Full-Term!!

I am 37 weeks pregnant today! That means that I am officially full-term! I've been waiting for this day for quite awhile, especially lately! It's awfully reassuring that Brenna would be just fine if she were born today - even though it's definitely not going to hurt her to keep cooking for a little while longer. I go back to the doctor tomorrow (if we can get there through the ice/snow/sleet/whatever) to check on any progress and to see if she's still breech. If she is, that could mean she'll be here in less than 2 weeks!! It's starting to feel more and more like this is something that is about to happen, instead of something that is still months away! WOOHOO! Here's my 37 week pictures with my first born! ;)

36 week Update

4 more weeks! We are so close!!

How far along? 36 weeks
Total weight gain/loss? 34.5 pounds. I only wanted 30 total. I'm trying not to freak!
Maternity clothes? Oh yes!
Stretch marks? No new ones at least!
Sleep? Not great at night, but naps are usually helpful if I can squeeze one in.
Best moment of the week? Seeing her nursery almost finished finally!
Movement? Quite a bit more down low - hoping that's a good sign!
Food cravings? Not really
Gender? Still girl...
Name? Still Brenna...
Labor Signs? I don't think so - we'll find out in the morning at my appointment
Bellybutton In or Out? In barely - it might not make it out, yay!
What I Miss: good sleep, a normal digestive tract, bending over
Weekly Wisdom: I will miss this, as much as I don't think I will!
Milestones: We are three days away from the month of her birth (hopefully)!

A Baby Poll

Let's take a poll. Leave a comment on this post with your name and a guess for Brenna's birthday, birth weight, and birth length. Unless some of my facebook friends come over to participate, we'll probably have 4 guesses - mine, Jonathan's, Kelley's, and Merritt's. Oh, and maybe my new blog friend - the other Erin. Yeah, I need more readers. Here's what I know...

1. My due date is February 25. It really should be February 26 because I was tracking my cycles very closely!
2. Brenna is head down, but I still feel quite a bit of movement up high.
3. I've been measuring about 1-2 weeks behind for a few appointments now, but still growing.
4. The doctor estimated she weighed 5 pounds last Monday (33 weeks, 4 days)
5. I feel way more pressure lower down than I did a few weeks ago.
6. I weighed 6 pounds, 12 ounces and was a few weeks early.
7. Jonathan weighed 8 pounds, 13 ounces (I think?) and was a little bit late (again, I think).
8. We had two friends from church have babies lately - April was due 1 day after Halloween and had him 13 days before Halloween. Victoria was due 3 days after New Years and had him 4 days before New Years. I'm due 11 days after Valentine's Day....hmmm.
9. A full moon is here on February 28!
10. Our dating anniversary is February 12. Valentine's Day is February 14. My birthday is February 15. Thus, my guess of February 13 - filling in the missing day!

Happy Guessing!

Baby Shower #2

We had our 2nd baby shower on Sunday after church. It was super fun and April did a FABULOUS job making it fun for everybody! Our church family has really been put to the test over the past few months - three new babies! Our church is pretty new (5ish years?) and these were the first brand new babies to come! Everybody is super excited and have already fallen in love with Baby London and Baby Micah. And now they are getting their long-awaited baby GIRL in our sweet Brenna. I can only imagine how little I'll see her between everyone passing her around. I wonder if they'll still hold her if she is wearing cloth diapers. I guess we'll see!

Mommy is ready for some food!

Baby London got all dressed up for his girlfriend's shower

Diaper cake!!

We played a few games - and Jonathan even won the one where he had to diaper, dress, and swaddle a baby doll blindfolded. I was so proud!!

Then it was present time! Brenna got her first cloth diaper (which is definitely not her only one now because the ones I ordered are here - more later!), her long-awaited Bumbo seat, clothes, blankets, lotions and bath stuff, a talking toy!, pack-n-play sheets, spoons, hairbows, socks, teething stuff, sleepers, window coverings, a Boppy cover that I LOVE, lots of good bottles, towels, organizing stuff, and a Sesame Street shirt - SO CUTE!! We need a bigger house!!!

