36 Weeks

Wow... these past couple weeks have been rough! I went from feeling really awesome around 34 weeks to really not awesome. Good news though. Baby is heads down now! I think a few days after my 34 week appointment I was laying in bed and decided to try to rotate the baby myself. Well... It went pretty easily heads down. I just did two little pushes and it was there. I don't know if it's actually been heads down ever since then. But I figured it wouldn't be hard to keep turning it myself if I had to. But ever since my false labor scare, (See my moving day post for more details on that) the baby has been heads down and wrecking all sorts of havoc on my cervix, lower spine/tail bone, pubic bone and bladder. (No... It's not fun and very painful...)

36 Week baby bump!

Date: April 27, 2016

How far along? 36 Weeks... Wow, only 4 weeks left. When I start having doctor appointments every 2 weeks I feel like I'm getting really close. But now I'm at weekly and seriously this baby is going to be here before we even know it! Now would probably be a good time to start refreshing on my hypnobabies....

Total weight gain/loss: I guess my body has finally decided to play a little catch up from not gaining any weight and I put on 3 pounds the past 2 weeks. So I'm now up 27 pounds bringing my grand total to 161 lbs!

Maternity clothes? I'm actually growing out of some of my maternity shirts... Getting nice and big I am.

Sleep: I've been sleeping pretty decent as long as my kids sleep decent. Lately Jacob has decided that Scott and I's bed is the place to be. It started really bad when Scott left for the first time to South Dakota for 2 weeks. Every night he was coming into bed. Well technically I'm sleeping in the bean bag but he would come into my bed I'm not sleeping in. I think it's a terrible habit to start before the baby comes because pretty sure Scott, Jacob, me and the baby (occasionally) are not all going to fit in the queen size bed. Plus, when I'm back in the bed I don't sleep well at all when Jacob is sleeping with us because he is such a wild sleeper. But Scott likes Jacob coming into bed with him.

Movement: The movements don't seem to be as jerky these days but they still happen often. When I was at the hospital getting checked out for the false labor stuff the baby moved non stop the whole hour I was there. It was moving so much that the monitors wouldn't pick up his heart rate and he kept kicking the off my belly. And the other night he moved from like 9 to midnight straight. I'm telling ya. After this baby comes we will not be sleeping. Also since the false labor stuff. (It started the same time I started having contractions) This baby puts so much pressure on my cervix sometimes it feels like he's taking a knife to it. I can't even walk when it happens because it's such a sharp, painful pain. I just try to cross my legs really tight in hopes it pushes whatever is putting so much pressure on my cervix up more. Also, it likes to head butt my lower spine and tailbone which is not a comfortable feeling. I never had that with Ida. Sometimes some cervix punches which felt uncomfortable but not painful. It also likes to head butt my pubic bone. I liked it much better when baby was heads up I think....

Feeling sick? I've been feeling nauseous here and there really randomly. But most of the time I don't feel sick at all. And that's the way I like it.

Other pregnancy symptoms? These past two weeks have seriously been so bad. I don't know why but my stomach has just been so uncomfortable. I don't know if it's been the babies position? For most of the past couple weeks before the false labor thing which happened 4 days ago, the baby has been spending most of it's time in a diagonal position with it's head or butt putting a lot of pressure on my right hip/pelvic bone. So I don't know if that's why I've been so uncomfortable? I also wonder if that has been the cause of my hip/groin pain to be a lot worse than it has been? I'm not really sure. But for whatever reason my hip/groin has been hurting a lot worse. I'm sure packing and moving boxes didn't really help with that either. I've also been feeling nauseous more often and my heartburn/indigestion thing in the evenings has been worse. My right foot randomly swelled for a couple days around 35 and a half weeks but I think it's gone back done. So that's nice that I haven't really had any swelling. I just hope I start feeling better because my life is really going to suck if this is how it is for the next month. Also I had been getting over the cough and sore throat from being sick a month ago and it seems to have relapsed and now it's back again. So I have a sore throat most of the day and my cough has gotten bad again along with congestion. Ida's has seemed to return again as well so we are both having fun with that.

