20 Weeks

Well folks, this pregnancy is more than halfway over! Its more fun now that I don't feel sick all the time. (Except that Noah objected strongly to getting up at 4am on Black Friday to go shopping. I nearly barfed. Or perhaps it was because I ate leftover chicken 'n dumplings after they sat through the 2 hour ride home from Wichita Falls, unrefrigerated. Who knows?) But hey, we got a good deal on a great new laptop at Best Buy. Merry Christmas to me! (Did you know there are crazies who spend the night in tents at Best Buy the night before Black Friday, even when it's rainy and cold??)

I have the "baby bump" now, even though its still small. I like it at this point. And Noah is quite the kicker. I needed to go to the bathroom the other day and it seems my bladder was cramping his style, so he started kicking at it. I decided I would go ahead and take care of that little bother for him. :) And Mimi and Papa sent me home with enough diapers to stockpile to cover his little behind for a couple of months!...maybe!

Not much else to report. We had an enjoyable Thanksgiving and got most of our Christmas shopping done. Now I just have to finish a little contract home study I'm doing so I can get to decorating!

Give Thanks!

Inspired by my friend Tina, here are some of the things I am most thankful for this Thanksgiving:

• Baby Noah. I have had a lot of contact with people who struggle with infertility, which is such a devastating loss. For some reason, that was always in the back of my mind and I was a little bit shocked about how effortlessly we were given this little guy.
• My husband. Amazingly, the man who spends hours mercilessly tormenting me and provoking aggravation also inspires such feelings of adoration and affection in me. We spend the majority of our free time together and never tire of one another. Well, at least from my perspective. :)
• My job. I love it when God lays things out clearly and reveals his plan. This was just perfect timing with Noah coming and it's such a great job.
• Our house. Today is the first anniversary of closing on our little place.
• Our church. God really knew what he was doing when he moved us to our area.
• Our home group from church. What a great bunch of folks. It's good to have some friends from church finally.
• Our great families that take such good care of us.
• Blogging.
• God of course. Just because. :)

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!

Highlights of the Past Week

1. Today I baby-sat the world famous Chamblee twins! Jake and Mallory are just too cute. And I had good luck--they did not wake up at the same time demanding to be fed. I got to feed them one at a time and felt like such a chicken :) Now that they are 3 months old, they are smiling, laughing, and love to be talked to! Check out their blog sometime.

2. Also today, I made dinner and we took it to a home group friend who had a baby recently--and got to meet little Braden!

3. I read the entire first Twilight book. Nevermind the husband kicking and whining the whole way. :) I just had to know what the hype was all about. Loved it. That Edward Cullen character is something else, ladies. Scarcely a dull moment. And Jeremy is taking me to see the movie soon...I can't wait!!

4. Thursday I had my doctor's appointment and sono, which was awesome! See previous blog.

5. On Wednesday, I learned that I have to have a cavity fixed soon because of an old filling that was not well done. That's more of a lowlight of the week.

6. Last Saturday, while we did our weekly shopping at our uber-cool and green Wal-Mart, I tried Dunkin Donuts coffee (decaf!) for the first time and I may like it better than Starbucks! Caramel latte was YUMMMMMY! I'll give it another taste test in the morning. ;)

I am really excited about this next week. I only have to work Monday and then I am off for Thanksgiving break. I love everything about the holiday season: the stupid Macy's Parade, the insanity of going shopping at 5am on Black Friday (armed with Starbucks), the eating, the decorating. We are headed to Wichita Falls to his parents on Wednesday evening and will participate in the "Chicken-n-Dumplings on the night before Thanksgiving" tradition. Noah can hardly wait!

And the Wiener Is...

...still there! We definitely have a little Noah on board. We have several pictures but they aren't scanned very well, so maybe I will post them later, when we get better copies. No more sonograms unless medically necessary though. Bummer. I'm going to check into the cost of the 4D sonogram.

