What is this?

First off ... a couple cute pictures of Emily playing outside tonight.

And now's your chance to click away because some gross pictures are coming up next. So click away .. click away now.

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Still with me?

Okay, with permission, I'm posting these pictures of Mike's arms and legs.

He's gotten into something and looks like an awful mess.

So what is it?

It's a bad case of poison ivy!

He has just had an awful time with it. He's been to the doctor and got a shot. He's used all different kinds of prescription and non-prescription creams and salves. He's tried oatmeal baths (they work pretty well.) And he's still suffering.

He thinks he got into the poison ivy when we were down at my parents house a week and a half ago - probably somewhere down around the pond. And since then, he's just been spreading it around all over the place!

It's awful to look at and I'm sure it's more awful to experience the itching and pain.

Hope you get to feeling better soon!

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Baby Day

I know the title is "Baby Day", but I forgot to mention one thing about Father's Day.

The other week, Emily and I picked out a Father's Day card for her Daddy. It was sooo cute. It had a caterpillar on it and an alphabetical list of all the wonderful attributes that her dad brings to our lives. And on Sunday morning, Mike was reading the card out loud to us ... all these wonderful things ... and "Happy Birthday, Dad!"

D'Oh! What was that? What did that card say? Oh yeah, it totally said HAPPY BIRTHDAY. Good job, Mom. Total fail on the card. But Mike was very sweet about it. He said it's the thought that counts.

And moving on ...

So the reason this post is called "Baby Day" is because Noah's birthday has been tentatively set. My cesarean section is tentatively scheduled for Friday, August 6, 2010. Sounds like a good day to me! It's only about 6 weeks away, which makes me a little nervous but I think it will be good.

When Mike got home tonight, I told him that August 6th was Noah's tentative birth date. He thought that sounded like one of his relative's birth dates so after supper he went to his family tree stuff and looked it up. He found out that it was not the person he thought, BUT there was someone who was born on August 6th. On August 6, 1910, Mike's grandpa's brother was born. And his name was Noah Smith! Isn't that wild?? 100 years later, there may be another Noah Smith born in the family line. Very cool, if you ask me.

Like I said, this date is tentative. I have been having slight blood pressure issues with this pregnancy just like I had when I was pregnant with Emily. When I went to the doctor last week, my blood pressure was elevated and I had to lay on my left side for a while and then have my blood pressure rechecked. When the nurse checked it again, my blood pressure was fine.

Minor grossness ahead so skip this paragraph if you're so inclined ... the doctor had me do a 24-hour urine capture to check for protein in the urine that might indicate the beginnings of preeclampsia. This is more of a baseline reading so that we can measure changes against this one if we have to do this again in the last few weeks of my pregnancy.

My doctor always stays on top of things with my pregnancies so I feel very comfortable with her watching me these final weeks. I know she will not hesitate to do what she needs to do to keep me and baby safe.

Another funny thing that happened ... this morning before work, I had to take my "sample" to the doctor's office and get some blood drawn to go along to the lab with it. So the lab tech at my doctor's office is always the one to draw the blood samples. She knows me by name and the difficulties with my veins (and always sorta cringes when I walk in). Sometimes she gets blood on the first stick. Other times it takes her SEVERAL tries. This morning, in fact, it took her three tries (including one in my hand) to get a tube of blood.

So this morning, the lab tech lady was telling me that she was going to be out of office on medical leave for a couple weeks starting this Friday. And she was concerned about the girl who was going to be taking her place because "sometimes she can be rough". And she doesn't like to turn over her "difficult patients" (Who? me?) to this person because she doesn't always have the patience to do a good job.

And I was thinking that this person just took THREE sticks to get a tiny tube of blood and she's worried about someone else being "rough"? I'm pretty sure I would much rather have someone who's a little rough who can get it on one stick than someone who's gentle and takes three or more stabs! I don't know, I just thought it was funny that she said that to me this morning.

So anyway, mark your calendars and put a big question mark beside it. At least we know that Noah will be here on that date or before. Six more week or less until we meet our sweet boy. Wow, I'm overwhelmed!

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Father's Day 2010

Today we celebrated Father's Day. We let Mike open one of his presents last night and the other four this morning.

