healthy...basically, how do you not screw up a kid? I dunno. I guess we'll just have to do our best. For now, however, the bigger question is: how do we change a diaper. Or feed a baby. Or...any of that crap. You can bet we'll be leaning pretty heavily on the nurses over the next couple of days. I envision a lot of:

Nurse: I'm not sure if you noticed, but your baby's crying.

Me: I'm sorry, what now?

Nurse: You might want to change the diaper.

Me: Diaper?

Nurse: Diaper.

Me: Diaper?

Nurse: *sigh*

But luckily babies give you lots of practice with the feeding and diaper changing early on, so expertise is pretty much guaranteed after a few weeks (yay?). And the whole raising a decent human thing? I guess we'll just have to figure that out as we go along.

Like Marathon Training?

So today is the big day and I was a little bit (ok a lot bit) anxious last night. It was almost the same feeling I have as before a big race. So it got me questioning how similar this pregnancy was to a summer filled with marathon training.

I always thought that the two things would be very similar. You train your body to go through something horrible and wonderful at the same time. With racing you run speed workouts, you run long runs, you run some races for practice. When race day comes you are prepared to toe the line even if you are nervous because all the work you had done for 6 months has you ready.

With this pregnancy I would have to say I feel like I'm toeing the line for a marathon without having done one single run. Aside from the fact that you can't really prepare for the first time you are going through childbirth, but it's more than that. This pregnancy has been maybe not the most fun thing (really....I weigh what?) and holy hell do I miss running and jeans that can button, but in general it's been super freakin' easy. I have zero, yeah you ready that right, swelling in my hands and feet. Well maybe not zero as my wedding rings became a bit uncomfortable, but very very slight. I can still walk around with the best of them, I wake up to go to the bathroom only about once a night and I'm easily sleeping 8-9 hours per night.

I have talked to other people that are 41 weeks pregnant or at least at the end of their pregnancy and they are so uncomfortable and have had enough pre labor signs that they might be more prepared for labor than someone like me who hasn't.

Add to the fact that if this was a race, when you cross the finish line they hand you something that is literally going to change you life for. ever. I mean not that I didn't know this going in. But it's not just getting through a race. It's starting a new kind of race.

I keep saying, "Oh this is the last time this apartment is going to be so quiet." or "This is the last time we are going to be able to go do this or that". What I have to start doing is thinking about all the firsts that we are going to get to do and how exciting that is going to be. I have a giant fear that Jason and I are going to lose who we are in this process and our relationship will change. And we probably will change, but it doesn't mean we aren't going to change for the better. We have to still make time for each other otherwise we will become what we despise. The people that talk about their loved ones with a hint of annoyance. Or talk about parenting like it's a chore. Jason and I are so excited to be parents and drag that little one all over this city doing fun things. We don't really lead a very glamorous lifestyle and most of the things we like to do will be more fun with a kid in tow anyways. Zoo lights? The beach? Gay Pride Parade? Anything else happening in the city? Hell. To. The. Yeah.

And so like marathon training? Not for me anyways. Marathon racing perhaps. But at the end of this race, instead of JUST being sore and tired, we will meet a Little Lucille Jean. And I'll be a Mom. Wait...who the hell let me be a Mom? WHERE ARE THE ADULTS?

<14 hours.

Less than 36 hours

Well these posts aren't too exciting as Lucy can't seem to get her head in the game and figure out how to come here all on her own. I am being induced tomorrow night at 10:30pm unless something happens between now and then that makes the baby come out. I am doubting that and so we are just counting down till tomorrow so that if she comes early it'll be like a fun little surprise.

Yesterday we had an appointment just to make sure it was ok to wait until Sunday night for the induction and everything looks great. The tech at my doctors appointment was wonderful and said that the baby looked perfect and although she's going to be a big baby she looks great. The doctor also calmed me down giving me some recent weights of babies they have delivered recently. Not that I could do anything about it anyways and we say the bigger she is the more of her there is to love. That's what I'm telling myself anyways, although I don't know if my vagina is in agreement with me.

I had another internal exam and the doctor said that I'm now maybe 1.5cm dialated. I wanted to tell her that she doesn't need to grasp at straws to make me feel better :). Also I'm about 50% effaced and I hadn't been anything effaced previously so I guess she's moving down a bit. When I got home I'm pretty sure...and here is where I'm questioning how detailed I want to get on this blog but what the hell...that the bloody show they talk about happened which was gross and scary. But I totally thought that it was a sign that labor was starting right then. I called the doctor and she said that it was probably due to the exam that got that stuff started. So yeah. I got that going for me. Just no labor.

We think that the baby is going to have to be ok with cat fur as everything in our apartment has at least one cat hair on it. Dagny the Wonder Cat has taken to sleeping on the changing table and inside the little bouncer that we got. She's going to be in for quite the shock next week I think. Anyone else out there with cats and new babies?

Everything in the apartment is ready. The bags are ready although I'm guessing since I have no idea what to expect I'm not going to have anything that I really need. What did you bring to the hospital? What did you find that you wish you had or that you had that made your time in the hospital that much easier?

I'm going to try and get some sleep today and tonight and tomorrow given that I'm going to be up for many hours starting Sunday night so I'm going to store up some time, although I know that's not really possible. So napping and football today and napping and football tomorrow. Good thing the Bears are so boring this year as they are super easy to nap to.

