baby girl update

i am 30 weeks pregnant today, and it hit me that i never did announce our baby girl's name on here!  this little kicking machine is sweet baby


hallie!

we can't wait to meet her in 10 weeks.  we are still deciding on a middle name, but at this point, i'm just glad we have a first name for her!  we were able to have another sneak peek at her this morning, and wow, does she have some cheeks!


according to the sonogram tech, hallie also has a ton of hair. apparently, it is uncommon to see a baby's hair this early on the sonogram, but she could see hallie's hair very easily at several different angles. she also pointed out that hallie was practicing breathing, and we also saw her sucking her thumb (not surprised at all by that one!). the tech also told us that i have a lot of fluid... i didn't remember this before, but after reading old pregnancy posts, my body apparently did the same thing with amelia.

and as she was squirming about, contorting her little body in all kinds of positions, something popped on the screen that my kids would've picked out immediately...

a hidden mickey!


can you see it?? it's her belly and perhaps her elbow and foot or something... not exactly sure. but i had to giggle when i saw it... and the kids cracked up at seeing the hidden mickey inside mommy's belly.

speaking of mommy's belly... here's the latest picture of me and hallie, taken yesterday.


yes i have 10 more weeks to go... or let's just say 2 months, shall we??? i decided rounding it out to "2 months" sounds a whole lot sooner. :) i must admit that i cringe when people ask me how much longer i have to go... i think they expect me to say "2 weeks", judging by my big ole' belly, so when i say "2 months"... i get all kinds of shocked expressions in response. now i should just respond by telling them it's all my amniotic fluid. :)

so as my belly has grown, my lap has disappeared. this has not discouraged amelia from trying to snuggle with me, though.... she is by far my most snuggliest child, and she never gives up a chance to sit with me. well... over the last several weeks, i've tried to explain to her that i just don't have a lap anymore! yesterday during church, she was sitting next to me and then climbed up in my lap (really, onto my knee). she tried to get comfortable, but it just wasn't happening. she looked at me and whispered, "you don't got no wap!" i think she finally understood.

something that is new this time around is pretty persistent back pain. i've experienced back pain in my previous pregnancies for sure... but with hallie, i can't sit down on any comfy chair or couch without the top left side of my back burning. if i'm standing for too long, the same spot hurts too... and i usually wake up a few times a night with the same back pain, no matter how i position myself to sleep. the other night, i woke up screaming, and i really scared brian! i don't expect to go through pregnancy without aches and pains... it just comes with the territory of a precious child growing inside you. i am thankful that i am not fighting early contractions or on bed rest because of placenta previa or something serious. while the back pain is annoying, and i would love to just get a good night's sleep, i remember the admonition in 1 thessalonians... "give thanks in all circumstances"... and OH, how much do we have to be thankful for!!

we are thankful that everything looked fine on our baby girl today. it never ceases to amaze me how intricate and detailed everything already is on this child, being knitted so fearfully and wonderfully inside me. to see her little heart beating, to see her legs kicking, and to see somersault after somersault on the screen as i feel her poke me all over... it causes me to just stop and to praise my Father in Heaven. He is so gracious and merciful to us! He showers us with loving-kindness that we do not deserve. when i consider all God has done for me and the ways He continually blesses me, my back pain just seems insignificant.

the next two months are busy ones for us, so i'm praying they fly by quickly. before we know it, hallie will be here and i'll have my "wap" back! and hopefully by then, she'll have a middle name!

i have a sweet tooth...

and apparently, that carries over to the gender of my babies....
because it's MORE sugar and spice around here! yep, we are having a

girl!

here's a little peek at her sweet little face... she had her hand up by her mouth just a ready to suck that thumb!
 
we are so excited, and we will spend the next few weeks pouring over baby girl names!

december is flying by!

wow! a week till christmas! i thought i should pop in and say hi before the festivities really get going. what am i talking about?! the festivities have been happening all month long... i just haven't had a spare moment to share them. we've enjoyed our usual christmas traditions around here-- the jesse tree, the christmas cookie making... and this year, we've added some new ones. like mommy being sick the first week of december, which has really made it feel like christmas is approaching at a break-neck speed! (and you betcha i'm praying that sickness is not in the running for a christmas tradition!!)

it's been fun to decorate the new house for christmas, and we discovered how much easier it is to trim a tree when it is not in the corner of a tiny living room next to a big ole' couch! we have a beautiful picture window in our dining room that faces the street, so we also bought a little table-top tree and filled it with spazzy-blinking-colored lights. :) that will have to make up for the fact that we have not yet gotten around to putting up lights outside. maybe next year.