The present last night was a two-person camping chair. The four presents this morning were three dress shirts and a new belt. I think he liked all his gifts.

After church this morning, I tried to get a picture of Emily and her Dad, but she was not cooperative. All of them looked like the one below with her hands in front of her face.



But before church ... she wanted me to take a picture of her and her doll, Stephanie, because they had on matching dresses. And she smiled just fine for those pictures.



She wore the navy sailor dress because her daddy was in the Navy. She looked too cute in it for sure.

For lunch, we went over to Mike's parents house to celebrate Father's Day with his dad. His mom and our sister-in-law cooked steaks, Hawaiian chicken, and all the fixins. It was a delicious meal, but we were all so stuffed.

This week is vacation bible school at church. They are doing a cowboy theme this year. I know Emily will enjoy that.

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Quiet

It's too quiet at my house.

Emily is spending the week with Grandmother and Granddaddy on the farm. Her cousins Tyler and Carter are there too and I am sure they are having a wonderful time.

But it's still too quiet at my house.

Mike and I have just been hanging out. We have a lot of things that we want to accomplish this week and we have gotten started. But this is a perfect time to relax and try to enjoy the quiet.

We don't get opportunities like this very often so we want to make the most of it. Except that doing nothing makes me kinda sleepy. And it makes me kinda want to go to bed early.

Maybe later this week we'll go out and do something fun one night.

In the meantime, I hope Emily is having an awesome time during Cousins Week 2010!

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More Busy Days

On Sunday, we celebrated Emily's 5th birthday at a local Mexican restaurant. She picked the restaurant.


And we invited all her faves ... like Aunt Heather and Uncle Stephen.

And Grandmother and Aunt Heather.

And lots of people!!!

And the proud parents.

Emily had fun opening her presents. She got a gumball machine!!!!! And she loves it. But we had to put it up out of reach because the day before she ate a BUNCH of gumballs all day long.

She received lots of wonderful gifts and was so excited to open each one to see what was inside. I don't think there was anything she didn't like.

And then ... we got to eat the cake that she picked out. The design featured Mario and Luigi. I think it turned out really cute. And, of course, it was so so yummy.

After lunch, we headed back out to the house to put on the first coat of paint in Noah's room. His room is sort of a bright sea blue color. I'll have to take some pictures in there sometime soon.

Mike and his Dad and his brother worked out in the yard Sunday afternoon cutting down some bushes, trimming some trees, weedeating and cleaning out around the shed and well house. Stephen trimmed some trees around the driveway.

The girls worked in the house finding other things to sort and organize and box up all around my house. I think no room was untouched! I tried to keep my master bedroom and closet closed off so that nobody would see the scariness there, but even that was not kept hidden.

They did a lot of work in Emily's room, too. We took a lot of stuff out of there and put it in the shed and her room looks great now. Stephen installed a "pet net" in Emily's room to store all her stuffed animals. At first, Emily was SO upset at the thought of her pets being up and out of reach, but Grandmother finally convinced her that it was best for them and for her.

Our sister-in-law Cherry brought us pizza for supper and we were sooooo grateful. It was the perfect thing and helped us out a lot. Thank you, Cherry!

The paint in the nursery had to dry four hours between coats so we were able to apply a second coat on Sunday night before we went to bed.

Then we decided that it might rain and we needed to move some things that were outside to the shed for the night. It was mostly stuff that my mom was going to take back to her house. So everyone loaded up the stuff and hauled it to the shed. And good thing they did because it rained almost 3 inches on Sunday night. The yard was a bit flooded the next morning. What a mess! A few of the cars got stuck in our yard. But Gary brought his truck out and the guys eventually got them all unstuck.

Monday

Monday morning, bright and early, Mike's mom brought us out some breakfast. Then we all got to work. We pulled off the tape in the nursery and Mike's mom did the touch up painting. Then everyone pitched in to move the furniture back into place in Noah's room. We moved a twin bed into his room and got the crib put back up. I think everything looks wonderful in there. I'm very pleased with how it looks so far.

All our out of town guests needed to be on the road by around 2pm so we were trying to get a lot of last minute things done. We had a few more boxes that needed to be moved to the shed. A few things were left to be done in Emily's room, and I still had lots more things to sort and separate.

