The Bird's Nest

Nell got a "fisheye" shot of the nursery.

Some little details.

Little Girl's room is very small so we had to really use the space carefully. There is no closet or built in shelving or anything. Here are some things that we did to capitalize on the space:

-Changing pad on dresser

-Baskets under the crib

-Book shelf with baskets

-Pocket shelves with baskets next to the glider as well as over the diaper changing area.

-all baby gear that I got is the smallest, cheapest, and most collapsable model i could find so that it can be stored under the crib, in the corner or in the dungeon. Seriously, everything: baby bath, baby swing, bassinet, packnplay, etc...

I have been amazed at how economically we could put together this space. I got the crib years ago at a garage sale for a few bucks and Landon refinished it with spray paint. I bought the glider for $35 at a local consignment shop and refinished it with fabric given to me by my sis. The mattress i purchased used on consignment for cheap. Otherwise, we already had the dresser and book shelf. Friends and family have been so generous to us at our baby showers, we really haven't needed to buy much at all. 

Mom and Nell helped put on the finishing touches during their Christmas trip out here. I specifically asked my sister, who is crazy organized, to help me come up with some creative storage ideas. And my mom really can look at a room and have great vision for its potential, so they were a huge help. I felt like I had to harness them a little bit, as they were very excited and had A LOT of ideas. I still wanted the space to be simple and be ours. And I think it is exactly that! I am very grateful and so excited to put our Little Girl in here soon.

Any day now....

Little Baby: 37 weeks

  Merry Christmas!

Family left to return to Colorado Wednesday and we are getting a little R&R&R (rest, relaxation, and regrouping) around our house. I am fortunate to have been able to take off the entire week, which is 9 days! What a luxury. During those 9 days, it SNOWED! We had near-blizzard conditions at times and sweet floating snowflakes at other times. I LOVE having white Christmases, and this year we were clobbered with snow. Dad and Landon were able to ski on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day and ice climb as well.   Mom and Nell helped me put together a beautiful nursery for the baby (or maybe i helped them put it together...). Otherwise, we just spent some good time together.

It snowed all day yesterday and into today. I really would love our baby to be born on a snowy day. Days of snow are so peaceful and beautiful.

Enjoying my Christmas present from my baby's daddy.

It'll fit better come summer. Excited to get our family into the woods!

Little Baby is 37 weeks

This is a very important week as Little Girl is finally full-term. 

I had an appointment with my OB today. I am 2 cm dilated, and 80% effaced. She thinks baby could come any day, although she said it could also be a few weeks. So we will just wait and see. 

Unfortunately, I tested positive for StrepB, which will complicate labor plans a little bit. This just means that I will be administered an IV antibiotic during labor and things need to progress relatively quickly to decrease the risk of infecting her. according to the CDC, if I am given antibiotics during labor, she has a 1 in 4000 chance of contracting GBS. 

Today I packed my hospital bag. Baby's was packed last week. So we are ready to go whenever the time arrives! 

I still feel like there is much to do at work in preparation for my maternity leave. We have hired an intern who will help out during the 10 weeks that I am on leave. Many people ask me when my leave begins and i'm planning on working until my water breaks. I'm not sure if it is wise to work until "d-day", but I'd rather spend every day of the 10 weeks with my baby girl instead of sacrificing those days to merely sit around waiting for her arrival. 

I will update again after my appointment next week.

Little Baby: 36 weeks

Christmas Eve. What a joyous time of year!

Right now my parents and sister are in town to celebrate Christmas with us. It is really wonderful to get to celebrate Christmas in our own home without having to travel at all for the holiday. It takes a lot of stress out of the season - getting to stay home.

On their first day here, Mom and Nell were on a mission to help me complete the baby's nursery. It is just beautiful. In fact, I am sitting in it right now as I write this. When the husband saw it complete, he called it "The Bird's Nest". That's about right. It's the sweetest birdy-themed little room for our little chick! Now all we need is the baby. It feels great to have the nursery completed. 