Have you started to show yet? I'm back to feeling normal big. haha I don't have a picture to compare to see how much bigger I am this time around because I've just been so busy that I haven't been good at taking pictures. But I'm pretty positive that I am bigger this time around.

Gender prediction: Scott has decided he thinks we are having a boy. I had a dream the other night that it was a girl. I'm just getting really excited to find out!

Moving Day!!

Scott and I have been looking for a new place for awhile now. But the seriousness was kind of so so because we still didn't know where Scott was going to get a new job. So we found this place about a month and a half ago that I thought was perfect. It was a 3 bedroom duplex with a fenced back yard and just really nice compared to everything else we had looked at. So we filled out the application and got accepted for it but then when they found out we might be moving if Scott found a job outside of town they thought it was too big of a risk and declined us the same day Scott got offered a job here in Idaho Falls. We didn't know if we were taking it yet so we couldn't really call her and tell her we had a new job so let us move in! So we didn't get the duplex and since that point it was the only place that I wanted to move. Nothing was even close to what I wanted or nice enough for me to even want to rent.

So I was excited when a couple months later the other half of the duplex came up for rent! We went and looked at it but because it was during the time that Scott was in South Dakota for work and I was sick with the flu, we didn't really get back to her on the duplex very quickly and when we did get back to her telling her we wanted it she kind of acted like she had promised it to someone else. But she must have liked us because later that day she said it was ours and we signed the lease on the 14th. So the original plan had been to move in the last weekend of the month on the 30th. But because Scott had another field job in South Dakota that weekend on the 20th we asked if we could move in a weekend early and we were set to move on the 23rd which gave me 3 days to pack. To be honest I liked it more that way anyways. I felt like I was stressing way more trying to figure out what I should pack early and what I shouldn't and when I only had 3 days to pack it made the decision a lot easier. Pack everything.

I have a tradition to take a pic of the front door for

all the places we've lived. So here we are. 

The front door for apartment #3. It's been a great

place to live!

It was a very busy week but somehow we got everything done without pulling any all nighters and were able to get rid of a car load of stuff in the process. Scott took Friday off work to help finish everything up and the Phelps watched the kids so we wouldn't have to worry about them either. Saturday morning we had a great turn out of helpers! I am so so grateful for everyone who came to help. Most of them stayed the whole 4 hours it took to move and we tried to bribe everyone by providing doughnuts and pizza! It was seriously so helpful though and again I am so grateful to everyone. And I think I moved 2 boxes the whole day because being 8 months pregnant nobody would let me touch anything. So I just spent my time directing everyone where to put furniture so we could get it all in the right spot the first time. I felt like I did a pretty good job organizing everything so it was easy to figure out where all the boxes went. I labeled all the boxes then added signs to all the rooms as well so they could see where to go. I thought everything went really smoothly and we were even able to get all the furniture down the  narrow stairs that we wanted.

That night I ended up having a lot of hard contractions. They started around 8 pm. I tried to take it easy the rest of the night and drink some fluids. The contractions continued through the night every 5-8 mins. By morning they were still going and so we decided to be safe, because I had been having them for 15 hours straight, to go get me checked out at the hospital. Scott was trying to decide if he should go to South Dakota or not and we were both just stressing wondering if I was or was not in labor. After getting checked I was only 1 cm dilated and not effaced at all and the midwife figured I had just overworked and dehydrated myself. So I was instructed to stay off my feet the next couple day, drink plenty of water and take a warm bath. After 17 hours of contractions they finally stopped as long as I was sitting. But of course things still needed to get done and Scott had Monday off so we sent the kids to the grandparents and we spent Monday getting the house unpacked. I felt pretty good most of the day but by the end of the day I was having contractions again. But we got the majority of the house unpacked excluding the garage and storage room. We at least got everything out of boxes.

