Today the day?

I think this little boy might actually be born today.....

Finally in labor. Packing bags now. Contractions every 2-6 minutes apart and PAINFUL!

Will update when I get a chance.

Ride 'um cowgirl!!

These are from a couple of weeks ago.

Jerry and Debbie dug out Jen's old bouncy horse for Julia. She thinks it is great and loves "riding the horsey".

Congrats to my sister

My hometown county fair is this week. Today my littlest sister (who is in her last year of 4-H), showed her beef feeder calf. Unfortunately, they arrived at the fair today to find that the calf got really sick over night. They had the fair vet look at it and it was feeling a bit better by show time, but still did not look as good as it should have.

Despite all that, she won Grand Champion Beef Feeder with it!!!

Although, it was really funny seeing her pull around a calf. It was not something I ever thought I would see!

Congrats Stacey!!

Progress?

I am hoping I am making some progress towards going into labor.

Yesterday Julia and I went to the fair to watch my nephew and sister show their pigs. I am not sure if it was all the walking, the heat, the chiro adjustment I had that morning, or what, but I started having more regular contractions. By the time we left the fair I was having contractions averaging about every 5 minutes (one of the reason we left before the show was over). Some of them were starting to get a bit uncomfortable too.

Unfortunately, once I went to sleep last night, they fizzled out. So far nothing today!

I am hoping that the regular contractions I had yesterday is a good sign that maybe labor will start on it's own really soon.

Jerrod's family thinks it is going to happen today because today is the 28th. Jerrod was born on 11/28, Julia on 12/28, Jerrod's grandma on 1/28; so they think the 28th is a day that babies are born in their family. Well, if that is going to happen, something needs to start happening really fast!!

I want to go back to the fair this afternoon and watch my sister show her feeder calf, but Jerrod is not to sure I should be driving that far (it is about 40 minutes away). BUT walking the fair is what brought on the contractions last night, so maybe they will do it again tonight!

Happy Birthday to ME!

Today I turned 31! Had a pretty relaxing day. Julia was sick and wanted held a lot, but I did not mind that, it is so rare that she will let you hold her anymore.

My in-laws took me out for lunch and brought me a birthday cake. They did not stay long though, since Julia was not feeling well.

The rest of the day, we all just lounged around the house, and did not do too much. I wanted to sweep and scrub the hardwood floors, but Jerrod would not let me. He said they were fine and he was not going to let me do any crazy nesting cleaning today.LOL

I did start a new book today and I am loving it so far. So I think I might just go to bed early tonight, read awhile and actually go to sleep fairly early!

I thought maybe Jude would come out and share my birthday, but I don't think he wants to share his birthday with his mommy!

Sick Julia

Julia is sick today. This is the first she has been sick since this winter. She is running a fever and just wants held. When I ask her what hurts, she opens her mouth (so I think her throat hurts). I think this is one of the first times Julia has been able to tell us where she is feeling sick at.

Luckily, once the medicine kicks in, she is feeling much better, but still complains about her mouth hurting (once again, I think she means her throat, she just does not know what a throat is.). So she has ate several popsicles today. She was loving that!

Normally, I would wait a day or two to see if she gets better on her own before making an appointment to see the dr., but with a baby due to arrive anytime, I think I will try to get her in tomorrow if she is still feeling poorly in the morning. I don't want her to get worse, only for me to go into labor and then Jerry and Debbie have to deal with Julia being sick, dr. visit, etc. I also don't want her being sick around the new baby.

Talking in the third person

I am not sure if this is normal for a kid Julia's age, but Julia still talks a LOT in the third person.
It is almost always "Julia go do this", "That is Julia's", "Julia did that", etc..., it is rare for her to say "I", "Me", or "Mine", when referring to herself or her things.

I don't know if I should start correcting her on it or just let it be. I am not worried about her speech or language development, she is leaps and bounds ahead in that department. This is just one of the weird quirks I notice she does.

Overdue!

Well, I am now officially overdue!

BUT, I figured this boy would be late. I really love being pregnant and try to cherish every moment of it since there was a time I did not think it was ever going to be possible. That said, I think I am ready to be done being pregnant this time. I am VERY lucky that I have fairly easy pregnancies. Even now, I really don't have much to complain about, so I am trying to be patient.

