Tuesday, September 25, 2012

The end is in sight!

Well....We have an end in sight.  SO excited!  We are set to head to the hospital tomorrow evening and will be induced.   I am a mix of emotions of course about the whole thing.  I am so ready to hold my baby girl!  I am ready for her to be here and have her safely in my arms.  I am ready to see SK reaction to seeing Evelyn for the first time.  So many things I am excited about.  Also anxious though.  I am glad we are going forward with the induction, but anxious to see how it all goes with the labor and delivery.  It is just hard to believe we are already at this point. 
So why induction?
For many reasons actually.  My doctor was the one that brought it up and we thought about it for  a week and prayed.  I feel like it will be best with SK and making plans for her to be taken care of while we are at the hospital.  I am a planner and like to know that she is more than cared for while I can't be home with  her.  I think it is helping to for Michael's school.  And, I am just simply ready to meet this little girl and my doctor is more than game to do it :)
We have been checking things off the list for the last few days and getting all ready for this big day!  The house is almost all clean, the laundry is going as I sit here blogging, plans are all set for many playdates for SK, and the bags are mostly packed.  CRAZY!
So before I head off to work on more cleaning, I thought I would give you a run down of how you can pray for us...cause we need prayers for sure!
--Pray for SK as she has other's caring for her.  She is super pumped about playdates, so I am thinking she will be fine, but being her mommy, I want her to have fun and not have a hard time while mommy and daddy aren't with her at home.  And, as she adjust to having a baby sister.  Michael will have the weekend and his class load is not too heavy thankfully, but he won't be taking any time off from classes.
--Pray for Michael.  He still has school work in the midst of the next couple weeks, including a paper that is due next week.  Pray for his strength and time management and that he will be able to enjoy this time as much as possible and get done what all he needs to get done. 
--Pray for a smooth and swift :) delivery.  Enough said about that, right? :)
--Pray that Evelyn Joy will be healthy and there will be no complications.


We are so thankful and in awe of how the Lord has brought us to this place.  I am so thankful that He has blessed us with another daughter.  I really began to wonder last year whether we would ever experience this again.  God has been and continues to be so gracious to our family and blessing us in so many ways.  Praise God from whom all blessings flow.  He is so good.  He has shown His great love and comfort to us in so many ways over the last few years and I am thankful that He is the one in control and not me, as hard as that was through our struggles. 

Alright...off to get ready to have a baby :)

Sunday, September 16, 2012

SK's First Ballet class--yr. 2!

So SK is back to ballet this year and so excited again this year!  She loved it last year and has been asking all summer when she could start back.  She is in an older class this year and I am looking forward to what all she will learn this year!
Now on to the pictures!



The last one is my fave :)  She is such a goofy girl and I think these pictures show that!  

Saturday, September 15, 2012

Happy Birthday, Daddy!

Today is a very special day!  Michael's Birthday :)
I have been awake since the 3 a.m. hour, so I guess I didn't want to miss a minute of this special day.  I am ready for the rest of the household to wake up so we can get to celebrating :)
We are going to start our day off right with some Chick-fil-A for breakfast then go to a pond to let SK and her daddy get some fishing time in.  Then it is home to get to cooking a southern comfort meal and watch some Alabama football with friends.  I have to admit that I might be the one more excited about the food today than the birthday boy!  On the menu....friend chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, cornbread cake things (fried....thanks Theresa for the recipe, even though I can't remember what you call them!), fried okra, sweet tea, and maybe another veggie or 2, and we will wash it all down with a cookie cake and ice-cream!
yum.
I am hungry now just thinking about it.  Well....I guess I am hungry all the time these days, but on a day like today, I especially am!
SO...Happy birthday Michael.  I am so glad you asked me out 11 years ago and we have been able to celebrate many birthdays together.  I hope this is a fun one for ya :)  You are the best hubby and daddy and we love you so much!  I am glad you are my husband!
Did I mention this was the "big" one :) Welcome to your 30's dear!  It's hard to believe that the first year we were dating, we celebrated your 19th birthday and now we are celebrating your 30th!  Time really does fly :)

I have other blogs coming soon hopefully.  SK started ballet this last week and we went last night to a hot air balloon glow at forest park!  Stay tuned....
that is, unless Evelyn decides to make her appearance as a birthday gift....I am not holding my breath for it though...

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Having fun with "school"!

So I think I have mentioned that we are starting some homeschooling this year with SK.   Nothing fancy....I am having a baby and all, so I am trying not to set goals that I won't actually be able to achieve.  Sk is definitely ready though.  She has been asking when she can start school working and all for a few months now, so we are diving in to this whole adventure!  After talking with some other homeschool moms we are focusing on our phonics and writing (including fine motor skills) and some number things as well.  Each week we are taking 2 letters to work on their phonics and writing them.  I have had fun finding crafts to do each week with each letter.  We work on writing the letters and the sound they make.  We typically each week make a trip to the library to find books that begin with the two letters of the week too.
I am trying to keep it low key and fun for SK!  So this week we are on letter G and letter H.  So yesterday we made our letters on white paper and glued cheerios onto the letters.  Then, for a fun craft, we headed outside to get some blades of grass to paint with.  We used the grass as our brush and went to town painting.  We started out just holding a couple blades of grass, but then Daddy helped make it even more fun by finding a stick with SK and using lots of grass to make a nifty little paint brush.  I think SK really had fun with it :)
I actually even took some pictures yesterday too!  Aren't you proud :)

This morning we went on a walk and tried to find things outside that begin with our 2 letters and SK really got into it.  I was quite impressed with how she sounded out words and found things that went with our letters!

