Yesterday was a quiet day in pre-labor land until Andrew called to have me pick him up at work. As soon as I got in the car my abdomen started doing its thing. They aren't contractions, but every muscle gets to work and starts squeezing the baby and sending pains down my sides. I remember this happening with Blake's birth too. Andrew is a good influence I guess. So from 5pm until 2am I felt lots of muscle pressure with contractions here and there. This morning I feel like I got run over by a truck, but that is good news I guess. When baby #2 kicks it is in the center of my body instead of the sides. Work your way down guy. We have gone back to liking the name Beech Wright Hurst. I like that it sounds like the beach, but also stands for beech wood. I know my father doesn't use beech wood that often, but it would be fun to say Blake and Beech.
I decided to start some Easter crafts yesterday at 4pm. The idea came from the blog listed below. They are our chocolate bunnies:
Today is a busy day so I am going to try to rest in between the activity: AM: Celebrate my friend Megana's birthday with some brunch treats (Happy Birthday Megana) PM: Andrew's parents arrive to stay with us for a few days (Jessica's flight leaves tonight) PM: Blake has his 2 year check up at the doctor (sorry you have to get shots kiddo)
Well the party is over, but the excitement still goes on. Here is Blake with his stack of gifts:
Grammie suggested opening gifts before having cake so Blake was in present heaven:
Nothing like a double chocolate birthday cake with a motorcycle on top:
Last night I woke up at 12:30am with some painful contractions. I didn't want to wake Andrew so I tried to breath through them quietly. At 2am, Andrew sat up in bed, looked out the bedroom door and said, "There is the little man. There is a proxy with the little man." It kind of freaked me out so I told him I was having some painful contractions that were every two minutes. He called our midwife and she said to call back at 4am if they were still happening. 4:00am rolled around and my contractions were still the same so Andrew called the midwife back and she said she was on her way to check me out. I told Andrew I didn't want to make a fuss and that everyone should go back to bed. Andrew woke my parents up and they all started preparing the room for a home delivery. All I could hear was a buzzing of activity and I told Andrew that everyone needed to slow down and chill out. Rosanna checked me and said she thought it was false labor and that my cervix hadn't changed. I was relieved that I got to go back to bed and ignore this whole thing. My contractions stopped then and there, but have since started up again (very mild) just as I write this post.
My parents stuck around today just in case and are heading back this evening. Andrew's parents are headed our way to see off Jessica (she is flying to Australia for a new job this Wednesday) so Blake has been enjoying all the attention.
I really feel like it will be a few more days before real labor sets in, but all the experienced moms around me tell me that second baby labor can turn on a dime quicker than I may anticipate. By the way, Andrew just admitted that he had been dreaming that babies were being sent down tubes to be born! Hilarious.
Today is Blake's big day. He is two years old and proud of it. I wanted to throw a party, but with baby #2 coming sometime soon I decided to go easy on our family and keep it small and quaint.
He helped put up his birthday banner:
I wanted to do something special for his day so I called up the Palo Alto police station and asked if Blake could see a squad car with its lights and sirens on. We ended up getting a great tour of the station as well. I enjoyed seeing the dispatch room the best (it looked a bit like NASA to me).
Blake getting a police car pin with flashing lights:
I loved the random police tape:
Checking out the squad car:
Oh, how great it was to be that close to police motorcycles:
Funny:
Blake large and in charge:
Yesterday morning I woke up with contractions at 3am. They weren't painful, but they reminded me of when I started pre-laboring with Blake. Here I am sitting downstairs at the computer just contracting away at 4am. They were every 15-20 minutes, but nothing major: There were a few more right before bed, but my night was peaceful and I haven't had a contraction since. This is a relief because the closer I can get to my 37 week mark, the better. So now I am trying to take it easy so baby can stay in as long as possible. My body still aches in a pre-laboring way and I feel like baby #2 is being propped up smack dab in the middle of my body. I just hope the little guy is packing his bags and getting ready to join us for a life adventure.
Here I am at week 36! No makeup, just plain old me for the camera.
Today was the "home visit" from my midwife so she could familiarize herself with my house and surroundings. She said the baby has dropped way down and is in a great position. Next Wednesday, I will hit the 37 week mark meaning I will be full-term and can relax and just wait for baby to make his grand entrance into this world. The names we are toying with for this child are (in no special order): Chip, Rowdy, Reade, Hampton, and Dex or Dexter. Please vote on the comments section if you would like! Remember it will be Something Wright Hurst.