So that is all. Just waiting and waiting and waiting.....

Two Knitting Projects

Over the summer I took two knitting classes. One to learn how to make a lacy ishbel scarf thingy and then one to learn how to do fair isle colorwork stuff. For the later my friend Jean and I took a class to make a Christmas stocking. The big plan was to make one for Lucy, Jason and myself but things got put down and so only Lucy will get one this year.

Here are some pictures of the Ishbel:

And of the Stocking:

For more details about each project you can check me out on Ravelry if you are a member of that. My username is LeahC (shocking) :) ).

Mini Contractions(?), Dreams and Teddy Bears

Last night as I was sitting on the couch I was again hit with some lower abdomen pain type things. I looked in the pregnancy books I have and these could be a sign of early labor. So that's cool. I don't know why I only get them at one time of the day when sitting in one position but there they are. Jason kept his hand on my belly and said he thought it was getting harder as I would get uncomfortable. So who knows. As soon as I went to bed they stopped though, or I was just too tired to feel anything.

Last night I had two crazy ass dreams. The first was the baby was here but it was time to take her home from the hospital and I was worried it was too cold out. So I put her back in (yes. I know it's fucking weird) and then birthed her again when I got home. What the what? Seriously.

The other dream I had was that I went back to work the day after I gave birth. And after work I was like, wait what the fuck am I doing? How could I have not take the day after the birth off? How is the baby eating? I wanted to breast feed. So I went running back to the hospital and when I got there I was like..um, yeah I'm back.

These dreams are not making me feel any more confident about my abilities to parent. At all.

Today my sister-in-law goes in for her scheduled c-section. I think it's at 11:30. I'm not going to lie, I'm a little jealous as I thought Lucy would be here first, but I can't wait to see pictures of that little one! It will always be fun I think for our kids to be almost the exact same age. Little Alice will always be able to do the, "I'm older than youuuuuuuuuu" routine. That'll work until they are about 30 and then Lucy can be all, "oooooh I'm still only 29!"

Jean and her son Ethan are coming over to visit this afternoon if Ethan is feeling up to it as he had his first round of shots yesterday afternoon and so might be a cranky baby and not feeling up to it. It'll be fun to have some company this afternoon so I'm looking forward to that.

Early doctor appointment tomorrow morning for another full round of tests to see how she's doing in there. Assuming all is fine and she's just clueless, we'll be enjoying one last weekend alone and then Sunday night we head in. Kinda scary. I'm wondering if I'm not any closer to labor Sunday night if I can just take the el downtown. I mean seriously what's the point of driving or taking a cab? The train won't be crowded at that time of night. Ok Ok, we'll get a ride. I'm just saying not much of a point I don't think.

Anyone know of any companies in Chicagoland that do teddy bear restoration? We went to this doll place on the north side but they only worked with dolls only and not plush animals and I'm sorry to say the woman working there was a little bitchy. She didn't even ask how old Charlie the Bear was! He's 50! Which I think is kind of impressive. Our plan right now if we can't find a teddy bear hospital is to take out the stuffing and handwash him and then restuff him and patch him up. So if you don't know any restoration places what would you stuff a teddy bear with? Any tips or suggestions would be appreciated.

So yep. Still pregnant. But I'm beating the shit out of Mario Galaxy so I got that going for me.

Thought Maybe. Then Not So Much.

Last night I was sitting on the couch and Lucy was doing her usual night time dance routine and all of a sudden I was all, "WHOA, ouch."

I was thinking this is it. This is labor. It's going to happen tonight. Yeah. No. Not so much labor I guess as her just moving around and hitting me in some bad places that caused a lot of pain. What the hell, how am I supposed to know what a contraction is.

So then I was all excited because I kept thinking that it would happen that night.  And again, not so much.

The biggest problem last night was that she would not stop moving, which is totally a good sign, but oh my god she was an animal in there. I couldn't get comfortable in bed, and laid awake for many hours wishing she would go to sleep so that I could as well. So. Not too good of a nights sleep and with me tossing and turning and Lucy beating on my stomach which has Jason's hand on it most night he didn't get much sleep either. I can take a nap of course but I feel really bad because he has a full day of work he has to get through.

It's looking like Jason is almost going to take the entire month of December off. His company gives a week of paid paternity leave (actually it's a week of paid leave for men and woman who have new babies, and then for women the short term disability kicks in) which is awesome and then he has a bunch of vacation saved up, so it's looking like he'll take the next eight days off as well. So this is his last week at work for awhile it's looking like.


Today I'm going with my Dad to take a 50 year old teddy bear named Charlie in for surgery. This is my Dad's teddy bear from when he was a kid and we all feel that Lucy should have it. However, Charlie is in critical shape and needs a lot of work and apparently Dad and Sue found a place that restores such things.

So it's Wednesday December 2nd. 5 days at the longest until we meet Lucy. 

Progress Lacking but an End in Sight

Well. I'm not surprised but I'm no farther along than I was 2 weeks ago. Still only 1cm dilated and nothing else is happening down there. No softening, no head moving down anywhere, no effacing. I have literally had 0 contractions. I mean nothing. No braxton hicks, nothing.

