Monday, April 27, 2009

28 & 1/2 days to go!

I had every intention of posting this morning and titling it 29 days to go, but since it is now 6:15 and I am just now getting to the blog I decided on the new title! It is pretty exciting to see that number! He will be here soon. Maybe a bit sooner than 28 days. As you will know from my last post we had a trip to Labor and Delivery on Saturday to stop preterm contractions. I am still having several throughout the day, of course there is no consistency to them so nothing to worry over. I am excited to see the dr on Thursday and see what they find then. I am supposed to have NST testing done that day anyway and that will show for sure how often I am having contractions. He is very active this afternoon and has been throughout the day. He really is active all the time! I think he is ready to break out of here!!! So that is really it for now, I just wanted to start a countdown. I probably won't plan another update until Thursday after seeing the dr. Have a good week until then!

Saturday, April 25, 2009

34 weeks and a trip to the hospital!

Well it has been a busy Saturday. Actually it has been a busy week. You can see from my previous post that we had the big zoo trip this week. Well this weekend was our annual Spring Ladies Retreat. So yesterday and today was a flurry of activity and a wonderful time of praising and worshiping our Great God. As fun as this all was it was also exhausting. We held this event at our local associational camp ground which means sleeping in bunk beds and community showers, not a bad thing for one night, but you never sleep that good outside of your own bed and then add 8 months of pregnancy to that!! Needless to say I am tired and rightly so. I also was on the kitchen crew so I did quite a bit of food prep clean up. All went well until about 11:30 this morning as we were just closing out our final session and I began to have contractions. Nothing too major or intense but I clocked them at about 5 minutes apart and lasting for about 30 seconds. So I only told my good friend Stephanie. We hurriedly got things finished up and took out on our way home. I came home and immediately packed a hospital bag and then sat down to eat lunch and begin clocking them again to be for sure. Well for one hour they were 4-8 minutes apart and increasing in intensity. So I called the doctor's office and the on call nurse called back and advised us to go on in to Labor and Delivery to see if they could stop them. So we headed there and arrived just before 4pm. They checked me all out and sure enough I was having them, about every 5 minutes and pretty intense. Fortunately my cervix is completely closed and I was not I guess in what you would call active labor. So they decided to give me some IV fluids and see if that would slow them down. I hate IV's and will now have a nice bruise on my arm to show for this one! They gave me the fluids and I had slowed down to the point of only have 2 in thirty minutes time so the on call dr decided to let me go on home with instructions to take it easy and come back if they were more than 4-5 in one hour or at the same frequency that we experienced early today. They said had it been about 3 weeks further along they would have likely gone ahead and done my c-section. So here I am trying to "take it easy". That isn't a phrase I really know how to adhere to, we will see how that goes! In all honesty though we need to really make it through May 15. That will be Drew's last week of school. I do not want to miss his graduation from preschool or keep him from finishing out his school year. So my prayer request at this time is that we can hold in there until May 15, after that bring it on!! I am ready for this to be over but I want a healthy baby that will be able to come home with me from the hospital and not require any special treatments. So please pray with us for 3 more weeks! We are in the home stretch anyway. Definitely no more than 4 weeks from this coming Tuesday. I am starting an official count down tomorrow as we will be at 30 days and counting. Most of my family does not think we will make it to May 26 so we will see!! I kinda want to start a baby pool to see who can guess what J.C.'s birthday will actually be!!!

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Zoo Field Trip


We had an awesome time at the zoo! It was a gorgeous day and the animals were pretty active. Enjoy the pics and videos!


Friday, April 17, 2009

Sweet Baby Face

The above pic is a 4D image. I could not get it to scan any better than that but it is a good picture. He has his right hand resting on his cheek and looks so peaceful. Of course looks can be deceiving! I can pretty much feel EVERY move he makes and some of them are painful! He is getting cramped in there. The next 4-5 weeks should be interesting!! Here is a slide show of the other pics from yesterday. None of them are great, it is just getting hard to get good pictures of him at this point. I guess that is just how it is this late in the game!

Thursday, April 16, 2009

33 weeks 2 days Doctor Visit Update

Well we saw the doctor this morning. Surprisingly I was only there an hour and a half! That is probably a record! The ultrasound showed him looking great, although getting cramped in there. They estimate his weight at 5lbs 8oz. That is still within average range (72 percentile). They said unless he was showing to be in the 90 percentile they would not consider him to be getting too big. He still has plenty of fluid around him. So all is good, just generally getting to the uncomfortable point, probably for me and him! Everything is still on track for a scheduled c-section on May 26, although we still do not have a time on it b/c the patient rep has not gotten it scheduled yet! I will reserve my personal comments on that for now. Lets just say that on my next visit I have to meet with her for the "you owe us money, when are you paying up" chat and I will certainly let her know how I feel about her failure to schedule this child's birth if it is still pending then! But enough about all that! I do not have to go back for 2 weeks, YAAHOO!!!!! That I am very glad about. Time seems to go a little more quickly when they are spread out a bit and that will mean only 4 more dr visits before delivery. She felt like things were just to good with my blood sugars and him to justify me coming in there next week. I was ecstatic because I am already taking 2 days off next week for a field trip and a ladies retreat so I wasn't really sure how the dr visit would fit in. Next visit will only involve a NST (non-stress test fetal monitoring). She indicated that when I go in the first week of May they will do another ultrasound that will probably be the last if all looks good.