Tuesday I had to clean the other apartment because the new tenants were moving in on Thursday and I had a project at work due Wednesday that I had already neglected because of moving. So much for taking it easy for a couple days.... But with the help from Lorna and the Phelps we were able to knock it out pretty quick. I even got sent home early for working too hard. But I'm so grateful for all the help we received through this whole ordeal! Scott didn't end up going to South Dakota and we were able to pretty much get everything else unpacked the rest of that week. So here are some pics of the new place!

Looking into the living room from the front door.

First bedroom upstairs

Downstairs in the family room/play room from the stairs.

Directly to the left is the laundry room.

Directly to the right is our room.

The kids room.

The covered back patio that leads out into the yard.

 It's really funny because the kids aren't used to having a yard.

They don't play on it much and stick to the sidewalk or 

the patio. :)

I am loving our new place and all the extra space! I even like this side of the duplex a lot more than the other side we had originally looked at! The spaces just work better and it seems more spacious to me.

34 Weeks

So I have been convinced to get the flu shot for the rest of my pregnancies.... Around 32 weeks I ended up getting the flu and let me tell you. I think it was the worst I have ever felt in my whole life. I am so grateful for all of those who helped me out during this time because I was pretty much out for a full week. It was really bad timing as well because Scott was leaving on his first field outing for work and was going to be gone for 12 days. He was there for the first couple days of it though and did an awesome job taking over my mom duties. After he left his parents watched the kids for 5 days and it was seriously a life saver. And on top of all my sickness Ida ended up getting tonsillitis and Lorna and Craig pretty much took care of all of her stuff. I was hardly functioning enough to take care of myself then take care of Jacob and Ida on top of it. And it might not have lasted as long but on the 4th day of the flu I ended up getting a sinus infection on top of it and it put me out all over again. I could hardly even open my eyes. And the whole left side of my face hurt so bad. I also felt like I was drugging my baby because I as taking tylenol around the clock as well as tamiflu, antibiotic and cough drops for my sore throat and cough. Again, I have never felt so awful in my whole life and I felt like it would never go away. And because I was pregnant I couldn't get comfortable either. I couldn't lay on my sides because it hurt my hips/groin too much or my back cuz I'd get light headed and nauseous and the bean bag was just making my back hurt for some reason. It was the worst. Thankfully I am mostly recovered now and just suffering from congestion, sore throat and cough now. Again. Thank you, thank you to all those who helped out at this time. It was very much needed and appreciated.

Date: April 13, 2016

How far along? 34 Weeks

Total weight gain/loss: So I'm still only up 24 pounds. Something about getting sick back to back has really slowed down my weight gain. So I guess there is one positive for all the sickness. (Although I think I would have just rather gained the weight.)

Maternity clothes? I finally bought myself a maternity swimming suit and I think it's really cute! I'm pretty sure I've ruined my regular one already from wearing it to my water aerobics class and stretching it out.

Sleep: I have been sleeping really good. I still wake up a couple times a night for no reason and some times to pee but that's pretty normal I think. I still feel tired all the time.

Movement: I think this baby moves more than Jacob and Ida combined. I'm also pretty sure this baby is never going to sleep. So hurray for us! But I think I felt hiccups around 32 weeks for the first time. They don't happen very often though. I've maybe felt them a couple times since then. Also... My midwife and I discovered baby is heads up as of right now. But... I'm not that worried about it this time around. This baby just moves so much that I'm sure it does 8 summer-salts in any given day. I think I should be more worried it's all tangled up in the umbilical cord!

Feeling sick? Sometimes at night I randomly start feeling really nauseous. It's weird and I don't know what causes it. It so random and doesn't happen very often.

Other pregnancy symptoms? So these past few weeks I've actually felt really good. Just the occasional heartburn and braxton hicks. Around 32 weeks I probably started waddling bad. Sometimes worse than others depending on how much pain I'm in and how many braxton hicks I'm having. But my groin/hip thing has felt really good lately and all around I am feeling really good.

Have you started to show yet?I am feeling huge again. It seems I just go back and forth between feeling normal big to huge big. 

Gender prediction: I am getting so impatient to find out the gender of this baby! We are getting so close! Only 6 weeks to go. Which is crazy.... But I feel like the closer I get to having the baby the less I feel like it's one gender or the other.