We are so grateful for everyone who came out to help us on this long weekend. We could not have done it without all of you. We love you all very much.

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A Long, Productive Weekend

We have had a very busy several days. We are so blessed to have a wonderful family who helps us. We are so thankful for everyone who pitched in this weekend.

Friday

On Friday, the shed company came out to build our shed. It took them about 5 hours, but it looked great when they were done. One of the guys told me that he normally works in the factory, but someone called in sick and so they asked him to go with the building crew. I'm just glad they were able to come out when I needed them.

Mike's dad came out while the builders were there and worked outside in our yard most of the day. He did a lot of weedeating and cleaning up out in the yard. Emily wanted him to play with her instead of working. She even fixed some blankets on the floor by her bed so that Pops could take a nap with her if he got tired.

Friday night, we went to the home improvement store to get shelves for Noah's closet and some shelves for the new shed.

Saturday

On Saturday afternoon, my Mom, Heather and Stephen came into town to help us move things into the shed and fix up the baby room. Mike's mom and dad came out to help too. We put together the shelves for the shed and quickly realized that we were going to need many more shelves than what we purchased. Mike's parents went to two different home improvement stores to get all the shelving that we needed.

While they were gone, we started packing and organizing boxes that we could move out to the new shed. As soon as they got back, we put up all the shelves. I think we had a total of 9 sets of shelves. That was a lot of work!

Later that night, Stephen and Mike installed some shelves and wire baskets in Noah's closet. It was complicated to figure out how the shelves went together, but I think they turned out great. Perfect for a little boy's room.

After the shelves were up, we put all the things we had purchased for Noah into his closet. We also moved a lot of the baby things from Emily's room to Noah's closet. Then we cleared the rest of the boxes out of the baby nursery and moved the furniture to get the room ready to paint.

Sunday

Sunday and Monday were more busy days. But those details will have to wait until another day. Now it's time for bed.

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28 Week Ultrasound

This afternoon was our 28 week ultrasound with the maternal fetal specialist. Mike and Emily came up to go with me to the doctor. We had to wait a long time, but we finally got called back to the ultrasound room.

The technician checked out Noah with the ultrasound for a long time. She showed us the four chambers of the heart, the long bones in the legs, different parts of the brain, the belly, the kidneys etc. When we first started, he was head down with his feet up in my ribs. The he later moved so that he was laying across me.

We got to see some cute cheeks. He had his hands by his face most of the time, but we did get to check out his face a few times. We saw some adorable little hands and feet. Some of them were 3D/4D images, but some of the pictures didn't turn out too great. He was still cute though!

Noah was measuring perfectly for 28 weeks and the technician said he was about 2lbs, 9 oz. Just perfect!

After the technician was done with her scan, the doctor (eventually) came in to take a look. He said Noah looked great and he didn't see anything concerning. I asked him if we needed to do anything differently and he said to keep doing what we're doing. He said we're doing great, but he wants to see us back in about 6 weeks for another check.

We're so grateful for the good news and the good ultrasound. Can't wait for this baby boy to get here!

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As American As Apple Pie

This afternoon while Mike was mowing the yard, he noticed that one of our trees had tiny apples on it. We have lived here 8 years and I don't remember seeing any fruit on this tree ever!

We think they might be Granny Smith apples, but we don't know for sure.

We do expect them to get bigger at some point.

Emily sure liked them!

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Will it? Wont it?

Will my new storage shed make it in time? For some reason, this is very hard to figure out. The shed company didn't call me back last night like they said they would. I called this afternoon, but had to leave a message.

When the guy called me back, he said he was "trying really hard" to get me scheduled for next Friday, but they still don't know for sure. He said one of their workers fell off a ladder and hurt himself today.

Apparently, he fell down on some boards on the ground chest first. He has no broken bones, but is in a lot of pain. And they hope to have him back at work by Wednesday or Thursday next week, but they don't know for sure. So in the meantime, we sit and wait and pray. The guy said he should know something by Monday or Tuesday and he will call me as soon as he finds out. Uh huh, I think that's what he told me last time.

I guess they already got my money and so they feel no real need to accommodate me at this point. I am sure they don't need my business as much as I need my storage shed. That's typical of companies these days, isn't it?