So. Yeah.

But we have a plan now and it helps to have that at least in my head. We go back to the doctor on Friday for another ultrasound, NST& checkup as that will be my exact 41 week date. If all looks ok, in other words that don't need to induce right away the induction will start at 10:30pm Sunday night. I know I know, there are a lot of people out there that are against inducing, but Jason and I are not. The baby is already measuring very big and frankly I'm done with being pregnant and so I'm looking forward to it.

The time sounded weird to me at first, but now I'm happy with it. The doctor said they don't like to just pump me full of lots of pitocin and would rather try to have it take some time so that my body can maybe figure out what it's supposed to be doing with just a little nudge. My doctor will be at the hospital on Monday and so with me going in on Sunday night I'm pretty much guaranteed to have her there to deliver the baby which I'm happy about.

If the baby is born on Monday her birthday would be 12/7 and what's cool about that is Jason's birthday is 7/12 so we got that going for us. The non-cool part about that is that we have to wait till Monday. Not that it can't happen on it's own before then, but worst case is the plan laid out for us and we really trust and like our doctor and that's the most important thing.

I never went into this with a set plan of "This is how the birth of my child HAS to go". About 18 months ago I went through some pretty major panic attacks and through that experience learned that as soon as you think something HAS to go a certain way, you can end up panicking and being severely disappointed when it doesn't go that way. Then being upset that you are upset and it's this awesomely bad spiral of badness :). I'm not the best with going with the flow, but I'm getting better and the thing I did to make that better was to stop saying, I HAVE to do something only one way. One of the best things for me to do is to ask, ok, this is how I would like something to go, but what if it doesn't? Then what? Knowing that the other options or outcomes to a certain situation are laid out and aren't "bad" is extremely helpful to me.

Yes I had to go to a therapist to learn to stop saying I HAVE to do this. Those months a year and a half ago might not have been the most fun in our household and I would say that they might have been the worst of my life. But I would never take them back because I am a better and calmer person for it. This situation would have been out of control I think had I not had some internal tools to deal with situations. So Yay for panic attacks!

Jason took a personal day today in case something went bad and now that it's not we are going to run some errands and then decorate for Christmas tonight. We are going to get the tree after Lucy gets here I think which should be fun. It'll be all decorated for when my mom gets here on the 12th which is perfect.

And so I'm off. And who knows, maybe Lucy will get her head in the game and figure out that she's very uncomfortable and make a move to exit on her own. You never know.

Diagonal

Diagonal, originally uploaded by LeahC.

What to Talk About?

Well how annoying has this blog gotten? I'll give you one guess to guess what I might mention in this post.

Guess yet?

How about now?

Well if you said, "Leah's going to talk about how she's still pregnant" then you would be correct! DING DING DING!!!!!

I know, this blog used to be filled with all kinds of wittyness, and awesomeness and so on and so forth. Now it's just repeating the same thing over and over.

LeahC is still fat and pregnant and not happy about it.

I should have known better to think that she would be early or on time. My family tends to make big babies that arrive late. Which is awesome. In addition to being late, I'm pretty sure she's going to be giant sized. I think my adviser said that his son was over 11lbs at birth (seriously...he was born in Switzerland when he was working at CERN) and so Jason is wondering if we can beat that one. Oh please I hope not. 

Not much going on today. Reading, walking, knitting, mario galaxying and patiently (!!!) waiting for labor. Tomorrow we go to the doc so we'll see if something interesting is happening. Happy Monday All.

Lucy Room Pictures

We finished Lucy's room about a week ago and I realized I had yet to put pictures of it up here. My tripod broke and so not as clear as my photos of her room usually are, but you'll get the idea.

These are a few of her crib area. The print above her bed was purchased at the Wells Street art fair and the cubbie mobile plays, "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" and was purchased by Lucy's grandpa. Although her Baba (my mom/ex-wife of grandpa...Baba is Ukrainian for grandma) would like Lucy to know that she saw it on Amazon a long time ago but didn't purchase it and so really she wins. Yes it's all about winning in my family. My entire childhood was me asking, "Is this a winning game?"

This corner is directly across from her crib and hosts several of the prints we got including room for many to go up in the future. The rocking chair was also purchased at an art fair and is one of the most comfortable rocking chairs I have sat in. I think Lucy will like being rocked in it. I love the little reading light next to the chair and am realizing that Lucy's room is way way cooler than our room and that we might have gone overboard.

We got this light fixture at Ikea and think it's pretty fun and makes the light a little less harsh in the room.

This is her changing table with two prints of little pigs over the top shelf which we got at an art fair in Bloomington, Indiana. Right now Teddy is holding Lucy's place and we are using him to practice diapering/any baby swings, car seats etc. No I'm not kidding that we strapped him into the car seat. And it was super cute.

This dresser was actually my Dad's grandparents dresser. Then it was his, then it was mine. Then we refinished it and now it'll be Lucy's. The clock on the right was given to Jason and I from my mom for our wedding and it's supposed to do fun things on the hour. It's supposed to play a song and the face opens up and turns around but it's not working for some reason. The print is another one we got at the Wells Street art fair.

This final one is just looking into the room from the hallway.

