35.5 week checkup...LORD give me strength

Today was the start of my weekly appointments at the midwives. I was a little nervous going in because I had not been eating the healthiest since my last checkup with pizza on two weekends and a ginormous amount of movie theatre popcorn, and not taking the time to go to the gym. I even cheated on my sugar intake at my baby shower and had (gasp) a cupcake and punch! However, I was surprised with my weight actually going down half a pound since two weeks ago. The midwife didn't seem too concerned about the lack of weight gain, so I guess I shouldn't be either. The lack of sugar in my diet probably plays a role in not gaining much weight. I just want to make sure that baby is gaining the right amount of fat, since all baby should be doing now is getting pleasantly plump. This morning I was confident that I would not be spilling as much sugar since I had completely unsweetened cheerios for breakfast; I was gravely mistaken. My sugar is still above 1000, which is really high, which is REALLY frustrating. The midwife said that it is really bizarre, but that as long as baby is measuring in the normal range and my weight gain isn't becoming a problem, we won't worry about it unitl after baby is born to make sure my kidneys get back on track, or I might have other health issues to worry about. I also was checked today to see if I have bacteria in the birth canal, so I'll find out at my next appointment if I need to be on antibiotics once I start labor. The midwife said that 50% of women have the bacteria, so it's not a huge deal, just a nuisance to have to take some more meds on top of being in labor. Also now I can be checked to see if baby is starting to make any progress into the world. No dilation so far, but I am 50% effaced and baby's head it right where it should be. We'll see how we progress each week now!
With four weeks to go, I am praying God gives me patience and strength for labor, and also in the meantime as I am getting more and more uncomfortable and it is harder to do normal tasks, like get off the couch. All that really matters though is that baby and I are healthy!

With a Chance of Showers...

Baby officially has the essentials: diapers, clothes, blankets, bath stuff, books, and more; all this made possible by generosity of our church family at our baby shower!
Honestly, while all the gifts are great and help me feel slightly more prepared for having a baby in our home, the greatest part of the shower was knowing that our baby will be loved and cared for not only physically but spiritually by a wonderful church family. I am so thankful God has placed us within the congregation at Grace Reformed to help us raise our child in the fear and knowledge of Him.
The shower was also great because my mom, sister, and sister-in-law could all come too! Here are some candids from the shower.




My pregnant buddy Jenny! She's due two weeks later, but this is her second baby, a little girl!

Thanks!

My new delicious smoothies!

So, I have really been wanting sweet things, like pie, ice cream, cookies, brownies, milkshakes, etc. However, since my kidneys aren't filtering sugar, that cuts all those beautiful things out of the picture of my diet right now. What's a girl to do to satisfy that sweet craving? Make smoothies! Yes, there still is some sugar, but at least it is coming from fruit and yogurt which also has important vitamins and such rather than empty calories from straight sugar.
Here is my recipe!



Beautiful Berry Smoothie
Servings: 2
1 cup frozen berry medley (strawberries/blueberries/blackberries)
3/4 cup vanilla (no sugar added) yogurt
1 large banana
3/4 cup orange juice
10-11 ice cubes

Adjust orange juice ammount for desired consistancy.

Sugar per serving: 17.5 g

34 Weeks

Six weeks is not a very long span of time for anything, and it feels like much less when preparing for a baby's arrival in one's life. Baby is getting stronger each day, which is wonderful to feel that God is continuing to prepare them for life outside the womb; however, the stronger kicks and pushes and punches means that I am increasingly more uncofortable and baby makes me feel sort of nauseous when active against my insides. But again, only six more weeks of this and then baby will be here! Not going to lie, I am looking forward to having my body back and especially to be able to sleep on my back again. My arms are usually numb in the mornings from sleeping on my sides, so I am looking forward to that being done.
With six weeks to go, our biggest project to get finished is the repainting of the crib. Garry and I are working together on sanding down the crib, and we are almost finished, so I hope to have the priming and painting done by Saturday. My mom and sister are coming this weekend, so I might commandeer their services to help.

My baby and me at 34 weeks!