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Good, Better, Best

Today was Emily's last day of school for this year. Her last day of Pre-K ever. She got her report card today and it was GOOD. She passed every skill, of course.

In her Pre-K class, they have a color chart that they use to track behavior. Green is GOOD. Blue is a warning. Yellow is worse than that. And Red is a trip to the principal's office. Emily, proudly, has stayed on GREEN every day this whole year. And that is GOOD!

This is what Emily looked like this morning on the way to school.

Do you remember what she looked like on her first day of Pre-K? Check it out here.




Isn't she just growing up right in front of our eyes?

Today while I was at home, I called my doctor's office to see if they had the results from my glucose tolerance test that I took last week. The nurse called me back later and said that the results were normal. I told you that's what it would be, but I feel BETTER now that I know for sure.

I also worked on cleaning and organizing in Emily's room today. I had a lot of baby things stored in her closet and I was trying to get everything sorted out so that I can move some of it to Noah's room soon. I don't know about you, but I clean and organize with a large trash bag in hand.

Anything that has seen better days goes into the trash bag. It's much easier to clean this way when Emily is not around though. And the bag has to be gone by the time she comes back!

When Emily got home from school, I put her to work putting away her things in her room. She is a good helper if I give her specific directions. "Gather up all the shoes and put them on the shelf." "Find all the baby doll clothes and put them in this suitcase." "How many books can you find? Put them on your desk."

When Dad got home, we went to eat at Ted's to celebrate the last day of school. It was good Mexican food tonight, but Emily was more interested in checking out the other diners than eating her dinner. Lately, she has become an expert people watcher. I have to remind her often to keep her eyes over at our table.

Tomorrow, Emily and I are going to spend the day together. And I think that's the BEST news of all. We don't have any specific plans, but we are going to try to find something fun to do. We might go shopping. We might go play at the park. We'll definitely try to get some things done at home. But I know we will have a great time.

More

I made some phone calls yesterday and was finally able to talk to a guy about our shed. He wanted to schedule us for Tuesday, June 1, but I said I really needed it earlier than that - before Memorial Day. He said their schedule was booked until then, but there was this one customer who had inquired about delaying their installation date because their building site was not ready. And IF they change their install date, then we can get our building installed on Friday, May 28. He called it an "outside chance" that we could get installed on that date, but I explained that we were expecting a baby soon and we NEEDED to get this building in before Memorial Day. So we are praying that we'll be able to get the date that we need and everything will work out. At this point, I just have to turn it over to God and let him work out all the details.

And A Funny

This morning when Emily and I were on our way to school, Emily and I were chattering about different things. She said that "Daddy works on suitcases." I said he doesn't work on suitcases. And she said "Yes he does. He works on a lot of suitcases at work." I tried to explain that they're not suitcases, but they are computer files that are called cases and that Daddy helps people. I am just wondering how many people she has told that her Daddy works on suitcases.

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Tasty Tidbits

• Emily's last day of school is this week. Her class is having theme days every day this week. Tomorrow is sports day. She gets to wear her new OU t-shirt. It's pink.

• I've been packing Emily's lunch for the last few weeks. I've just been putting "stuff" in it - peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, rolled up slices of ham, string cheese, yogurt, chips, cookie. Just whatever I have on hand. She's LOVING this because she had been eating lunch in the cafeteria for months. The main reason I'm packing the lunch now is that the school will no longer allow her to charge her lunch because the school year is nearing an end. And I don't exactly know how much a lunch costs each day. Lame, I know.

• We went to our local home improvement store this weekend and ordered a storage building for our yard. So far, they have not called to schedule delivery. And, you know me, if they don't start doing right by me, then I'll have to start naming names on my blog. And you know they don't want that!

• On Sunday night, a bad hail storm came through our town. Many people have horror stories of hail stones going all the way through shingles and the roof deck and right into their living room. Many windows were busted out on both homes and cars.

• Did you know that the largest recorded hail stone was something like 7.5 inches in diameter? Mike told me this. He knows all about it.

• We're expecting more bad weather tomorrow. I know this because Mike keeps telling me that "Wednesday looks interesting". When he says this, I hear "Wednesday looks dangerous."

