Tuesday, April 30, 2013

A little before and after

Back in December, my sister in law Amy and I posed our pregnant selves

Back to back, belly to boobs.  She was 29 weeks along, and I was 21.  A difference of 8 weeks. 


Jeremiah was born March 2nd, so he was 8 weeks old when he got to meet his new cousin, Jacob.  


What a difference 8 weeks makes!  


Great is the Cuteness! 

Baby Bouquet

My Grandma surprised me and sent me the Prettiest bouquet of flowers in Congratulations on the healthy birth of Jacob.  I had been Missing the opportunity to photograph some flowers this spring. I just haven't felt up to it.  It was a great opportunity to snap a few, and they provide a really lovely centerpiece for the table too.  



A spray of roses. 


Gerbera daisy. 


Larkspur. 


Beautiful flowers for a most beautiful occasion! 

Thursday, April 25, 2013

It's A Boy!


Ready to have a baby!

Today is the day.  

The last day that I'll be pregnant.  


So I asked Daddy to take some pictures of me with my boys.  


Not too shabby.  I love that Sam wants to constantly tickle the baby from inside my belly button.  


Getting Artsy! 




I just love this one.  




Wednesday, April 24, 2013

When in doubt, take pictures of Flowers and Sweetboys

It's official.  I'm having the c-section tomorrow.  My BP has been really crazy the last few days, and I'm tired of fighting. By this time tomorrow, the baby will be here.  Now it's getting a little scary.  Hope I can sleep tonight.   But I think I'd rather have this fear than the one that's been nagging me for months about how my own health is pooping out.  This weekend was rough, but Monday it was Pretty outside, and for a brief moment in the evening, I felt good enough to go outside...to go outside and take some pictures.  

That was Therapeutic for me.   And you know my favorite subjects:  


The last of the daffodils blooming in the front yard - I haven't had the strength to go exploring out back to see if any came back this year, I haven't been able to see any from the house, Eric said he saw some greens pop up, but since neither of us has the energy for yard work, or yard exploring, the backyard remains undiscovered country.  


A special tulip - When Sam was born, Eric's Aunt Teri was in town visiting, and she brought a small pot of pink tulips.  They were lighter pink, but I planted them at the old house right in the garden walk by the front door at the old house.  And when we moved here, I transplanted more than a few things.  Irises (that haven't bloomed yet) and a couple tulips.  This one came back and Bloomed this year.  


Happy Happy Day! 


Yellowish tulips - That first fall we lived here I bought some tulips, I hadn't realized they were doubles.   But this year, they look even more different from last year.   Very cool.  


I love the light yellow, and one of them has just the slightest hint of pink.  


While I was laying in the grass taking pictures of flowers, I had company.  Someone thought I was very funny taking pictures in the grass.  


But then he stood up on the rock, and showed me just how funny he was.  


Silly Sam.  

Sunday, April 21, 2013

The Baptism of Jeremiah

My nephew got Baptized today.   And we got to be there.  That was the height of my day, of my week, maybe even my month.  I hadn't been able to see the baby in person since the day he was born.  But I REALLY wanted to be there on his special day.  And Eric and I were not sure if we'd be feeling up to making the trip.  Eric had surgery Friday, and we had been sitting around, not doing much, not even having the energy to do much.  My blood pressure was misbehaving, it was high this morning, and I was really worried it wouldn't behave enough for me to go.  I was sad I wouldn't be able to drive under the influence of a whacky blood pressure. But just when I was ready to surrender, Eric surprised me by telling me he had not taken the vicodin so he could Drive us to the church.  I called Mom and she agreed to meet us to have someone push me around in the wheelchair, since Eric is on lift restrictions of 10 pounds.  So they met us at the church front, and Mom, and Erica pushed me into the church where we got to see All the Family, and oogle over all the Cuteness.  I hadn't seen my girls in Months, and I missed them so fiercely.  It did my heart such good.  I could have probably turned around right then, before the Service even started, and gone home.  But we didn't.  We stayed.  
And Eric finally got to hold Baby Jeremiah.  He hadn't had a chance before, but Amy just plopped him in his arms...he didn't even have to "lift" him, you know that 10 pound thing....Jeremiah has already surpassed that. But Eric and I decided that Holding is not lifting.  And both these boys were just so sweet.   



Baby Jeremiah holds Uncle Eric's finger. 


Jeremiah  started making faces at Eric, and quite likely a diaper deposit, they were so sweetly silly.   


Jeremiah was really interested in his Daddy and Sissy.  I could just tell they were some of his favorite people.



Then the Baptism began.
Aren't they just a Beautiful family! 


Pastor Blessed Jeremiah as he became the newest member of our church family.


Uncle Brian and Aunt Val became Godparents as both families stood side by side while Pastor Baptized Jeremiah.  


Jeremiah must've been making faces during his  baptism because the girls started to giggle.  
I would have too, if I hadn't been so busy crying.  My eyes just couldn't stop leaking.  It was so beautiful to see this Miracle Baby brought into the family of Christ.   


Then they introduced the entire Willman Family.  