Did we do too much? Probably.
Is her room way cooler than any other room in the house? Yes.
Am I worried about when we move out and then landlord seeing that green paint? Absolutely.
Are we totally excited for Lucy to arrive? More than you can imagine.
Is mom totally bored out of her mind and wondering what the hell she's going to do this week? Yes. With a capital 'Y'.

Earlier today she moved so much and we don't know if she realizes she'll be so much more comfortable out here with us as I'm guessing those long legs and giant head are running out of room.

So I guess this is just preparation for me to get ready to not be able to control every little thing like I like right now.  I'm just such a planner and I'm always on time for things and so on and I'm guessing sometimes I'm just going to have to let things go if they don't go exactly according to plan. Maybe Lucy is already teaching her mom a lesson. Maybe....but maybe Lucy will just have to learn to be on time in the future. Not even here yet and already a Daddy's little girl.

The Stuffing Didn't Do It

We had a wonderful thanksgiving yesterday at my Aunt's house. There is a story that my cousin's wife's sister (got all that) went to thanksgiving there two years ago and then at about midnight went into labor. AND she had gone to the doctor a few days before and they told her that she wasn't even close to and so nothing to worry about. I thought maybe there was something special in the stuffing that induced labor. Apparently my Aunt is batting .500 as I am clearly not in labor and I am thinking the stuffing has made it through my system.

And so we continue to wait and hope and not be in labor or have one single fucking sign of starting the labor process. I really really want her to come on her own or at least have some progress before I have to be induced in 10 days. I just worry that there won't be any progress and I'm starting to worry that she's going to come out giant sized. Although, I was giant sized and look at how perfect I turned out, so I suppose that will be ok.

Today I'm going downtown to take some pictures of the holiday shopping crowds and walk through the German market and meet the soon to be dad for lunch. Maybe black friday crowds will do it....although I bet that it's calmed down a bit by this time given that the crazy starts at like 4am. So the crazies that did got out should be back home and napping by this point.

Should be a pretty fun weekend. With no plans I'm guessing we'll just be enjoying each other's company and staring at my belly hoping for something different to happen with it.

Run Her Out?

Jason and I just went for a nice little walk in some cold weather. Feels like winter is almost upon us, which is perfect timing since we got our firewood supply delivered yesterday.

So on this walk it was a little chilly and I was like hey, I'm wearing running pants and running shoes let's see what happens if I run a little. So I started running, and might have started yelling, "I'M WINNING". Winning what? The crazy pregnant lady race? Yeah.

So I ran from about Racine to Ashland, about 1/2 mile. Aside from shin splints felt good. It would be funny if it worked and my water broke in the middle of Thanksgiving dinner, right? If anything else, just to see my Dad and Jason's reaction. I think so too.

We are very much enjoying Jason having the day off. Watching some Indiana Jones this morning, and now watching some Turkey day football. Leaving in about 2 hours to go pick up my Dad and Sue to then head to Downers Grove for yummy dinner.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Hates Lateness

I put in an order for firewood on Monday and the original plan was they were going to deliver it yesterday between 2 and 4pm. 3:55 rolled around and so I gave the place a call just saying I was checking in and seeing if they were going to still show up. They said that holiday traffic was killing them and the guy would be there, but just be late. Eventually I talked to the driver at about 4:50 who was still stuck on the Kennedy and asked to reschedule for today at 9am. No problem on this end.

It's now 9:09 and he's not here yet. Granted he said 9:30 at the latest, and so I'm not mad yet. However, I just think that 9:09 is later than 9am even if you did say the latest would be 9:30. How about a call saying, yep, still on our way or something.

I HATE LATENESS. I know there is nothing you can do about traffic (or babies not being ready to come out on time or early) but when you reschedule you should be on the phone calling me if you are going to be late. Now I am going to have to be the bad guy on the phone and be like yeah your delivery guys isn't here yet and I have to leave at 10:30. Yes I know he might still be here in the next few minutes. That doesn't make me any less crazy.

Lots of errands to run with my Dad today. I'm sure he's going to be super excited to go into a Jewel, Carters, Be By Baby, Target....all the day before Thanksgiving, let's see if we can make his head actually explode. Maybe most people have left for the holiday already and so it won't be that bad. Wishful thinking? Probably.

Thanksgiving is tomorrow and while it's my favorite holiday of the year all I can think of is baby and so I keep forgetting that I'll soon be eating some delicious Turkey dinner. So Happy Thanksgiving everyone and think good baby coming thoughts!

editors note: the firewood guy showed up at 9:25 so not late which is good. 

Feeling Good, End Date and Belly Pictures!

So I'm feeling pretty good these days, I mean not good in the sense that I feel the baby is going to come out. But rather that I feel exactly perfect like the baby isn't moving anywhere uncomfortable.

Doctors appointment today went really well. Had an ultrasound and everything looked great, another NST and although Lucy started off sleeping soundly she woke up and passed. I'm still only 1cm dilated though which isn't awesome. I got the go ahead to head to Thanksgiving dinner but just to watch how much salt I eat. IT'S THANKSGIVING. LEAVE ME ALONE. Although....my blood pressure was 118/84 which is the lowest it's been all year. I also dropped some weight so goes to show that I was probably retaining some water. I've been drinking a ton of water this week and really watching the salt so apparently it helps. We asked what is going to happen if Lucy doesn't greet us on her own and we found out that I would be induced on December 7th. So we got that going for us. Anything that happens, the baby will be here in less than 2 weeks. Which is exciting to think about.