36 weeks:

Last Monday (a week ago), I was 1cm dilated, 60% effaced, and baby was in position -1 in the birth canal

 

(sorry, i was unable to resize this one)

Women can stay dilated 1cm for the entire last month of their pregnancy. However, the effacement and lightening (dropping) of the baby in the birth canal means that this baby will probably be early. That makes me happy. I want her to stay inside as long as it takes for her to be healthy and strong when she comes out, but i would really love to finally hold her and to finally not have a pregnant body any more. 

The news about her progress kicked both landon and I's nesting instincts up a notch. Three days last week I woke around 3am with baby concerns on the mind: choosing a name, packing our bags (mine still isn't packed), finishing the nursery, getting the rest of the baby stuff that I need, etc... Made for some exhausting days, having not gotten much sleep last week. People tell me that it's just preparing me for my lack of constant sleep once she arrives. But at least when she is here I don't have to go to work for 8 hours in such an exhausted state. I'll let you know later if these sleepless nights "prepare" me for anything. My guess is that lack of sleep doesn't prepare one for lack of sleep ;)

I completed my breastfeeding class last week. It was interesting. I spent the break crying in the bathroom because I was the only expectant mother in the entire group to plan on putting her baby in daycare. It made me feel like a poor parent. I think the class did a good job at teaching about what to expect if I have a "normal" experience. I didn't learn anything about unique situations or babies. I didn't know that breastfeeding takes up practically half of your new-mommy life at the beginning. Sheesh. I am looking forward to it, though. Here in Utah, you get very experienced women teaching these classes. My teacher has 10 children! 

It is exciting to think that Little Baby should arrive in a few weeks. In the meantime, I just keep getting bigger and bigger. I am getting increasingly uncomfortable with some intense round ligament pain, braxton hicks transactions, and sciatic nerve pain. However, I remain so grateful that this pregnancy has gone so smoothly and I have been mostly comfortable throughout these 9 months. 

In a few days Little Baby should be full-term. I am not going back to work from my Christmas vacation until Monday. Having a long 9 days off is something that I have been really needing and looking forward to. 

Tomorrow is Christmas! So grateful to get to celebrate the gift of "God with us" with my family in Utah this year. Merry Christmas to you and I hope you will celebrate with much joy and thankfulness. 

Little Baby: 35 Weeks

  Our baby had hiccups at around 5am this morning. Sleep is hard to come by these days, for Mr McBrayer and for myself.

With only 10 days until our little girl is full-term, we are getting more prepared for her arrival.

Baby's daddy built a cloth diaper sprayer with about a billion separate parts that he located from the hardware store and a plumbing shop. 

It works beautifully.

We had two Christmas parties with our colleagues this last week. I've also had several days of Christmas cooking and crafting. So we are feeling Christmas drawing near and are looking forward to the arrival of the Sheely family come Friday.

Although we have received 20" of snow in the mountains, we spent 10 hours in a childbirthing class this weekend. 

We were surprised by how much we enjoyed it. We learned a lot. We received a tour of the hospital and every little thing inside of the labor and delivery rooms and recovery rooms. I really appreciated that because I feel like i can visualize this whole mysterious and terrifying experience better, which makes it less mysterious and terrifying! It was fun to be surrounded by other parents-to-be and hear their questions. I really am amazed at how fortunate I am to have such a wonderful pregnancy. I think I took more bathroom breaks than all the other women, but i wasn't miserably huge, on the verge of passing out, unable to fit in my shoes, hormonal, or snacking on tums... 

Doony putting in his 15 minutes with "the belly". It was 25lbs. He didn't like the way it felt on his stomach, and it was uncomfortable to wear standing, he said. I told him that I've put on more than that! Luckily for me, though, it was a gradual 8 months instead of 8 seconds, so my body is more used to it. I didn't have him try to tie his shoes walk up and down the stairs, ha! 

