Yes, They are Still Working on the House!

Okay, it seems like forever since anything has been accomplished which is photo worthy. The carpenter has been the only one working in the house for the last few weeks. (I'm not kidding, he has been there for WEEKS!!!!) Anyways, we went to the house today on three different occasions. The first was to meet with the man who is taking care of our window blinds, the second was an unexpected trip to meet with the man who is putting in our closets, mirrors, and shower door in the master bath, and the third was to again meet with the window blind guy (he forgot the book with the color samples for the one blind we chose for the half bath and master closet windows so we had to meet again to look at it). On the third trip I took the camera to take some pictures of what has been accomplished recently.

The stairway (he was actually finishing it while we were there):


Molding along the shelf above the fireplace:

The mantel:

I wish I could show you what we picked out for blinds. I think it is going to look very nice! We are assuming that the painters will be finishing up their stuff early next week (but, we have been wrong before). Jeromy talked to Mark today and was told that we will probably be moving in the week of the 15th (yes, that is after Abigail will arrive). We are thinking about staying at my mom's house when we get home from the hospital. Our old house is having insulation problems and the upstairs is very cold. We don't think it would be wise for Abigail to sleep up there, so we were going to sleep downstairs on the pull-out sofa. Jeromy decided that that was silly since my mom has two empty bedrooms and has a bassinet ready for Abigail to sleep in. So, I think we are now leaning in that direction.

One Final Shower

Today was the shower at work. My co-workers and friends, Sarah and Erin put together a great shower! We received some wonderful gifts! The gifts included clothes, a couple toys, a boppy (with sweetpeas on it!), a shopping cart cover, and sheets for the crib and changing pad. I even received a quilt today from one of my students! She said that her mom made it for me. It was really cute! It was a really nice shower! My mom was even able to come! Thanks to her I have the pictures that you see here.


In other news, Jeromy and I decided to go to Babies R Us after dinner to buy some things that we still needed. (We also thought it would pass some time so we are not just sitting around the house.) We bought our changing pad, some sheets for the pack 'n play, some breastfeeding paraphernalia, an umbrella stroller (orange of course), and a couple pair of tights for Abigail when she wears her Christmas dresses. I think we are starting to get ready for her arrival! I almost forgot that we also bought our diaper bag!

We did get some bad news today about moving day into the new house. It seems we will probably not move until very close to Dec. 11th (which is the day the doctor is thinking of inducing). Oh the stress! Jeromy and I are forming contingency plans so we can be flexible in this situation.

An Update of Our Life

Okay, it has been over a week since I last updated the blog. Weird since I was updating every day for a while. In my defense, my weeks have been flying by. In fact, other than the fact it is Sunday I have no idea of the date. I thought I would do one big update entry instead of separate ones for each area of our life. Here it goes...

1) First and most importantly is Abigail. She is doing great! The doctor says that she is growing beautifully. We have a doctor's appointment tomorrow, so I may have more then.

2) The house...It is starting to get frustrating (I think because the baby is coming soon). For the past week, not much has happened. A guy has been there installing floorboards, doors, and such all week. After a week and a half he has still not finished. One highlight took place last weekend when our countertops were installed in our bathrooms. Here are some pictures:

The french doors leading into the study:

Master bathroom countertops:

Upstairs bathroom countertop:


3) In other news...we finished our childbirth classes this week! This last week the lesson was about breast feeding. I learned a lot! Even though I learned a lot from all the classes I am glad they are done. I'm tired of having something to do every Wednesday night! I know Jeromy is glad they are over. He didn't learn much of anything new.

All in all, the past couple months have been crazy! I feel like I am never home and I am always exhausted. Last Sunday, we came home from church and decided to relax a couple of hours before doing anything. It turned into an all day thing. Jeromy watched football (which he doesn't get to do very often) and I read. Then, I fell asleep. Jeromy took this picture (yes, it felt that cold in the house!):

Believe it or not, we did leave the house that evening! Jeromy decided that we would go on a date night. So, we went out to dinner at Red Robin (where I got a salad. I was pleasantly surprised at how good it was. I would definitely recommend it!) and then to the movies to see Madagascar 2. It was pretty good, but the first one was better.

I will update more later if anything happens this week. Hopefully, we will see some progress on the house!

New Progress on the House

With the laying of the concrete for the driveway the work on the house came to a complete halt for a week. Now that it has been a week, trucks and vans can now park on the driveway so progress has continued. We went over Wednesday and saw that work had continued, but I didn't have my camera. Yesterday we didn't have time with all the trauma (see previous post) and the fact the sun sets shortly after five. So, today we went over shortly after I arrived home from work. Here are the pictures I took:

The stamping on the edge of the driveway:

The sidewalk leading up to the house:

The french doors for the study. Obviously they are not hung yet. I expect that will be completed on Monday (if not sooner).

