31 weeks, 3 days

Ummm yeah, I have a baby coming in 2 friggen months. Have I done ANYTHING to prepare? Umm, not really. Ok thats a lie, I ordered my birth kit. Woohoo. I have a list of supplies I need to get as well. I have time, right? I'm oddly relaxed about this whole thing. I remember being pregnant with Lily and having all the first time mom anxiety... I remember being pregnant with Julia and having anxiety about wanting a natural childbirth, and anxiety about breastfeeding, and anxiety about having a second child (Could I love another as much?).... this time, I'm not really having any anxiety. I KNOW I'll love this child as much as my two girls, I know I can birth naturally, and I know I can breastfeed. Of course there is the fear of the unknown... can I take three children grocery shopping and survive? But I figure, that comes with the territory of motherhood. I am pretty excited about not having to go back to work this time around. With Lily and Julia I spent most of my postpartum time trying to figure out how I was supposed to leave my baby at 7 weeks... granted it was with Paul, but still, it was like this gloom was looming over my maternity leave. This time, I don't have that. I don't have to leave. I get to stay home with my baby. No worries about pumping enough milk....

This past weekend, my friend Jen and I went to see a documentary, The Business of Being Born. It was amazing! First off, I got a night out without kids and a husband... I honestly don't remember the last time that has happened, maybe in years? haha. Secondly, it is an amazing documentary. I think it should be required viewing for every woman. I went in thinking it could very well end up being this big pro-home birth propaganda filled movie. But it really wasn't. It stressed the importance of a woman's responsibility to research her child birth options and take the responsibility of her birth away from her doctor and place it on herself. It made a lot of sense to me. I really enjoyed it. The documentary really solidified my desire to have my home birth. I am so excited and looking forward to it. I know what I'm doing/planning on is safest for me and my child.

Ok I"m getting off my soap box now. LOL

And here comes 2008!

Our family had a fabulous Christmas. The girls were blessed with many gifts and lots of time spent with friends and family. I of course think that Toys R Us threw up all over my house, but luckily we've been able to find some new homes for our old toys, and even put away some of the new toys for rainy days. We had a wonderful Christmas Eve dinner here at our home then went to Church with the girls. Christmas morning was spent watching the girls happily unwrap presents and then we headed over to my inlaws for more presents. After that was done the girls were getting a bit tired, so we went home and they took their naps. Paul and I spent their nap time putting together toys, cleaning up some old toys and mostly just finding the space for all their new gifts.
My parents arrived on Friday and I spent most of Saturday preparing for Paul's graduation party. We had his party yesterday and it went really well. We had tons of food and drinks left over, but I'd rather have too much than not enough, and was even able to send food home with friends, so that was great. The girls got to play with their friend's at the party, and Paul and I got to see some friends we hadn't seen in a while. All in all I think it was a wonderful time.
Today is my father's birthday, in addition to being New Year's Eve. The girls and I went out this morning to pick up breakfast for him and we had a nice breakfast together. I've been trying to get the house cleaned up a bit today as well. Tonight we will be going out for Sushi with my mother in law. Paul is working tonight from 4pm-12am and tomorrow from 8am-4pm, so he'll be spending the night at a friend's house instead of making the hour drive back home, and therefore missing out on some much needed sleep.
Wednesday is my next midwife appointment, and I'm really surprised how fast this pregnancy is going. I'm almost 27 weeks I think, which puts me at the beginning of my third trimester. I haven't done a darn thing to get ready for this baby. My goal however is to get the bedrooms painted in the next couple of weeks, then move the girls into the same bedroom in the beginning of February. Getting Julia and Lily comfortable sleeping in the same room is currently my priority, and I feel like once they are ok with that, I can start getting the nursery ready.

I'm going to attempt to post some pictures from our holiday celebrations... however I always have trouble with this part, so we'll see how it goes.

so i've been ordered

I've been ordered to update my blog... apparently there is a rule I need to write once a week. Paul graduated from the police academy this past weekend! I'm so proud of him. We had such a fun weekend with family and friends.
Christmas is one week away and I'm not feeling that stressed about it. I'm happy Paul has off the 4 days before, that way if anything needs to be done, it can be done then and I'll have help. I'm more stressed out about the Graduation Party I'm throwing him the week after Christmas. Luckily my parents will be visiting, so we'll have some extra help.
Lily is getting more and more excited for Christmas, nearly every day she asks me if its Christmas yet, and every time we drive by a house with Christmas lights and decorations, she yells out "Mommy, look, they are having Christmas at their house!". Its just too cute, and I love hearing the excitement and wonder in her voice. Julia doesn't really have any concept of Christmas yet, but she sure loves the tree and all the fun ornaments to play with. I put all the safe ornaments on the bottom and let her touch them and play with them. She loves putting them on and off the tree.

Ok hopefully this blog post fulfilled my requirement for the week... next time I blog will probably be after Christmas, if thats ok with you Melissa.

There's snow, Christmas must be coming!

"Look Mommy, its snowing!!! Christmas must be coming!" So says Lily. Christmas and all the joy and wonder and stress that comes with it, certainly is coming. This weekend I have dedicated to baking and decorating. Maybe even some wrapping if I feel especially motivated. I've been a baking fool the last couple of days and have gotten a good dent in the baking I want to do. Tomorrow, Lily and I will be baking chocolate chip cookies (with red and green chocolate chips that she picked out), pizzelles, and starting our sugar cookies. I'm hoping to also get the tree and the lights up, and do some decorating. We won't be decorating the tree or the sugar cookies till Sunday, when Lily and Julia's aunt is coming over. All in all, it should be a festive weekend.