This last week has been nice because for some unknown reason, I have been more comfortable in general than the week before. This week, Little Baby stayed curled up inside my belly pretty well. I did feel her often pushing beneath my ribs, but I didn't feel like she was being magnetized away from my body, like i did the week before. Today, however, has been a different story. It is a little more than uncomfortable. It is a little painful to feel my skin stretch to tightly, and sometimes i feel like her boney butt and little feet have got to be bruising me with the discomfort she causes.

Updates in pregnancy land:

my belly button is starting to pop out just a little bit (can't see in the picture). 

I haven't shaved my legs in 3 weeks.

She is 20 inches long and 5 1/2lbs. 

We still don't have a name for her. 

Even my maternity clothes are starting to get too small.

Thoughts of being able to drink beer or go skiing in less than 2 months makes me giddy. But not as giddy as the thought of cuddling my baby girl at last...

Little Baby: 34 Weeks

  I feel so fortunate when the big snow storms arrive during the weekend. It is wonderful to wake to snow and be able to just sit home and enjoy it instead of bustling off to work. This was another snowy weekend this winter and I took full advantage of it by making a lot of Christmas goodness in my kitchen while singing along to Christmas music. 

Landon preparing his powder skis last night for this morning's 12 inches of powder.

Like I mentioned previously, I'm not making much for Christmas - especially not with my sewing maching. Every year, though, I like to put together something in my kitchen in bulk that I can give to multiple people, like colleagues or friends from church, or whomever we would want to give a gift.

.

Burlap pillow covers I made for this winter

Also this week I felt like I was truly in the thick of this pregnancy.

Little Baby is 34 Weeks:

By now our baby is 5lbs and 19 inches - pretty big baby, eh?

5rrr

This week the "nesting" instinct not only arrived in force, but totally clobbered me. We were finally able to put a dresser in the baby's room which was the last thing I needed in order to begin putting the nursery together.  We don't have a closet in there so everything has just been sitting in piles on the ground waiting for this dresser. Sorting out all of the baby's clothes and washing it all and organizing it in the dresser took several hours and a lot of it was in the middle of the night. Wednesday morning, I woke at 3:30am and couldn't think of anything else except for our little girl's room so I just gave up on sleeping and spent that entire night/morning doing her laundry and sorting through her drawers. I was the first person in Target that morning to buy a few things I realized I still needed after I took an inventory of everything we have. 

A few days this week I have awoke in the morning to find Landon on the couch. My snoring is getting worse, apparently , which is absolutely a pregnancy side-affect!

I also have experienced my first sciatic nerve pain, which was honestly awful. It was so piercing and painful, I could hardly walk by the end of my work day. It took 3 or 4 days to go away completely. 

My maternity clothes are starting to feel too tight and uncomfortable. I've never been one to lounge around in pj's, but every day when I get home I put on my elastic pants and baggy sweatshirt immediately. 

I have had several people this week tell me that it looks like the baby is coming "any day now". These kind of comments don't actually bother me.  I certainly feel huge. I hate to inform them that I still have a month and a half. erg!

This baby FEELS huge. I actually asked my doctor of she was sideways because I can often feel her feet on my ribs or my hips. And my doctor thought that I was funny. In fact, our little girl has been head-down for a long time and still is, she is just running out of room in there and sometimes likes to kick her legs out in uncomfortable positions. 

I officially cannot tie my shoes any more. Luckily I have several velcro or slip-on shoes in my winter wardrobe. And the sweetest husband ever.

Next weekend we will go to our birthing classes, of which I am a little nervous about and a little excited about. I really have no clue about childbirth and neither does my husband (beyond what you can learn on the internet), so I am hoping it will help us feel more prepared

I am looking forwar to Christmas. And Doons and I finished our Christmas shopping this week, and with new snow and Christmas crafting complete, I am prepared and stoked. I am excited to have a week's break from work and family here to visit.

Little Baby: 33 Weeks

 Welcome December!

This week we have begun Christmas preparations around our home.

