"Turkey in the Straw"

Here is a video that I attempted to take of Nelly with a stuft turkey that sings and dances to "Turkey in the Straw". When I first brought it down this year from the rest of the Harvest decorations her face totally lit up. It was so nice to see. So I tried to take a video of it a couple of days later but she didn't really show the interest in the turkey as much as she showed in the camera. Well as you can tell.

I'm feeling a little better. I'm still having contractions every day but if I'm active it helps to ignore them. The problem is they are always during the time that I like to relax, but whether I relax or not they come on. I had the doctor check me the first week I had them about 2 weeks ago but I wasn't dilated at all. So I don't know whether or not these are actually causing me to dilate at all. I'm a little disappointed that they very well could not be making me dilate. I thought late last week if I got a lot of the stuff on my to-do list done maybe then I would just go into labor. I heard about people who psychologically have an issue that holds themselves back from the labor progressing. The only "issue" I had was just the list of things I wanted to get done. So I wrote down a list, that you saw partially on the previous post, and it was 16 items long. And yes I have completed everything. So now I'm again just sitting here with contractions that don't seem to be progressing. Well, I guess that wasn't it. Oh well....

It is nice to enjoy being a stay-at-home mom with just one child. I'm really trying to make the best of the time of only Penelope and I. Until baby brother comes....

warning: a little grumbling

Well I've been having more and more contractions (crampy feeling) and bad back pain. I feel them everyday and sometimes so bad that I can't do anything but deal with the pain. After some research on it however I'm probably only in pre-labor or false labor. Which absolutely sucks because it can last for weeks on end. It's really tiring to be in this much pain all the time but not really get anywhere with it. I don't necessarily want the baby to come this early. Some people have heard me say that I want a "fat baby". Meaning I want a chubby little boy! Right now if he was born he'd only be about 7 lbs and that isn't exactly plump. So if you can pray that either the pains lighten up or that I go into labor. I told Russell I don't know how much more I can stand of it.

In the mean time I have been thinking about all the stuff I want to get done before the baby comes. Here is list

1. pack hospital bag
2. buy candies/ cookies for the nurses at the hospital
3. buy MOPS stuff for craft in December
4. make sure all laundry is done
5. grocery shop and get quick meals in the freezer
6. Clean and reorganize bedroom closet, bathroom closet, and computer desk (bc I'm never going to have time to do it when the baby comes)
7. finish baby shower thank you cards
8. paint the white cord holder blue in the babies room

The problem with this to-do list is that I'm completely exhausted and can't get very far on one task to complete it. Plus Russ has been working 12 plus hour days, which means I have to take care of an interesting rambunctious 2 year old. Oh well....

Fall is here!

Fall is here! It's so nice. I really enjoy the weather. I use to curl up in sweats, a good book, and make yummy baked goods, or a pot of tea. Moments like that are far and few between now to say the least. But they are still enjoyable. Today Nelly and I sat around wrapped in a blanket, cuddling in front of cartoons, as I filed through a couple of pages of a book. Warm soup is still on the burner and ideas of baking aren't far away, though it wont be fulfilled today. The house is all decorated in present fashion. I have come to enjoy decorating for fall in my house much more then decorating for Christmas. It is so much more easier to through a couple of candles out and a few figurines then upload the Christmas tree and fluff it out and decorate it from head to toe and then hang garland around the doors and find spots for all the nick-knacks that come along. I don't know how much "the simple life" is going to integrate my Christmas decorating this year. But it will be interesting with two little bundles instead of just the one.

We have been also involved with festive activities. We were able to squeeze in a trip to the Big Horse Feed and Mercantile for our annual trip to the largest corn maze in California and other activities. Then additionally to the Apple Festival in Oak Glen. We were too late for apple picking this year but we did enjoy the petting zoos, little handmade boutiques, and some homemade apple dumplings, dutch apple preserve, apple butter, and all the other goodness.

Here are some cute pictures of our adventures....

Here is a picture of the family posing.



Nelly and Russ outside of the bouncer


Nelly bouncing around with Alton


Inside the large corn maze, such little people in a big world.

On Daddies shoulders (Travis and Alton, Russ and Nelly)

In front of the pumpkins


inside the shop, saddling up

At the petting zoo in Oak Glen. Here she is with the miniture horse.

Here with the lama



Nelly and Russ enjoying an apple

Baby Shower

Here are some pictures from the baby shower that I had a little bit ago. Nicky had payed for a friend of hers, Stacee Lianna, to professionally photograph the event.

ticking along...

My pregnancy is coming along, I'm 35 weeks pregnant (36 weeks on wednesday). I am also just finishing my last day of work last friday, which I am very excitted about. And then hopefully (Lord willing) I will have 5 months of being a stay-at-home mom. My work has gone through a couple of management changes and so all the times that I cleared my extended maternity leave through the different managers didn't seem to matter. The current one states they will not hold my job for me. So I either go back to work after 6 weeks or not at all. It's not completely unexpected since I'm 'per diem', the hospital looks at me as a little extra expense. The hospital has been trying to get rid of all the per diem's at this hospital for a while. I wish this wasn't the case, but I'm not willing to come back so soon. It's really a bummer. They say that nurses can always find a job, and hopefully that will remain true even though I have heard otherwise with the current financial situations our country has been facing. My co-workers are giving me a shower, which is really really nice of them. I feel so blessed by it, even when I worked at a place full time they didn't throw me a shower.

I started having a lot of contractions and pains similar to what I had with Penelope this last week and was starting to worry that I was going to have the same early dilating problem I had with Penelope. I mostly had the contractions after working, which is being on my feet for 12+ hours. I went to a regular scheduled doctors appointment on Thursday and found out that I'm not dilating. Which is GREAT especially because I'm absolutely horrible at bedrest and bedrest with a 2 year old would have been a complete nightmare. Russell and I did decide that I wasn't going to push myself anymore with work and call Friday my day of work.

The doctor said I am 75% effaced (100% is ready to deliver). But my cervix is still closed (meaning I'm not dilated at all). This is so much different then being 3 cm dilated and 75% effaced with Penelope. The baby is head down and around 5 to 6 pounds right now. So Austyn will probably weigh a little over 8 pounds at birth.

As to when this baby is coming. I hope he comes on or before his due date. I'll be pretty upset if he comes after, but it is still a possibility. I'm not having any of the problems I had with Penelope so it is likely that he will be later. However he could come early because you are suppose to be earlier with your next one.

I have to update some pictures that we took and different activities. I finally talked Russell into going to the corn maze/ pumpkin patch that we have been to almost every year. Hopefully we will go next weekend or we might not go at all. The thing is it is a 2 to 3 hour drive away, but it is the biggest corn maze around. Russell and I even as adults could never finish the whole thing.