30 Weeks

3/4's of the way done with this pregnancy! Finally! I feel like I am really over being pregnant this time around. It feels like I've been pregnant for years. But I'm down to single digits! I go back and forth between being really excited to meeting this baby and having a third running around to feeling like I'm not ready in any way to add a third. I am just really excited to be able to comfortably get down on the ground and play with my kids. And to have energy again to want to play with my kids. Here is my third quarter transformation pictures. I find it funny as I go back through my pics because I feel like I'm not just carrying high, or low. But I feel like it changes depending on the week. Sometimes I'm carrying really high, and other times I seem to be carrying really low. It's kind of weird...

It my appointment today I was measuring 2 weeks big.... I really hope this doesn't mean I'm having a monster baby again. But oh well if I am! There isn't really anything I can do about it. Other than that everything looks great! Also today we did a 3D ultrasound of the little babe! And here he/she is!!! Now here's the question..... Boy? or Girl?

Date: March 16, 2016

How far along? 30 Weeks

Total weight gain/loss: So crazy... But I actually didn't gain any weight the past 2 weeks. Which means.... I'm still up 24 pounds! My total weight is 158 pounds. So now I'm only 4 pounds more than with Jacob and Ida at 30 weeks. YAY! Ok... I'm sure having the stomach bug and not eating for a few days helped....

Maternity clothes? I just ordered some maternity hike ware and I'm so excited! I figured we do enough hiking and whatnot while I am still prego that I can totally justify buying hiking pants and a dry fit shirt for when I'm prego. And I'm really tired of going on these hikes and feeling like I have nothing to wear. Plus. They were on sale for a really cheap price so I couldn't really pass it up. I'm pretty much really excited for them to get here!

Sleep: I have still been sleeping great! Although I still feel like I'm always tired. It's like it doesn't matter how much sleep I get I still tired all the time.

Movement: So I have decided I do actually like the baby moving a lot in the mornings. Because that is when I feel the best. I still wish I could just see into my uterus and watch the little guy move. It would be so cool! In the evenings, especially if I over eat, which seems to happen almost every evening, the movements really aren't very comfortable.

Feeling sick? Besides the stomach bug I got that seems to keep randomly making my stomach feel upset, I am feeling GREAT!

Other pregnancy symptoms? The past couple weeks hasn't been so symptom free. (Hello third trimester) My indigestion, gas, heartburn, over eating feeling has come back full force. It seems like lately I start getting heartburn starting at 3 pm every day. Then it stays the rest of the night. I am really bad at disciplining myself at dinner to only eat a really small portion and that always comes back to bite me in the butt. I am good at eating only small portions the rest of the day. My pelvic pain has been feeling pretty good but I have also stopped exercising. Not really because I don't want my pelvic to hurt. More just because I lost motivation. I'm hoping to gain it back soon. I seem to be coming out of a hormonal low so emotionally I'm actually feeling pretty good!

Have you started to show yet? I seem to always have a little bump right above me belly button. I am starting to wonder if it's a foot that just sits there most of the time. I'm not feeling as huge anymore but I think it's because I feel far enough along in my pregnancy that I feel like I should start feeling big. So now I just feel normal big. I don't think I really look that much different in size as I did with Ida.... But I do think I'm carrying a lot differently. Definitely higher with this one. At least right now.

30 weeks w/ Ida                                         30 weeks now

Gender prediction: Only 10ish more weeks till we find out! But after looking at the ultrasound pics I'm kind of thinking boy even more.... I got the baby blankets done for this baby and I think they turned out so cute! I might kind of be doing a woodland theme for this baby because it's really cute.. And I got the most cute fox wub! Because this will be a citrus baby. I have decided to only tie half the quilt now so that when the baby is born I can tie the rest with either blue and pink depending on what I have. That way it wont be quite so citrusy. :)

29 Weeks

I went in for 28 week appointment today and did the glucose test. I was a little worries because the families been suffering from the stomach bug and I still feel like I'm getting over it and my stomach is still feeling kind of sensitive. So I didn't know how well drinking a 50 g container of sugar water would react. Thankfully it upset my stomach very slightly but not too bad. I passed my glucose test again with flying colors and got an 88. They want you to be under 140 so I think I'm good. I was measuring a week big today at 30 cm. Hopefully this doesn't mean we are having another Jacob sized baby....