Decking of halls with Christmas lights and the smell of evergreens are my favorite parts of this season (except for the snow, of course!) Our Noble Fir is beautiful! As several of our Christmas lights are at least 10 years old, we had to expire some of them this year. So our Christmas tree has doned LED lights. It is less traditional-looking but still beautiful. Doons and I are fortunate that we both brought a box of our childhood Christmas ornaments into our marriage, so it is really fun and special to sit here and look at our ornaments, some just as old as we are! 

With December now here, I am reminded that our daughter will be born NEXT MONTH! amazing. 

At 33 weeks, she is 4.5lbs and is 19 inches. 

Her movements are less extreme but she squirms for longer durations these days. I am finding that her movement has become much less of an annoyance and is now a comfort to me, to know that she is doing well.

Sleep has been our biggest struggle around here. I have been slightly under the weather, which makes it hard for me to breathe at night. This pulls me out of sleep often. Landon has spent several nights on the couch as my snoring and constant movement make it nearly impossible for him to sleep. Today we skipped church, both of us conceding to more sleep. 

The aches of pregnancy are getting more uncomfortable. This week I experienced my first braxton-hicks contraction, which was more of a surprise than anything. My back aches often, and I find myself using a heat pad while I'm at work and when I lay down for bed. Heartburn is becoming a regular occurance, and I can't believe that some people have to put up with it all of the time. I can tell that my joints have loosened up a bit, especially my hips. By 4pm most days, I feel like our little girl is being pulled forward and down by gravity which can sometimes be a little painful - i like it when she's crammed in close and snug.

As I mentioned last week, I still have some sewing planned. With the preparations that I am undertaking for this baby, I don't have as much motivation or time to do home-made gifts this Christmas. Usually I really enjoy making things for family and friends but this year I will just surrender to the other things (mostly this baby!) going on in my life... Maybe next year (would I really have more time with an 11 month old?).

The husband and I are trying to make every day an enjoyable time together. This week we went out to dinner one night and to a movie another. Things we don't usually do too often, but we want to take advantage of these last few months (weeks!) when we are baby-free and can go out on the town without any cares beyond each other. Dooney and I have so much fun together and are blessed by such wonderful friends. This is a really wonderful season of our life. We are so grateful.

Little Baby: 32 Weeks

Wow. Is it really 32 weeks? These days I'm having a hard time keeping track, honestly.

Last weekend was spent in my hometown. We celebrated my mother's 50th birthday on Friday and on Saturday we had a multi-generational baby shower. My grandmother, mother, and I all invited friends and family. There were 25 women over all, and it was a beautiful celebration. It is really special to see good friends, and almost all of my grandmother's friends have known me my entire life, so it is great to celebrate this baby with them. 

mom-to-be with the hostesses

It was a beautiful and very special shower. My grandmother did a wonderful job making the most incredible food and my mother and sister decorated her home so sweet and planned a very fun craft. It was great.

By the way, i am still extremely surprised every time i see a picture of myself (like just now, looking at the picture above). I certainly feel pregnant, but i don't realize how huge i actually am until i see myself in pictures. I even still try to turn my body sideways to get through narrow spaces - ha! that's a joke! maybe i'll be used to being enormous by the time the baby arrives.

This week we celebrated Thanksgiving with dear friends. With 14 adults, a baby, and 5 dogs, it was a Thanksgiving to remember! This was our first Thanksgiving with friends - we have always been with family or just the 2 of us. Landon began the day skiing, which is the best way to spend any holiday. We certainly have a lot to be thankful for this year. And I am just amazed at how our lives have changed and will change in such a short amount of time. God's blessings are so abundant!

Thanksgiving morning our Christmas tree arrived on our front porch. The last 3 years we have used a pre-pay Christmas tree service from a local familiy. You buy it in advance and they drop it off on your front porch between Thanksgiving and December. It is sitting in our living room smelling gorgeous, but we have yet to decorate it as we have been pretty busy around here.

