Welcome Baby Aksel!

Stephanie and Alex had a baby boy last Monday! So exciting! His name is Aksel. When Aksel was born, Alex sent a picture text of Aksel and Stephanie to us, which has been the background of my cell phone--so I think of them often! :) I have been showing the picture to Liam and at first he would say "baby" but now guess what he says....check out the very cute video! :)

Baby is Getting Ready!

Hi! So I thought I would do a new baby update!

I will start with some background info--this last week (Monday-Thursday) I have had a bit of a low grade fever (around 99.5-100.4). I went to the doctor for my weekly apt and she told me to rest, drink fluids and take tylenol. I tried to do all that and when I take the tylenol the fever went away but once it wears off my fever comes back. I felt a little uncomfortable with the fever but luckily it isn't a full blown flu or anything.

On Thursday, I had to miss work because of the fever. I was at home and started to notice some contractions. I started to time them and they were about 7 minutes apart the first hour. They didn't hurt but I could feel something happening. By the second hour they were around 4 minutes apart and sometimes became a bit uncomfortable. John had a really busy day at work and I didn't want to call him out of work if I just had to go to the hospital and get hooked up to a machine for an hour, so I called my Mom to have her take me to labor and delivery (since that is what the doctor told me to do if the contractions were for that time period for that long).

When I got to labor and delivery it was about noon. I had to give urine and blood. The urine showed I had ketones in it and that I was dehydrated. The baby monitors showed I was having contractions about every 2.5 minutes--still not really painful just a bit uncomfortable. The nurse also checked me out (you know....down there....) and said I was dilated to a 2.5 and about 70% effaced. So what ended up happening was I got hooked up to 2 liters of IV fluids and had to have a shot to stop the contractions. By 3:00 I was ready to go home--the contractions slowed pretty much to a stop. I was told I can still work (no bed rest or anything) but I need to try to rest if I can by putting my feet up, relaxing my pelvis and to make sure to drink a lot of water.

Things have been going well since then....I did lose my mucus plug yesterday (sorry...I know that might be TMI for some people but I want to remember how the process is going that is why I wrote it down).

I have been trying to rest but also trying to enjoy some last minute time with John and Liam before this new little one comes--I am so excited to meet him and John even said, "It feels like Christmas!" since we know the baby is right around the corner--but I am trying to still enjoy being pregnant and not hurry up the process too much! :)

John's family has started in on a pool as to when the baby will will be born--John thinks today at 4:30pm and I think April 25 at 11:00pm and everyone else falls in the middle of the week somewhere. What do you think? My goal is to get some work finished up and meet with my substitute and then I will feel like I am more able to be focused on having a baby but if he comes earlier then I will be so excited too! :)

I spent this morning doing last minute things to the nursery, John is outside doing yard work--I think that is his form of nesting right now, and Liam is putting his teddy bears in the baby swing and practicing swinging them saying "baby." We are all getting ready and so happy for this time in our life!

Happy Easter!

What a wonderful day! We spent the morning at church with my Mom. Liam let out a big burst of energy, for lack of a better word, during a quiet part of mass and the church starting laughing, I got bright red but it was funny. Then my Mom made us a delicious meal--crab cakes, potato pancakes, shrimp, egg/artichoke rolls, asparagus--oh my! The Easter bunny made a visit to her house with real eggs that we dyed.

Then we went over to John's Aunt and Uncle's for more food, good company and another Easter Egg hunt! The Easter Bunny was very popular this year! It was so fun being a parent and being a part of the holiday celebrations and to see Liam get into it more and more!

Getting Ready for Owen

Well, can you believe that I am 34 weeks along?! I sure can't! I had Liam at 36.5 weeks so I am never quite sure now if I will have Owen early or if he will go full term (hopefully--except hopefully it won't be on Maria's graduation date which is the due date). I also can't believe how I can get any bigger and what 40 weeks pregnant will actually feel like--huge and attractive I am sure! :)

We have been making a lot of preparations for Owen's arrival. I am definietly in the nesting period and the panic dreams of not having things ready have been going away now that we have things more put together. It seems like we have oodles and oodles of time and then all of a sudden it feels right around the corner! We painted Owen's nursery over the past couple of weeks and John (and Liam) have put together the new stroller, which will be wonderful to have for the summer walks with the boys. I have been doing a lot of laundry this week washing all of Owen's clothes and now am trying to find the best way to organize his room. It is a houseful of preparation, fun, excitement, nerves, etc. getting ready to welcome a new little one. I don't know what it will be like to have two children so close together but above all I am so blessed and happy to have our family welcome little Owen!

Easter Suit

Liam has graduated out of the bunny costume (see last years Easter photos) and into an Easter suit! Wow! Doesn't he look sharp and doesn't he look so big?! I can't believe how handsome he is and just like a mom, I totally cried and said that when he put it on--can you imagine the water works when he dresses up for prom?! Since we got the suit we decided to go and get his photos taken professionally at the Target portait studio yesterday--which is interesting trying to tell a 20 month old to stay in one spot and pose for a picture--yeah--not happening!

In these photos, you can see a very beautiful bench that Liam's great Uncle Lee made for him! Liam loves the bench and it is such a work of art, plus the perfect size for Liam.

I think Liam really looks like John in these photos--I think there is even a photo of John in a little suit when he was about Liam's age and if we had a way to scan the photo and put it next to these ones I think you would agree. Liam will grow up to be one handsome man! :)