• This is a three-day work week for me. I'm taking a few days off to celebrate Emily's last day of school and her first day of summer vacation! I want to spend as much time with her as I can now before we become a family of four!

• I saw on the news that Sonic now has "real" ice cream. (Not sure why this was news.) So today at lunch, I went to Sonic to check out this new feature. And while I believe them that it's "real" ice cream (why do they need the quotation marks if it's really real?), I didn't think the ice cream had much taste. Am I the only one who feels this way?

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27 Weeks

I'll be 27 weeks pregnant on Monday. I thought I would go ahead and post a picture from today. 'Scuse my bad hair day. It's been rainy and I took a nap!

I had my glucose tolerance test this morning and it was no fun at all. They draw your blood for a baseline reading and then you drink a nice big bottle of super sweet orange drink (must finish it within 5 minutes.) I was drinking this and the technician told me not to get sick or they would make me come back and do it again another day.

Then after you drink the stuff, they draw your blood every hour for three hours to check how your body processes the sugar. In case you were counting, that's a total of four blood draws. Well, they got their four blood draws from me, but they ended up sticking me a total of 8 times! That's a miss every other time. It was awful. They poked both arms and both hands.

Noah is very active these days. He flips and kicks and hiccups a lot during the day ... and night. Sometimes you can see my belly moving when he kicks. That's very cool to see. He is about 14 inches long and 2 lbs.

My current craving is Reese's Pieces. I'd rather have these than ice cream. I'd rather have these than just about any kind of food. Too bad that won't fly. Peanut butter in a crunchy candy shell. What's not to LOVE?

I'm looking forward to going to the doctor for another ultrasound in about 2 weeks. It's always so fun to see how much baby Noah has grown and what he's doing in there.

I was talking to Mike the other day and told him that I was going to be 27 weeks on Monday. Emily was born at 37 weeks so we Noah could be here in as little as 10 weeks. Yikes! That makes me think I need to get busy.

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Glucose Tolerance Test

My glucose tolerance test is in the morning. I just want to take back what I said earlier this week about knowing that I'll pass the test this time. It's sorta like when you say that your kids sleep through the night ... or when you say that you or your kids never get sick. As soon as you say that, you know whatever you said WILL happen. So I take back what I said about the glucose tolerance test. Just because I don't want to press my luck.

So tonight as I prepare for the test, I'll be eating nothing after midnight. And I'll dutifully show up at the doctor's office early in the morning to start my test. Oh, and someone told me that it's not three blood draws. It's actually four. OUCH! I was thinking I might take pictures of all my "wounds" and post them on the blog, but I think Heather might not like that. Sorta like the alien baby pictures.

I told Mike that I might need some TLC tomorrow when I get done with my test. Mike went to the doctor's office with me when I had to do the three-hour test when I was pregnant with Emily, but he's not going to be able to go this time.

There seems to be a lot of confusion about the difference between the one-hour glucose screening test and the three-hour glucose tolerance test. I keep getting asked about this A LOT. The point of glucose testing in pregnancy is to look for gestational diabetes (aka diabetes during pregnancy.)

Like any screening test, the one-hour glucose screening will not give you a diagnosis. It's purpose is to identify which women need a closer look at their glucose levels. I think about 80% of women will pass the one-hour glucose screening.

The women who do NOT pass the one-hour glucose screening will have to take the three-hour glucose tolerance test and this will tell her doctor if she has gestational diabetes. Of the people who have to take the three-hour test, only about 30% of them will end up actually having gestational diabetes. So statistics (and history) are on my side.

I'll have to take a good book with me or something because three hours is a long time to sit in a waiting room. Especially when you're hungry. And especially when you're hungry and pregnant. And especially when you're hungry and pregnant and had to drink a bunch of nasty orange liquid (which gives me wicked heartburn) and have to get your arm jabbed repeatedly.

Okay all this talk about the test tomorrow is making me grumpy so I better go to bed.

Goodnight all!

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Spring Storms

As you know, we live in Oklahoma. Oklahoma is known for being in "tornado alley". On Monday evening, we had some damaging storms in the area. A tornado came through about a mile and a half from our house. There's a lot of major damage just down the street. As of today (Wednesday), there is only one north-south road that is open out near our house and it has power poles and power lines leaning over the roadway. Some of the cross streets are closed or blocked off.