Noah was very cute though...and very active! He was dancing around and even yawned for us. People have tried to tell me that I'm just having gas and not really feeling him move, but I knew better. Apparently his little one-inch feet are dead center and the kid packs a punch already! He is 5.5 inches, crown to rump, and probably 8 to 9 inches total, so it's amazing that no one really notices that I am pregnant unless they already know.

Last night I dreamed about seeing Jeremy holding the baby and he had big, blue eyes and was beautiful. However, we were calling him "Cade" and I'm not sure why. I'm also not sure why we were in a parking lot the day after he was born and I was seeing him for first time. As previously mentioned, the dreaming gets a little weird with pregnancy. Just like everything else!

An update on our romantic getaway: we found some cheap Southwest tickets to New York for the first weekend in December and got all excited until we realized that Jeremy has too much going on with work at that time. We'll try to save up and go next year. Leave the kid with grandparents...maybe. :) I have dreamed of going to NYC during the holiday season for years. I was already envisioning myself at the Rockefeller Christmas tree, sipping frozen hot chocolate at Serendipity, and posing for pics with Matt, Meredith, Al, and Anne. Oh well. I may look into a bed and breakfast in Austin or something.

I still have spats of nausea, usually early morning and nighttime. But it's definitely improved! Tomorrow I will be babysitting my cousin's twins for a bit. They are just precious. God definitely knew which Erwin girl could handle two babies at once! Allison is super mom. :)

Have a great weekend!

18 Weeks

I am happy to report that at EIGHTEEN weeks, my nausea is finally going away...I'm pretty sure anyway ;) And I think that I have been feeling some movement in there, especially when I squash the little guy by laying on my stomach or wearing constricting pants. He doesn't seem to appreciate being squished. :) I am averaging one pair of jeans per week that have to be retired. Pretty soon I will only have prego pants left to choose from! Another interesting aspect of pregnancy: lots of bizarre dreams. Although I read that pregnancy does not increase dreaming, rather it just wakes you up more frequently during the night, therefore you remember more of the dreams. I can attest to the frequent waking up part.

This Thursday we have the big sonogram coming up and I am pretty excited to see him again. And to confirm that the equipment is definitely there!

I have a confession to make. Since starting this process, I have become a total blog addict. I am disappointed when I come home and someone hasn't written a new blog or left me a new comment to read. This is kind of sad. I just love spying on the lives of those I know...whether I know them well or not! And I had to laugh when my cousin recently blogged about being recognized in a restaurant by a stranger who "stalks" her blog. There are little blog voyeurs everywhere!

We Need a Getaway!

Jeremy and I need one last little romantic getaway before our lives are completely taken over by Baby Barclay!! We need somewhere within driving distance that isn't too expensive. I really wanted to go to New York City during the holidays (I've never been) but it looks like that's out. So give us some ideas if you have any!

Election Day!

Well, this isn't exactly pregnancy-related, although I guess the outcome of today's election will impact my little one in some small ways.

I am one of the least political people you will find. Clearly, I did not pay attention and/or have forgotten 99% of what I learned back in those good ol' Government and Economics classes. I regret that because there is so much I don't understand. I also despise "fakeness" and people not being themselves or not representing their values just to impress others. I digress...

But how can you not find this year's election just a little exciting. One way or the other we are really making significant history here, something I feel like our generation hasn't seen a lot of. (We just haven't competed with WWII, JFK, MLK Jr, etc.)

The high school that I work at held a mock election among staff and students yesterday. With the students, Obama had a 30% lead. With the teachers, McCain had a 9% lead. Isn't that funny? I can remember participating in some kind of nationwide election in 7th grade where Clinton had a landslide victory among the students. The kids will always vote for whoever is younger, better looking, and more popular. :) There were kids cheering for the opposing candidates in the hallways today and I was tempted to ask if they knew anything about what the candidates actually stand for, or if the kids were rooting for them based on less important things.

