Quick Takes Friday #4

1.  I'm feeling good except for being tired and short-of-breath often!  I think that is due to my low-iron issue, and even taking my iron supplements does not seem to be helping all that much.  I will be 31 weeks on Sunday!

2.  Okay, so actually I guess it's not technically Sunday that I turn 31 weeks...back when we had our anatomy ultrasound, my OB decided to bump my due date back 3 days to April 6th.  So when people ask, I now tell them "April 6th" but I keep "updating" my week as if my due date were April 3rd (and have not changed my ticker at all)!  I happen to like the "date" of April 6th, because it is also St. Gerard's birthday!!!  Amazing!  If you forgot, here is the post about my "run-in" with St. Gerard during this pregnancy.

3.  I just saw that an article I wrote for Catholic Online back in July 2010 was linked on this blog!  It's funny because I follow Simone's blog, but somehow missed this post, and only found it by googling "Mary Grace Holmes" and "St. Gerard" to try to find the name of my own St. Gerard post!  LOL! 

4.  I'm currently reading three different books *blush*....  Father Elijah:  An Apocalypse by Michael D. O'Brien, Catholic Education: Homeward Bound:  A Useful Guide to Catholic Homeschooling by Kimberly Hahn and Mary Hasson, and Rediscovering Catholicism by Matthew Kelly.  Yeah, it's quite a handful of reading material...not sure how I ended up reading all three of them at the same time, but that's what's going on!

5.  My next doctor's appointment is Tuesday!  I really look forward to them....it just gets us closer and closer to the Big Day!

6.  Tonight we are going to see Cinderella performed by the local Christian Youth Theater group.  I'm pretty excited about it!  They take a story and put a spiritual twist on it, so I'm interested to see how they do it.  We are taking Isabel...I'm hoping she will stay awake since it starts at her bedtime!

7.  I am taking recommendations for a baby swing!  We have this Fisher Price Aquarium swing from 5 years ago, but since it has been up in our attic, I guess the heat has done something (very bad) to the motor...and it is now useless.  DH even took it apart to try to fix it, but it is done for!  I really don't want to buy a brand new swing...we are looking around on craigslist for a deal, so if you have/had a swing that you bought within the last couple of years, leave me a comment with the type!  Then I'll go and try to find the good ones on craigslist!  Thanks :)

Absolutely in love!

I'm head over heels in love with this little baby boy!  He's not even here yet, but as each day draws closer to his arrival, my heart has been swelling with love and excitement!   I cannot wait to count his fingers and toes, to watch him breathe, to see if he has a head full of hair, to hear those precious baby cries.  He is going to arrive and add another member to our family....okay so that might have already been obvious to everyone, but for me it has been this sort of slowly unfolding revelation.  Sure, I've understood it in my head, but wrapping my heart around it....that we will really have another living, breathing, comes-home-to-live-with-us child (!) is just so joyously overwhelming!

My head swims with the idea lately....and sometimes I have to put the thought "away" because it is simply overwhelms me with emotion. 

Everything is making this reality more clear:  from my ever expanding belly, to the way we've been incorporating the new baby into our everyday speech (to get Isabel more and more accustomed to the idea), to the way this boy just rolls and stretches in my belly like he is ready to evacuate! 

He is coming in just a scant 10 weeks!!!

I can barely contain myself!  God is indeed wonderful and gracious!  And somehow, though we cannot always "see" and understand it, His timing is perfect.  It has indeed taken time for me to appreciate this, and there are days when I wonder why it could not be the way I had originally intended it.  But through my story I have been able to witness to others of God's love and faithfulness....what would I have had to witness about had I not experienced the pain of suffering infertility and losing babies?

Lord, my prayer is that I may not lose sight of the preciousness of life, which only You give and take.  Please let others see it too!  And bless those struggling with infertility and/or pregnancy loss, that they might find strength in You during their darkest moments!  Bless those who desire a child, with a healthy pregnancy or a smooth adoption!  Put your hand over those who are currently pregnant that both mother and child would be strong and healthy.  Always Lord, turn our hearts to You, that we might know true life in your son, Jesus.

29 weeks

Quick Takes Friday #3

1.  I was totally blessed by a friend this week who gave me a TON of little boy clothes!  I had so much fun pouring through box after box of clothing that I didn't even care when my back started hurting from bending over all these precious little outfits!  It was like opening Christmas presents.  I swear she had some of the cutest boy clothing I've seen, and that made me really excited, because as a mommy to a little girl, I know there is adorable girl stuff out there.  But everytime I'd peek into the boy section of the stores, I was kinda disappointed.  Well, now I don't have to be because I am set until Baby Boy Holmes is 2!!! 

2.  I've decided not to have a baby shower.  While I was approached by several sweet friends offering to throw us one, I just felt like I couldn't have one before the baby is born.  Too much has been uncertain during the last 4 pregnancies for me to feel "safe" having a shower.  I don't really want to say that I'm superstitious and that having a baby shower will somehow "jinx" this pregnancy, because that sounds really stupid and I know it's not true.  But I guess there is some part of me that doesn't feel right about having a full-blown party celebrating a baby coming before he is physically in my arms, safe and sound.  Hopefully people will understand that.  We are looking forward to having a "Meet the New Baby" party once he arrives...maybe a cookout or something! 

3.  Painting the nursery was a huge project, but I'm glad that we did it and that DH helped out....because I learned that even though I think my way is best, it's not necessarily the case ;)  There can be two equally good ways of taping horizontal stripes on the walls....I just need to mellow out sometimes and let people help me.  (Thanks Rob for hanging in there with me!) ;)  I'll post more pics when I get it all put together :)

4.  The last two days I've been on and off the heating pad...my back has been sore in three different areas.  And I've been having some lower back crampiness...I get my period cramps in my lower back, so I'm keeping an eye on it in case it turns into more than just crampiness.  Kinda strange.  I'm trying to remember to offer up all these little aches and pains!  I know I can put any discomfort to good use if I am just intentional about it!