i am so excited that we are hosting christmas dinner at our house this year! we'll see just how many people will fit in my dining room! i'm still contemplating (chocolate) dessert ideas (thank you pinterest!), so if you have any suggestions, i am all ears.

thanks to the cedarmont christmas carols dvd (so sweet, by the way), amelia is loving singing christmas carols. she belted out "three wise men" in the car today, getting most of the words right. her face just lights up anytime she can follow along with a song. it brings me such joy to see her enjoying singing!

in addition to the excitement this month regarding advent and the birth of baby Jesus, our family has been eagerly anticipating my sonogram appointment this upcoming monday morning! we will hopefully find out whether this precious baby is a boy or a girl in a couple of days. it's been neat to talk to the kids about our excitement for this baby and to compare/contrast it with mary's anticipation of Jesus' birth. we discussed how we wonder if our baby is going to be a boy or a girl, who he/she will look like, etc... and then we talked about how much more mary must have been in amazement and wonder over the fact that her baby would be the Savior of the world!

and that reminds me... my mom introduced me to a new children's christmas book this year: song of the starsby sally-lloyd jones. (she is the author of the Jesus storybook bible, one of my very very favorite books.) this book is such a precious message of God's creation anticipating the birth of Jesus. it is so poetic and so hard to describe. if you love Jesus, just buy this book. you won't be disappointed. even if you own 25 children's christmas books like i do, buy it. this one is different.

i pray your family is enjoying this Christmas season!

the icing on the cake

brian's birthday kind of got lost in the process of moving (among other things we've yet to find), so we had a little belated celebration last week. anybody who knows brian knows that he is not a cake guy... unless it's a bonafide american cookie company cake. he's had the exact. same. cake. every single year. so why bother to even look at the cake? that's obviously what everyone was thinking this year. here's a shot of our birthday crowd singing to the birthday boy. you can see brian's dad is about to flip out the lights.... but wait! brian's grandmother seated at the table actually read the cake!


when the birthday song ended, i asked, "has anybody even read the cake?" natalie was a fast reader. :) everybody else was a little confused... and surprised!


ok... those are the smiles we were hoping to see!
 
so much for boring cookie cakes! :)
 
we are so excited to be expecting a precious addition to our family in may 2012! praise God from Whom all blessings flow.

For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.  I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.            -Psalm 139:13-16

amelia's big day

amelia is one week old already! this time last week, i was plum tired and so glad to be holding my baby girl. and a week later, well, i'd say things are about the same. :) ha! i thought her week-old birthday would be the perfect time to share amelia's birth story... another successful vbac, praise the Lord! this is a long post... in fact, i think it took me longer to write this post than to actually birth amelia!

here we are, ready to leave for the hospital at 5:50 AM last thursday morning. don't we look bright-eyed and bushy-tailed?


we arrived at the hospital right at 6 AM. i got settled in to my labor and delivery room, which was the same one that claire was born in a little over a year ago. my nurses, jenny and angie, were wonderful. jenny has been working in L&D for almost 30 years, and angie is a very experienced nurse who has been training in L&D for the last 2 months. i guess nobody would really call delivering a baby "fun", but these two ladies sure did make it a great experience. before things really started kickin', we chatted and laughed a lot (while brian enjoyed the burn notice marathon that had already begun at 6:30 AM). they really were great nurses. and they kept the ice chips comin'. :) you've gotta love hospital ice!

since i wasn't getting my water broken till around 9 am, i assumed they wouldn't start my pitocin till after that... well, i was wrong! i was 3 cm when i got there, and they started a low dose of pitocin around 7:00. by 8:45, i was still 3 cm, and i was ready for my epidural. that didn't take too long to kick in, but it was a little stronger on my left side than on my right. my blood pressure stayed pretty low through all of this, which is one sign that the epidural is working, but it was too low, and i had to stay lying down for most of the morning. when the dr. came in to break my water at 9:20, i was still at 3 cm, so they started really kicking up the pitocin. i was having good strong contractions, but they were incredibly far apart. by 10:50, i was at 5 cm, and an hour later, i was fully dilated! woohoo! so we went from thinking that we'd be waiting until well into the afternoon to "it's time to push!". woah!