On another note, SK starts ballet this afternoon!  She is quite excited to get back to ballet class.  So much so that she has been in her ballet clothes for an hour already, and ballet doesn't start till 4 this afternoon.  I might wish I had waited to tell her that ballet was today till closer to time...let's hope the afternoon passes quickly!

Monday, September 10, 2012

Doc report :)

I went to the doc this morning for my last ultrasound!  We are getting so close!
Everything looked great with the ultrasound and according to measurements, Evelyn is weighing in at 5 lb. 15 oz., so bigger than SK was at birth!  We are so happy to have had a healthy pregnancy this time around with no complications or scares.  What a blessing that has been!  So now we wait and see when this little girl decides to make her appearance.  I think it would be fun to have her be Michael's birthday present (meaning this sat.) but not looking likely :)
But...wouldn't that be cool.  I mean, SK came on Father's Day, it just seems fitting to have Evelyn arrive on his birthday! 
Moving on....
I am full term now, which is exciting.  My doctor asked today our thoughts on induction.  He is fine with either way, to induce or to not.  There's a lot to weigh into this....  like being able to plan out care for SK better, and inducing on a day that Michael doesn't have a full load of classes, and knowing that my doctor will be the one there to deliver.  But on the other side of the coin, I liked going into labor with Sk, and I knew my body was ready, and delivery went fairly smoothly....oh....decisions...
We wouldn't necessarily induce early or more than a week before due date, but it is something to consider as we get closer.
Opinions???
Let's go ahead and take a poll too on when this little girl's birthday will be and her weight for fun?
What do you think?

No matter how or when this all goes down, I am excited to meet this little girl and have her in my arms! 
**Funny side note....
I was looking online this last weekend at ways to induce labor yourself and it is quite funny the ideas out there on the internet.  I already knew many of the ways that people say help get labor going, but some were new to me...
for instance...
Did you ever hear galloping like a horse????  Yep.
And swinging on a swing.
Those were the two that made me laugh out loud and made Michael take the computer away from me :)
So if you see me around campus galloping to the playground then take a swing....don't look at me funny, just know I am trying everything to go into labor :)  Ok....so maybe you can laugh at me and tell me I have lost my mind.  I have, I know it.

Wednesday, September 5, 2012

Evelyn's Nursery!

So since the camera started working again, I snapped some shots of Evelyn's room.  We had fun doing some inexpensive/free projects to make it a cute room :)
We still had our crib and rocking chair from SK, so that was taken care of and we are using the crib skirt that was made for SK too.  SK did have 2 dressers drawers in her room, so we downsized her to 1 and put the other in Evie's.  Of course, we painted it a cute pink to freshen it up a bit! 
(so I know it is a mess on top of the dresser....just ignore that :))
 

Other things we made include some bunting above her crib, a crib skirt, curtains, and a wooden sign. 


My mom was in town for a few days while Michael was gone and helped with some of the sewing projects and Michael took on the wooden sign project.  I have to say that pinterest inspired most of these things and I love how they turned out!  All of the fabric came from my sweet friend in Alabama (the lovely and talented Maja!) so that was awesome to have free fabric to tackle these ideas I wanted to do for the nursery.
Maybe when I actually clean up the rest of the junk on the floor I will take better pictures, but this will have to do for now. 
We are counting down the days now!  Can't wait to meet this sweet little one!

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Finally a belly pic...

So I finally got Michael to take a belly picture last night.  You can compare for yourself.  The picture on the left is the morning I was in labor with SK, 40 weeks and 3 days.  The one on the right I am 36 weeks.  I feel bigger that is for sure. 



















The last 2 nights have gone back to being rough.  I was up 2 nights ago from 12-5, and last night from 1-4.  The lack of sleep has left me in a poopy mood today :(  I feel like whining, yet again....
Don't get me wrong...I am so thankful to the Lord for this little baby girl and the gift of this life, but man I am ready to have her.  My back hurts....I'm stuffy....I have a constant headache....My right leg has tingled for 24 hours now from her pushing on my nerves down my leg....I get so restless during the night...
Ok.  I am done.  Sorry for the whining.  That's all I got today. 
**Oh...and on a better note, Michael was able to get our camera working again :)  I have a feeling it might continue being tempermental, but for now it is working, so I am thankful.  Now, as long as it doesn't decide to quit when we are at the hospital....