This picture doesn't really do justice to the moment, but the sun was shining through the stained glass window and bouncing off the baby and Kaylee's little fuzzy heads such that they Glowed.  Glowed with God's Love.  


We welcome Jeremiah Jason Thomas Willman into the family of Christ!  



It was a Beautiful Day and I was so Blessed to be present for it. 

Saturday, April 20, 2013

37th week, Stepping Out!



Well, we made it to the 37th week.  

These pictures we took last Sunday, as Eric was headed out to Marion.  It felt good to be officially "Term".  
I don't feel Full Term.  I feel like I could bake a little longer.  But it's felt so good to know that this baby has made it as far as Christopher...further even. 


On Tuesday, we went in for our ultrasound pictures.  And he was transverse, with his head facing downward.  He had hands in the way and we couldn't get very many cute baby face pictures.  But really, that didn't matter to me.  It does my heart such good to see his heart beating, and feel him wiggling, just seeing him on the screen at all gives me Comfort that he's doing OK.  Eric took me out for a date lunch at Yen Ching to celebrate how well we are all doing...and because he won the guess how big the baby contest last week, when we didn't have time/energy to pick a nice place for a date like lunch.  We were thinking it may be our last date for a while.  Gotta make hay while the sun shines.  And anymore I only get out to go to the doctor.  
So, on Tuesday when all they could get were pictures of his fingers and fingernails, I was OK with that. 


Little baby dagger claws!  Already!!  


On Thursday, I didn't just get out to go to the doctor!  Eric went to work a little late, to take me to Sam's school for his Circus Program, so both of us were able to attend! 
The kids have been working on their circus skills for weeks.  Last week, Eric took Sam to see the Circus, (Murat Shriner) at the Fairgrounds.  They saw elephants, dogs and trapeze artists all do their tricks.  But I'm sure all of that wasn't nearly as adorable as these kids showing off their skills.   


Sam was doing Forward Rolls...Unassisted.   Brother still doesn't do that.  And when we took the semester off from gymnastics this spring, I didn't think he'd be making progress in school.  But oh yes!  They had him doing a balance beam, pretending to be a trick pony up on a block, and jumping around.  It was Enchanting! 


At the end, the kids broke out the parachute and flipped blocks around.  Sam had so much fun, and so did I.  
I was so glad that for once, I was feeling good enough, (and my BP was good enough) that I could get out to play!  Of course, even though all I did was sit in my wheelchair for an hour, it was enough.  Eric had to take me home, and I crashed.  Fell asleep on the couch - I NEVER do that.   It was a 2 nap day.  

The next day, Friday, was a bonkers day. 

Eric had his surgery.  Mom came for him at 7 in the morning and took him downtown for his sinus surgery.  Unfortunately, we had flood warning, we'd gotten rained dumped all over us for 3 days, and they gave us a 2 hour delay for flooding.  So I had to entertain the boys for a couple hours.  Well, that didn't last long, I managed to get Sam dressed...with Chris's help, before grounding Chris to his room.  I was exhausted by the time Kathleen arrived at 8:45.  The little kids played for a bit before they hit the road, and Erica arrived to take me to the doctor, but we sat and visited for a while first.  It was so nice to have some girl talking time!  Erica arrived just as they took Eric back into surgery.  What a Blessing to have Eric's Mom around to take care of him, and send me updates, and bug the staff there to take good care of him, since I couldn't.  They did a great job! Eric was out of surgery by the time I was ready to go to my OB appointment. 

Erica was wonderful to have around.  She enjoyed seeing her nephew on the screen too.  
Once again the baby hid his face with his hands and feet, but this time we got a really neat picture of the fact that you can't see his face because he has 2 hands and a foot in the way.  













Little maniac. 


 Another cool shot we got, while trying to see his little face.  His Ear.  It's practically perfect already.

My Blood Pressure was a bit high in the office, 130/100, which isn't bad but it's the highest it's been in office for a while.  So we decided to up my drugs from 5-600 mg labetalol.  The Dr. also said he'd confer with my doc about moving up the c-section from May 3rd to a bit sooner.  I don't care, all I want is to not have a baby this weekend.  Let's let Eric recover from his surgery first!  That's what I told the doc, I just don't want it this weekend.  Eric does look a whole lot better than he did after the last surgery he had, he's still loaded up on narcotics, and it would just not be good for me to be having surgery too.  
Mom took the boys overnight, and popped by with them today, so we got to see them, get drive by hugs and didn't have to worry about the physical effects of taking care of them.  She's keeping them most of the weekend.  Though we both have headaches, and my bp doesn't want to calm down, neither one of us has much energy to really get off the couch.  I'm thinking it's not going to be much longer until our little maniac joins us.

Monday, April 15, 2013

Lo! Daffodils Ere Blooming!

I know.  It seems weird to be home on bedrest, so "sick" I have to be left home alone instead of going to Family Festivities.  But Sunday, while Eric took the boys to celebrate Grandpa Willman's 97th Birthday, I stayed home.  Turns out only taking care of myself is a little bit easier and less stressful than trying so miserably to help out with the boys.  So in the afternoon, I found myself with a boost of energy.  
And it was a sunny day.  