hang on...let me back up to 7 cm, though. around 11:30, i started feeling the contractions. not just the pressure, but the pain. down there. at this point, there wasn't really much they could do about it, and i knew i wasn't feeling all the pain that my amazing natural-birth friends have felt, but it still wasn't pleasant! so i had a feeling that i was going to really feel this baby come out this time. and i did. with caroline, my epidural was too strong, and i couldn't even feel to push very effectively. well, i made up for it this time! that pain sure is motivation to get that baby out, i tell ya what! again, i'm sure i only felt a fraction of the "real pain" that comes with natural childbirth, but i felt plenty! i don't fully understand the whole epidural thing. i know it can have some patches where it doesn't take, but i couldn't feel the nurses checking me, i couldn't feel being stitched up later, but i could feel the whole birth. that's all in the same general vicinity if you know what i mean, so i just don't get it!

ok, so i started pushing at 11:55, and after several contractions, amelia's heart tones did not bounce back as quickly as they should have, so she needed to come out fast. my doctor ended up using the vacuum to get her head out, though he was really hoping that i could push her out without any help. i told him just to do what he had to do! as her head emerged, the dr. saw that amelia's cord was around her neck. he was unable to unwrap it, so he had to cut her cord while i waited to push her out. (i was thinking, "take your time!") at 12:16, only 25 minutes after i was fully dilated, amelia lynn was born! my whole labor and delivery was clocked at 3 hours and 20 minutes. not too shabby!

since it all happened so fast, we didn't have time to call any friends and family before hand to say, "she'll be here soon!" (after ethan's 30+ hour labor, our loved ones are hesitant to hang out at the hospital to wait for our babies to be born!) so after amelia was born, brian and i were both frantically calling everyone to let them know she was already here. i'm sure we looked like incredibly uncaring parents, both chatting on the phone while our baby girl was taking her first breaths in this world!


she was a little stunned after her birth, so amelia had to be under observation for about half an hour before i could hold her. i could see her from across the room, and i could already tell that she looked like her brother! amelia had great apgar scores and checked out fine, so around 12:45, they handed me my baby girl!



newborns make me smile for a million reasons, but one being that they can look like precious little dolls one minute and wrinkly grumpy old men the next moment. :) does anybody else know what i mean, or am i just a really bad mother?! the picture of me holding amelia above? grumpy old man... the pictures of the kids holding her for the first time below? grumpy old man. picture at the top of this post? precious little doll! and there will be plenty more precious doll-baby pictures to come, i am sure! i guess those sweet newborns' grumpy little looks are pretty legitimate after what they've just been through to arrive in this world! ha! ok, on with the pictures... i love this one!


ethan and caroline arrived at the hospital with my mom about an hour or so after amelia was born. they brought her "happy birthday" cards that they'd made earlier that day with gram. ethan was so excited to give his card to amelia. the kids hopped right up in the bed with me to say hello to their baby sister. they were so sweet to touch her gently and talk softly to her. they were very concerned that her feet were black (from getting her footprints printed), and caroline did not like the hospital bands on us or the lines taped to my hand (hep-lock?). ethan's first comment to me was, "why did they make you take off your shirt?" :) good to see you too, son!


aunt kristie and karina also showed up with chick-fil-a (thank you!!). so amelia momentarily was forgotten, and daddy's fries were the real showstopper. this picture makes me laugh... (insert finding nemo: "mine! mine! mine! mine!")


the kids were so excited to hold baby amelia for the first time. i actually didn't even know they had held her until after it happened because they were on the other side of the room, but at least kristie caught this precious moment on camera for me! caroline seems SO OLD AND BIG now, just as i thought she would. look at that proud big sister! :) and look at the sparkle in ethan's eyes. he is so happy that amelia is finally here!



ethan and caroline loved watching amelia get her first bath. my nurse was so wonderful to make sure that the kids could see what she was doing.


we had visitors for most of the rest of the afternoon and evening. it was such a blessing to share amelia's special day with so many people we love! i'm pretty sure i got a picture of everyone that came to the hospital, but this post is already extremely too long, so i won't make it too much longer. by the end of the night, we were exhausted. they moved us to a TINY room, and we tried to get some sleep that night. every little peep that amelia made was waking me up, so we eventually sent her to the nursery, and i was able to get three whole hours of sleep before they brought her to me to nurse again. but before we sent her to the nursery, i had a little fun taking some pictures. i raised my hospital bed as high as i possibly could, and with amelia beside me (and below me) in her little bassinet (i call it the rubbermaid container), i snapped away. here's a sweet shot i captured...


so that wraps up amelia's big day. the kids actually came back to the hospital later that evening for a little birthday party for her, so i will share those pictures next. we are having fun enjoying every little thing about amelia, and we're so thankful that she is here. i can't believe it's already been a week! check back soon for more fun stories and pictures.

amelia lynn has arrived!