Sunday, September 2, 2012

10 random thoughts....

I am up early, of course.  The last few nights I have been sleeping through the night at least, so I am thankful for that (well....other than getting up to use the restroom 2-3 times).  I have had many blogs rolling around in my head, but when I sit down to blog I can't think of what to focus on to blog about.   SO, instead this morning I will do some randomness  :)

1.  Our camera is dead.  Bit the dust last week and we have tried different things to get it working again to no avail.  Not a very nice thing to happen to a woman who is 36 weeks prego and needs her camera ready for the millions of pictures that need to be taken soon.  So did I get pictures of SK's first day of Log Cabin "school" as she calls it this year....no.  Have I taken a belly pic? No.  I planned to take pics too of the fun things we made for Evelyn's room....not happening though.  Mix in a broken camera with a hormonal pregnant person and it's not good :(
2.  SK started the beginnings of reading this week.  We are easing ourselves into homeschooling her (the plan is the homeschool for the next 2 years at least...and then see from there if we want to continue or not depending on where we live at that point...)  So we have started just with some phonics and writing activities, nothing major.  I am not trying to set my goals too high since I am about to have another baby and all.  She loves it though!  She reminds me each day (for the most part) that it is time to do some school work and ask what she can do.  Crazy kid :)  The other day she brought me the book, Hop on Pop and started just sounding out the first page on her own putting the sounds together to make the word!  So we continued reading, I helped her a little and we read a good portion of the book.  When did my little girl get so big????
3.  Michael started school this last week.  He is excited about his semester and it is looking like it won't be too heavy of a load.  He has a lot at the beginning, which will hopefully help to get some bigger things done before our little one arrives :)
4.  I decided to whip up some more baby doll carriers.  Remember these?  I thought, just in case anyone might want to get one for Christmas this year or an upcoming birthday, I would already have some made up.  Anyone wanna buy one???  If you refer back to #1, it would help us get a new camera maybe :)  Leave me a comment if you want one :)  We can chat about it!
5.  I'm hungry...just ate a rice crispy treat...all better. :)  Let the list continue...
6.  I like ice.  A. LOT.  I could chew ice all day if I had it to chew.  And root beer. That stuff is amazing too :)
7.  SK wants to be batman for Halloween this year.  How funny is that?  And random.  She has always been either a princess or ballerina (well...I think one year she was a ladybug...) and this year she is mixing it up a bit.  She has requested to be batman.  Thanks to her friend (Hannah Mae :)) she is now fascinated with the dude.  We got a Batman book at the library yesterday.  She picked out a batman notebook at the Target dollar spot yesterday too.  So Batman she will be :)  I found a black shirt that I plan to make a Batman emblem thingy on, then will use a men's black shirt to cut up and turn into a "cape" (both found at the free store on campus!)  So far I am liking that this costume is free at least :)  Now I just have to figure out the ear head thingy.  I guess I will start looking on pinterest for ideas of how to make that.  Maybe I should go ahead and make her little sister a Robin costume :)  How cute would that be????
8.  I am ready for the weather to cool off.  Yesterday made me more ready than ever for it too.  I love football season, not just for the football, but for the cooler weather, the fun get togethers, the food....We watched the Alabama game last night with another family here on campus that are Alabama fans too!  That might have been the first game in 2 years we have been able to watch with other Alabama fans.  They are harder to come by up here in St. Louis :)  We had fun hanging out, cheering on the Tide, and eating yummy food!  We decided our next get together we would do some southern comfort food, so fried chicken and all the yummy veggies and such to go with it!  YUMM!!  Anyone got a good recipe they want to share with their favorite southern food???
9.  I have been in major clean out mode lately.  Poor Michael.  He gets my craziness a lot and still loves me :)  I guess you could call this "nesting".  I decided the other day that we have too much clutter and I couldn't deal with it anymore.  So we went to town cleaning out some things.  It was a fun quick clean out and within an hour we had multiple bags of things to take to the free store on campus.  It felt good :)  I guess this stems too from what we are feeling like the Lord might be leading us to after seminary.  Might as well start downsizing now if we are feeling led to go overseas right??? (By the way...we sent out an update letter to family and friends this week, kinda letting everyone in on what is going on with us lately, including this overseas crazy talk.  If you didn't get it and would like to, let me know!)  I guess we could do some blogging about it too.
10.  I have a lot of friends on my mind this morning....I hate that we live in such a fallen world.  A world where we have to see death and suffering.  Won't heaven be so awesome!  It excites me to think of the day that we won't have to see our friends lose loved ones or fear miscarriage or struggle to have children that they long for.  Heaven.   I want that.  THe Lord has us here for the time being though, and HE does have a plan through all of this.  He loves each and everyone one of these friends and knows their hearts.  He is good.  He is always good, even in the hard times.  I have to remind myself of that constantly.
Alright...enough talking...maybe I will actually go and pray for these friends.  I don't do that enough I know, and to be completely honest.  SO...while the house is quiet....I will this morning.

See y'all later!