37 weeks

I'll spare you weekly pictures and post one next week instead.

But I did have a doctor's appointment today:

Weight Gain: 19 lbs
Belly Measurement: 39"
Baby's Heartrate: 138 (she must have been sleeping because she didn't respond to the doppler at all and her heart rate was lower than it's been in a while... cutie)

I actually lost half a pound this week, but I've been rounding my weight gain, so it still rounds to 19 lbs. But my belly grew about 1/2" in a week, so the baby must be doing fine. I'll chalk it up to all the moving and stress of the past week.

Changes Changes

We had the official closing on the house yesterday. It went well. I cried a lot during the final cleaning out of the house. I got lots of pictures of the measurement wall (we also transfered the measurements over to a nice piece of wood). I think I decided that some of my tears were from missing the four little boys who once occupied our home. Such sweetness (and chaos, I know). Looking at Cole's first measurement on that door jam and thinking of him at that age was just overwhelming.

Then I went to the house at 4pm to pick up Jacob and Cole off the bus (I warned the new owners that I wasn't going to be stalking them, but that I'd be there every school day) and while I was waiting, Dennis, our tile facilitating neighbor, came over to talk to me. I started crying right when I saw him (hormonal?). He hugged me and had lots of nice and wise things to say. Still, it's hard to leave a good neighborhood and such wonderful neighbors.

But I will honestly chalk up a lot of the emotion to hormones. When I think about getting out to Texas, I get excited about being in Austin, being near my dad, and starting a new adventure.

You also probably know that Mike got a new job. He starts on October 13th. One week before the baby is due. They want him up in Boston (the headquarters, but it's a telecommuting position) during that week. So he'll be gone from the 13th to the 17th. A little unnerving for me. I don't want him to miss the birth of his little one. But I've never had labor that lasted less than 7 hours, so hopefully he could make it back in time. But I've still got some arrangements to get together for that time so that the kids and I are taken care of while Mike is gone (in case I do go into labor during that time).

But the really good news is that we'll be double covered with insurance, so I should get all of my $600 back that I've paid to the doctor and instead of owing around $1500 for the hospital portion, we'll only owe $250. That will help offset the moving costs, so that's a good thing.

And now I'll get back to my slow attempt at getting this apartment feeling like a home instead of a war zone.

Pictures

Here I am today... 36 weeks, 2 days. I am facing the wrong way... I guess I'll know that the other pictures were in the house and this one and the rest are in the apartment... 3 and a half weeks to go. I should get the pack n play put up and start washing the baby clothes. Ack! I'm having a baby!

And then there's the not so baby aspect of our lives... this is Reid this morning on his way to school. Looking quite dashing in his fancy football jersey. He was quite proud to be wearing this.

Sadly, they lost their game tonight. But they played a team that is typically quite good. Last year they lost to them 30 - 6. Today they went to overtime at 8 - 8. The opposing team scored on their four plays, but we didn't. Sad to lose, but nice that we did so well compared to last year. Reid played about the same amount as he did last game, but I think he did a bit better. Hopefully he'll start seeing more and more playing time.

36 weeks plus a few days

Well... I'm officially down to less than a month to go (hopefully, anyway). I had my doctor's appointment on Monday:

Weight gain: 19 lbs
Belly Measurement: 38.5"
Baby's Heartrate: 156

The baby almost jumped out of my stomach when the doctor put the gel on my stomach. She's getting smarter and knew that the doppler machine was coming and expressed her continued displeasure at that, I suppose. :)

And aside from swelling feet and a stinging pubic bone, I'm doing alright. Although, the pubic bone thing is keeping me from walking much today. I know it's been made much worse with all of this moving and cleaning and packing and lifting. I'm hoping a little rest today will help it calm down a bit.

Housing Update:

The closing is still on schedule for Friday. We have almost all of our stuff out of the house, so we're pretty much on track that way. Mike's been making evening runs over there to load up stuff and bring it either to the house or to the storage unit. But there's only one load plus the kid's bike left. Well... and a bedroom set that I'm going to be donating to the local thrift shop.

Several women from church came over yesterday and cleaned, so that was really nice. I don't have any more cleaning to do except to vacuum the living room once more after everything is out. One of the ladies from church even accepted the assignment of going around the house picking up trash that was around the sides of the house. Amazing how much junk ends up between the bushes and the foundation. Especially when your kids and the neighbor's kids all play around your house. So anyway. Things are moving along. The apartment is slowly coming together, but will have to wait until after the closing on Friday to get much more attention.

And Reid has his second game today. I'll post about that tonight (now that we have internet at the apartment!).

Reid's First Game and Our Last Dinner

Reid's first football game was today. Obviously, he's number 88. :) They won 12 - 6. Reid is on the starting defensive special team. And he got to play about 5 or 6 plays at defensive end. I think he is a little disappointed in his performance, but I thought he did pretty good for his first game.

And tonight is the last night we're having a good cooked dinner in this house. Tomorrow is frozen pizzas and Friday is probably an eat out night. I made lasagna, french bread, salad, and blueberry coffee cake. The only problem is that it's Wednesday, so by the time Reid and I got home from his football game, Mike was heading out the door with Zach and Jacob for scouts and they had lasagna in plastic ware to eat on the way. (I cooked the dinner early this morning.) So no family time with this dinner, but that's okay. It's nice to have a good meal when you know you won't for several days.

Here are some pictures from the football game.


This is Reid on the first play of the game. He's standing right to the left of the referee's arm in the picture.
And if you look carefully, you'll see a white helmet in the middle of the red team's main blob. That's Reid playing as defensive end. :)

Apartment and Packing

The really, really good news is that our two month apartment here is going to be on the first floor! We are soooo happy about that. We will move into the apartment on Saturday. That will give us almost a week to do what we need to with the house to get it ready for the new owners.

Mike spent the day yesterday moving boxes into the storage unit. And with near record highs of 91 degrees and unusually high humidity for September, I was very impressed. I supervised the kids taking boxes outside for easier loading, but didn't actually lift a box all day. Given that I kind of threw my back out last weekend doing lifting and such, I think it was wise... but it's hard to not be in the thick of everything. I am still the primary packer, so that's making me feel quite useful.

The attic is almost completely empty thanks to Mike, Reid, and Zach. And I think we're close to having all of our miscellaneous junk in piles in the dining room. I can start packing those up this week.

So the plan for now is for me to get everything packed up that's going to the storage unit by Wednesday. Then on Thursday and Friday, I'll pack up the things that we'll be taking to the apartment. And I need to call the utility companies to get things worked out for the apartment and house.

One of the big problems with this plan is that life is going to be busy this week. I have to go to Shodor for most of the day on Monday (I know... WHY?). Turns out their bookkeeper quit and so the new bookkeeper needs a little bit of direction. I agreed to one day. It's bad timing, but it's also the last time... for real. :) Then Tuesday, Jacob and Cole have a dental appointment. Wednesday is Reid's first football game, Zach has an appointment on Thursday, and I have to pick one day during the week to call our pediatrician's office and try to get Zach in for a nurses appointment to get a vaccine that he needs in order to stay in 6th grade. Friday is clear. That's something at least.

Picture and Update

So I just now got around to taking a 34 week picture. So now it's a 34weeks 5days picture. I don't think I've grown that much in the past two weeks. The baby seems to be finding lots of nooks and crannies to fill into. That's been really fun for me. Yesterday I had the first little twinge of "I might just be ready to have this baby" feeling.

We're leaving in a few minutes to go look at the first floor apartment. Then we'll spend the day moving boxes into the storage unit. The kids are really looking forward to that! Life is such a blast sometimes! :)