5.  We've decided to do the circus instead of Lion King this year.  The cheapest tickets left are $90 a piece (since I didn't buy them back in October) so it is just more economical to go this year to the circus.  I have seen Lion King before and it was SPECTACULAR!  I would love to go again and take DH and DD, but hopefully it will come back into town in a few years and DD might better appreciate it in a few years.  Thanks for all your votes ;)

6.  DD has been obsessed with "having babies"....Whether it is requesting to watch "A Baby Story", or asking me to be the doctor so that she can deliver her own babies (Oh yes, I "delivered" two sets of twins just today....one batch was natural and one was a C-section), and her dollhouse family has been having babies too...including a newborn stegosaurus.  It has been such a trip! 

7.  Looking forward to a much-needed date night tonight with DH.  We are going out for BBQ (closest thing to Texas-style BBQ that we have here in NC), and hopefully I can lure him into doing a bit of nursery accessory shopping!

Quick Takes Friday #2

Find more at ConversionDiary.com

1.  I've been devoting 4 hours a day for the last 2 days to painting the nursery and I'm not even halfway there!  Let me just say that taping horizontal lines is....well, less than fun.  I don't care if we have twin girls next, whoever winds up in the nursery next is keeping the same paint colors!!!  As you can see I even turned over some of the work to DD!

2.  Isabel has started taking pictures of me with my Olympus SLR...they are less than flattering (no offense Iz!), and thanks to her, I've realized that I'm now sporting my very unattractive pregnancy double-chin.  :(  Not pleased.

3.  Current household debate (yes, two 30 year olds debating a 4 1/2 year old makes for a good time!):  Go see The Lion King (Broadway South Series) or go to the circus??? 

4.  Yesterday we celebrated Three Kings Day and the night prior we did in fact leave out a bowl of grass and a bowl of water for the kings' camels....Isabel was delighted when the grass and water bowls were empty Thursday morning!  We also gave each other very small gifts received very small gifts from the three kings.  I got a bottle of nail polish :)

5.  I made Karen's Chocolate Guinness Stout Cake yesterday (because I had been craving it for about a week!) and if you have not tried it, it is just the BEST!  One of my all-time fave cakes....and DH's too!  Of course it's probably not helping my double-chin..... ;)  but it's too delicious for me to care!!

6.  DH and I knocked out Isabel's "before bedtime show" and replaced it with family prayer time.  So it didn't go over too well when I announced it that way to her, but now that we've been doing it these first few days of January she's jumped right in and even reminds us that we need to have prayer time.  (Kids are so adaptable!) We have either been saying a rosary or the Divine Mercy Chaplet.  And the real benefit is that it is true "family time".  Before when she would watch a show, Rob and I would both be preoccupied on the computer, so each family member was really having their own isolated time...and now...well what can I say?  We're bonding! ;)  It just feels like a much healthier dynamic we've got going on now.

7.  The sentence "if you notice any frantic activity, contact your healthcare provider" in my baby book has always unnerved me.  I mean, what the heck does "frantic activity" by a baby in the womb feel like?  And once I figure it out, would it be too late??  One night this week I woke up and rolled onto my right side and within about a minute noticed what felt to me like "frantic activity".  I panicked a little, but kept lying there almost too afraid to move, until I realized I needed to get on my left side and see if it got better.  Well as soon as I got to my left side, all movement stopped and I was completely freaked out.  So I roll back to my right side and then the activity picks up but now it just feels like normal movement.  Ugh....talk about not being able to sleep the rest of the night.  I thought I was going to have to sleep with the doppler on my belly.  So the worry has not completely ceased during this pregnancy....I suppose it will be like that until I deliver.  I'm still praying every day for a healthy outcome and a baby to bring home! 

27 week update!

I was supposed to have a 26+1 day OB appointment and glucose tolerance test, but the beautiful snow caused the office to reschedule me a week later.

So yesterday I went in and drank the flat, syrupy, orange flavored drink and had an appointment.  I was so relieved that I had only (ha! ONLY) gained 9lbs over the last 5 weeks.  I was thinking it would be more like 13lbs!!  Yikes!  My OB was completely unphased by 9lbs and said I was "doing great"!  Overall, I am up 24lbs at 27 weeks. Blood pressure was normal, stomach is measuring right on track.  They drew my blood an hour after drinking the glucose drink and hopefully they will call me with the results...I forgot to ask!   I have one more appointment that is 4 weeks away, and after that I go 2 weeks, 2 weeks and then 1, 1, 1 until baby is born! 

As far as aches and pains go, I still have the numbness/tingling/pins and needles feeling in my left leg only.  Doctor says it is baby's position on a nerve...and I've basically gotten used to it.  It is constant, but sometimes more irritating than others.  Also as of yesterday, I've developed a lower back pain which again, is not very painful, just a little uncomfortable and irritating....it feels more like an "old person" back pain.  I keep reminding myself that I AM five years older than when I  last experienced being this far along in a pregnancy.

Rob and I are in the process of looking at (and differing over!) paint colors for the baby's room.  We have very different ideas of what this room should look like! LOL!  I went into hyper-nesting mode on Sunday and about drove him crazy.  He was driving me a little crazy too....I kept sending him "away" and then calling him back only to say, "Why aren't you helping me with this?"  Yes, pregnancy can do strange things to you.  But seriously, there are only 3 months left until this baby is due and I've got to get on the ball!!