And the sad thing is that we're having more bad weather in the state tonight. I think we're supposed to get storms every day from now until Monday or Tuesday next week.

We lost power on Monday night and finally got it back on Tuesday night. We stayed at home in the dark on Monday night, but we were getting ready to go stay with family on Tuesday. As we were packing our bags, the electricity came back on. I was soooooooo glad!

There are lots of people that had it much, much worse than we did. Many people are in need of our prayers during this time. I can't drive through the damage area without getting emotional. (I mean, I am plenty emotional right now without seeing all that.) But, it just breaks my heart to think of all those people who worked so hard for what they had and now it's all destroyed. Just seeing them out in the yards putting tarps over their roof or boarding up part of their house that was damaged, I can't imagine what they are thinking or feeling.

So all that to say ... please pray for these families who have lost their home or who have damage to their home.

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Mother's Day 2010

What a wonderful Mother's Day I have had!

This morning, it looked like we were going to get rained out, but the rain only lasted for a few minutes. Then we headed off to Sunday School. Cherry and I had some cute things planned for our SS kids to do for Mother's Day. Well, most of it was already done. And Cherry did most of it. But I think their mothers will be very happy.

After church, we went to lunch with Mike's family. The place was packed, but we got there early and didn't have to wait long. Mike's mom was excited about her gift - a large framed picture of the grandkids. The picture was from our Easter/Spring photos a few weeks ago. I think it turned out really cute and I'm glad she liked it.

After lunch, we went back home to take a nap. I think I'm the only one who actually took a nap, but I did take a long one. And it felt GOOD. Well, except for one little part.

When I got into bed, the sheet was sorta stuck down in the bed (because you KNOW I didn't make my bed when I got out of it this morning.) So I tugged on it to get it pulled up. And I ended up punching myself in the mouth with my fist. Got a nice fat lip out of the deal. Very classy look, I might add.

It was so nice to have a relaxing day. We had been so busy lately. It's been hard to keep up with all the little chores around the house ... like laundry. I can't say that I did great job of getting things done today, but there is always tomorrow. Or maybe the next day. Or sometime soon. Relatively soon.

In Other News ...

• We had a grand time yesterday in Tulsa for Miss Brynlee's first birthday party. Brynlee was so cute. The food was delicious. And Emily had a great time playing with all the kids. My ankles swelled quite a bit and I was sooo tired when we got home, but it was a lot of fun.

• I failed my one-hour glucose test last week. Total fail. Boo! So I have to do the three-hour (three-blood draw) test this week. So. Not. Fun.

• Emily only had about two weeks of school left. This week, she has to bring snacks for her class for the last time this year. It's also a day to celebrate her summer birthday. I was thinking we could stop by our favorite bakery and pick up some iced sugar cookies. And maybe one .. or two .. for baby and mommy. But Emily wanted to pick something else. So she's taking pre-packaged cookies from the grocery store.

• Cubbies is done for this year. Very happy about this. Wednesday we'll be able to relax instead of running all around town. I'll miss my Wednesday night date with Mike though.

Hope everyone had a great Mother's Day this year. I can't wait until next year when I'll be a mom of two. *squeal!* So fun! I think that almost makes up for the three-hour glucose test that I have to take this week. I just have this feeling that I'll pass the three-hour glucose test just fine. Sorta makes me want to call the doctor's office and say "ya know what? I don't feel like doing a three hour test this time so I think I'm just gonna pass. See you soon." What do you think?

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Where We've Been And Where We're Going

Have you noticed that the blog has been silent for a "few days"?

We have been extremely busy. This weekend was the city-wide garage sale weekend where we live. We went in with Mike's family to put on a garage sale at Mike's parents house. Well, they did most of the work, but I contributed some things to the sale.

Mike and I have been gathering up things for the garage sale for the last several weeks. One night last week, Mike's dad and brother came out to get a couple loads of the big things. I was so tired that I felt like I was done gathering up my sale items. But then I went to help at the sale on Friday afternoon and they were selling a lot of baby and kids clothes and toys. And I knew that Emily had lots of clothes stored in her closet that no longer fit. So Friday night I went home and gathered up 5 bags of clothes and shoes to take to the sale. And then I was pretty sure I was done.