So overall I feel like we are getting really close! It helps to know the next time I have to go in will be the last day of April and I will be over 35 weeks!! I was 36 weeks and 4 days when my water broke with Drew, so we will see!!

I do have some pics of today's ultrasound but I left them in the car, so I will get them later and scan them in. Bye for now!

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

A Sad Afternoon

Well, we have just seen Jim off for the band's trip to San Antonio. It was rather sad. We had already had our goodbyes this morning which were more emotional and then we went to see him off at the school. I did not expect Drew to be so sad to see Jim go. It was all I could do to hold back the tears at that point. He wanted to go with his daddy. His just hung onto him. I realized this afternoon that this will be the first band trip that I have not gone with him on since we were married. In the last 8 years we have been on two trips, one to Atlanta and one to Disney in Orlando. He did go on one the spring before we were married and I really think that was the last time I have been away from him for this length of time. We have spent as much as 3 nights away which I suppose isn't really that great a difference from the 4 nights he will be gone this time. I think it is probably feeling so long this time because I am pregnant and more emotional than usual. I am not really concerned that there will be any baby action in the next few days. All seems to be going well and I will have another dr visit tomorrow along with an ultrasound. That should make tomorrow go by rather quickly because the dr office is usually a 3 hour ordeal! It does not seem to matter what time I schedule appointments at, I am just there forever!! On Friday we will be going to my mom's house to spend the night and spend some of the day on Saturday with her and then it will be Sunday and he will be home.

Please pray for the band and all the adults with them this week as they travel It will be a hard trip as they will be sleeping on the bus tonight and starting their day off early tomorrow at 6am. Pray for Drew and I as we are on our own for a few days, as well as the other band directors wife and child who are home and all the moms and dads that sent their kids off today.

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Kindergarten Ready

Excited and ready to see the doctor!

Well we are getting geared up for Kindergarten! Hard to believe that my baby boy is going to be going to school this next year. Of course we had to make the obligatory visit to the doctor for shots and all the thorough check up. He has a vision screening, hearing test, cholesterol test, iron test, etc. It was a very thorough examination. He did so good. Of course we had to get a shot. He only had to get one b/c we had gotten extra ones last year to avoid so many this time. He did good but he did not want to get it. We did not tell him we were going to the doctor that morning and of course when we got there we just told him he was having a check up. It was not until after we had done all the other screening test that he finally ask if he was getting a shot. Well I told him yes and he was no longer happy! So we spent the remainder of the time reasoning with him that he had to get it in order to go to school! It was interesting! Here are the pictures to document this milestone.

Just moments after learning that he would be getting a shot.

Easter

Well I am a little behind on getting to my blog from all the Easter Weekend fun. We are in the midst of a very busy week. We spent Friday and Saturday at Jim's mom's house and had a wonderful time and then spent Sunday at my mom's. Last night we had a concert at the school for the High School Band and tonight is the Middle School concerts. So as you can see we have been busy! I am actually staying home tonight because of the lengthiness of tonight's concerts. I am trying to do a little freshening around the house by washing the sheets and getting the floors vacuumed. Jim leaves for San Antonio tomorrow afternoon. He will be gone until Sunday at noon. I am trying to be incredibly whiny about it and make him feel bad! Seriously though it is pretty close to this baby's arrival for him to be gone for that length of time! I told him he needs to have a back up plan for if I were to go into labor or something. I am sure Drew and I will be fine though. I have a dr appointment tomorrow morning and another ultrasound so we will see how all is checking out then. They should do growth measurements on him to so we will see just how big a boy he is right now. That is about all that is going on in our world right now, just staying really busy! As you will see below I have made a slide show of our Easter activities. I do not know why I did not get my camera out at mom's but I did not. They ended up not getting to hunt eggs due to rain but my brother brought his Wii and the kids, and adults, loved that! My sister and I ended up scoring the highest score, 174 each, not bad for a pregnant lady!! Drew bowled a 154!! I was amazed! I think we will be looking into getting a Wii this year! It was a fun day even though it got rainy and cold. So enjoy the pics below!

Thursday, April 9, 2009

LPBC Baby Shower


Here is a slide show of the baby shower they gave me at work yesterday. It was so very nice and I am so appreciative of all that they blessed us with. It was a wonderful time of fellowship with all the people I work with and their families. We had some wonderful food and they were all so generous in giving us an abundance of things we will need to welcome J.C. into our family. I work with such an incredible group of people and God used this time to remind me of how blessed I am that He has placed me in the workplace that I am in. Thank you to everyone for all that you did to make this a very special time for me. I also want to thank my very best friend Stephanie for being there with me. It just happened that Jim was unable to be there because of band stuff and she gave up her lunch hour to come and be with me and to sit and write all my gifts down for me. Thanks Steph!!
Also a big thank you to Joey. He is the Worship Pastor at the church and he graciously accepted the job of being photographer, Thanks Joey!!