Chiropractor update:  So for this past month I've been going to see the chiropractor twice at first and then once a week for the past couple weeks.... I was feeling pretty discouraged because I was really hoping going would make it so I could live my active lifestyle without being in so much pain. It turns out that will not be so... After going for a month and only seeing little progress Dr. Bench told me the best solution for my problem would be to do no physical activities. Basically. The more physical activity I do, the more pain I will be in. The less physical activities I do the less pain I'll be in. I'm not terribly disappointed because I didn't have much hope that the chiropractor would fix it in the first place. I already knew if I didn't do anything it hurt less. I just really wanted to be able to do a regular workout program. Or go hiking. Or go for a walk without being miserable for 4 days after.

Date: March 9, 2016

How far along? 29 Weeks

Total weight gain/loss: I am up 24 pounds. So that's not bad! I only gained 1 pound a week for the past 5 weeks!

Maternity clothes? Gotta love maternity clothes..... Whoever invented maternity pants was a genius. But that doesn't mean I like them....

Sleep: I have actually been sleeping really well the past few weeks. I don't feel like I wake up 30 times a night.

Movement: Holy cow does this baby move.... In fact... I'm wondering if it ever stops moving.... This has been my most active baby for sure. If I am not moving, it is. I pretty much feel it all day long. And honestly, sometimes I get so tired of it. I just want to sit and relax and not be constantly jabbed in the belly! Also, I'm pretty sure it's trying to escape my belly... thru my belly. Like a vampire child. The only time it's really bad is when I'm not feeling well. Cuz that just tends to make me feel a lot worse.

Feeling sick? Not sick and I love it!!!! Whoop, whoop!

Other pregnancy symptoms? Honestly from 24 to 28 weeks I actually felt pretty good! I felt like I finally got a taste of that second trimester bliss for a month. My groin/hip pain, although not pain free, does feel a lot better then it did and I do think the chiropractor is helping it feel better. Even in the evenings I have felt pretty good with no indigestion, gas and heartburn. Just the occasional heartburn. Those pesky braxton hicks started a week ago which I could have done without a bit longer.... But that's a lot later than with my other pregnancies. I think I started getting them around 24 with the others. I feel like one of the most challenging aspects of this pregnancy has been my emotional state. I feel like an emotional roller coaster. I randomly get in these hormonal lows were I just feel so unhappy and I'm crying all the time. Everything sets me off. It's really hard to deal with the kids. It's feels like Scott can't do anything right. And I don't know how many of the negative thoughts going through my head are valid. So I don't feel like I should talk about them because I don't know if I'm still going to feel the same way when I'm out of the hormonal low. But at the same time. I don't know how long the low is going to last so I just constantly have really negative thoughts going through my head all day long and I just seem to get more and more angry. It's really been a struggle for me.

Have you started to show yet? I am carrying this baby on my right side. Which is opposite from where I carried Ida. I felt like Ida lived in the left half of my uterus and this baby lives in the right. At least they are evening out the use of my uterus... Baby is heads down though (yay!!!) with it back against my right side and kicking me all over my center/right side.

Gender prediction: So I thought it would be fun to do one of the little gender prediction things so I peed in some baking powder and according to that..... It's a boy!!!! The only problem is.... My little sister, Ondrea, who is not pregnant, is also having a boy.... She was the control group and got the same results as me. So I really don't know how accurate this little gender prediction thingy is.... I guess we'll see!

Happy First Birthday Ida!!!

This pretty little lady is 1!!

Newborn

1 Month

2 Month

3 Month

4 Month

5 Month

6 Month

7 Month

8 Month

9 Month

10 Month

11 Month

1 Year!

We had a great birthday party! We got Ida balloons and she loved them! She spent the day grabbing as many of the strings as she could then she would just carry them around the house everywhere she went.