Hi--This is Emily's mom just letting you know that Amelia Lynn is here! After a short labor, she arrived at 12:16 p.m. weighing 8 lb. 4 oz. and 20.5" long. We all think she looks just like Ethan when he was born! They are planning to come home on Friday afternoon, so check back later this weekend for "a few" pictures. Thanks for all your prayers for a safe delivery and a healthy baby.

walkin' out the door!

good morning! isn't it a BEAUTIFUL day at 5:35 AM!??! :) we will be leaving for the hospital in just a few minutes!!! i'm just slightly excited as you can tell. our wonderful pastor just called to say hi and to pray for us over the phone, so you really can't start out your birthing day any better than that, can you? brian and i talked last night about how it feels like so long ago that we were doing this with caroline (a whole 2 years! ha!). it feels so different this time around, but i really don't know why that is. maybe it's that there are two excited kiddos waiting to meet their sister... maybe it's that i've had the vbac experience behind me, so i know more what to expect... i don't know. but two things are the same. 1) i could not be any more excited and 2) our God is the same as He was when He perfectly orchestrated the births of ethan and caroline. that is something to hold on to today and to rejoice in!

two cute stories to tide you over till pictures of amelia start overtaking this blog....

-yesterday morning, i got home from my appointment and got the kids out of bed. i greeted them by saying, "guess where mommy's going tomorrow?!?" and ethan exclaimed, "to have amelia!!" in his excitement, he shouted, "i'm going to hug her like THIS!" and hugged his stuffed giraffe with all his might. caroline climbed out of bed and exclaimed, "NOT LIKE THAT!" and slapped herself in the head. oooooh dear, amelia better come out wearing a helmet and shoulder pads!! caroline continued this mantra all day, and i did my best to focus on how we will pat amelia instead of what we won't do!!

-as the kids and i were having a "picnic" on the living room floor yesterday afternoon, we talked about how today would be amelia's actual BIRTHday. this concept was kind of hard for ethan to understand, and he asked, "what kind of birthday is she gonna have?" wellllll....... a DOCTOR's party, i guess! haha. so we're hoping to have a little birthday party for amelia tonite when the kids come to visit.

alrighty, we've gotta get on the road! thanks for your prayers today. we will do our best to get the information out as soon as possible after she's born!

a green light for tomorrow!!!!!

so you can see there is good news to share today! my doctor has given the go ahead for my induction tomorrow morning at 6 am! woohoo! i am dilated to 2 cm, 50% effaced, and "very soft". amelia's sweet lil' head is lower this week, just like i was hoping! thank you Lord! i spent all of monday night and some of tuesday morning timing contractions, so i know my body is preparing to get this baby out... and if i don't go into labor today or tonite, then tomorrow it will be! thank you for your encouragement and prayers. please remember us in prayer tomorrow as we welcome our sweet amelia into our family.

we're gonna try to rig up some kind of internet access at the hospital tomorrow, so hopefully we can share pictures from amelia's BIRTHday pretty soon after she's born! my doctor doesn't plan on breaking my water and getting things rolling till 9 or so because he has a surgery to do earlier in the morning, and he wants to make sure he is completely available for me... we will be twiddling our thumbs and hanging out for awhile. all that to say that i don't expect her arrival before lunch since we'll have a late start. we will let you know as soon as we can! we can't wait!!!!

hello sister!

hi amelia, it's your big brother ethan here. mommy said she is done writing about waiting on you, so i figured that i should say hi before you get here. are you comin' or not? they have been talking about "when amelia is born" for what seems like forever, and mommy looks like she can't hold you in much longer. did you know she has all these lines on her belly? do you have crayons in there or something? and how can you be comfortable in there? mommy has your pretty crib all ready for you. believe me, there is much more room on the outside. mommy's belly gets in the way of so much right now! she can't tuck me in on my top bunk, and she gave bathtime duty over to daddy a long time ago (though i really think she likes the break from bathtime duty!). and every sunday when we stand up in church, her belly bonks me in the head over and over! can a kid not sing "holy, holy, holy" without a belly interrupting him!? anyway, please come soon. we pray for you everyday, and i have so many things i want to teach you. we have a ton of trains and balls that i know you will love. daddy & mommy keep telling me that at first, you will just sleep and cry, but that can't be all you'll do. surely you want to play with trains, too! well, caroline wants to say hi, too, so i'd better go. we can't wait to hold you and kiss you and make you smile! please come soon, amelia! i'm really getting tired of waiting! love, ethan