Yesterday Dooney took Duvick into the desert for some rock climbing and I stayed home and did some crafting. With less than 2 months until our due date, I'm feeling the pressure to get everything ready for Little Baby (is that pressure or just a nesting instict? Either way, it makes me pretty productive!). Now that my baby showers are over, I sat down and surveyed what I still need and tried to see what I could make myself.

I made a seersucker crib sheet a few months ago and decided that I should just buy the rest because they cost more to make than to buy (takes 2 yards of fabric). But I haven't been able to find ANY flannel baby sheets in stock in Target or online. (imagine taking however many minutes it requires to finally soothe a baby to sleep and then place her on a cold cotton sheet. No way! This winter Baby requires flannel!) So I just bought a pair of flannel sheets that were on sale for $15 from Target, and was able to make 2 crib sheets out of that AND a changing table cover. I think I will be able to make another sheet from the remainder (but feel a little guilty giving Baby Girl 3 GREY crib sheets). I need at least 4 sheets since our baby's daycare requires 2 sheets there and i'm sure we will want more than 1 at home as well. Baby sheets are extremely easy to make with Dana's awesome tutorial.  

It's extremely satisfying to be making things for our baby. I really do sit there for hours and think about her as I sew. It's therapeutic for me and makes me feel like I am already being a good mom to my girl. Her nursery doesn't really have any colors or theme yet, although it does in my mind. I think of it as a grey/white/ room with a birdy theme. In reality it's just the room where we keep all of our baby junk so far. I know that grey and white isn't very exciting, but i really wanted a soothing space for our baby, with soft colors. We can go nuts creating a bedroom with tons of color for her once she has opinions about that sort of thing, but for now, I'm just envisioning a very peaceful place for her first year. 

We ordered a dresser that should arrive in the next couple of weeks. So hopefully by Christmas I'll have the nursery better situated with her things laundered and organized in boxes and drawers. I'm excited for that. 

Still on my list of things to make: cloth diapers, cloth wipes, nursing pads. These are each things that I already have in stock - I've received some as gifts and have made some of my own. Yet, I still require more. So those are on my crafting list. Maybe if I can get those done by Christmas I can start to create really FUN things for our little girl, like leggings and hair bows. Maybe by then we'll have a name picked out for her...

Little Baby: 30 weeks

This last week has been an exciting one. Hitting 30 weeks feels like a milestone in itself 10 weeks left: that’s about 2 months. Amazing.

Our back yard on Sunday morning.

We had a major snowstorm here in the Valley that lasted about 48 hours. Friday morning we started to receive flurries and it didn’t stop until Sunday afternoon. I LOVE snowy days, especially when they fall on the weekend! The excitement I always had as a little kid returns each snow storm. I always wonder about the people that rebuke the snow - if maybe their childhoods deprived them of the beautiful snowy memories that mine is so rich with.

Landon was able to ski in 52” of fresh snow Sunday morning. We went into the woods with some friends on Saturday and I was able to snowshoe. It was wonderful to hear and smell the snow as we hiked among the trees. My ski pants didn’t fit too well, but I was still able to get my jacket zipped. This is becoming a problem for me lately: getting my cold weather jackets to fit over my belly. A lot of the time, I can just button the top button and let my belly hang out. I see this becoming an increasingly “bigger” challenge as my pregnancy progresses.

Baby is 3lbs. I can’t believe she still has so much growing to do! I’m not sure where she is going to find the space. She and I are maxed out in this body, I feel like.

Sunday I was able to celebrate Little Baby with friends at a beautiful baby shower. The shower was so fun and so sweet and my friends really “feathered our nest” with lovely gifts and well wishes.  

Baby shower hostesses: Lindsay and Shelley

Landon and I have received so much support during this season of our life and we are so grateful. If we would have had this baby 2 or even 4 years ago, we would have been mostly alone and isolated. In the last year, God has really given us a great community of loving support, which is such a blessing during this baby season so far away from family.

The next two months, I’m sure will fly by. With holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas to plan for and enjoy, they always seem to make time move faster. Our Little Girl will be here soon!

30 weeks!