Here is what I look like now. A nice normal picture and then me being a little wacky, cause really when you are carrying around a basketball under your shirt you can't help but be a little wacky.

Today is a pretty lazy day for me. We are getting some firewood delivered this afternoon and I'm just reading (currently reading Dracula which is good although been slow going), knitting, doing some things with photos. Tomorrow I have a lot of errands to run which my Dad is going to join me on, and then that's it. My doctor is on call Thursday and Friday so maybe I'll go into labor at Thanksgiving and get to have my doc be there to deliver. I hope so! Maybe enough Turkery will push her right out.

So yes we wait. Lucy COME ON OUT! WE ARE READY TO MEET YOU!

We Are All Ready

Well....with all the stuff. With the being parents part maybe not so much.

Jason and I had just about the best weekend. We had planned on spending all of Saturday walking around the city and enjoying that. But turns out when you don't sleep enough and are 39 weeks pregnant that's not so easy to do. But we did go to Yolk at the River North location for breakfast and if my doctor is reading this, I had the fucking oatmeal ok! No Salt! Even though they have the best egg breakfast in town, I declined. The oatmeal was delicious though, so there's that.

From there we walked to Dearborn and then to Lincoln Park. Along the way we took a belly picture at the same location that we took one at 20-something weeks. It's still living on my camera though so I'll post it tomorrow.

We stopped in Lincoln Park for a short rest and the stopped at starbucks at Wells and North and then as I was sitting in comfy chairs and sleepy we decided to just train home. After getting home I passed out for about 3 hours. Which was *awesome*. We spent the rest of the night doing *nothing* (yes mom, I know I have to finish those thank you cards...tonight for sure!). We watched a lot of football and then watched the first two Indiana Jones movies. Those movies really are the best. I started a few new knitting projects and have been in a knitting craze. I have a project 99.9% completed for the new niece we have arriving next week and I'm thinking I can get this other thing done before she gets here as well. Hence. Maniac. But maniac in a good way. I seem to get crazy about things and then I'll put it down and then get crazy about something else. I'm guessing when Lucy is here the photography will bump back up a bit.

Yesterday I got up at 6 and from that point on didn't stop moving. We had a bunch of things to do around the house including a bit more rearranging of our bedroom to get the portable crib in there so Lucy can be near us for the first few weeks to a month. We cleaned off our back porch and can now put our order of firewood in now that there is somewhere to put it! My Dad and stepmom came over around noon and we watched football and then we hung all of the prints in the baby's room. Even though I was so tired I had a really hard time falling asleep and then spent most of the night fairly uncomfortable. Yay for pregnancy!

So yeah. Done. Done? Maybe? I think we need a *few* more things but other than that we are good to go. I'll take some pictures of the finished baby's room tonight. I know we did way more than you have to do, but it helps my crazy and anything that can calm that down is a good thing.

Tomorrow morning is another appointment with an accompanying ultrasound (high blood pressure is keeping these coming). So I'm guessing we'll get to hear that her head is in the 90whatever percentile and I have too much fluid and blah blah blah. She's been a little moving crazy thing all weekend and so I know she's doing fine. Maybe just anxious to come out?

So here we go. Any day now!

Under the Bench We Sat On

Under the Bench We Sat On, originally uploaded by LeahC.

Needs a New Knitting Project

Yesterday I finished the last of three projects that I had started over the summer. Yes. That's right, over the summer. They shouldn't have taken me so long but I would get into a bad state on all of them and not want to fix any of them and so I would just put them all aside. Then I would pull one out and rip out the bad rows and continue one until I screwed up again and so on. Eventually they all got done with the exception of the baby sweater I was knitting. I ripped that whole thing out but used some of the yarn to make a little baby hat. I just have to get a button for the chin strap and I think it's going to be really cute.

Last night I finished the Christmas stocking I was making for Lucy. I was so proud of myself, it was the first colorwork I had done and I think I had done a pretty good job on it. I knitted her name through it and everything! Then I went to iron it to try and block it out and what's that....oh wait...WHAT BURNED? You can fucking burn things with an iron? Of course I burned right through her name on the white part of the stocking. This whole thing sent me into hysterics which would have been a funny story if those hysterics had sent me into labor, but they didn't and so the story is not funny and is just tragic. Ok, not *tragic* as it's a fucking stocking but it made me sad anyways. Jason tried to scrape the burned parts off the stocking and in the process scraped holes into it. SO I reinforced those parts with just some yarn and a needle, and it really does look a lot better. So Lucy will have the crappy stocking and I'll work on ones for Jason and myself and make them all perfect and it will just be the start of me ruining her life forever. The problem with me and knitting is I hate having mistakes, and I will rip things out if I see that I did a perl instead of a knit so every time I look at that stupid stocking I'm going to throw up a little bit in my mouth.

Anyways.

I also knitted an Ishbel. Which actually came out beautifully and I'm excited for it to get colder, and for me to fit into my black pea coat so that I can wear it. I'm going to take some pictures of these projects today and I'll start a smugmug gallery with all my knittings.