hey mee-yah. it's caroline. your sister. your BIG sister. will you please come out now? i really really want to see you. and i really really want mommy's lap back. i never wanted to snuggle when i was a baby, but now i am wanting to make up for lost time... and apparently this is really bad timing. because mommy has no lap. and her belly is poking out of her shirts. at home, i am always telling her to "close amelia" to pull her shirt down over her belly. i know that once you get here, mommy's shirts will fit and she will have room for me again! i have been having so much fun playing with all your baby toys in your room. mommy is trying to teach me how to push your baby swing gently, but i think you would really like to swing really high in it like i do in my swing in the backyard. i am all ready to sing "la la lu" to you just like the mommy in "lady and the tramp" sings to her baby. i practice singing this all day so that i will get it just right when you get here. i am such a big girl now, and i am ready to hand over the "baby girl" title to you. you get to wear all my clothes from when i was a baby, and i am also giving you my room. maybe one day we can share a room- we will have lots of fun as sisters, i know it! so what are you waiting for? come on out and see us soon! i love you, caroline

wait, we have a couple more pictures before we sneak back to bed... mommy likes to take these pictures of her holding her belly every now and then. we're not really sure why because we are frankly getting tired of the belly... but we'd better put this picture on here for mommy. we heard her say that she is at 39 and 1/2 weeks, whatever that means. maybe this will be the last belly picture mommy takes before she goes to the hospital.


ethan, don't forget this one of me! i've watched mommy take so many of these belly pictures that i knew just what to do!


ok, amelia, we can't wait to see you! mommy has been going around the house organizing and cleaning up all kinds of stuff, so maybe that means you are on your way soon!

the Calendar

well, on the way to my appointment this morning, i prayed for patience. and apparently, i need the practice in patience because that's what it's gonna take! patience! i am now dilated a whopping 1.5 cm and my cervix is soft. of course, i was hoping to be a little further along than that, but at least it is a little progress from last week. i also found out that my preferred doctor (the one that delivered ethan and caroline) is not on call again until my due date, next thursday, so that fact makes me in less of a hurry... of course, if i go into labor over the next several days, i will not care who is there to deliver amelia!! :) i gave my nurse a good laugh when i told her that, in addition to the cramping, i had two really strong contractions last night about 2 minutes apart. she looked at me and said, "emily, you can't birth a baby on two contractions!" but better than NO contractions, right?! :)

my doctor and i had a great discussion about how he really wanted me to be a little further along before he felt comfortable inducing me (with a vbac, they are leery of rushing your body to deliver before it has shown signs of being ready because they are concerned about uterine rupture). i told him that yes, i was ready to have this baby, but i of course wanted to do what was best for the baby and my body. because i'm "a vbac", the doctor must be on site at the hospital once i am in labor. therefore, he wanted to go ahead and schedule an induction for my due date because he will already be on call. he told me that he reserves the right to cancel that induction if he sees me next wednesday and i have not progressed. SO nothing is set in stone really. i could either go into labor this week, be induced next thursday, or have to wait a few more days past my due date. :) how's that for uncertainty!? the "scheduler" in me is going crazy, but i just keep telling myself that amelia's birthday is already circled on God's calendar!

in Your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them.
psalm 139:16

just waiting....

well, it's not too much longer until those sweet new ten little toes come into the world! i always get so excited when the expiration dates on things at grocery store finally match my due date! amelia is still moving and pushing with all her might, and i just keep telling her to move DOWN! move DOWN! hopefully she's listening! at my 38 week appointment last week, i was dilated 1 cm and "a little effaced". so nothing to jump up and down about, but at least things are starting to happen. last night during bible study, i began feeling a little crampy, and i continued to feel contraction-like-but-consistent-cramps throughout the night and most of today. nothing that i could time or keep track of, but i definitely felt them. and it is definitely a sign that my body is getting ready to have this baby! we got our bags ready "just in case", and i went to bed hoping that i would wake up in the middle of the night with serious contractions... but no. my next appointment is in the morning, so i am really hoping to get some good news about my progress. i keep telling myself not to get my hopes up, but after the last 24 hours, i can't help but to get excited!!

i've officially been in obsession mode for the last week or so. every little thing has made me wonder if i'm in labor. every time i get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, i think, "maybe my water will break!" every time she moves like crazy (like she's doing now), i think, "oh, she's packin her bags!" so this whole cramping thing has really pushed me over the edge. i'm ready. and i hope she is too. :) but i'm actually feeling really great. i am not as uncomfortable as i remember being at this point with both ethan and caroline (i think i told brian at the end of my pregnancy with caroline, "if i ever tell you i miss being pregnant, shoot me in the head!"). i am huge, don't get me wrong, but my back really isn't hurting much, and i still feel ok getting around at my almost usual pace. but i do look forward to enjoying amelia on the outside!! the little ticker at the top of my blog made me laugh so hard the other day. here's what it said....