And there were daffodils  blooming in the front yard.   The first fall we moved in I planted some "random" daffodils.  Basically, the boys and I threw them all over the yard and hoped that some would come up.  Well, they did.  They did again this year too.  It was such a joy to me to see them pop up too.  Normalcy among the Abnormal.  

So yeah, I went out and laid in the grass to take flower pictures.  And it was good. It was a sunny day, the ground wasn't soggy anymore, and it was ok that I didn't have the energy to do much more than lay down, because turns out that's a Great angle to take flower pictures. ;) 






Enjoy Spring!  

Saturday, April 13, 2013

The 36th week

How Time Flies when we're having fun...or something like it.   

This last week has been another crazy one.   My belly has started contracting, mostly Braxton-Hicks, which people say aren't painful, but really, they can be.  In my case, this week, they haven't been too bad, I can tell my body is just revving up for the inevitable.  The problem lies when Baby starts stretching out and irritating my already irritable uterus.  That's not been fun.  It really takes my breath away.   Even the boys comment now, is Baby J not being nice?!  Is he kicking you?  They think it's funny how much personality their baby brother already exhibits while still inside my tummy.  Sam is particularly hysterical.  This week he started tickling my belly in an effort to jump start his baby brother.  What's really hysterical is how Sam will stick his little index finger into my belly button and wiggle it around to tickle the baby.  Sure, a belly button is easy access.  

I finished watching Alias and took up watching Call the Midwife, a British miniseries set in the early 50s in poor eastside London.  It's Great, Well-Done, and Addictive.   But I've decided that it is too much pregnancy stuff for me to watch.  The tragic parts don't bother me so much, I'm not catastrophizing..yet, I'm just feeling woefully unprepared.  Good thing my body knows what to do.  I was talking to Lisa about it, about how my Birth Plan simply consists of Go have a c-section.  Just keep going to the doctor until they say Go.  She said, I can't decide if you are High maintenance or Low maintenance?

This week, I'm declaring myself kind of low maintenance...at least as far as the doctors are concerned.  I went in Monday for an Ultrasound.  I didn't see a doctor, which I must tell you, I don't like those days as much, they don't take my BP, which frankly is my worry.  But they do check the baby, and they score him based on how well he does his tricks.  I learned this week, he is up for 8 possible points, 2 each for heart rate, breathing movements, tone (stretching each limb and I think how many times he boxes a bladder or kicks my ribs) and fluid, they check to see the quantity of amniotic fluid.  He scored perfectly.  And he was head down this week too, which is good.  But he has one leg up and head down, so he really his Boxing my bladder and kicking my ribs, not just euphemistically  Not that it makes much of a difference for a c-section, but it's easier on the doctor apparently to pull him out head first.  



He's still sweet, and growing, and full of cheeky cuteness. 


Can you see how much he loves to keep his hand up by his face?  Every Time!

 

Now in this last one, you can really see how he's got that one leg up by his head, and his arm.   
Mommy's little gymnast!

Did I mention it got  Bloody Hot this week?  I've been hot, and that leads to uncomfortable, which leads to being grumpy, and having very little that is nice to say.   Thus I haven't been writing a lot.  It got up to 80 and Tuesday I just lay like broccoli, I didn't know why until I had dreadful issues at naptime, it was so gross and hot in the house.  It didn't occur to me to open windows, and turn on all fans until the evening.  I've never been this pregnant in the heat.  Both previous boys all the heat came while I had morning sickness, which is also not fun, but this being 900 million months ass pregnant when it's getting to 80 is Very Uncool.  

Frankly I'm feeling like he can come any time now, because I have been uncomfortable enough with the BP issues, the shortness of breath, I don't think I can take hot and sweaty too.  My camel is very full and we just don't need any more straws.  

We go in twice a week for ultrasounds/non-stress tests, to see how I'm doing.  I saw the doctor on Wednesday too.  This was also a really good visit.  In his Ultrasound Baby did all the things he should do, PLUS every two weeks they do an estimate of his weight.  His estimated weight was 6 pounds and 13 ounces!  I couldn't believe it had been such growth...that's a bit more than an ounce a day.  Must be the Gatorade! 



But his cheeks are sure filling out.  And his head was still down, cuddled up with that one leg.  


In addition, my blood pressure was 110/75.  I was so surprised that I made them check it twice.  I really didn't believe them.  I was a little shaky at the time, but perhaps that old normal is my new low.  Though really overall, I have been feeling pretty decent this week.  So as long as my pee is still good, I'm going to run with it.  I feel like I'm just waiting to start pushing protein.  And we have no idea when that's going to happen, so we try to continue our lives, but it's really hard when there's this giant On Call thing going on all the time.   I have trouble planning much more than a day or two in advance.  But this week, we made a Decision.  
Eric's ENT feels he needs surgery.   His head is full of snot and crap again, and they did a CT scan, and they feel he needs to get roto-rootered. Understandable, Eric's headaches are back, and he's not too much with the thinking.  The last surgery didn't fix it all.   So we're going to go for it.  We're scheduling his surgery for next Friday.  It's a risky bet, betting that we can get Eric fixed up before the baby comes.  But we figure easier to do it now, rather than later.  Pray it goes that way.