Nathan Turns 5 and Operation Baby Eviction Commences

Dear Nathan and Hannah,

We thought that surely by Nathan's birthday, your baby sister will be here...but she has not made her entrance. And so we wait.

Nathan, 5 years ago we brought you home and our lives have been forever changed since then. You grew from being a helpless infant, to a thoughtful, justice-focused young kid. 

I remember thinking, one day you will be able to do more things than our dog, Teddy. And here you are, commanding Teddy to do his tricks. 

 You love your little sister so much. Always thinking of her, saving things for her and forgiving her time after time after she takes your toys away from you.

At 5 years old, we are working on how not to be a sore loser. You have always been ok with losing, but lately even the smallest loss seems earth-shattering.

Hannah, you love your big brother too and you constantly seek his approval. You too are very concerned with following the rules and doing the right thing. Sometimes your pre-frontal cortex takes over and you act impulsively, we can always easily talk to you and once you process things, you will end up doing the right thing.

You are also so expressive Hannah. I think in the next few days, I'm going to try to capture all of those different expressions that you have.

So, last night, we celebrated Nathan's 5th birthday. We all had yummy chocolate cake, opened presents and spent time talking to family on Skype.

 We also went through your old clothing and you wanted me to get rid of anything that doesn't say 5T. You are pretty much convinced that since you are now 5, you have suddenly grown a lot bigger and the 4T clothing just won't fit you anymore. (Did you know you were wearing 3T shorts just last week?

Approaching 41 weeks and still no baby.
Last week I had an appointment with the midwife. After an examination, I was 4 cm dilated and 80% effaced. Everything looked ripe and ready for labor to start soon. I also got my membranes swept and cervix positioned forwards (which I didn't know was even a thing). I pretty much expected to go into labor within 24 hours. Well, a week later, still no baby.
I've been doing lots of research and trying a bunch of crazy things to start the labor process"

1. Eating spicy food. I've been eating meals with Siracha and putting cajun hot sauce when I see it out. If you know me, I'm usually a wimp when it comes to spicy foods, so you know how desperate I am at this point.

2. Eating bromelain-rich fruits. Mangos, pineapples and papayas. I've made smoothies, pina coladas and fought over the last bite of mango with the kids.

3. Walking. We've walked every other night, until my hips started to hurt. Steve hates to walk, but we walked.

4. Exercise ball bouncing, rolling. In an attempt to get baby girl positioned lower in my pelvis, I've been trying various birthing ball exercises.

5. Dancing. When I think about pelvic thrusts, the king of pop immediately comes to mind. So this morning, Hannah and I tried dancing like Michael Jackson in the Wii's version of Michael Jackson, the experience.

So after doing all of these things, I realized, maybe we don't want the baby to arrive just yet..
1. My mom had caught some sort of virus on the airplane and is still recovering.
2. Hannah has now caught something too and when she gets sick, she ends up with a croupy cough.
3. Hannah's coughing made it tough for her to sleep last night so Steve went up and slept with her in a tiny bed. This morning, he discovered that he has hurt his back and is pretty much debilitated.
4. The mentoring program that I've been working on for the past few months starts this Friday. It would be cool if I could actually be there to see it occur in person.

Here are the reasons why I want the baby to come soon.
1. My mom told me that she feels like she's wasted her time here and she hopes the baby comes soon.
2.  Actually, that is the only thing that's stressing me out.

At this point, I don't know what I want. But I know the Lord has a plan. I just need to remind myself to relax and let God take control.

Hopefully next week I'll be able to post a birth story. Or maybe not.

Until next week,
Love,
Mommy

Lessons Learned by Week 40. (Still No Baby...)

I think we are about to embark upon an exciting time in our lives. God has definitely been using different scenarios to teach me what it means to follow Ephesians 3:12 which says:

In Him and through faith in Him we may approach God with freedom and confidence.

When we announced that we were expecting our third child, almost everyone on my side of the family was not very supportive. This easily led to doubts in my mind on whether or not Steve and I would be up to the challenge of raising 3 kids. 