I did a ladybug theme and I think the cake turned out pretty cute! I like to try and design the cake so when you look at it as a whole the cake all fits together but then has a removable item, (in this case the ladybug) that you remove for the cake smash!

Ida enjoyed opening all her presents. When she got this little doll she immediately kissed it. It was so cute! 

Ida didn't really dig right into her cake and make a mess. She definitely enjoyed eating the cake. And ate A LOT of it. But kept fairly clean in the process. :)

All in all we had a great birthday! Thank you to all that came! Ida is still just a tiny little thing. At her 1 year appointment she was 16 lbs and 27 inches tall. Which means in her first year she gained 8 lbs 13 oz and grew 6 3/4 inches. She is still in size 2 diapers. (Probably will be for awhile) Wearing 6-9 month clothes. (Which I just switched out like a week ago) And size 2 shoes. The problem we are having with Ida's shoes right now is finding shoes that aren't too big around on her foot. Length wise they fit her but they are huge everywhere else. Ida's hair still hasn't grown much. :( Makes me sad because I just want pig tails! It is growing some but it is still so fine and baby hair like that you can't do anything with it... Someday... She does surprisingly still keep headbands in pretty well though! Which has made me happy. As long as you distract her right after putting it in she usually leaves it alone. Her eyes look like they may be blue... But they still have a lot of grey in them and a kind of light brown around the iris. So I'm not sure. I'd like if she had blue eyes like her daddy and dark brown hair!

This past month with Ida has been so fun watching her personality really start to bloom. Her favorite thing to do right now when she wants something is to point and say "eh, eh, eh" over and over until she has it. Also Jacob and Ida have been interacting so much more! Jacob actually seeks Ida out to try to play with her and Ida doesn't just scream every time he comes close to her. She still does if she isn't in a very good mood. But I've actually caught them a few times playing and Jacob is actually making her laugh. It's the cutest thing and I love it! I love when they play together and it's happening more and more every day! This little girl has quite the personality. She is seriously the biggest goof ball and LOVES making people laugh! She has also started getting into a lot more things... Like dog food...

Ida started walking about a week and a half before she turned one. She still falls a lot! And crawling is still faster. But she is getting pretty good! She has wanted to for so long and finally the ability has caught up with her desire! Which means my prediction came true. If only by 3 weeks it still came true. I had predicted that Ida would start crawling after Jacob did but would walk before he did.

Ida has fallen down the stairs more this past month then when she was actually learned how to go down the stairs! She's seriously fallen down them like 4 or 5 times! I think her problem is she's getting to comfortable on them and starts doing things she shouldn't and then falls. She really likes to climb up a few steps just turn around, sit and play. Hence the reason she may keep falling. 

Ida is a great eater and I hope it always continues! It's so much nicer to deal with a baby that eats almost everything vs a baby that eats almost nothing! She hasn't really picked up signing yet. She will do all done. Most of the time only if prompted. I'm sure she will catch on soon though! She does nod and shake her head. And it's the cutest because when she nods she doesn't just nod her head. She nods with her whole body!

Sleeping on the other hand.... Not been so great. For the past few weeks Ida has become a terrible sleeper. Ok... Maybe not so much sleeper. But going to sleeper. For some reason if I just lay her down and then leave the room she just screams and screams and screams. She just will not settle down. And believe me. I've tried to just let her cry it out. But this little girl is not the cry it out type. Most like I'll just scream louder and longer type. The only way I can get her to go to sleep is if I stand or sit by the crib until she falls asleep. Which sometimes isn't terrible when it takes her like 3 minutes to fall asleep. But gets really annoying when it takes like 30 minutes to fall asleep. The whole time I stand there waiting this internal battle is going on in my head saying, "This is the worst habit ever I need to stop." and "It's ok, it's just a phase... It's just a phase..." Just recently it has seemed to be getting a little better. She will fall asleep on her own every once in while. Usually when it's going to bed. But I hope it ends soon! Good thing she is a little cutie and we wouldn't trade her in for anything! :) Love you Ida! Happy Birthday!!!