24 weeks

24 week appointment.

so we had our 24 week appointment today. everything looks great. the baby measured right at 24 weeks. according to the doctor, i'm carrying him low. his head is very low...and so we couldn't get a good look at his face today. she tried...believe me. i thought she might be hurting him. she was jamming that little wand over my belly hard.

it's amazing what they can see with an ultrasound. she just keeps pointing things out...and only about a third of it makes sense. i always feel like i need andy there.

she pointed out the spine...cervical, thoracic and lumbar sections. it's just all unreal! she showed us the cord, the brain, the heart, the hands and feet, arms and legs. i could go on and on.

it's for sure a boy! yeah! we hadn't told them that we already knew...so when she told us, we both kind of let out these really wimpy "yeah's!". when we left clint said she probably thought that we were the worst parents ever.

the doctor asked us to think about circumcision. he said if we wanted to do any jewerly...we needed to think about that too. :)

clint and i have talked alot about banking the cord. using it for stem cells later. i watched something on the today show a while back that said you might as well just put the money in a savings account for the child. we wanted the doctor's opinion. he pretty much said the same thing. it's just a hard decision. i would hate to not do it...and then something happen. but we're just unsure of what they are really able to do with the stem cells. after working with multiple myeloma for 2years, i know the power of them. i know that they can and do work wonders...i'm just not sure what we're going to do.

enjoy the pictures. i feel bad for putting them up. you know...he's naked and everything. and i hate to be naked...so i'm assuming he probably does too...but i'm putting them up. sorry little boy...you can get mad at me later. oh, and he weighs 1 pound and 8 ounces.

because i had forgotten.

how very much i love this song. until today. when i was killing time on my itunes. and came across it.

it's one of my favorites. the first line always gets me. because i have lines across my face. and in a way, i wouldn't change it. they are very much me. very much from my dad. and i'm sure that i'll pass them on to this child. he'll be blessed with a large forehead...but even better...hopefully, lots of expression. lots of laughter. and more importantly...tears.

because it takes tears to understand happiness. it takes pain to understand joy.

here are the lyrics.

all of these lines across my face
tell you the story of who i am
so many stories of where i've been
and how i got to where i am

but these stories don't mean anything
if you've got no-one to tell them to
it's true...i was made for you

i climbed across the mountain tops
swam all across the ocean blue
i crossed all the lines and i broke all the rules
but baby i broke them all for you

because even when i was flat broke
you made me feel like a million bucks
you do....i was made for you

you see the smile that's on my mouth
it's hiding the words that don't come out
and all of my friends who think that i'm blessed
they don't know my head is a mess

no, they don't know who i really am
and they don't know what i've been through
like you do...and i was made for you

uncomfortable.

i just remembered that time at the market...snuck up behind me, and jumped on my shopping cart and rode down aisle five....

john mayer. comfortable. a wonderful song. one of my very favorites. written about a girl gone from his life...but why she left, he can't remember. but he knows that she could remind him of why if he'd ask.

a girl he was was comfortable with...their love was so broken in. one who wore grey sweat pants. and no makeup. and knew all the words to coltrane...or could distinguish him from jack johnson, depending on the version you hear (cd vs. acoustic)

i'm just the opposite of this song. i'm extremely uncomfortable. not with my husband. or my family. or my friends. or even life, in general.

it's being uncomfortable when having to move. yes, moving anywhere really. getting up from a sunken in chair. getting out of the recliner is nearly impossible these days. it's like i lean forward, but that does nothing. i literally have to heave myself forward and just hope that it's enough to get me up.

sitting in the car and trying to reach in the backseat for something is just impossible. carrying anything up the stairs and expecting to not be out of breath...forget about it. putting my hands on my hips and actually being able to rest them there...nope. it's like i have to stretch my hands so wide to get them around that waist. or what used to be my waist. and then my hands hurt.

which brings up a strange occurence. my hands hurt in the morning. when i wake. it's like i've been sleeping with them in fists or something. they ache. what's this about?

and i've become a grunter. like my dad. you know, where you lay in bed at night and just grunt. "oh lord....i think i'm dying". that kind of stuff. every time i have to sit up in bed....there's that sound. that grunt. rolling over...grunt. putting a pillow between my legs to keep my back from hurting...two grunts. one for rolling over and another for lifting my legs. oh...and probably one for having to grab a pillow. i'm pathetic.

for christmas, clint bought me a cute pair of shoes. they're flats. i pointed them out one day in dillards, and not only did he pay attention...just after one small comment...but he went and got them. i tried to wear them to church last week...impossible. my feet were so uncomfortable and squished.

and i haven't tried it again. because i don't want to. i'll just stick with flip flops. so that i never know that my feet are all swole up.

i've always complained that my weight gain has always been in my thighs and butt. and how i wished it could be in my waist...because i'd much rather do sit ups than leg lifts. but now...i'm retracting that statement. i'm happy with weight gain in my butt. i'll take it anyday. :)

again...i'm thrilled with all this. i mean, the baby. not really the uncomfortability. mrs. kirtley would tell me that is not a word...i know, i know. but you know what i mean.