When I was given the opportunity to help set up a mentoring program at a nearby elementary school with a baby on the way, I really doubted that I would be able to do a good job with the program and adjusting to a new life in the family. 

God has recently reminded me about how He is here for us, which makes me think about how when we play life "safely" we really don't get an opportunity to step out in faith to depend on God's power and will for our lives. Now, I'm not advocating that you jump out of a plane 7 months pregnant, but I encourage you to listen and follow God's little nudges for you to step out in faith.  

Not that God needs you to give Him opportunities to show His power, it's more like, you need to give yourself opportunities to experience the really cool things that He can do in your life. 

I am definitely disappointed that we still don't have a baby outside of the womb yet. Considering that we were expecting her to come early, as we approach the actual due date, I'm starting to get impatient. But I have to keep reminding myself that God has a plan. God has a plan.

Last night, Steve and I went on a brisk 2 mile walk around the neighborhood. Walking downhill seems to trigger more contractions, so perhaps I'll keep at it. I have an appointment tomorrow and so we'll see what the midwife has to say. So far, we have been very careful not to do anything that may break my waters because inducing is a bit dangerous for VBAC candidates.

My mom arrived on Wednesday, so we've spent some time together while the kids are at school. She leaves in about 2 weeks, so I hope the baby doesn't come that late. 

Dear Nathan and Hannah, 

As we anxiously await for the arrival of your new sister, we've been taking it easy and just going with the flow. This weekend, we were able to attend 2 birthday parties that we didn't think we would be able make it to. And I am sorry for the lack of pictures because I have not been doing a great job of being motivated to get up and get the phone to take pictures. 

I did, however, manage to snap a quick photo of the church dance party during the worship service. 

With both of you attending school Tuesday-Friday, I feel like I don't have as much time with you two to make memories. After I pick you up from school, we spend some time together, but there's also independent time that you guys have. So, usually, I've been trying to get stuff done so I can spend time with you two after school.

One thing that ended up being pretty interesting involved exploring shells. I gave each of you some playdoh and had you stamp and make impressions of different parts of the shell. You both thought it was pretty cool and really enjoyed the activity.

 We had checked out a few shell books from the library, so we were able to identify many of the shells that we have.

Nathan is continuing to go to Chinese school and is able to read some characters with the help of the bpmf system. Hannah you are working on spelling your name and identifying letters.

I have figured out that Hannah, you need naps on gymnastic days in order to make it to bed time as a pleasant human being. Ama says that Hannah has grown out of the terrible 2 phase and is a much nicer kid to be around. Nathan and I both agree.

Well, that's about it for now. Until next week,
Love,
Mommy and Baby 3

Enjoying the Weather as a Family of 4

Dear Nathan and Hannah,

Even though you two have been attending gymnastics pre-school for 2 weeks, last Thursday was your first day back at Bethany. We took the obligatory front door first day of school pictures. 

 And for your viewing pleasure, this was from last year. Both of you seem to really enjoy your time at school. Both of you don't know any names of the kids in your class yet, but you seem to describe your friends as (for example) the "girl with the Elsa backpack."

Wow, we've had amazing weather this past week, but the temperatures are starting to creep back up. We took advantage of the cooler weather without allergies and spent lots of time outside. 

While taking Teddy on a walk, Hannah wanted to go check out the creek behind our house. Last time it rained hard, the creek was flowing and we could splash around, but 2 weeks after the hurricane has left it dry once again. Hannah definitely has the outdoor explorer gene while Nathan is a bit more timid when it comes to being outside and exploring. 

 Eventually Hannah convince Nathan to climb down and you both decided to go through the storm drain to see what was on the other side. For security, you both held hands.

 My heart just melted, I simply had to take these sweet pictures of you two exploring together.

 On Saturday, we visited San Marcos's Flying Armadillo disc golf course. It was a totally fun experience and I'm glad both of your enjoyed it in your own little way.

What makes this course special is that it is extremely kid friendly. The holes are shorter and there are lots of fun things to see along the way. For example, at hole 1, there's a dinosaur sculpture.

 The idea of throwing a disc towards a basket was interesting to Hannah for about 2 holes, and then you decided to not play anymore and just explore, which was totally OK.