Pregnancy news:

This third trimester has brought with it de-ja-vu from the first trimester: I am much more tired, and have food cravings again (still salami and chocolate shakes)

I am starting to notice a bit of a schedule of movement from Baby Girl. She goes a little crazy every night around 8 pm, so I like to sit still and enjoy her movements in the evening since I am pretty busy during the rest of the day. She moves a lot when I sing – like Sunday mornings at church. I love that I can feel her frolicking during my own times of worshipping the Lord. It reminds me of when John rejoiced from within Elizabeth’s belly when she saw Mary with child. I think my baby can feel the presence of the holy. Or at least, I like to think of it that way. As her creator is always lovingly working in her, I enjoy that she can join me in my times of worshipping him.

 

Little Baby: 29 Weeks

A lot of same 'ol, same 'ol happening around here.

Momma and Baby are doing very well. Since she was 14 weeks and was able to hear, I starting singing a particular song to her and still try to sing or hum it to her every day. She usually gets pretty squirmy when I start singing it these days. Although my hope is that it will soothe her when she needs to be soothed once she is born.

The girls that i work with had a baby party for me last weekend. We just sat around and had a good time with great food, drinks, and girl-time. I was amazed at the support I received from my colleagues - I am so blessed! They all pitched in and got us our travel system, so we have a car seat! I am slowly checking off a list of baby MUST-have's and that was on the top!

We are still dealing with Duvick's porcupine problems which is a little stressful. We keep expecting that he will be healed and perfect and then another quill pops up somewhere causing massive swelling and discomfort for him. Sad, sad.

My biggest discomfort pregnancy-wise is my sleep deprivation. I have had to get up multiple times each night to pee since the beginning of my pregnancy, but now I have a lot of tossing and turning and repositioning and "oh shit, i'm lying on my back!" moments on top of the frequent trips to the bathroom. I wake each day with back pain from the night - i'm not sure how to fix this.

The weather here remains gorgeous, which is wonderful. We should have a snowstorm Friday this week, which we are really looking forward to.

This morning as i was driving to work I was thinking about the election and how this one carries more weight to me than others have in the past. The results of this election not only effect me, but they effect the world that i am bringing my daughter into. That is a scary thought.

Little Baby: 28 weeks

Baby is 2 ½ lbs and has eyelashes.

Ginger has been a love of mine in this pregnancy: ginger candies, ginger drinks, etc… are sooooo good. Makes me want to name her Ginger. How cruel would that be? If she turns out to be a red-headed, freckley kid like I was, she’ll be called “Ginger” anyway…

We are still thinking of names for this baby girl.

She is moving a lot more these days. I think she had the hiccups for the first time (or, rather, the first time I’ve noticed). I’m starting to have trouble sleeping some times, but I think Landon has had the worst of it as my snoring keeps him awake more than my pregnancy aches keep me. 

Sitting at my desk for 8-9 hours/day is starting to become more difficult. My back aches by the 6^th hour. So I’m trying to get out and walk around the aviary 15 minutes each day and use a heat pack and a stool when I am uncomfortable. Otherwise, I feel wonderful and excited. Now each week that passes really DOES feel like a week closer to when we get to meet our daughter – earlier in the pregnancy,  the expanse of time was so vast that the end wasn’t really in sight.

I am very grateful to have loving friends and family to throw me baby showers, so I am looking forward to some more of those soon.

As far as projects go: The house is still in transition so not much progress on the nursery yet. I sewed my first diaper last weekend, which took me a long time but was a success. Only 10-or-so more to go.

Last weekend landon and Duvick went skiing and Duvick ran into a porcupine. It’s was an incredibly traumatic experience for him (and for Landon too, I think). We’ve been monitoring him closely (landon’s been able to be home with him this week) and we have found and pulled 6 or so more quills out of him in the last week. He is sometimes almost his normal self and sometimes a very hurting and tired puppy. It makes us sad to see our strong and beautiful dog gimp around the house and lack enthusiasm for the things he usually loves. We are hoping he will get better soon.