it's time again!

With another two weeks under my belt (literally), it's time for me to photograph the changes in my pregnancy. Here's me two weeks ago, 33+ weeks:

Here's a couple of me tonight, 35+ weeks:

My belly almost looks smaller, but I can guarantee it's because he's dropped in the last week or so. Even though I still feel really good, I'm getting more uncomfortable and I can feel that he's a lot lower.

I'm shocked that I have less than a month to go. We're still on track to have a scheduled "water break" (sounds refreshing, doesn't it? It's not much of a "break" if you ask me!) on the week after Christmas. I'll be over 39 weeks at that point, and if I haven't had the baby by then, my doctor wants to make sure I have a "controlled delivery" given my history of very fast labors. We might have to do it a bit sooner depending on how my body progresses, but for now, I feel really good.

For as excited as I am about having this baby, I'm not even close to being ready. We just listed our house for sale and have been looking at options to build, so suffice to say, I've been very, very busy and preoccupied with all of that. I honestly haven't purchased one baby item (not even one!) for my little guy, not even an outfit to wear home from the hospital. I'm a horrible mommy!

The truth is, I'm not even concerned about it. The more babies I have, the more I realize that most of the preparation for a new baby is done in vain. As long as the car seat is installed properly for the ride home, all the new baby really needs is me. That makes me feel special. :)

two more weeks down...

Here's my last belly photo taken 2 weeks ago (31+ weeks):

Here's me today (33+ weeks):

Not near as much "noticeable" change from the side view as my last comparison (see my last post), but if you look closely you can tell he's grown more upward in the last couple of weeks than out. From the kicks in my ribs, I'm not at all surprised. He's definitely getting longer and packing on some weight!

Even though he feels big, the measurements at my appointment last week verify that he's growing right on track. To the very week, actually.

This pregnancy has been so good to me. For those of you who know me, you know that I have pretty severe circulatory/vein problems that initially began while pregnant with Britten and required me to have surgery before getting pregnant with Chloe. But they still got so out of control with Chloe that it was literally debilitating and I could hardly get around the last couple of months of my pregnancy. We chose to stop having babies after Chloe because it was so horrible, and frankly, I was scared of what another pregnancy would do to my body.

Suffice to say, God had another plan for our family and despite all of OUR effort to NOT get pregnant, he blessed us with our 4th addition. Ironically, it was while I was at my pre-op appointment preparing for another surgery that I found out I was pregnant again. I can't say that my initial reaction was happiness...It was more like fear.

Fear of having yet another baby when I just stopped nursing Chloe and we just started sleeping through the night again! Fear of the financial implications of adding yet another child to the budget. Fear of starting the baby stage all over again, when I was so ready to put that behind me and move on in our life. But mostly fear of how this might affect my body (not in a "vain" - no pun intended - way, but physical). How could I keep up with everything in my life when struggling with the pain for almost 9 months?!?!

Once the news finally sunk in a little, it didn't take me long to get excited and realize that God gave us this baby for a reason. I assumed it was a boy from the beginning, only because God knew we were already content with the three beautiful girls He gave us...didn't He?!?!? :) Though we would've have been thrilled to have another girl, Andy and I were practically speechless when we found out we were having a boy. God is good. I decided to put my fear aside, leave it all in God's hands, and know that He is ultimately in control. Besides...in the whole scheme of life, it was only 9 months, and I could handle that.

With only about 5 1/2 weeks to go, I am totally amazed and honestly in awe of how good I've felt this pregnancy. I've had days where I'm in pain, and all my body aches to do it sit, but overall, I've been great, and my doctor even commented on how my veins don't look near as bad as they did while I was pregnant with Chloe.

Call it what you will - whether it's related to the hormonal difference between being pregnant with a girl vs. boy, or how the baby is positioned in the womb, or who knows what other medical mystery it might be - but I'm calling it what I think it is: a miracle!

So yeah, overall I'm very happy with how this pregnancy has gone/is going, and I haven't sweat the small stuff this time around. But that's not to say that I'm not looking forward to having this pregnancy done and over with...Because when it is finally done and over with, I'll be holding my little miracle in my arms.

what a difference 2 weeks make!

I'm posting this more for my own amusement than anything. When you're the one who's pregnant, the day-to-day and week-to-week changes aren't really noticeable. The view from above doesn't change a whole lot, and even though it feels like the baby is filling up more space, and I do feel more uncomfortable as each weeks passes, I honestly haven't felt bigger. In fact, two nights ago I was lying in bed actually worrying about the little guy, wondering if he was growing like he should be.

My concerns were put to rest this afternoon, after I decided to do an impromptu "belly photo" session in front of my bedroom mirror with my phone. I knew I had taken pictures about two weeks ago, so I decided I'd take a few today and see if I could see any noticeable growth.

Here's the one from exactly two weeks ago today (29 1/2 weeks):
Here's one from tonight...You tell me if you see a difference!
Yikes is the first word that came to mind. Seriously. If this is an example of how much he's going to grow on a bi-weekly basis for the remaining weeks of my pregnancy, I'm a little concerned that I'll give birth to a very big boy. I'm about 31 1/2 weeks right now, so that leaves him with about 7 weeks (my approximate guess, based on past pregnancies) to pack on the poundage (is that a word??).

Anyway, I'd much rather have him gaining than not, so seeing this actually made me laugh. I decided that I HAVE to take pictures at least every two weeks from this point on to document the growth. It'll be interesting, to say the least, to watch him/me grow!!!

YIKES!

halloween 2009

I have to admit, that as a mom of three girls, I'm very lucky that (aside from Chloe's obsession with dolls and babies), my girls aren't really into anything "girlie"...yet. I've been able to save a lot of money and storage space because my girls could literally care less about Barbies, Hannah Montana and American Girl Dolls...yet. I say "yet," because I'm sure it's bound to change one of these days/years.

It's partially because of this that my girls have never obsessed about what they wear for Halloween, and for the fourth consecutive year, have gladly donned their princess and frog costumes.

See proof below:

Halloween 2009

I didn't get many pictures of Halloween this year, and the ones I did weren't very good quality. I was "single-parenting" it for the night (hubby was out of town), and quite frankly, had my hands very full. We were (and still are) also in the midst of recovering/dealing with the flu, and that didn't really help matters. either. It just so happened that all my girls felt good on Halloween, so we were able to handle a little trick-or-treating.

Halloween 2008

Halloween 2007
Halloween 2006

Halloween 2005*
* though there aren't pictures to prove it, Ella wore the frog costume that year

The amazing thing is that the princess dresses have continued to fit them each year - the bigger size being a 4T and the smaller one an 18 months. Both Britten and Chloe will still be able to wear the princess dresses next year and maybe even the year after (that is, if they haven't caught on to my manipulative ways on trying to save money without having to buy new costumes).

The 2010 Halloween mystery remains....

What will Ella and her baby brother be???!?!?