if you can't read it, it says, "i'm at least 7 lbs, and if i decide to stay in here, my fingernails will need be clipped." um, if she "decides to stay in there", the last thing i'm really thinking about is her fingernails! ha!


the kids are getting so excited. we've been talking a lot about what amelia will do at first (sleep, cry) and little noises she'll make. we've practiced how they can tickle her toes and kiss her head softly, and they just giggle and giggle thinking about it. caroline just walks around the house saying, "mee-yah, mee-yah", and ethan has decided that he will teach her "how to say some things". he told me, "i think i will teach her how to say train." you're not surprised, are you?! :) tonite, caroline said, "mee-yah! i like her eyes" out of the blue. as usual, i repeated what i thought she said to make sure i got the translation right, and she said, "pretty eyes!" if you ask caroline, "where's amelia?", she'll say, "still in tummy!" so i'm not the only one ready to see this baby!


it hit me last week that i'm actually about to give birth again. the idea of having another baby around the house has been a wonderful thought, but i just hadn't really contemplated labor much... which is probably a good thing. of course, we're praying that all will go well and that i will be able to avoid a c-section again (2 out of 3 wouldn't be too bad, huh?). it's a blessing to know that God has already written amelia's birth story, and now i'm just ready to live it out!! as the girl at the publix meat counter said to me the other day, "haven't you been pregnant for like 30 years?!", i do feel like it's taken forever to get to this point. but in a week or so (or less!??!), this will all seem like a blink of an eye, and our sweet amelia lynn will have stolen our hearts. i wish i didn't think about it every second of every day. the days would probably go by faster that way, but i can't help myself. it's just as exciting as with the first, but this time, i have an idea of all the joys ahead. :) so come on, baby girl, there's lots of people waiting to love you!

6 weeks to go! and i don't mean till christmas!

amelia and i are in the home stretch, folks! if the next 6 weeks go by as quickly as the last 6 weeks have, then this baby will be here in no time!! here i am as of today, 34 weeks. (and i don't know what is up with the back of my shirt! look at that right angle on my back! ha! now THAT would be uncomfortable!!) i have been feeling GREAT, pregnancy-wise, for the last few weeks, so that has been a nice change and a huge blessing. i am finally getting over my horrible cold-turned-sinus-infection (my first ever and i would love for it to be my last!), and i am so happy to be tasting food again.

we were able to sneak another peek at baby amelia this week at my doctor's appointment because they were "concerned about her size". :) she has definitely chunked up since her sonogram in september! according to the sonogram, amelia is currently weighing in at 5 lbs, 5 oz! and she's gonna keep growin! the sonogram tech was very happy that i had a lot of amniotic fluid... and she said that was one reason i was probably measuring large (besides the big baby!). so now i finally have an explanation for that lady in the grocery store! :) it's my amniotic fluid!! the tech also said that it's why amelia still has plenty of room to kick and play around vs. just twisting and rolling. she is still able to do water aerobics in there! and boy is she at the head of the class!! amelia is quite the mover and the shaker in my belly. i think she moves more than the other two have combined, but it's never really painful like it was with caroline. i can definitely feel and see her wacky contortions, but it's more amusing than anything. anyway, everything on the sonogram looked good. amelia still had her hands in front of her face, so i guess she's just waitin' to suck that thumb like my other two babies! her head was very low, which made it hard for the tech to get a good look at her face... but i was glad that she is making her way toward the exit! :) here's a couple of the pictures that we did get to see of sweet amelia.



don't worry- the umbilical cord is floating freely-- it's not wrapped around her neck like it looks to be in the pictures. it actually looks like she's snuggling with it! i guess we'll have to get her a blankie. :) you can't really see it in the pictures, but we could tell from the video that she has caroline's chin. so i think she's gonna end up looking a lot like her sister. i can't wait to kiss her fat little cheeks!!!

as soon as i got home from my appointment, the kids asked to see the sonogram video. caroline said "heartbeat!" over and over and over until i fastforwarded it to the very short "heartbeat" part of the video. so guess what we watched over and over?! i had to laugh because everytime the screen would change back and forth between the video and 3D pictures, caroline would exclaim, "another mee-yah (amelia)!" she is getting very excited about being a big sister! here's ethan and caroline watching their baby sister's heartbeat.


we came home with over a dozen pictures of the baby, as well as more pictures on cd, so i was more than happy to share a picture with each of the kids. they carried those little photos around all day long. look how proud they are of their little sister! amelia, you are already so loved!!!