notecards and lanyards

monday clint had the day off. so he had several projects around the house that he wanted to get done. he put up molding in our bedroom. he changed out his closet from in the baby's room to our room. several other things too. all the while, i carried around my rainbow and vacuumed everything i came into contact with.

his new nickname for me: rainbow bright.

i helped him hold the molding and nail it up. and then it was up to me to paint over the nail heads. no worries. there was lots of ventilation...and the fumes were pretty nonexistant.

that night, i realized that i had been so active, that i hardly felt the baby move at all that day. i began to go over everything i had done. i had lifted several things, smelled paint fumes, probably not have my seven servings of fruits and vegetables...had too much chocolate...which means too much caffeine. and on and on and on. (my mother made a dessert from a new cookbook called "the comfort table". it's a chocolate sheet cake and when it's warm...just out of the oven, you pour an entire jar of peanut butter over it..then top that with chocolate frosting. it's all homemade...no box cakes allowed...and it is without a doubt the best dessert ever. i bet i had half the pan)

clint fell asleep pretty early. exhausted from all his work around the house. it was around 10...and i couldn't fall asleep. i just kept laying there thinking that i had done something. and that i couldn't feel him move. and that had to be a bad sign.

my mom got us a fetal heart monitor several months ago. so i snuck out of bed...careful not to wake clint up. he has an idea of my psychotic ways...he doesn't need any extra information on my part. so i sneak downstairs...and lay flat on the couch. and i begin to listen for my baby's heartbeat. sure enough. it was there. loud and clear. i averaged it to somewhere around 145 or 150. perfect. just where it should be. but i still wanted him to kick me. just to be sure.

i've already become neurotic. and he's not even here yet. i don't want to be one of those parents who stands over the baby at night holding a mirror in front of his nose to make sure he's breathing. i can't be that way. that takes wayyy to much energy. and i don't have that energy.

i worked with a little boy once who kept blowing on people. he'd just walk up and blow in your face. we went through everything. tried to figure out what he was getting from it. because all behavior...even the worst...is some form of communication. to this day...i'm not sure what he was trying to obtain from that. anyway...one intervention that worked with him was a type of reward system. we attached a notecard to his belt loop. with a lanyard (a deb style lanyard...you know, napoleon dynamite..."i'm trying to raise money for college"...."your mom goes to college"...)

anyway, we attached this notecard to his belt loop. everytime he did something good or something "correct", he was given a small sticker for his notecard. then his teacher would count up the number of stickers and he'd get a reward.

i actually thought about attaching a notecard to my pants. and every time the baby moved, i'd put a sticker on the notecard. and then...i dunno...maybe i could have a bite of cake or something as a reward. :)

i thought about it. went as far as getting out the notecard...but that's where i stopped myself. i don't really know why. it's obvious that i'm crazy.

memorial day

we had a wonderful weekend with my parents in hot springs. clint and i got to get out on the boat for the first time this year. i didn't get any pictures...and that's probably best, as i'm not the hottest girl on the lake in my liz lange bathing suit. :)

in an attempt to be skin cancer free...i'm very white. which means that i burned in the thirty minutes we were out on saturday. so i stayed out of the sun today. clint tried to wakeboard...but the pull rope was missing. maybe next time....

the highlight of the weekend was getting a rainbow vacuum cleaner! i just cannot express how excited i was/am about this thing. my mother got one several years ago. they were way too expensive...for a new one...so we bought a refurbished one in hot springs. for a used vacuum...it was still pretty expensive. but it came with a two year warranty...and probably a lifetime of happiness for me.

i love having a clean house. with a dog and cat...we have so much hair around here, it's just gross. luckily, we only have 2 rugs. but with a baby on the way...we both want to make sure we do all we can to have fresh air around here.

if you've never used one of these before...i can't describe how fabulous they are. they trap all the dirt and dust in the water. it's bagless. as soon as we pulled into the driveway today, i got out and instead of carrying my bags in...i brought in the rainbow. and started cleaning.

our living room rug alone was filthy. disgusting. i should have taken a picture of it. then we cleaned this chair that yoda sits on all the time. the vacuum can be used as an air purifier. so we put fresh water in the basin with a little deodorizer...and let it run for about 15 minutes.

i promise that when we looked at the water, it had hair and little white specks in it.

gross me out. that was in our air. what we're breathing.

i can't wait until tomorrow. i'm going to use it on our mattress. the lady at the store said the water would literally turn white with all the dust mites and dead skin cells. yuck. yuck. yuck.

i'll keep you posted. i'm sure you're interested! :)

hope you enjoyed the holiday.

quote

i came across a quote that i really liked.

"for children, today is all about tomorrow. by nature, they look to the future, since so very little of life lies behind them. everything worthwhile is 'in front'." dr. wess stafford, author of too small to ignore.