Pics from the Dr. Seuss baby shower

Well I'm up at two in the morning, so why not catch up on posting pictures? This is why I hate taking naps, but everyone tells you to sleep when you can, so I did. Now I probably won't go back to sleep until 4 or 5 though, grr! Anyhoo, I realized I haven't posted the few pictures I have from the Dr. Seuss shower my sister and mom put together. Sorry for the terrible quality, they're iphone pictures since I had left my good camera at home.

The dining room had a bunch of quotes from his books hanging from the ceiling.

Mom, Shan, Cousin Amanda, and Shan's friend Amanda all made different foods that were Dr. Seuss-themed. So neat!

Mom crocheted little "Cat in the Hat" hats filled with jelly beans as favors. 

aka- Mississippi caviar, mmmmm!

Shanna's friend's Amanda's super secret punch. Oh good night I love punch!

Cousin Amanda's addictive chicken salad sandwiches. The entire family is ravenous for these!

Still waiting...

Wednesday was our latest OB appointment and good news: I'm 3 cm and mostly effaced! Which means I'm close right? Welllll, I've heard of women walking around at 3 cm for weeks, so who knows? Friday night/Saturday morning I thought was going to be it. Woke up with some really painful contractions (painful enough that I cussed rather loudly without realizing how loud I was and scared Ben half to death), tried to time them, but of course they weren't regular. So I got up, drank a bunch of water, walked around and began to be bored. Thank goodness the Olympics are always on for those of us who can't sleep!

After talking with my mom and finding out all three of her children were late entering the world, I'm getting a little nervous. I had known I was two weeks late, but both of my sisters were also a week late, so I'm sure this is karma just getting me back for making her suffer in the summer too.

I found this article on the blog AND MARY I just read and makes me feel so much better about how I'm feeling right now: "The Last Days of Pregnancy: A Place of In-Between". How true it is! For the past couple of months I've felt ready to get this motherhood gig started, but in the last week or two I've begun getting nervous again. I try to think of the false labor pains as progression, but I either feel annoyed nothing is happening or nervous that I'm about to go into labor and I don't feel ready. I know I'm ready, so it must be these damn hormones again...grr!

Behold...

My seriously swollen feet! One of the doctors laughed when I referred to them as plump franks. Oy!

Reasons to be glad you're having a boy:

I never have to worry that companies are making stuff like what's in this article for him.

This I actually don't mind, but trust me it gets worse!

I can see why pregnant women feel less smart...

...because once you start to show, nearly every conversation you have starts (or is only) the same five questions.

-When are you due?
-Is this your first?
-Boy or girl?
-Do you have a name yet?
-Are you miserable yet? (or some variation of "Hot enough for you?")

Friday was my last day of work before I'm on maternity leave, and I have to say I'm relieved. Partly because my feet have swollen to dachshund-like proportions once my shift is over and partly because I'm tired of having this conversation with every patient. With the exception of one, we had a woman in who was close to my age and when I went to help her pick out glasses we got to talking. Turns out her due date is the day before mine. It was exciting getting to commiserate with a fellow 37-weeker, especially our poor husbands that just look at us worriedly and ask what's going on whenever we have contractions. Like I have any idea, I'm just as new to this as you are, bud!

Pregnancy bitching moment: I'm all for the bun baking as much as he needs to in the oven, but I've hit that wall: I no longer want to be pregnant. I'm sick of the swelling, nausea, allergies, how painful it is to roll over in bed, sleeplessness and sleepiness, and looking with envy at the normal clothes section of Target. I swear their clothes got much cuter this summer!

Okay, now that I'm done being negative, something positive... our adult gifts! Ben's dad and brother our gifting us a porch swing and some pavers to create a covered patio kind of area. And upon hearing that, Ben's mother and step-dad decided to gift us painting our shed/carport, which right now is close to halfway being done. I'll post a picture in a bit, hm, wish I had taken a before....darn, I never remember to do that!

Well, off to try and get a few more Zzz's before I have to get up. (I've been up since 4 today...blech)

Add this to things to not watch while pregnant...

I've been told before to not watch Alien while pregnant if you've never seen it before, because you are guaranteed to have nightmares. Well, I've had The Business of Being Born on our Netflix queue for a while now and thought, what an appropriate time to watch a birthing documentary! Not exactly. Well, not exactly if you are like me and are a worrywart or you aren't really sure what you're doing during the birth. I've already got my mind set on the epidural, so the talk about doing it natural and at home fell on deaf ears. But I could see how watching this would make people think they were hurting they're baby by choosing my path, which I think is a little unfair. Some of the information in it is really interesting (and terrifying), like the history of hospital births circa 1950s...yikes! But some of the information is just opinions of people, and there's no sources! From a documentarian's point of view, it's kind of weak. BUT, it did get me used to seeing births. There are a couple in the film, and I didn't look away once and I'm rather proud of that. Maybe my fear is finally subsiding. Or maybe I'm fed up with being pregnant and ready for this to be over?

Went to the weekly doctor appointment yesterday and met another of the doctors, this one also seemed painfully shy but was very nice. Unfortunately we didn't make that much progress this past week. She said I'm 1cm dilated externally, but nothing internally, so not technically dilated at all. Which kinda confused me, but maybe a I have a long cervix to go with it being crazy high as well?

Ah well, as excited as I am to meet him, I'm willing to wait until he's fully baked. I just worry about him being late and my doctor wanting to induce. That's the only thing that seems kinda sketchy to me. 

Birth plan?

We don't need no stinkin' birth plan!

Dropping trou visit...

Oy, I haven't updated in a while! But then again when it hits 107 degrees, life just kind of slows to a crawl. Reminds me of the old joke about that's where our Southern drawls come from: it's too hot to speak quickly!

Since I've been stuck in our air conditioned house the past couple of weeks I've been working on getting the nursery finished. And I swear if I ever see another plastic tie-thingy (those things that hold tags onto clothes) it will be too soon. Why in the hell does a hooded towel need 12 of them?! 12! 

Today was the beginning of our weekly OB visits and that means getting my cervix checked weekly...yay? Really it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be since the doc and I got to talking about the show Pregnant in Heels. Which, by the way, if you haven't seen is pretty darn funny. And has just enough drama to make me feel better about Ben and I's relationship and parenting ideas. Today's favorite quotes from our OB were:

"Yeah, swelling sucks!"

"This is another reason why we should be glad men don't have babies." (talking about the strep B swab)

"No woman has to be a martyr." (talking about when to get an epidural)

I think I'm in love with our OB, hospital, and L&D staff. There's just enough new-age talk that they're not going to judge you if you want to try something different (except they aren't set up to do water births yet), but dammit if you want to go in dilated at 1cm and get an epidural they won't turn you away. It fits right in with our philosophies. Ben and I both are open to new things and are very "wait and see" with this pregnancy, but if something has to be done, then let's do it and not cry about "it's not what we had imagined".   And if I need someone to tell me to stop whimping out, I think these chicks are willing to tell me that. 

Ugh, cramping again! Think I'll go lie down a bit and catch up some more on Mad Men.