Had a meeting at Obtiva yesterday and have a full plate of things to work on today which is good. Looks like it'll be a nice day today too so maybe go meet up with my Dad for lunch or something as well.

Happy Friday all!

Bright Lights

Bright Lights, originally uploaded by LeahC.

I Know It Means Nothing...

but I say it's something.

Went to the doctor yesterday for our ...let's see 38 week appointment, even though it's closer to 39 weeks than 38 weeks, but what. ever. Now I understand that I'm not even at term yet, but that doesn't mean that I wouldn't like to see some progress in the baby is going to come out at some point. We had another Non-Stress Test I guess because she failed the one before, and perhaps because they have had to keep an eye on my blood pressure throughout the entire pregnancy.

Doctor came in and gave me a lovely little internal exam just because I wanted to see if I was dilated at all. And yay! I am currently 1cm dilated. Now I realized that I could have my water break and still be 1cm dilated, or go another 3 weeks at this state, but I don't care. It means something is happening down there and so an end is in sight. As we get closer to the end I get more and more freaked out. Obviously our lives are going to change forever and I know in a good way, but it's still scary.

I got a little talking to about my lack of drinking water and what I have been eating the past week because I had gained some weight and my blood pressure had gone back up. I realized that I've basicallly not had any water and have eaten like *crap* for the past many many days. And so we are reeling all that in. I have to really really watch my salt intake over the next 2 weeks, and pump up the water drinking. So I did that yesterday and shockingly felt a lot better.

I had a lovely afternoon with my friend Jean after the appointment. We had lunch and then got pedicures and just had a really relaxing time chatting and so on. Jean had a baby boy about 8 weeks ago so always fun to hear what she has to say about the baby growing and so on.

So here we are. Under double digits to go...meaning 9 days to go. At least until the due date. Maybe I should start counting down to a week late, so that if I go before then I'll be all WHEEEEEE. Nah, I'm sticking with the due date. So yeah. 9 days. 

The final month of pregnancy as told through Star Wars, Part III

I'll know Lucy's my daughter if, after a harrowing trip through the birth canal only to arrive in this cold, foreign world, she looks up at me with a wink and a smile and says, "Just like beggar's canyon back home."

Hell yeah!

Still Nothing

Not shocking I know. And I know I'm a broken record with the, "Yeah there is still no baby and no progress towards baby." But I can't help it, I want her here so badly and so every day that nothing happens is killer. As soon as we found out that she had turned head down it's like time stopped moving.

We have another appointment on Wednesday where we will get another NST, and I'm guessing have the doctor tell us that there is no progress down there and so we will continue to wait.

Jason does have a pretty big meeting at work tomorrow, so maybe I'll go into labor right in the middle of that. Also I don't have a bag packed yet, so maybe my water will break, I'll have nothing packed, Jason will be in a meeting and you can see everyone just freak out. Ok, probably won't happen...but you never know. Shit, I should probably pack a bag as that would be a bad thing to not have ready to go.

This weekend we finished up getting everything put together, purchased and the only thing left to do is get some art prints for the baby's room framed. They are in at the frame shop and we are just waiting for the frames to come in. I'll take some pictures when it's totally done. I know that I'm going into overkill mode as a lot of this shit isn't necessary to have a baby come home but I like to be overly prepared, it calms me down a little bit.

So yes. We are still waiting. 12 days out from the due date.

The final month of pregnancy as told through Star Wars, Part II

I don't know who you are or where you've come from, but from now on you'll do as I say, okay?


Yeah, Lucy! That's right. Once you're out of that womb, you're on my time and you'll do as I say! Daaaaaaamn straight.

Wait, no. Stop. Wait, don't cry. Stop. Stop crying. Shit.

Fine, I take it all back. Want a cookie?

The final month of pregnancy as told through Star Wars

And so, with just over two weeks to go before Lucy is due, we turn to the Great Bard. Through his immortal words, we tell the story of Lucy's final days in utero.
"Just for once... let me... look on you with my OWN eyes"

Soon enough, Lu. Soon enough.

Remember When I Slept?

Oh and I was soooooo cocky. I can't believe I'm getting 9 hours of uninterrupted sleep, I'm like the best pregnant lady ever. Yeah. Well that's all gone down the shit hole. Still not as bad as it could be I'm guessing and not as bad as it will be in a few weeks that's for damn sure. But our bed has gotten very uncomfortable and Jason won't believe me.

I woke up at 2:30 to pee and then flopped around for like an hour because I couldn't get comfortable, Then when I got up at 6 my back was in a world of uncomfy.

We got this really comfortable bed about 18 months ago and when we got it, it was like magic. Now it seems that it's all sunken in in the middle and I'm frustrated because it wasn't cheap at all. We have a warrenty on it and I have half a mind to go in there and be like, well I used to like it AND NOW IT SUCKS. Jason still thinks it's awesome though so maybe it's just the pregnancy, which isn't totally unreasonable.

I think I way way over did it on Tuesday because I totally felt like poop yesterday. I was so exhausted in the morning (after a pretty good night's sleep) and fell on to my couch and fell asleep. I'm frustrated, but on the other hand that's exactly why I wanted to work at home part time. Some days I know I'm not going to be able to dictate to my body what I want it to do and so being home is a great thing.