Thanks to all the TFC family - we love ya'll!!

Baby Shower #1

Since we were going to be in Bristol for the Thanksgiving weekend anyway, my sister, my mom, and my cousin decided to throw us a baby shower with friends and family in that area. My family is huge (my grandpa had 12 brothers and sisters and most of them had several too...) and it is always so fun for me to get together and see my great-aunts and uncles, aunts and uncles, cousins, and new family members alike! There were lots of people there from my mom's family, some of my aunts and cousins from my dad's family, some friends of my mom's from work that I've known forever and their daughters, some family friends who seem like family, and some of my friends from the good old days of B.Dalton who I don't see nearly enough!!

My Great Aunt Phyllis, My Great Aunt Ann, My Aunt Pat, and my Grandma Abel

My cousin Kris, My Aunt Teresa, My Aunt Sherry, and My Cousin's Daughter Ally

My mom's good work friends Debbie and Shirley with their daughters, Angie and Heather

There is no way to list all of the wonderful things we (and Brenna!) were blessed with on that day. My sister made some awesome cupcakes and we had lots of other great food (including my favorite ham rolls - so yum!)

Brenna got more clothes than she'll know what to do with - Can you say 4 outfits a day? She got a bathtub and some good baby-smelling bath stuff, some books, some hairbows, some grooming stuff (seriously terrified about the nail-clipping), diapers and a genie (that we are going to use for the wipes even when we use our cloth diapers, which will have to be another post), stuff for her stroller and her diaper bag, lots of Target gift cards that we'll put to great use, and a pack-n-play! We also got some really fun handmade stuff from some family members. Jonathan's mom put a new back on his baby quilt and gave it to Brenna. My cousin knitted us a beautiful brown and pink round afghan. My aunt made us an awesome green, pink, and brown quilt. Actually that quilt inspired us to ask her to make all of the bedding - so soon Brenna will have curtains, sheets, a crib bumper, and a crib sheet to match it! It's gorgeous. And to top it all off, I found a lampshade and some wall hangings that match it almost perfectly on sale at Babies R Us online! I can't wait!!

So many gifts!!

Pink, Pink, Pink!!!

His baby quilt - awwww!

So many goodies!!

My aunt's gorgeous quilt!

The loot once we got unpacked at home!

Brenna Jane is a lucky, lucky girl to have so many people who already love her. And we're pretty lucky, too! I can't wait to show you what it looks like when all this stuff is where it belongs. Speaking of which, I should go check on Jonathan's paint job in the nursery! ;)

Snow Day Update

Today is our first official snow day of the school year, so I vowed to use some of my free time to update this blog. I really need to get in the habit now, so that I'll be better at recording things I want to remember about Brenna's first days. I'll start with updating a pregnancy survey so I can be sure to remember this time!
How far along? 33 weeks, 1 day
Total weight gain/loss: about 28 pounds, yuck
Maternity clothes? except around the house - I can still pull off a few of my bigger tshirts
Stretch marks? Let's not go there...
Sleep: It comes and goes - getting rougher though!
Best moment this week: 2 hour delays Monday-Wednesday, 2 hour early release on Thursday, snow day on Friday....extra time to work on baby stuff!
Movement: Like you would not elieve!!!
Food cravings: I seem to want a lot of fruit and chocolate!
Gender: girl
Name: Brenna Jane
Labor Signs: nope
Belly Button in or out? in, but barely!
What I miss: a waistline, sleeping on my stomach, working out (weird, I know!)
Weekly Wisdom: I will never get the feeling of her inside me back, so I might as well enjoy it!
Milestones: We can now say we are having a baby NEXT MONTH (hopefully!)