 There were plenty of swings for you to rest your legs along the way. Hannah loves swings.

 After awhile, Nathan, you started to get some air with your drives. You totally enjoyed the whole experience. In fact, after going 18 holes, you wanted to do a few of the adult ones with Daddy. I'm pretty sure if hunger was not setting in, you could've finished those 18 holes as well.

 Here's another example of a cool basket set-up.

 After spending a little over 2 hours at the course, we headed out to lunch and then made a quick visit to what used to be the Aquarena Center. There's lots of construction going on by the campus, so it was a bit weird to see all the changes.

 At gymnastic school, there's a pretty big focus on arts and crafts. Nathan, you brought home probably the best picture that you drew in your life! It's a race car with thunderbolts on the wheels. I even joked with you about how it can be a transformer because if you look at it one way, it looks like a vehicle, and flipped upside down, it looks like a robot bird. You totally got a kick out of it.

 I love how our front yard gets shade in the afternoon. While the mosquitos are pretty bad right now, we all loaded up on the bug spray and hung out outside for awhile. You guys really love creating obstacle courses with the chalk and I was able to see you all use your newly acquired gymnastic skills as you completed the course. I'm especially impressed with the beginning stages of a cart wheel.

 Hannah has gained an interest in seashells lately. Before bed every night, you want to look and sort different shells in my collection. As a result, Nathan has kind of joined in and become interested too. I've put on hold a few sea shell books and we can hopefully spend some time exploring them next week when the books become available.

Baby Update: Approaching week 39.
Well, this baby is enjoying her time in the womb, which don't get me wrong, I am totally OK with it. In fact, if baby Ketchup (what the kids want to name the baby) can stay in for 6  more days, until my mom arrives, that would totally be optimal.

I guess since both Hannah and Nathan came at 38 weeks, I never really got to the point of just being uncomfortably big. I can't sit comfortably, getting up requires some extra momentum from the motion of my hands, and I pretty much roll around a lot.

I was able to go to body pump yesterday and complete the workout with a lighter set of weights, but I'm going to skip out on Zumba because moving around is getting a bit uncomfortable.

Instead nesting has kicked in this morning and with the kids being at school, I have cleaned the whole downstairs. (Upstairs is where the kids have their toys, so I'm not going to even attempt that). We have washed the car seat covers, and set up the changing table in our bedroom. If baby Ketchup were to come today, we would be ready for her.

After playing some disc golf this past weekend, I was getting some pretty strong hot flashes around my head/neck followed by stronger Braxton Hicks contractions. Steve became a bit worried that we would have the baby Ketchup on the golf course, but thankfully we didn't.

I have a feeling that my next post will be a "meet the baby" post. I can't believe it. In just a few days I will be meeting the little girl who has been sticking her foot into the side of my torso (which is the most weird feeling ever).

Yep, this little foot is the culprit! 

I guess that's it for now. Until next week! 

Love,

Mommy 

Birthday Season is Upon Us & I Can't See My Belly Button Anymore

Just a quick baby update. She is not here yet... but if I were to take a guess, it would be next week when we get to meet our new little girl. Technically, tomorrow marks week 38 and that is when I had both Nathan and Hannah. I had my 38 week check up today and we decided to forego the internal check just to keep anything from breaking. 

I met the last midwife that I have yet to meet today and I really like her. She's totally relaxed and as Bohemian as you can get. In her introduction she told me today that she has had 4 kids, all delivered by midwives, and the last one she delivered herself. What?  She is also from Africa (or has lived in Africa for awhile) and she learned this trick to tell how far dilated you are without actually checking. Apparently as your cervix thins out towards the bottom, it thickens up top, so by feeling the thickness, she can have a pretty good idea how far things are coming along. Based on this method, she thinks I am about 2cm dilated. 

I'm starting to get slightly uncomfortable contractions that start towards my back and radiate towards the front. It occurs sporadically, so we can be safe that labor is not starting yet. 