Today I'm going to spend most of the day working at a coffee shop/library/other coffee shops. Just going to try and get out and about a little bit more today. Hopefully the crappy nights sleep doesn't effect that plan too much.

17

Maybe I'll just title each post from now on with how many days until the baby comes. But that's dumb cause what if she comes two weeks late, then instead of 17 days to go it's going to be more like 31 days to go and that thought makes me want to vomit a little bit. Although, I guess 31 days is probably the most that it could be....so there's that.

I fear that my fingers are starting to swell up as my wedding rings aren't as comfortable as they usually are. And by that I mean when I can finally slide them off, there is a nice little dent going around my finger. I feel naked without my rings on though and so I don't want to take them off so we'll see how long I can make it. It's not that bad....yet.

We had a great evening last night with my Dad and stepmom coming over for dinner and some Dead Space game playing. Before that I made my Dad go for a walk with me. Did about 3 miles and I think I'm still walking at a pretty good pace. Holy hell do I miss running though. I talked a lot about training for the marathon and I think my Dad was very, "Yeah Yeah Yeah....stop talking about running" Ok, but if I stop talking about running I'm going to start talking about the baby's head in the 93rd percentile and you've already heard that a time or two...or a thousand.

Today going to do my usual work in the mornings and baby prep things in the afternoon. My Dad took all of the prints we found for the baby's room into a frame shop yesterday and we are going to make some of the frames. So if they can get the wood cut I'll go with him to do that this afternoon.

This weekend Jason and I are going to go get all the final things that we need for the baby. There are just a few more things that have to get done for me to feel like we are really ready, then we can really play the waiting game.

Last night she was *crazy* I am so active during the day that I don't feel her as much, so last night I layed down in bed and all of a sudden it was like a monster in my belly. It was hilarious. I put my Kindle down on my stomach and it almost flew off. Can't wait to see those kicks and rolls in the world!

So yeah. 17. or 31. Whatever.

And The Weight Lifts

...and not in the way that I don't have a giant belly anymore as Lucy is still all comfy cozy inside, but rather that everything is fine with our little chubby cheeked little girl and now we just play the waiting game. 

Yesterday we had our 37 week appointment and had to do another Non-Stress Test. I have been so clenched since last week's failing NST and so was worried about the appointment. We were in the waiting room and Lucy was going crazy and I was thinking, oh perfect she's going to move now and then she's going to sleep again for the test. However we got into the room and got all my vitals down. I dropped a pound and my blood pressure was again lower! It was 128/80 which is damn close to normal! So that was good. Then they got the sensors on me, I had some juice and then we started the test. And what do you know, Lucy did a little dance. And by little dance I mean crazy town. Which was nice. The doctor showed us the difference between last week's graph and today's and now I understand why they sent us to triage given that there was basically a flat line last week.

We also talked about the fluid levels that I was so worried about and the doctor we saw yesterday wasn't worried about it at all and said we didn't need another ultrasound. I asked for some numbers even if I didn't really know what they meant. She said we were at 21 and that she starts to maybe get worried if that number gets to 24. She wasn't worried about it at all and since I'm not having any kinds of contractions it doesn't look like a problem at all.

I just feel so so so much better. But I have that feeling after a big presentation or test or something when you are just drained. I think worry takes a lot out of a person.

So now we wait. They did an internal exam and there is no dialating yet, but that's to be expected I think since I'm only just past 37 weeks. So right. Now we wait. I know after being all excited about knowing the exact date and time that she's coming, she's going to end up being late. As long as she's healthy I don't care, I just want to meet her already!

Yay Jason!

Last week Jason talked to his boss about the unfairness of his review since he didn't get a raise for no good reason. His boss talked to his boss and they came back with a 6% raise as well as an end date for the current project he is on and an actual new position in the analytics department that he'll be moving to. So yay! and a big congratulations to him.

Yesterday I did my 1/2 day of work and then my friend Jean and her 6 week old little one Ethan came to visit. We had some lunch and then we went for a walk over by the lake front path. It was a great time, even if Ethan got a little cranky for about 15 minutes.  A new diaper, some foods and some walking with mom calmed him down and knocked him right out. Jean also left me some baby knitting books that I'm going to get some patterns from. I ripped out the sweater that I was making and so I need a new baby project. I'm about done with this Ishbel scarf thing, and then I have to finish this stocking that I was making for Lucy for Christmas. But I like have 3 projects going at once because inevitabley I'm going to screw one up and thus need to put it down for a bit. The bad thing is that then I end up with 3 screwed up projects and I don't remember why they are screwed up. Anyways. Yes. new baby knitting project.

I'm considered full term today which is very exciting. So any day now Lucy. Any. Day. Our appointment next Tuesday morning got moved to Monday morning because of the NST failure I guess. I don't really know, but apparently it's so important that we come in a day earlier that now we won't see our primary care doctor this week. So that's a bit annoying. Not that all the doctors aren't good, it's just frustrating because it's easier to just always have to deal with the same person. I'm guessing I'll be going to triage again or at least I'm just going to plan it because then when it does happen I won't be so stressed out. Tip from my friend Lydia which I think is a good one.