Here is me in my overdue pregnant belly glory!!! (Take today at 40 weeks, 1 day pregnant.)

Night out at the farm

My dad's birthday was yesterday. So we all went over there last night to celebrate. But since the fair starts this week, the fair animals still had to be worked with.

We had supper first, then all the fair animals came out to be worked with. Julia was LOVING IT!!!

Petting the "cow". It is actually a feeder calf, but I thought that might be a little too detailed for Julia. I was impressed she touched it.



She tried to feed the calf a sugar cube, but the calf licked her with his rough tongue in the process and she did NOT like that. She has a weird thing where she does not like to be licked by animals.

The four oldest cousins climbed up on the tractor to watch the pigs being washed on the trailer hooked to it.




Uncle Bill was also washing the calf.


Yum.... A freeze-pop!!


Walking the pigs with daddy. This is the first time Jerrod has walked a hog since he was in 4-H 15 years ago!! (Jerrod was helping walk some of the pigs)




Julia found a Sit and Spin. She really liked it and was getting it to spin her around pretty fast!


After all the animals were taken care of, we sang "Happy Birthday" to Grandpa (my dad). They then re-lit the candles and sang to me (my birthday is tomorrow). She loves birthdays and singing "Happy Birthday", so she thought it was great that she got to sing it TWICE. She even helped me blow out my candles!!

Today is Due Day!

Well, today is my due date with this little guy. Unfortunately, I don't think he is planning on coming out anytime soon.

Had a midwife appointment yesterday. Still no progress. Although, she did find the heartbeat up high on my belly and she was worried that he flipped breech again. I was almost positive that he was still head-down, but she wanted to make sure. So I got a 20 second ultrasound right then. They had the probe on my tummy long enough to see that he was indeed still head down and measure the heartbeat. Whew!

I am also starting to get cankles. I guess I cannot complain since I am full term! My hips are also really starting to bother me. I think running after Julia makes the end of pregnancy a little harder on my body.

I already have my appointment scheduled for next week. We will talk then on a induction date. Urgh.. I really don't want to be induced again. I will deal with it if I have to, I just hope I don't have to.

Oh, I still have not packed my pack. I had always heard that if you had everything ready weeks before the baby is due, the baby would definitely come late. Well, I thought maybe the opposite would be true, that if I did not have things ready, he would actually come on time! So much for wishful thinking!

I think I am going to take Julia to the Boonshoft Museum this morning. This way she burns off some energy, my house stays clean, and I will walk, walk, walk and maybe that will help move things along!

I will definitely be posting any major updates in my blog!

Do all kids do this?

Potty training has been going well. But I have noticed lately that she is having accidents right in front of the toilet. It is like she needed an extra 2 seconds to get on the potty. Is this normal for kids who are potty training?

I try not to get mad at her for this. She is at least trying to make it to the potty. It is just frustrating to clean up when if she would have just not waited quite so long, she would have made it.

Meeting her new cousin

My older sister had her baby last week.

Today we were both at mom's house making homemade applesauce. Julia got to meet her new cousin, Justin, for the first time! She was in LOVE... She just loves babies...

Saying 'hi" to Justin for the first time...



She just wanting to touch him, and kiss him and hold him, etc....

Stop on Red!

I now have a little back seat driver!

Julia has recently started to pay attention to the color of the traffic lights. S0 I explained to her that red means stop and green means go. So now every time I pull up to a red light she tells me to "stop on red" and then "waiting til it change green". Once it finally does turn green she tells me "green means GO!". So now as I drive through town, I have a little back street driver telling me how to drive!

Julia is also really starting to stutter a lot when she talks. I am not concerned about it. I really think it is just her brain is working faster than her mouth and she is trying to talk faster than she can; which makes it come out as a stutter. I'm sure it is just a short phase she will soon be over. In the mean time, I am trying to be patient and let her get the sentence out without me saying it for her.

I also quite often get a running commentary from Julia about what is going on in the show she is currently watching. This is especially true if it is something she was seen before. Then I get a play-by-play of what is going to happen. It is just so funny and cute!