Monday, April 6, 2009

What's On My Mind Today

Well since I consider this blog to be my own personal online journal so today is going to be a bit of me sharing about me personally. I am officially 31 weeks and 5 days pregnant. I believe I have reached the point of constant discomfort and fatigue. I have been completely exhausted since last week and it seems that no matter how much I rest or get to bed early or on time I am just tired. J.C. seems to be much more active to me than I ever remember Drew being, and he was what I consider active! He is awake and moving most of the time. He is not that bad at night except when I first lay down, but once I go to sleep he is not waking me up with horrendous kicks or anything. Of course I do get up at least once a night if not 2 or more times to run to the bathroom. Getting in and out of the bed in the middle of the night is getting complicated too. It seems no matter how I turn my body it just hurts when I go from laying down to sitting to standing. I feel like my stomach is as big and bulky as it could possible ever get and he is supposed to hang out in there for another 7 weeks! In general I am feeling pretty miserable and down right whiny today! I don't usually get like this. I am generally a "glass is half full" kinda girl. I just cannot shake this mood I am in. I do not think the weather around here is helping one bit since yesterday afternoon it was in the low 70's and today the temps are in the low 50's! Excuse me, I just checked the temp on my google homepage after typing that and it is actually only 43! That is crazy!!! I have had a dull headache all day, I am sure this can be attributed to the change in air pressure due to the drastic change in temps. I have begun to feel that I am not going to make it the next 7 weeks. With Drew my water broke 3 1/2 weeks early. Now I know that every pregnancy is different so I am not saying that means it will happen again, but I just have a feeling is all. I have found myself growing very anxious over my water breaking and if I will know it has happened if it does and if I have been having contractions and not realizing it. I know this is all crazy stuff to be worrying over but I am.

Now before I get emails, comments, and text messages of all my friends telling me to chill out and relax I have to comment on my own depressing rant that was the previous paragraph. I know that God is in control. I know that J.C. and myself rest in the palm of his hand. I know that this is normal for me to have these anxieties and to be so ready to have this baby here. I know, I know, I know and I believe it all! I am praying for God to help me snap out of my "funk". I believe that in a few days when the sun is back out and I can feel a little bit of warmth on my face that my mood will brighten. I know that the next weeks whether they be 7 or 5 will go by quickly, more quickly than I realize. I just long right now to hold him on the outside and be able to smell that sweet new baby smell and dress him in all the cute clothes that hang in his closet and just begin being a family of 4! Now I am almost crying! I don't do crying people!! Can you see how hormonal I am! This has been a long journey and yet it has gone by very quickly. I can still feel all that emotion of 8 months ago calling Jim to our bathroom to look at the faintest of lines on the pregnancy test and wondering if it could really be true! I remember vividly the day we took Drew to the park to tell him that he would be having a baby brother and watching his excitement that lasted just a few minutes as he was more excited about feeding the ducks! It is marching on by and will soon be here and before I realize it he will be turning 5 just as Drew has now done and getting ready for school in the fall. My real prayer is that I will cherish him so each day and not rush past one milestone for another. To enjoy the days that he will let me rock him gently to sleep or just sleep in my arms.

So with all that said I ask your prayers for strength and stamina for the next 7 weeks. I ask your prayers for the protection of J.C. and that all would continue to go as it should and that we will soon be holding our precious new son.

Saturday, April 4, 2009

Little Fisherman


Okay, so you can see by the date on the pic and the date on this blog that I am behind on the blog! I have a good excuse though; 1. I am pregnant, that should be enough! 2. I was out of town on Monday and Tuesday for work and have now been behind all week. So that is why you are just now seeing Drew's first big catch. This was last Saturday at my mom's house. If you remember that day you will know that it was incredibly cold compared to the temps we are now getting accustomed to and it was extremely windy. Needless to say fishing did not last really long. Drew caught this fish almost as soon as his Finding Nemo pole hit the water. He was so excited. Of course I ran out there to get the picture of it. He pretty much came back in right after he caught this fish because it was too cold for him. Now Jim and my dad on the other hand decided that they would need to stay out there because they could not be outdone by a 5 year old! They had no luck and both ended up in the house less than 15 minutes after the big catch of the day! I think it was a really neat thing for Jim and Drew to experience together. Jim loves to fish and of course wants his boys to love this activity with him. We will be having the second annual Lyon family fishing rodeo on May 9, so hopefully Drew will get some equally as impressive on that day. Just in case any of you are wondering if this love for fishing is something both his parents share let me set your mind at ease. NO I do not fish! I do not touch bait, fish, anything slimy or wet! I used to think it would be fun to fish with Jim if he did all the gross stuff for me until he took me one time. I like to talk you see and pass the time and he can sit there and watch a cork bob around in the water for hours and never say a word. That is not my idea of a good time! This will just have to be one of those special father and son activities.