We are officially one week into the new year, and I realized I need to make some resolutions. So, here they are.
1. Birth a baby and keep her safe, healthy, and happy.
2. Lose the pregnancy weight and the extra ten I was carrying when I got pregnant.
3. Run at least 2 5K races, maybe even the same one I did last year in Greenville? Kelley?
4. Keep my motto that "babies are portable" and not let her limit our family, but instead to include her and provide lots of fun memories for all 3 of us! Okay, okay, she won't remember them, but still...
5. Hear my husband say, "You were right about cloth diapers. They really aren't that bad."
6. Wear pre-pregnancy clothes to the many, many weddings we'll be attending (and in!) this summer!
7. Read through the Daily Bible.
8. Drink more water.

I think those are some lofty goals. Pretty much all I care about is number 1, but the rest would sure make me a more pleasant mommy! All this baby talk has inspired me to go work on her nursery, but maybe later I'll post about our baby shower in Bristol.....and soon I'll be able to post about our church shower and our shower with Jonathan's family. For now, here's the two of us:

Baby Brenna

Our baby has a name! I guess you already figured that out by the title of the post. We've actually had her name picked out for quite awhile, but for some reason it was kind of fun to not really make a huge announcement. But, here it is anyway.

Sprout will be named Brenna Jane Halsey. We had quite a list of girl names, but we also had a lot of requirements for a name. Jonathan was adament that her name not end with a long e sound. Halsey is kind of a hard name to get to "flow" with names, so that with a little tricky. I have loved the name Brynlee forever, but as you can see, it breaks the long e rule. So I mentioned the name Brenna. My friend Kelley has a friend named Brenna, and I always thought that was a beautiful name. I never really realized how close it was to my favorite name, Brynlee, until we really started getting serious. It soon became one of our top 3. Our top 3 were Brenna, Ashlyn, and Hannah. Hannah got ousted after Jonathan remembered it was his coworker Tim's daughter's name. Also Hannah Halsey is a little sing-songy for our taste. So that left us with Brenna and Ashlyn. We kept going back to Brenna, so we knew that was it. It's beautiful and feminine and perfect for our little angel! Jane is my middle name, my mom's middle name, my cousin's middle name, my great aunt's middle name, and my great-grandma's middle name. We think it flows well with Brenna before it and Halsey after it. Brenna Jane Halsey. My daughter. I love it!

Jonathan googled "Brenna" to make sure nothing terrible came up. Here is what he got.

Pefect, right? I've found several meaning for the name "Brenna". It means sword, which means she'll be a fighter I'm sure. It is the feminine form of "Brennan" which means prince. So I'm going to say this makes Brenna mean princess. I've also read that it means raven or black-haired. Urbandictionary.com says it means "one who dances in cages". I don't think urbandictionary has any credibility.

So, it looks like come February (please not March!) we are going to have us a little dark-haired princess. However, Jonathan and I both had blonde hair at birth. We saw no hair on her 4D ultrasound. So I guess we'll find out!

Same Survey, Different Day

I've composed about 3 blog posts in my head lately, but I really can't remember any of them. So, here is the same survey I did about 9 weeks ago....so you can see how much has changed!

How far along? 26 weeks, 2 days
How much weight gain? about 18 pounds, yuck!
Is your bellybutton in? yes, but not nearly as "innie" as it used to be
Wearing maternity clothes? you betcha - love the shirts, hate the pants!
Cravings or aversions? not really, just getting tired of food
Signs and symptoms? heartburn - I bet this baby comes out with a ponytail!
Feeling baby move? Oh yes, she apparently enjoyed the kickboxing moves I taught her at the beginning of the pregnancy!
Pregnancy milestones? We are 5 days away from the 3rd trimester - WOOHOO!
Upcoming appointments? December 3 - the yucky glucose test one!
Name? Yep, about 99% sure of one!!

I'll update more next week - after our first shower!! SO FUN!!!

Viability

We are officially passed the 24 week pregnant mark. This is super exciting because it means Sprout could live outside of me if something unexpected happen. We are still awaiting an uneventful last 15.5 weeks, but knowing this does bring some sort of relief....and a little awe! I think it's finally clicked with me that a human is living inside me. It could be the constant kicks, punches, and bladder stomping that I feel, especially at night. Maybe it's the crib and cradle that have found homes in our house. But whatever it is, has finally brought a little realization to this mommy.