Me being funny:
This is what I get for multi-tasking during a photo shoot. I am making chicken and cheese enchiladas to stick in my freezer and thought my thumb would be a nice ingredient to add into the mix. Yuck and ouch:
Andrew's mother made Blake this special, big boy quilt while we were in Oakhurst. He loves his new quilt and makes tractor noises whenever he gets near it. The backing is super soft and resembles dirt. Perfect for Blake since he usually has a nice layer of dirt on him at any given time.
Blake says, "Grandma, thank you so much for my quilt. I love it and can't wait to sit on it at the park. Tractors make me smile."
Blake has been spending his spring days at the park, but it is getting harder and harder to keep up with the little guy so I may have to start outsourcing park time to Andrew.
Andrew might be smiling in this picture, but he was really not too happy with me. We went on a bike ride this morning to drop off two bags of Goodwill stuff. I popped inside just to see if there were any treasures and ended up buying a desk chair, basket, and picture frames. He asked me how I thought I would get it home and before he had finished his sentence, I had all the junk balanced in a precarious manner on top of Blake's bike trailer (yes, Blake was inside). I can only imagine what people thought as they saw thrifted goodies ride by on top of a toddler with a pregnant woman biking behind in case anything fell off.
Oh, Leprechaun come sprinkle some of your gold my way. I am kind of stuck. My house is ready for flair, but "unbreakable" flair is hard to come by. Too bad they don't make plastic, retro lamps for your desk. My brain is dreaming of plastic gnome villages that look like ceramic or soft, silly knick-knacks that make or break a small space. I will try to get my head out of the clover and focus on real issues like making dinner. My goal is to make sausage, cauliflower casserole, potatoes, and something green for dessert. We will see if that happens.
Andrew's programming books finally made it out of the moving boxes. I just need to find the right flair for the top of the bookcase (dreaming of a collection of small globes):
The baby linens are washed and the only thing holding me back is having to lug the vacuum upstairs to suck up any dust from two years ago:
Today, I bought these rugs and I have a plan to sew them all together to make one, big rug for the family room. They are only $1.50 each at the Daiso Japanese store by my house. If I wasn't so jazzed about the project I would ask myself why I think I have time to do this:
Happy St. Patrick's Day and enjoy your corned beef and cabbage.
We are spending the weekend at Andrew's parent's house to say Bon Voyage to Jessica before she heads off to Australia to work on Harry Potter 7 at the end of this month. We have been running around the garden having tons of fun before heading back to suburbia.
Growth:
Aunt Jessica teaching Blake how to gather moss for cute arrangements in Mason jars:
Blake thinks everyone around him is having babies:
When my brain likes an idea it tends to run with it. I can't stop obsessing about mid-century modern decorating. I want to read every blog about it and I comb through craigslist enjoying each Eames chair that passes my retinas. Thank goodness I will really be busy in a couple of weeks with more important things!
Our dining room reinvented:
Andrew snapping Blake in the office chair:
A faux mid-century modern corner:
Company is coming so I am going to allow myself ten minutes of craigslist perusing and then off to clean the bathrooms!
Today was Andrew's day. It was his last weekend on-call before he switches teams at work. After paternity leave, he will say goodbye to the great SRE's of Google and head towards Gmail. Typical on-call weekends bind Andrew to the house because he has to be within three minutes of a reliable internet connection so he can respond to his pages. Sometimes we all hang out around the house and sometimes I just up and leave Andrew in charge of Blake for big chunks of the day so I can get some things done. Here are some goodies from his day with Blake:
Picking our sad, sad carrots from my garden. I responded, "I have a garden?" when Andrew told me he was going to take Blake out back and start cleaning up the backyard (Andrew has had enough of the rain and wishes it was summer already):
Then while I was gone, the two of them baked brownies together. My grandmother and mother always made such a fuss about not licking batters because of the chance of death related to raw eggs. Andrew has always laughed at my fear, but I still won't eat batter! Thank goodness for daddies because otherwise, Blake would never have any fun.
By the way, we gave Blake his first haircut. We have video footage and awesome pics, but Andrew is having a hard time figuring out how to upload it to Youtube. I hope the puzzle gets solved soon so you can share in the fun.