Gavin almost died yesterday

Gavin is our youngest cat. He is probably close to 5 years old, but is a perpetual kitten. He is also deaf. BUT he is Julia's buddy. That has saved his life more than once, including yesterday!

Jerry was over trying to finish up Julia's new room. He was painting the closet doors. Anytime we do a messy project around here, we lock Gavin out of the room, because we know the havoc he can cause. Well, I guess I forgot to warn Jerry about it. He started painting the doors white while Julia, Debbie and I were out picking up some last minute things. When we got home he explained that Gavin about lost his life...

Jerry had put the wet paint can lid on top of the dresser while painting. He knew Gavin was in the room with him, but did not think too much about it. Next thing he knew, Gavin was no longer around and there were white cat paw prints all throughout the house!!! Yep, Gavin stepped in the paint lid, then proceeded to track paint all over the house. When we got home from the store, Jerry had just finished going around the house on his hands and knees scrubbing up all the white paw prints! Luckily, we have hardwood floors and it was fairly easy to clean up.

Jerry said he thoroughly cussed out Gavin and kept telling Gavin how lucky he was that he was Julia's buddy. I tried to explain to him that Gavin did not hear a word of it, but I think that mattered to Jerry.

(Disclaimer - We would never actually kill Gavin, I was just being dramatic. His perpetual kitten antics are a bit much to put up with some days, but he is a wonderful cat.)

Eye dr. appt

Julia had an eye dr. appointment this afternoon.

Normally I would not have taken her to the eye dr. until she was closer to starting school, but she was doing this weird blinking thing that I did not know what it was. She did not seem to be straining when playing, drawing, etc.. The blinking appeared to be a sub-conscience thing and not something she even realized she was doing. I figured it was probably either hay fever or a weird toddler quirk. But my brother had really bad eyes as a young boy and even went through a couple years of eye therapy to help correct some of his eye issues. Soooo, I thought it was better to be safe than sorry, and have her eyes checked out. We are paying for vision insurance on her anyway.

First off, her eyes are just fine. The dr. said the blinking must just be some weird quirk she recently started. He did say that she will probably have to have glasses in the future. Apparently, at Julia's age, toddlers are supposed to be far-sighted. Julia was not. You would think that was a good thing, but it is not. Luckily, she was not near-sighted either. She was right smack in the middle, not far-sighted, but also not near-sighted. He said that at her age, that is usually a good indication that she will become near-sighted in the future. Not surprising since both Jerrod and I are near-sighted and wear glasses for it.

Secondly, I am SUPER IMPRESSED with how well Julia did at the dr.'s office. I was telling her all day that she was going to the eye dr. and he was going to look in her eyes. I explained to her that he was going to shine a flashlight in her eyes, look really close into her eyes and might even stick things on her eyes. I told her how it did not hurt and how mommy and daddy has this same dr. look at our eyes. By the end of the day she seemed pretty excited to see the dr. I know she always does better at a dr.'s visit if I explain everything before hand. Well, it worked even better than I expected!! He had her identify different pictures of different sizes, covered her eyes one at a time, had her wear funny glasses, shone a flashlight in her eyes, even used the machine where you have to put your chin in the little holder while he looks deep into your eyes. She was not afraid of any of it!! She was not even hesitant about doing these things. I thought for sure some of it was scare her and she would start crying. That was not the case! I am still amazed!

So unless we start noticing her having problems seeing things far away, she does not need to go back until she is closer to starting kindergarten.

Yellow Rings

Since the Air Show was going on this weekend and all the jets flying over makes it really loud at our house, we try to stay out of town on this weekend.

Yesterday we decided to take a stroll through a hippie town not too far away called "Yellow Springs". When we told Julia where we were going, she kept saying Yellow Rings. THEN, once we got there, she kept asking where the "yellow rings" were at!!LOL I guess she thought it was a thing, not a place.

Just outside of Yellow Springs is an AWESOME ice cream place. They produce their own milk from their jersey cows right there to make their ice cream. You cannot go past without stopping for some ice cream.

I think this was the first time we have gone since Julia has been old enough to eat ice cream. We let her pick out her own flavor. She said she wanted the "blue one". Which turned out to be Cotton Candy. We let her have it anyway!

I think she enjoyed it!!