I always feel a little frustrated by voting. There is just no way I can vote that fully encompasses my values. I am "conservative" (Which, by the way, is a funny way for society to label my Christian values. Come on, Jesus was the biggest radical of all time :) But I also value equality, standing up for the oppressed, helping those in need, and all those good Democratic things. However, I can't stomach abortion (no pun intended), especially these days, and I can't go for gay marriage. Sorry, God called the holy union between a man and a woman marriage. They need to come up with another term for their relationships. And we can't really afford to hand out much more of our income to Uncle Sam. Not with the state of things.

So where does that leave me? I go with my gut I suppose. I'd probably vote Independent but what does that count for? Actually, unless you live in a swing state, your vote doesn't matter that much anyway right?

And then there are my relatives who send out political emails. You know who you are. I have never seen so much fear raised by a single politician. I think that most likely Obama will win tonight but I'm not going to be anxious about it, even though I don't particularly trust the guy. God has it all planned out. He is not surprised or dismayed by anything. God will do what he will do, and he doesn't need our help. In our homegroup, we read over an old sermon of our pastor's last weekend. It was about Sodom and Gomorrah (sp?) and how the real problem wasn't sexual deviance. Shocker. That was only a symptom of the condition of the hearts of those people. Keeping abortion and gay marriage illegal doesn't change the heart of the nation.

Well, enough of my ramblings. Either way, it was about time for some excitement in this country...and hopefully our next President will be an agent of change in making some positive outcomes.

16 Weeks and Happy Halloween!

Ya gotta love it! We had a little get-together at our house on Halloween night with some friends and had a great time. Here is the spread that Kelly helped me prepare:



Crazy weekend! After Halloween, we celebrated my mom, dad, and brother's birthday on Saturday evening at our house with some chicken chili and cake. Then today we are taking the snacks to our homegroup from church. I have never cooked so much in one weekend.

Here is my 16 week pic:



Jeremy was thrilled because he thought for sure people could see a little belly this week. :) Lots to report. Had my 3rd OB visit this week. It was kind of a bummer though. She just listened to the heartbeat, asked a few questions, and I was outta there. The last two visits I left the office glowing after seeing my baby. :) Strangely enough, I walked out of the office and found Keeli Williamson (not sure of her married name) sitting there, more prego than me. She lives close by and sees one of the other docs in the practice.

There are so many new experiences to be had when you are pregnant! I had the privilege of having my nonexistent belly patted down by a couple of virtual strangers (though they know Jeremy) a couple of weeks back. When my aunt did this recently, I laughed because really all that's sticking out at this point is the fat and intestines that are being pushed up by my expanding uterus. :) Also, since I think my blog viewship is basically female, I will add that I have more boobs than I know what to do with these days. I have gone in the last several weeks from a comfy B to a big mama D!! Is this really going to continue at this rate for the next 24 weeks?! If so, they won't even be able to find my belly when it comes time to deliver this child. And the "roadmap of pregnancy" finally appeared this week. Thought I might get out of that one. OK, OK, no more about the boobs, I promise. I just can't get over them...no pun intended...heehee. And then I purchased my first maternity clothes this week, a fabulous red wool coat and a pair of jeans, to have ready and waiting. I have had to retire some of my more snug-fitting things now. And who knew all the "normal" body functions that are disturbed by pregnancy? I had to visit the eye doc this week after seeing "sparks" flying around. This is apparently caused by changes in blood pressure or iron. And I did not know that your nose could be made so stuffy/runny by pregnancy. Although I'm not convinced that allergies aren't playing into that one. Lastly, the nausea report. My doc kept telling me that it could last as long as 16 weeks. Well, here I am. This week she told me it might take me an extra week longer. Gee. But I am feeling better at least!

Whew, that was a long one! My next appointment and sono is November 20, when we will hopefully confirm that we have a little Noah on the way. Have a great week everyone!