The laundry room door (just an example of the doors hanging throughout the house):

Thankfully, A False Alarm

Yesterday, we had a scary moment (or partial day) with Abigail. It began Wednesday night around 9 o'clock when I felt Abigail moving. She was moving so much that I even commented to Jeromy about it. Then, I had a good nights sleep (strange in itself). What stood out to me about the good sleep was that every night I am awaken at least once by Abigail moving. She usually moves so much that it is usually a half hour to a hour until she settles down enough for me to sleep again. But that didn't happen Wednesday night. So, then, I focused everything on feeling her move. All morning at school, I felt nothing. When it came time for my cafeteria duty I bought two cookies and ate them. I thought that the sugar would get her moving. Still nothing. Now I was getting nervous.

When I returned to my room after cafeteria duty (around 12:00) I called the doctor. They wanted me to come in to be hooked up to the monitor at 1:00. Well, they took a phone call to the office and a rapid making up of lesson plans for whomever the secretary placed in my room for the final two periods. When the bell rang releasing my 15 minute study hall class to lunch (at 12:18), I quickly left to head to the other side of town.

As I pulled out of the parking lot I started freaking out because I was so scared something was wrong and I was going to the doctor by myself. I didn't have time to drive over to get my mom and Jeromy was sleeping with the phone unplugged. I didn't have time to wake him up and get him dressed. So, I called the house and began to leave a message for him. He heard my voice and the fact that I was crying (I was really scared and nervous) and he quickly answered the phone. He quickly got dressed and was ready by the time I pulled in the driveway.

Well, we arrived at the doctor's office by 1:00 (a miracle in itself) and they hooked me up to the monitor. Right away we were greeted by a strong heartbeat. I have never been so happy to hear her heartbeat (I began to cry again. I know not a surprise.) Then we waited for her to move. She moved a couple times, but not enough. So the nurse used this vibrating thingy on my stomach. Once again, she moved but it was still not enough (even though she was approving). So, the nurse brought me an orange juice and I drank it up. That finally did the ticket and she moved...A LOT! Actually, she didn't stop moving for the rest of the evening! Jeromy joked that I was going to pay and she would keep me up all night.

I felt really stupid, but the nurse said that I had done exactly what I should have done. She said you can never be too careful. I would have to agree!

Even though this has been a long story, the good news is that Abigail is fine! It was a false alarm and she remains very healthy! Just a little update...she has been moving all day!

Just Too Cute!

Okay, it may be because I love reading myself. But, I thought these pictures were too cute. Alex had the last two days off school for parent/teacher conferences. Yesterday, I received the picture of him sitting under the tree reading (for those of you out of town, the temperature was over 70 degrees yesterday) from Kelly. Today, he spent the afternoon with Grandma at work and I received the picture of him reading a book in the library. It seems that Captain Underpants are his favorite books. I've never read them, but they seem to be very popular with the elementary set.

Update on Abigail

Today Jeromy and I went to see the doctor. It was actually a marathon appointment. We started off with an ultrasound, then we went to a non-stress test, and finally we met with the doctor. Originally, Jeromy was unable to go to this appointment because he had to work. But, then one doctor was sick and could not work and everyone was moved around and then Jeromy's schedule was changed so he was able to go.

Abigail is healthy and growing right on schedule! The doctor is very happy with how the pregnancy is progressing. The pictures are difficult to see, but she kept moving and she is so big that they can't fit much of her in the shot at one time. The only one we have of her face is very blurry. Here are the two pictures that came out semi-clear:

This is of her foot and leg. The foot is to the right. It was up against my bladder. Believe me, I knew that before the ultrasound tech told me. It had been a very uncomfortable afternoon.

Another picture of her foot (the opposite of the one pictured above). This time it is pointing to the left. If you look closely, you can see her hands on either side of her ankle.

The doctor was not happy to discover that she is still breach. She will give her a couple more weeks before making any decisions about forcing her to turn. Actually, when she checked in the office she was already tilting like she was going to flip again. I'm not that concerned. She still has plenty of room to move so I am confident she will flip in time. We have almost four and a half weeks before the doctor decides on the delivery date.

The Showers Keep Coming!

This weekend we traveled to Dayton for shower number 2. Jeromy's mom and sister, Jamie, threw us a shower at their church. It was very nice! We received a lot of nice things. Here are some pictures from our exciting day:


Jamie gave the bakery a picture of the rug that went with our bedding set and they decorated the cake with the design. Cute!

Yes, Jeromy stayed for the entire shower. I kind of told him that he had to since he was the one who knew everyone. I think he had a good time. His friend Shawn came with his wife and they were able to hang out for a while.



The little chair was not on our registry. Jeromy's Aunt Jo bought it for us. It matches everything in our nursery. Isn't it cute?

We received a lot of great gifts. Last night we packed everything up and took it to the storage shed. The storage shed is filling up with things for little Abigail! Who would have thought that a little baby needed so many things!