And this is what I saw at one point during the drive... She said she had a "snag" that she was getting.

More big girl bed success!

The second night of the big girl bed went even better!!! Actually, I could not have asked for it to go any better!!

She skipped her nap yesterday, so we went to bed a little earlier since she was so tired. She cried a little when we put her in bed because she wanted to sleep on the couch. But I tucked her in and sat right next to her and sang to her. I think she was asleep by the third verse of Amazing Grace!

Then, we did not hear a peep out of her all night!!! She came up to our room about 7:30am (her normal wake-up time). She was saying the sun wake up (her cue that she is allowed out of bed).

I think I will now wash up the crib bedding and move the mattress up to the infant setting!

Big girl bed

Last night was the night we made the move to the "big girl" bed for Julia. Her room is almost complete, just adding some finishing touches now. It is done enough for her to sleep in. We bought sheets for her new bed yesterday. I still need to get a blanket for the bed and Debbie is still working on the quilt top, but we can just use her quilts from her crib until then.

Here she is as we tucked her in.



She is AWESOME!!! I was expecting a fight to keep her in the bed. She tried to get out when I was tucking her in, but I explained to her that just like when she sleeps in the crib, she is not allowed out until the sun comes back up. (That is the only way we can keep her from climbing out of the crib) Well, it WORKED!! She was asleep in about 30 minutes and did not try to get out ONCE!!!

She did fall out of the bed around 4am this morning and came up to bed with us. But she did fall back to sleep in our bed until 7am. (She almost NEVER sleeps with us.)

I consider this a HUGE success!! Hopefully tonight goes just as well, if not better!!

Julia did look so tiny in the big twin bed. So grown up...... Very bittersweet.

39 weeks

I am 39 weeks pregnant today. That means one week until my official due date.

I had my midwife appointment this morning. Not much happening in the way of progress. In fact, the midwife told me to go ahead and schedule my ultrasound and appointment at 41 weeks. In this practice, if you go overdue, you have to have an ultrasound at 41 weeks to make sure the baby is still fine. After that, they will let you go to 42 weeks before they induce you. So the midwife does not think labor will happen anytime soon.

I am sad at the lack of progress, but not surprised. I figured that I would go late again.

I really want to avoid induction again, but that may not happen. Maybe if I wait until 42 weeks it will be a little easier. (I was induced at 41 weeks with Julia.)

So it could be 3 weeks yet before I have this baby!

Other than that things are doing fine. Having some swelling in my ankles this week, but nothing too bad, I can still wear my rings too. I have been having heartburn, it is almost impossible to bend over, and I think Jude just might break a rib with his kicks, but nothing to complain about.

I did get Jude's hospital bag packed this week, but not mine. I figured it will take all of 5 minutes to throw stuff in a bag, so I am not worried. I can do that while in labor if need be. Same with Julia's overnight bag.

The toys are MOVED!!!!

Well, we did not get Julia's room done today. We just have to paint the closet doors, varnish the entry door, put on door handles and touch up the trim. One more day should do it. I am holding off taking pictures until it is completely done. BUT, it is done enough that Julia can move in. I had Jerry build LOTS of shelves in Julia's new room, this way all of her toys can be stored in her room and NOT in my living room!

I will post pictures of the shelves when I post pictures of the new room.

BUT since the shelves are up, I finally got to move all of Julia's toys out of the living room!!! I cannot believe how much bigger the living room seems now!! That girl has got a LOT of toys!! There are a very select few things that will stay in the living room, just because of space. (the barn and cozy car)

This is what the living room looked like before, with all of Julia's toys cluttering it up....


This is what it looked like tonight after I got all of Julia's toys moved and things re-straightened. The blue and white bins under the coffee table are the baby toys. I thought that this would keep them separate from Julia's toys and also teach Julia that Jude can only play with the toys from these blue bins and not her's.


Gavin was also checking out the change....

Really thirsty?

This was taken 2 weekends ago.

I made coffee, and of course, Julia needed some. A little bit later I thought I would see if she liked cranberry juice.

This is what I saw when I walked into the living room! She was drinking out of both cups!



In other GREAT news, construction should be finished tomorrow on Julia's new room!!! Hopefully Friday night will be Julia's first night in her new room sleeping in her "big girl" bed!! I will get pictures after it is done.