On Saturday, we set up a table with my kids clothes on it and we sold lots and lots of them! I was so excited that I decided to go into Emily's room and look at the clothes hanging in her closet to see what might be too small. And I ended up dragging out another 3 bags of clothes. I had no idea I had that much stuff in Emily's closet, but I did. If I had more time and was not so worn out, I would have gotten out some of Emily's old toys too. But I was bone tired.

Today after church, we opened up the garage for a few more hours. I put out my three bags of clothes and we moved some of the larger items out closer to the street. We did not have a lot of traffic, but we did sell some items.

Overall, I think we had a great sale and I am soooo glad that I moved out so many things. It will be a huge help when baby gets here in a few months.

And to top off a great weekend, Emily sang in the church choir spring program tonight. Her class sang four songs and they did a GREAT job. Madison and Sarah were also in the program and they did really good too. They both had big roles and it was wonderful to watch!

So that's where we've been, but where are we going?

Hopefully things will be slowing down for us this week because I could sure use the rest! But I do have my 25-week doctor's appointment this week. This is the one where I do my glucose tolerance test and I am not looking forward to it! This is the one hour test and I'm not supposed to eat before I go in. The nurse said to have nothing to eat 6 hours before the test, but the lab technician said to fast for 12 hours if I want to avoid the 3-hour glucose test. (She wants to help me avoid that because it is not easy to get blood out of me and she sure doesn't want to have to stick me three times in one day.


All that's fine except that my appointment is not until 1:30pm. I am already cranky about how much I will be starving by 1:30pm. I'm thinking there is no way I can avoid eat something that morning. I'm thinking I can get up early and eat something that is low in sugar/carbs. Do you have any ideas on something I could eat for breakfast that morning?

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Weekend Recap and Sleeping Arrangements

This weekend started out as a busy one, but it ended up on a quiet note.

We had an appointment early on Saturday morning to get Emily's spring/Easter pictures taken with Madison and Mason. We actually got out of the house on time (See sidenote below) but we didn't get very before before we got a phone call from Cherry. Our photographer had a family emergency and couldn't meet us. Cherry did some calling around and found someone else who could take pictures for us.

*Sidenote: We have an AWFUL time getting Emily dressed most of the time. Everything is too tight or doesn't feel good or whatever. She has been complaining about her Sunday Schools shoes for several weeks so we stopped by the shoe store on Friday night to find some new and larger shoes. I saw down on the floor in the shoe store and let her try on many pairs in different sizes. She finally found one that wasn't too tight and didn't hurt her feet .. but it was a size 9 1/2 wide. It was SO big on her little foot! So I did a little switcheroo and got a pair in size 8 1/2. She thinks the shoes she has are the ones she picked and so they miraculously do not hurt her feet.

Anyway, as I said, Cherry luckily found someone else to take our pictures so we drove across town to meet them. We went out to the University of Oklahoma and took some pictures around the beautiful campus. It was a beautiful day and I think we will end up with some really cute pictures. We also did Emily's 5-year-old pictures while we were out there. By that time, she had all but lost interest in the whole process but I think they will still be good.

When we got finished with the pictures, it was just about lunch time and Mama was hungry! Mike and Emily and I went around the corner to Hideaway Pizza and shared a delicious pizza. I forget what it was called, but it was so so good!

Sleep Update

Mike got his CPAP machine the same day he went to the doctor last week (that tells you how serious his sleep apnea was!) It took him a while to get everything set up, but he slept very well after that was done. He did not snore at all so I didn't have to get up out of bed. Unfortunately, that first night is when I had leg cramps several times during the night. I was so frustrated! The first night I could get some sleep and I couldn't get any sleep.

Since that night, Mike has been sleeping well. He doesn't even get up during the night. And he's much more rested during the day. The doctor told him not to go to sleep at all without using the machine. The doctor is taking this very seriously now and so is Mike.

I have been sleeping well too. I have not had any more leg cramps since that first night although my calf is still a bit sore. It is so nice to be able to rest well.

Suffice it to say, that machine is a keeper.