So Happy Friday all. Jason is going to Bloomington tomorrow for the IU/Wisconsin football game with his good friend. I am not at all jealous about that trip. All I know is that I'm going to have a super good time in Chicago, so there. My only instructions are that I don't go into labor, although I do think it would be funny to call Jason in Bloomington after he's had many beers and be like...actually you need to get home, baby is coming. The freak out would be legendary.

Looks Like Silent Hill

Looks Like Silent Hill, originally uploaded by LeahC.

Always A Little On the High Side

Seriously. I'm going to start to really panic. First it was my blood pressure. It's not high, but it's not normal either, it's just on the high side of normal. Then when the measure the baby on the ultrasounds she's never crazy big, but just a week or two ahead of where she should be (except for her head...wowza!). Then apparently the fluid levels surrounding here aren't too high...they are just on the high side of normal.

GRRRR.

The doctor yesterday said that she wasn't losing sleep over the fluid levels, but it's something she has to keep an eye on because while they don't see any structural problems on the ultrasound it could mean that she doesn't know how to swallow. Awesome. Glad you aren't losing sleep over it doc I'll make sure to rest easy now. And of course if you google that only bad things come up. Ok well not really, but still. So now I have to have yet another ultrasound at 38 weeks. I'm so sick of getting these. Yeah they were really cool the first few times around but now I'm like, yeah, that's her with her chubby chubby cheeks. I just want her to be here so I don't really care about the pictures. We did find out that her head is in the 93rd percentile, yeah that's right she's got a big brain! And her legs were in the 90something percentile. Both Jason and I are really tall and I, along with most of my family, has a big head atop our shoulders so it makes sense. Pushing out a head in the 93rd percentile makes less sense, but I'm sure I'll be fine.

Yesterday I also had to do a Non-Stress Test for the first time. I had no idea I was going to have to do it. As soon as they put the sensors on me, Lucy went straight to sleep. Well apparently the non-movement of the baby was much more of a concern to the doctor than the fluid levels and so she sent me to the triage to have them do some prolonged monitoring. I was a little mean to the nurse because I really thought the NST was bogus in the office and I didn't want to be there. So they hooked me up to monitors and left Jason and I in a teeny room for about an hour. They gave me some ginger ale and Lucy perked up enough for them to send me home. So that was a "fun" little experience. I guess they are going to do these NSTs every week now, and I'm guessing every time she isn't going to move and so I'm going to get to know triage really well.

The only thing that isn't on the high side of normal right now is the positiong of Lucy's head. Sometime in the last two weeks she has managed to turn herself around and so she's head down like she's supposed to be. So no more worries about a planned c-section for right now. I'm hoping she stays that way, I mean with all the fluid that she has to float around in in there who knows what she's going to do.

Shitty shitty night's sleep last night. Crazy dreams and then I woke up to pee at around 1:30 and the dog upstairs would. not. shut. the. fuck. up. I'm sorry. I'm not a dog person, but seriously what is going on up there that you are just letting your dog bark and bark and bark. I think they were home because I could hear them talking...but maybe that was after the barking. Then I think they were having the dog run up and down the fucking hallway plus more barking....maybe...I don't know, but I do know it was *really* annoying. I'm happy Jason was able to sleep through it because he had to get up at 4am this morning to do some contractor work.

Going to do some work this morning and then my friend Jean and her baby Ethan are coming over to visit around lunchtime, which is going to be a great time.

So now we wait until Tuesday at 10am to see what is happening with the baby. This last month is *very* frustrating!

Feeling Overwhelmed

You know that feeling. You have your to do list. And it's long...or at least it seems really long. And so you think, well I could that...or that ... or maybe that item. But instead I'm seeing that there is a Law and Order SVU marathon on so I'll just watch some of that while I figure out where to start. Of course if you just do one thing on the list, you're pretty motivated to do another and eventually you are done or at least feeling like you've accomplished something.

That's where I am right now with the baby coming in about 2.5 weeks. If she came right now..honestly we would be fine. But I want to be a little bit more ready and so there are things that have to be done.

Today is our 36 week appointment. We have an ultrasound scheduled at 3pm (yes...this will be the 5th one...I'm over it) and then we meet with the doctor at 3:45. Like Jason said, we think she might be sitting a little lower (I mean did have to get up twice last night to pee compared to my usual dead to the world sleep for 9 hours that I've been enjoying!) but I don't think she has turned around. I wonder if this would make it harder for them to manually turn her. That's why we are getting another ultrasound, to check and see exactly what is going on in there so that we can have a reasonable estimate for the probability of externally turning her to work out. I thought that we would have a definite feeling of what we should do by this point given that we have had 4 weeks to think about it, but we don't really know. I think that this situation is making the whole baby thing more overwhelming.

ANYWAYS. Don't say overwhelm.

My Dad has been away visiting his sister and his dad for about a week and a half and comes home tomorrow and I'm looking forward to him being back. It's funny, he was gone for 4 years and I only saw him once or twice a year for a few weeks and now that he's been around and we have seen him almost every day, it's like...wait, I haven't seen you in forever! With him back it will help too as now that I'm working part time we can work on getting the baby's room finished in the afternoons.

So that's it. Working part time has been *wonderful*. I do my work stuff in the mornings and have the afternoons off to relax and enjoy myself. So here's to Wednesday!