And this week, I officially can't see my belly button anymore (unless I'm looking in a mirror). No matter how I try to lift the belly, bend my body forwards, I can't see my belly button. This has not happened with Nathan or Hannah so it's kind of weird to me. I've been trying to take a picture a week to document the bump growth. I think it'll be neat to put them all together afterwards to show the overall growth. 

Baby is kicking a lot more than normal. Her bottom shifts from being on my right side to being on my left. The midwife told me that while having the body on the left side is more optimal in birth, having her be on the right may not be a bad thing because it may slow down my labor, giving me extra time to get to the birthing center. In the meantime, I have puppy pads, paper towels and wet wipes in the back of the car. 

Last week I was able to attend Body Pump without a problem, but when I tried Zumba, I felt very restricted in my movements. It was starting to get a bit uncomfortable, so I called it quits early and went next door to get a bagel. 

Dear Nathan and Hannah, 

We started to use the gift cards that you guys had received for your birthdays. Nathan, you pretty much think you are the coolest kid when you strutted up to the chick-fil-a counter, ordered your meal, and swiped your card. You are starting to kind of understand the concept of a gift card and you have connected that concept to credit cards (which is what I usually use to buy things at the store). The idea of "putting money in a card" was just too abstract for you to understand, but somehow, with the gift card, you are starting to get it. 

Hannah, you wanted your own lego set, so we picked out a lego Jrs. set. You started to put the bricks together, but when you saw the little things that came with the Legos, you were completely distracted and started to play with those things, leaving Nathan to put your Legos together (which he gladly did without complaining.) 

This past weekend we got to attend 2 birthday parties! Here are 2 of the best pictures that I took of just both of you. This was at Locomotion, the same place where Nathan, you had your 3rd birthday party (although it was at a different location).

 On Labor Day, our neighborhood had a BBQ lunch fundraiser to help with the people affected by hurricane Harvey. We arrived at the pool early in the morning to get some cool pool time in and then had a delicious lunch by the pool. Hannah and Daddy were doing some tricks...(I can see a cheerleader in the works)

 And Nathan, you splashed around with your new end of season clearance aisle find friend.

Hannah, I am finding that your taste buds are becoming closer and closer to mine. Nathan, you turn your nose up at a lot of the more uncommon ingredients like scallops, shrimp, salmon skin, etc. while Hannah has learned to love them and will quickly say, "Well, I'll take it!" when you announce that you don't like something.

On Sunday, we attended another birthday party. This time it was a joint birthday party for all of Nathan's birthing center buddies.

 There was a pinata involved...

 And with so many siblings and friends now a days, getting a group picture was quite the impossible feat.

 We gave up, and just had everyone help blow out the candles on the cupcakes.

Tomorrow, you two start preschool at Bethany. This year it will be Nathan's last year and there's all sorts of feelings that go with that thought. I'll have lots of pictures to post next week.

Nathan, you may have your very first crush on a girl! When I went to go pick you up today, your teacher told me how you just kept going on about how this new girl, Hazel, is just so pretty. On the car ride home, you told me about her and you expressed that you wish she could join our family. After the incident that happened with your last fiance, (you broke it off because you found out that she likes to eat dog food) I ended up stop to explain to you the whole courting, dating, engagement and marriage process. And when you found out that you have to be 18 (16 in some states) to get married, you exclaimed, "Oh man, that's a long time to wait!" Don't worry son, it takes time and I encouraged you to be friends with Hazel and just enjoy spending time with her each Wednesday.

I thought it was so cute how you remembered what she was wearing (blue hello kitty shirt and pink skirt) and you tried to imitate the sound of her "pretty voice." I think this is just so adorable and I need to remind myself not to make too big of a deal out of it. I think this is a major milestone.

Hannah has had a runny nose for the past 2 days so we decided not to let you go to school today. I proclaimed it to be mommy and Hannah day and while we didn't do too many special things, the 1-on-1 attention was enough to convince you that it is way more fun to hang out with me than to go to school. Hmm... hopefully your mind will change soon.

Well, that's about it for the week. We have a busy next few days, but afterwards, it's smooth sailing until baby arrives. (Which you guys are so excited about and Nathan prays every night for the baby to come the next day)

Love,
Mommy