Decorating Progress

Pride isn't always a bad thing, right? I mean, I can be proud of a project I thought of and completed without it being a bad sort of proud. I sure hope so, because I am proud of how my brain thought of a design concept for the baby's room. I long ago knew I wanted to use animals since they work well for boys or girls, so I started purchasing stuffed animals. Then I had the idea of using pictures of baby animals around the room! So I downloaded some pictures and went on Walmart.com photo center and ordered the pictures I found in 8x10 size. Next I went to Hobby Lobby to get in on their %50 off on all photo frames sale this week and found three frames that I thought would fit the pictures well. Now that the room is empty of the guest bed, all it needs is a crib and a dresser/bookshelf thing that I can position around the room and then I can put the animals in their new homes. Here are some pictures of the "before" nursery. Hopefully it doesn't take too much longer for the "after"!

The room

Decorations! Baby Penguin and Leopard are new

Mommy and Baby Giraffe

Shelves that will eventually decorate the walls

Random picture of Mimi in a tissue box. Hehe.

Steady Progress at 33 1/2 weeks

This morning I had another appointment with the midwife, and considering that last time my routine checkup had spawned three blood draws, I was praying that everything would be going fine. God answers prayer! My sugar levels are still extremely high in my urine (which is frustrating since I've cut practically ALL the sugar out of my diet), but I was back on track for my weight gain and uterus size, so baby is not getting too big too fast. I am measuring 34 cm, weighing in at 166 pounds (with my shoes on, so practically 165), and baby's heart was beating at a strong 143 beats per minute. I just continue to pray that I can keep managing my weight and baby's weight so that labor is not too difficult.

Step right up, step right up and enter your guess for baby!

Just for fun, I started an online guessing game for people to predict information about baby. This way it is set in stone--or electronic imprints--so that people later cannot say, "That's what I thought it was going to be the whole time!" when realy they thought the opposite.
The game tallies up who is the closest and ranks everyone in order according to their information they guessed. The link is on the side of the blog, so sign on in and have fun guessing!

Celebration Week!

The first week of August is always exciting for us as I celebrate a birthday and then we celebrate our anniversary! Garry got me some wonderful cards and a massage certificate for my birthday, which will be coming in handy sometime within the next year after going through the stresses and joys of being a mom.
I couldn't help but be joyful when I considered all that our loving Father has blessed us with over the past four years of our marriage. God provided both of us with the perseverance to graduate from college, opened doors for a solid career at KPMG for Garry and teaching opportunities for me with Omaha Public Schools, provided us with the money smarts to save up and plan for buying a house, helped our moving process go smoothly, and now has blessed us richly with the responsibility of becoming parents in a very short seven weeks. Praise be to our God from whom all blessings flow!
To celebrate, we went to 94/95 Sports Grille which is a gourmet sports-themed restaurant and bar out in West Omaha. We made it in time for happy hour so we got an appetizer for half price. My food was pretty good and Garry loved his pizza. Afterward we went to Target to do some preliminary registering for baby. Whew. I think half of our registery ended up being books because I got really excited about those.

My chicken roulade and potato. Yum.

My wonderful husband enjoying his food--even if he doesn't enjoy my documenting!
Garry has been hard at work on our crib, which is turning out to be more of a task than we originally anticipated...but at least it has given Garry an excuse to buy some man toys, like his new De Walt power hand sander. We bought our eco-friendly primer and paint for when the original paint is all stripped. I am excited to see the crib turn to a beautiful white for our baby!

Garry and his new sander

Three "finished" sides

Baby's Second Wedding!

One of my brothers is now a husband! We had a nice time seeing a lot of family for Jordan and Andrea's wedding on July 31, and I was super happy that baby didn't move around too much or kick me when I was singing during the ceremony. Here are some picturs of our time at the wedding! Black dresses seem to hide 32 week pregnancies pretty well, if anyone needs a formal dress for a fancy occasion. This dress is courtesy of friend Liz from church, and I'm SO glad she let me borrow it.


Family Picture!


Future Grandma and Grandpa, Uncle Jordan, Uncle Nathan, and Aunt Nicole


The beautiful bride and new sister-in-law!

Sugary update

Although I haven't officially heard back from the lab about the last bloodwork that was done to figure out how well my kidneys are working, I'm assuming no news is good news as far as taking action for the problem. I did my own research online and talked to a couple doctors and a dietitian that I know and they said that it is normal for some pregnant women's kidneys to not filter out the sugar from the endocrine system. It should go away after baby is born, so I just have to continue to watch what I eat. Although, with a birthday and anniversary this week, I might cheat a little bit and have a tiny little sweet something extra. Except that I cheated this past weekend with my brother's wedding and had some cheesecake. Eight more weeks and then I hopefully won't have to worry about it anymore and we will have a healthy baby as a result of not a lot of sweets!