Next weekend will be quite busy as well. Paul graduates from the police academy on Friday! Can you believe it? I can't! Well I can, because he's worked so hard the past 4 months, and has really kicked butt in the academy. We'll have his graduation ceremony on Friday, a Christmas Party for the girls on Saturday, then a graduation party for his class. So it looks like it should be a fun filled weekend.

We recently found out that Paul will have the entire weekend before Christmas, as well as Christmas Eve and Christmas Day off of work, so I'm thrilled we will have this holiday to spend as a family. Of course he won't have these days off again for the next 7 years, so we are definitely going to take advantage of it and make the most of it.

On a side note, can you believe it, I'm already 23 weeks pregnant!?!? I haven't done a darn thing to prepare for this baby... but I figure we can worry about all that stuff after the holidays.

I suck at blogging apparently

I really stink at blogging lately.... maybe its the lack of time to myself. Probably. But I'm certainly not complaining. I blogged more when I was working, because I was bored at work. And I'm certainly NOT bored at home, not even for a minute. The girls keep me going from the time they wake up until the time they go to bed, and its fun (for the most part).
Can you believe I'm half way done with this pregnancy already? I can't! I'm already 20 weeks, and its gone by so quickly. Baby is moving around a lot and my belly is looking pretty large. As for weight gain, it hasn't been a lot at all, but I'm feeling huge and large.
Our Halloween was nice, Lily dressed up as a bumble bee, and Julia was a ladybug. My little bugs. I call them "bug" or "buggie" all the time, so I think the costumes were appropriate. I always have a really hard time getting pictures uploaded on my blog, but I'm guessing more people have seen the pictures already, and if you haven't, email me.
Thanksgiving is next week, and the girls and I are planning a week up in Rochester to visit my family. I'm thinking we'll leave on Tuesday, and come back on Sunday. It really depends on Miss Julia and her sleeping routine. We've all been pretty sick the past couple of weeks, the nasty cold virus really took its time going through each one of us. Julia seemed to be affected most, at least when it came to bedtime. I had her all weaned off the bottle, but then gave it back to her when she got sick, because I was desperate for sleep. She'd last a couple hours in her crib, then it was into our bed for the remainder of the night, and she'd toss and turn. Ugh, I was so tired. Luckily the past two nights she has slept better, been up once but quickly went back to sleep in her crib, so I'm happy. I'm just hoping she gets back into her nice sleeping routine before we head to my parents, or its going to be a long week!
Lily is doing pretty well, actually right this moment she is in time out, but other than that, she's been doing well. She absolutely loves school, her teachers and all the children in her class. I'm so glad she took to preschool so well I had a parent-teacher conference last week and her teachers talked about how soft spoken she is, how empathetic and gentle she is... I'm sitting there thinking to myself, who's child is this? Because this certainly isn't mine. Lily is the farthest from gentle and soft spoken when she is home. At least she's doing well there!
Paul has 4 weeks left at the academy. I really can't believe how well its going. He is doing so wonderfully with everything. I'm counting down to his graduation on December 14th. I'm so proud of him!

15 weeks down

The girls and I spent last weekend in Rochester visiting our family. Lily and Julia seemed to really enjoy themselves and slept great at my parents (which always makes me happy!). My parents seemed really really tired by the end of the weekend, I guess my kids wear them out. haha. We went to the Children's Museum which was lots of fun. We also hit up Ontario park, by the beach to ride on the Merry Go Round. Lily loves Merry Go Rounds! The drive up there went suprisingly well. I always get nervous driving 4-5 hours on the thruway with the girls by myself. But I really have to say that this trip was one of our better ones.

Lily had a tough time returning to school on Wednesday. She has never cried before about going to school, so imagine my surprise when she was pretty hysterical at school and clung to me pretty badly. I stayed with her for a few minutes until she got settled and when I picked her up, her teachers said she had done fine and didn't cry at all during the morning. What a relief. I'd hate to think that if she did cry that they didn't call me.

I had my second midwife appointment on Tuesday. Paul actually got out of work a bit early and was able to come. I was pretty happy he got to be there. My midwives are so nice and down to earth they really make me feel comfortable. I gained about 2lbs since my last appointment, the baby is measuring perfectly and "it" has a nice strong heartbeat of 160. Just like the girls, which leads me to think its another girl, LOL. I've pretty much decided that we are definitely NOT finding out the gender until the birth. Paul on the other hand still thinks differently, but what he forgets is that he won't even be at my ultrasound because he'll be working... and to be quite honest, at this point I don't even think I want an ultrasound.

Sorry its been so long

I feel like I haven't updated in a while. Sorry, such is the life with two little ones to run after, I suppose. I'm now officially in the 2nd trimester. And I've been in maternity clothes for about 2 weeks now. I have my second midwife appointment next Tuesday. Paul and I have decided (well I decided for Paul) to let the gender be a surprise. I figure, with it being my last baby (most likely), I want to experience having one surprise. So I guess we are going with yellow and green for everything as of now. haha

Lily is doing great in preschool, she really loves it. She does come exhausted from school but luckily is taking a good nap when she gets home. Julia is also doing pretty well. She has her "diva" moments, and the days when I can't put her down, but overall, she enjoys life. In three days she mastered how to get out of her highchair (while strapped in), how to climb up on the coffee table, and how to pull out a kitchen chair, climb up on it to get onto the kitchen table. I can't leave her alone for a second, and she wears me out!

Paul is on week 10 at the police academy... half way done. He's been doing really well but has been suffering a lot of back pain from the PT and DT they do. I hope it passes for him soon. He isn't too much help with the girls when he's in pain the whole time he's home.