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Baby Book Preview

Noah's Baby Book and Photo Album arrived in the mail today. I am soooo happy with it. I think it's very cute and will be perfect for him.

Here are a few pictures:

This is the main photo on the front of the baby book.

First Year Calendar, Baby Book, and Photo Album
The adorable stickers that came with the calendar

I was showing Mike all of Noah's new things tonight and talking to him about some of the pages in the baby book like the family tree. And Mike suggested that maybe I should go ahead and fill in as much of the information as I can now and then just start with the new stuff when Noah gets here.

And sadly, I had to admit that I had not even finished filling in Emily's baby book. And ... very sadly ... in fact, I can't even find her baby book right now. And if I could find her baby book, I would be filling that out before I start on the next one. I do have a lot of the details written down, but just not in her book.

Just for fun, one more picture of the crib bedding. This is the main picture of Noah's Ark on the crib quilt. The top and bottom of the quilt says "Two By Two By Two". We always make sure that there are two of each kind of animal. Some of the Noah's Ark bedding and accessories only have one of each kind of animal. That just does not seem right to us!

We have ordered several other accessories for Noah's room. His room is going to be so cute! I can't wait for all his things to arrive.

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Noah's Ark .. err Crib

Tonight when I was at Cubbies, Mike texted me and said that I got two packages. I was hoping it was going to be Noah's crib bedding. Turns out, I was right!

I opened the box and the bedding is sooo cute. I love it!


Here are couple tiny teasers. I promise to show more pictures of the bedding and accessories soon. I have not even gotten everything out of the box yet because it's late and I'm tired.

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Sleep is No Laughing Matter

Or maybe I should say "Lack of sleep is no laughing matter."

The last several weeks, Mike has had a terrible time sleeping. He's started snoring very loud and obnoxiously. At first, I thought it might have been related to a cold that he'd had. But it just continued and I started noticing that he was tired all the time and having a hard time staying awake in the evenings and other times.

He tried Breathe Right strips, but they did not help. I tried them too and I ended up getting a cold after the very first night. That'll teach me to try new things!!!

You all know what it's like when your bed partner is not sleeping well. It's been hard for me to get some sleep too. I've tried ear plugs, but I could still hear him snoring over the ear plugs. Most of the time now, I just go sleep in my recliner. That seems to work better than everything else. And if I turn on a table fan in the living room, I can't even hear him snoring.

The downside to me sleeping in the living room is that I can't hear his alarm go off and so I don't make sure he gets up on time. Now most of the time, he's done fine but there have been a few days where we were running late.

A couple weeks ago, he got in to see the doctor. I went with him in case I needed to explain what I had been hearing and seeing. Mike told the doctor that I thought he might have sleep apnea. And the doctor acted like I was just a crazy wife who was tired of the snoring. I told him that I was worried about Mike because he was so tired and having a hard time making it through the day.

So he tells me that lots of people stop breathing at night and he starts doing a demonstration with his watch on how he can hold his breath for 10 second and still talk to me and he's fine. Luckily, Mike was between me and this guy because I was suddenly feeling like a pregnant hormonal woman and I was getting sick of this guy's attitude.

The doctor finally said he would send Mike to do a sleep study, but "everybody I send to the sleep study comes back with sleep apnea." Personally, I don't care what these other people are doing. I just want Mike to feel better.

Late last week, Mike went in to do his sleep study. It was scheduled to be a two-day study. He went in the first night and they hooked him up to all the monitors. He had a hard time going to sleep so they finally gave him a sleep aid. And he still slept very little that night. The technicians were not supposed to tell him anything, but one of them said he "kept waking up when he would stop breathing."

The second night of the sleep study was much better. They hooked him up to the monitors and also put a CPAP machine on him to see how he would do with that. In the middle of the night, they came in and switched him to a different mask. I think the first one just covered the nose and the second one covered his nose and mouth. After the mask change, he went back to sleep and slept well the rest of the night. He said that when he woke up the next morning, he was the most refreshed he'd been in years.

Unfortunately, he is still waiting for his doctor to get the sleep study results to see if he can get a machine of his own. He's going to call them tomorrow and see if he can get this process moving. He is just ready to feel so much better after a good night's sleep. I'm praying he'll have his machine by the end of the week.

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