Diaper bag

It is so funny that we were finally getting to the point where we did not have to drag a diaper bag with us everywhere, only to have another baby. So we will be dragging a diaper bag with us for at least another 2 years!

I did buy a new diaper bag for this baby. So at least it will look nice for awhile...

Clothes hamper fun!

I thought Julia needed a new clothes hamper for her new room. This way the smaller one can stay in the nursery. I could not decide if I should get a fun one, or a more traditional looking basket-type one. I think I made the right choice!!

Julia LOVES, LOVES her new clothes hamper. She thinks it is really neat to play in!



This is what it looks like when the "lid" is closed. It is supposed to be a lady bug.


This is what happened when I said to wave at me so I knew she was in it.....


This hamper has been HOURS of entertainment to Julia so far. If I would have known that, I might have bought it much earlier just as a play toy!

Blankets....

Remember when I posted about how Julia finally sucked off the tag of her Blankie?? It looked like this.....





Well, this weekend I finally sewed a piece of ribbon on it to replace the tag. I asked Julia if she wanted a new tag, or if she wanted left like it was. She said she wanted a new tag. I then took her to the store with me and she helped pick out the ribbon to replace the tag with. I think the fact she had an input on it made the new tag all that more special.

Here is the new tag. I was able to snap a quick picture before it got sucked/chewed on!!LOL



Julia loves the new tag and I made sure to buy a whole roll of ribbon, so I will have plenty when I have to replace the tag on the other Blankie (which is just about to go), or if she manages to suck/chew this one off too! I hand sewn over it about 3-4 times in hopes it will not come off easily.

In other blanket news, I finally finished the baby afghan I was crocheting for Baby Jude. I love the bright colors, but I am not sure if they worked together quite right. Oh well, at least it will be unique!!



Here is a picture of it with the flash off. This shows the true colors of it a little better.

Yes, I know I am huge....

For the last couple of days, everyone who has seen me as commented on how big I am and how I look like I am about ready to pop! I guess I forget just how big I really am! LOL

Here I am this evening at 38 weeks, 2 days pregnant......

What a big girl!!

Luckily the potty regression from being in pull-up for a weekend only lasted about 2 days. Julia is back to being great again.

Actually she is doing better than great. This morning I heard her on the monitor that she was climbing out of the crib. So I got up and was trying to hurry in getting myself ready. While I was getting ready I hear through the monitor her leave her room, only to go back in a minute or so later. I thought this was weird, because normally she comes upstairs to our bedroom when she climbs out of her crib. I finally finish getting ready and go done to see what Julia is up to. What I find shocks me some, in a good way!!

Julia had climbed out of her crib, taken off her sleeper pajamas, taken off her diaper, peed in her potty, went back to her room, put on underwear, and just about had her pajamas all the way back on by the time I got down there!!! I was AMAZED!!!! She usually LOVES her diapers and makes it quite clear that she prefers to wear diapers. So that is why I was so surprised that she decided to put on underwear! Some mornings it is a real fight to get her in underwear (once she is in underwear she is fine and likes them, it is just getting her into that first pair that is the problem.).

Then today, we left the house at 9:30am and did not get back until after 5pm, except for the 20 minutes we stopped at home to bring in and put away groceries. I had two dr. appointments, we went to Babies R Us and grocery shopping! She did not have one accident while out! She told me every time that she needed to us the restroom!! I was very proud of my big girl!

I just hope she keeps this up once Jude arrives.

38 weeks!

Well, I am 38 weeks pregnant today!!

Overall, I am still feeling really good. I occasionally have times when I am ready for this pregnancy to be over, but mostly I am trying to enjoy these last couple of weeks.

I am having a lot more Braxton Hicks contractions this time around than I did with Julia. Some of them can actually be quite uncomfortable! Starting to have a bit of swelling too. I will be fine all day, but once I sit down for the night and try to relax, my ankles will swell some. Nothing too bad yet, but something I have noticed.

He is still head-down and is probably to big to be flipping now. But I am still not taking my chances and I am staying out of the pool!!

Went to Babies R Us today and picked up the few things I still needed/wanted for this baby. Trying to get some stuff washed up now....