I'm so ready to meet this little acrobat and learn all about her personality. I wonder if she will be laid back like her daddy or wound-up like her mommy. I wonder if she will be a good singer like her daddy or tone-deaf like her mommy. I wonder what she'll look like, what her voice will sound like, what she'll be good at, what will make her laugh. I wonder what it's like to love somebody as much as I know I'll love her. I am doing a lot of wondering right now.....

Look....

over to the right. See the Baby Sprout poll? You should cast your vote! Only four more days until the big ultrasound!!

Baby Survey

I'm a really bad blogger. I'm going to try to work on that. I only have like 2 or 3 readers, so at least I'm not disappointing too many people. While you wait for me to have something interesting to say, here's a survey about baby Sprout that I stole from Merritt. The questions - not the answers.

How far along? 17 weeks and 4 days
How much weight gain? 4-5 pounds as of this morning - but I chalk that up to my MIL's cooking this weekend!
Is your bellybutton in? yes, but not much else is "in"
Wearing maternity clothes? the 2 articles that I have....can't find any that fit right quite yet
Cravings or aversions? no chicken, no way
Signs and symptoms? horrible back pain....think it might be my sciatic nerve already.....oh, and heartburn, restless legs, sore gums, headaches, and stuffy nose!
Feeling baby move? Not yet....maybe one little jab last night but I'm not terribly convinced....still waiting! I actually just felt it again....but Jonathan says it might just be the meatloaf, haha!
Pregnancy milestones? The 2nd trimester was fun.....made me worry a little less! Clothes not fitting was a milestone, but not really a fun one!
Upcoming appointments? October 1....it's the big one!
Name? Nope. Jonathan is super indecisive. We have it narrowed down to about 2 boy names and quite a few girl names. We'll start narrowing them down after the appointment!

Meet Sprout...Finally!

Since facebook is the new way to break news, you all know about our exciting, pickles-on-pizza craving news! But, in a futile attempt to make people read my blog, I'm going to give you all the good info here.....and some pictures, too!

We knew we were ready for babies a few months ago. In fact, we actually had a miscarriage in April and were absolutely crushed. We really had to trust and be patient for the next few months while healing from that pain and praying for another healthy pregnancy. On my first day of summer vacation I took a test, and there was a faint line. I had already known I was pregnant just by the way I was feeling.....but Jonathan was harder to convince. He said he wouldn't believe it until he saw words - apparantely lines don't work for him! Luckily I had one digital one that April had given me after Tad was confirmed, I took it the next day, and we knew for sure!

Honestly, it was the longest 3.5 weeks of my life waiting for our first appointment at 7 weeks. It's amazing what losing a baby will do to the optimism of the happy time it's supposed to be. I started having a lot of signs - including terrible nausea. I knew this was a good sign, but boy it wasn't fun. And it hasn't stopped yet! Oh, and by the way - the 5K I ran was a week after we found out - doesn't that make it even more awesome?


We went to the doctor on July 10 and got our first glimpse at this sweet baby. He/She was not much more than a peanut - but have you ever seen a peanut with a beating heart? Awesome! Here, look!
I'm now 13 weeks, woohoo! This means I'm done with the first trimester - finally! Ready to start feeling better! We went to the doctor again on August 6 and got some more pictures and heard a strong heartbeat of 164. Everybody says that means girl - guess we'll see in about 6 weeks! I feel pretty strongly that Sprout is a girl, but wouldn't it be ironic if the first time I guessed wrong was on my own!

And to hopefully answer most of your questions - I'm due February 25 and will take at least 7-8 weeks off. Jonathan and our parents and family are thrilled! I will deliver at New River Valley Medical Center in Radford. I have actually lost a few pounds due to the nausea - no maternity clothes for me quite yet! I crave pizza, breadsticks, and cheesesticks. Meat disgusts me. Healthy, I know! We'll find out boy or girl around the beginning of October if little Sprout cooperates. I go for my 15 week appt. on September 4. God is good - and we are so thankful!