one of my doctors told me this week to "lay off the carbs" since amelia is already 5 lbs... i'm sorry, but that is not what this pregnant woman wants to hear 2 weeks before christmas! (and 3 days before a COOKIE EXCHANGE!!) after he said it about 20 times, i just had to laugh. and then i reminded him that my last baby was almost 9 lbs. and he gave me a look that said, "exactly!" i met his daughter that night at a bible study as i was shoving a christmas cookie in my mouth, so i told her to make sure she told her dad that she saw me eating a cookie. :) ha! on the subject of getting really big, i have to share this realization i had the other day. so around thanksgiving, i could really feel amelia pushing against my stomach, and when i rubbed the big round protrusion, i could feel lots of little bumpy lines in a row. i thought surely those have to be her ribs! so on thanksgiving day, i had everybody feeling her ribs... brian's mom, his grandmother, my grandmother... it was show 'n tell! and everybody thought that was so cool. well, the other day i was rubbing the side of my belly, and amelia wasn't really pushing or anything... but i could still feel those bumpy lines. they couldn't be her ribs. it only took me another minute to realize that i've had everyone rubbing my stretch marks. so maybe i should lay off those carbs!

hope your christmas weeks have been merry ones so far!

if you can't say somethin' nice...

fellow mommas, please tell me if you can top this one...(kristi, i'm counting on you!)

i ran to the grocery on saturday to just pick up a few things. i saw an old friend as i was walking in the store, so we stopped and chatted for a few minutes. i noticed this lady waiting to talk to me, and as i said good-bye to my friend, the lady approached me. and this is what the complete stranger waited to say to me...

you couldn't hide behind a tree if you wanted to, could ya!?

um, well, if it was a big tree!

no, i'm not due "any day now"!!!

so this baby is a growing. or at least her momma is! i'm now at 26 weeks. this photo was taken a week ago, at 25 weeks for those of you who don't want to do the math. :) amelia and i are doing fine. this pregnancy has (thankfully) been pretty uneventful so far, besides expected back pain from carting around a teething toddler. i am trying to take it easy by relinquishing bath duty to daddy (and gram when she comes over! thanks!!) and by enlisting ethan & caroline to pick up anything off the floor that requires me to bend down. :) but a mother's work is never done. so my back is just going to hurt.

several strangers have commented that i must be due "any day now". (kristi, i know you're laughing right now...) i try to just smile and graciously reply that i have three more months to go (actually more like 3 1/2!). if it's a fellow mom, i will bring up that it's my third pregnancy and "you know you just start showing earlier", blah blah blah... all my justifications for why i am so big (though i never really mention in public that i love desserts and have not exactly routinely exercised lately!) well, the other day, i received the "any day now" comment from a skinny skinny girl checking me out at a store. so i told her it was my third pregnancy, trying to retain an ounce of pride... and then she said, "yeah, i'm on my third pregnancy too". well that did it. almost. then when i shockingly replied that she didn't even look pregnant, she said "i'm four months!" and proceeded to lift up her shirt and show me her six pack adorned with a belly ring. i really wanted to punch her. but i don't think i could've reached across the counter to get to her with, ya know, my big belly in the way. so i smiled and waddled out. i know brian would tell me that if i would stay home and not go SHOPPING, i wouldn't get those comments. :)

the kids are getting more excited about amelia. ethan and caroline are sharing a room now (definitely another post for another time!!), so ethan loves referring to caroline's old room as "amelia's room". anytime we talk about the baby, caroline lifts up her shirt to see the baby that is apparently in her belly. ethan got the thrill of the year the other night when he felt amelia kicking for the first time. (his first time... she has been kicking very often for awhile now.) as soon as he put his hand on my belly, she gave a little punch to her big bro, and he was AMAZED. i wish i would have had that moment on video. it was priceless. she kicked a few more times, and he just giggled and giggled. anytime i tell him that she's kicking, he comes a runnin' in a hurry! i love it. we'll see how long it takes for the excitement to wear off there.

as for me, the excitement never wears off! i remember the thrill of feeling ethan move around for the first time. it was an unusual yet wonderful feeling. and the first time amelia gave us a little kick, brian and i were giddy like new parents all over again. the wonder and miracle of God creating a precious life inside me will never grow old. ever. i hear women say, "i miss being pregnant". and when you're waddling around with an aching back and running to the bathroom every 10 minutes, it's tempting to kind of laugh that off and say, "are you crazy?!" but i think what those women are saying is that they remember the joy of carrying a child. they remember the awesome witness that it is of our Creator. they remember the hope and curiosity that they also carried, wondering what this child will be like. it is a special time each time, for each pregnancy brings with it a new set of circumstances and experiences. for example, this is the first time i've really been able to share the excitement of the baby with one of my children! and oh what a joy that has been! seeing the look on ethan's face as amelia kicks makes me even more excited for the day when he will get to see his new baby sister in the flesh!