It is so funny because at this point in my pregnancy with Julia, I had everything done; room done, clothes washed up, hospital bag packed, etc.... This time around, I just got the car seat washed up, but that is about it! Actually, Julia will most probably still be in the crib when Jude is born!! Good thing we have the co-sleeper that we will be using! I am not NEAR as stressed about things this time around.

Dragging out the baby stuff

My house has become invaded by boxes.

I am finally pulling out all of Julia's old baby stuff and washing it up. Today the infant seat and swing came out.

All of this "stuff" is making my house look REALLY messy. Add on top of that all the construction material everywhere from working on Julia's new room and all of Julia's toys; my house is a disaster!!

Since Julia's new room is not done yet, we have no place to put all of this baby stuff I am getting out. Julia's current room is where Jude is going and all of Julia's stuff is currently in there with very little room for anything else!!

Oh well.....

Aquarium visit

Since we were down in Cincinnati this weekend and the wedding was not until 5:30pm Saturday, we thought we would head across the river and go see the aquarium again. The hidden motive was that maybe it would tire Julia out enough that she would nap that afternoon.

Julia likes the aquarium, but I really do to....

Luckily, there was not too many people there so Julia was free to run from tank to tank as she liked.

The aquarium is really dark, so I really only got pictures in the areas where it had better lighting, so unfortunately, I did not get pictures of the fish.


Playing with the giant rainforest frog....


Digging for dinos! Actually, I think Julia just thought it was a neat sandbox to play in.

Feeding the lorikeets. Julia was just captivated by them.

She REALLY wanted to pet the lorikeets.

I think the lorikeets really liked Jerrod!!

Julia trying to touch the SHARKS!! (they let you touch the sharks in this tank)

Sure she goes after the sharks, but she freak out when I tried to get her to touch the harmless horseshoe crab.....

This aquarium has several 360 degree tunnel tanks you walk though. Julia thought those were really neat, but was pretty unsure of the see-through floors. She did not like to walk on them.

We also got to see a diver in the shark exhibit feeding the sharks!! Julia thought that was pretty cool.

Oh, and the aquarium worked. We got about a 30-45 minute nap out of Julia afterwards. I would have liked it to have been longer, but it was enough to keep her happy and going for the rest of the night!

More wedding pictures

Well, I finally have a chance to post more wedding pictures. This time of the reception. Julia had a BLAST at the reception. Well, she cried for about 5 minutes of it because she tripped over the hem of her dress and face-planted into marble tile, causing her to get a bloody nose. A little loving from mommy made it all better. But you can still see the remnits of it in a few pictures. It was also an adult only reception, so Julia was the only kid there......

Jerrod and I attempted to dance, but my preggo belly was so big that I had to sort of dance sideways! LOL



Our attempts at a family picture. Julia just wanted down to dance and run....

Blowing bubbles with Aunt Ninne.

Blowing bubbles with Mike (Jerrod's uncle, so Julia's great-uncle, but we just call him Uncle Mike)

This is where Julia spent a good portion of the night. In front of the CANDY table!!!! Every kid's dream!

Using her pink lollipop like a wand..

Dancing and a swinging.....

Dancing with Aunt Ninnie

Dancing with Mike

Dancing with both Mike and Bev. They are like another set of grandparent's to Julia and spoil her like crazy!

More dancing with Aunt Ninnie.... I think Julia really wore her aunt out that night. Although, I am sure the 4" heels she wore did not help either!LOL

Julia is finally starting to tire out!

Now dancing with Aunt Ninnie and Bappa

Just with Bappa....

I think she wore several people out dancing with them. I am not sure where she got all that engery! But I am sure all the sugar from the candy helped!!!

Oh, Julia really like her "new shoes" she got to wear with her dress. She thought they were super fancy and neat. She even kept them on all night and did not want to take them off!! It looks like to me that they cut into her feet some, but she never complained about them. In fact, she wore them again today for several hours!

I am really glad Julia had so much fun at the wedding. Jerrod and I just loved watching her having a blast and her being in what seemed to be her element. You would never know that this was the same shy girl who used to cling to me at any social gathering! I think she hardly gave us a passing glance most of the night!