so we've got 14 weeks to go. kristie's mom gave me the most wonderful encouragement in passing a few weeks ago. she said, "you know, once the holidays get here, your pregnancy is going to fly by." i'd never really thought about that until she said it, but it gave me a new attitude about my last trimester. it really IS going to fly by! october will be over before too long, and then november and december will be full with birthdays and holiday activities. (oh dear! two feasting holidays! how big WILL this child be?!) and before we know it, january will be here, and we will be anxiously awaiting amelia's arrival. (and detoxing from christmas cookies!) these next few months really will be full of joy and celebration. and amelia's birth will just extend the celebration! God is so good.


Psalm 100
make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth!
serve the LORD with gladness!
come into His presence with singing!

know that the LORD, He is God!
it is HE who made us, and we are His;
we are His people, and the sheep of His pasture.

enter His gates with thanksgiving,
and His courts with praise!
give thanks to Him; bless His name!

for the LORD is good;
His steadfast love endures forever,
and His steadfastness to all generations.

it's a............

girl!
ethan and caroline are having a baby sister! our sweet baby girl's name is amelia, and we enjoyed having a little peek at our healthy 13 oz. baby today. she was very cooperative at letting us know that she is a girl (we'll work on sitting lady-like in the years to come!), but she was quite content with keeping her hands over her face through most of the sonogram. after 45 minutes of trying, the sonogram technician was very aggravated that she couldn't get a good view of amelia's face for us... i kept assuring her that we would get plenty of pictures of that face once she is born. :) her face was also smushed into my placenta like caroline's was, so we didn't get super clear pictures. but you can definitely see her little face. we can already tell that she has ethan's (and her daddy's) mouth and chin, and she may just be a good mix between her brother and sister. we'll see! it's so fun to compare their sonogram pictures!


a slightly freaky looking profile shot... but still sweet as can be!

i love this picture.
all you can really see is amelia's two fists in a sort of block.
she is a third child ready to take on those siblings! :)

we took ethan with us to the appointment this morning, and he loved finding out about his baby sister and watching her on the big screen. last night, we reviewed caroline's sonogram video so he'd know what to expect this morning. :) he was very curious about all the buttons that the tech was pushing on the machine as she measured and clicked away. here's a picture of ethan, so proud of his baby sister's noggin in the background. :)


i have a really hard time just picking up the phone and announcing, "it's a girl!" i feel compelled to make these big announcements in some kind of creative way. for ethan, we delivered balloons to all the grandparents after i got off work (my mom was NOT happy about waiting until 4:00 to find out the gender of her first grandchild!!), and with caroline we delivered "it's a girl" lollipops. well, carting two kids around town to make deliveries today was not in my game plan. (sorry, amelia!) my mom stayed at our house while we took ethan to the appointment this morning, so we brought pink sugar cookies home to her (nobody has donuts with pink icing!). kristie made me tell her over the phone so she could bring the baby a gift... CLOTHES! :) here is amelia's first gift... how sweet! thank you, auntie k!



when kristie got to our house, i was able to pull off my one surprise today. brian's mom called this morning just dying to find out, and i told her i could not tell her over the phone (though i did email one sonogram picture to her blackberry!). :) i got the run down of her schedule for the day, and i found out she would not be at her office till after lunch. so while kristie stayed at my house with the kids, i ran up to nana's office and snuck this amelia bedelia book on her desk:


glenda and i both share a love for children's books, so this was a special way for amelia to announce herself to her nana! she was so surprised when she got to her office... yay! mission accomplished! (i'm sure amelia will end up with plenty of amelia bedelia books. they were some of my favorite growing up!) by this evening, i still had not told several family members, so my dad and joy, grandma, and brian's dad (who is out of town) got the "it's a girl" phone call. :) but they didn't seem to mind!

we are so thankful that amelia is healthy. thank you for your prayers for our sweet baby girl. please continue those prayers for the remainder of my pregnancy! i would love to avoid a c-section again as God graciously allowed with caroline, so feel free to begin the prayers to that end. :) i know i am "overdue" (haha) for a belly picture on here... i will try to take one soon and share it. there is definitely a belly!! strangers already have no problem asking when i'm due, versus a more sensitively worded question "just in case" i'm not actually pregnant. it's pretty obvious already! ha!

i'm signing off to go browse for nursery ideas online! the fun begins again!!!!! :)