11 weeks

11 weeks down, 29 to go!! Is it too soon for a count down??

What is baby up to?
Embryo has graduated to fetus! Fetus II is growing finger nails, moving, rolling, opening and closing hands and making fists, producing urine, tooth buds and hair follicles are forming, brain waves are transmitting, ovaries and/or testicles are forming, and baby would react if touched ... busy little baby!


Images via Google.com Images

What is mamma up to?

I have to think about not peeing my pants when I cough or sneeze and keeping all this extra, fast growing body hair under control is a full time job!!!!

I had a doctor’s appointment on Friday. I gained back the weight I lost the first week I was so sick. The midwife did an external Doppler for the baby’s heartbeat. Unfortunately, we were unable to hear anything due to the baby being still so small. That evening Dylan, Addi and I went to Dylan’s clinic and we did a quick ultrasound. All is good. Baby’s heart was beating great and baby was even moving and we saw baby waving his little arm!

Eating is still difficult. I have aversions to almost everything I normally eat. I have an appetite, but few things taste good. I get occasional heart burn and feel out of breath really easy! I could literally sleep 18 hours a day. I would feel better if I could nap around noon each day. I am definitely chubbier, but I don’t look pregnant! I am happy to say that the nausea has passed, as long as I don’t allow my belly to completely empty. I am extremely emotional. I literally cry at a drop of a hat. TV commercials, baby pictures of Addi, songs and random thoughts send me into a whorl wind of tears.

This pregnancy feels so different from my first and I have been trying to put my finger on why that is. It is hard for me to remember exactly how I felt with Addi. I know I was so surprised, excited, giddy and anxious for her to arrive. I remember that the pregnancy seemed to fly by. With this pregnancy, the past few weeks have seemed to drag. I am sure it is because I have been so sick and because we are experiencing what feels like the world’s longest winter ever. We have spent most of our winter days inside. We are bored and cooped up. I think I have less time to day dream. I was always thinking about my pregnancy with Addi, it became like an obsession. With this pregnancy, it doesn’t feel real yet. I am still waiting for it to hit me! The first trimester is brutal for me. I am SOOOO tired ALL the time and really nauseous for weeks, it really wears me down. With spring and my 2nd trimester right around the corner hopefully I will start to feel normal!

With this likely being my last pregnancy, I am trying to soak up every minute, remember each detail and enjoy each stage – the good and the not so easy. I am loving that Addi is older and able to participate. When she sees the baby on ultrasound she gets all smiley and was excited that her baby sister waved to her! If I accidently refer to the baby as him, she quickly reminds me that the baby will be a baby sister! She often touches my belly and tells me it is getting bigger. The other day she said with a sad face, “When will my baby sister be here?” She has me read to her out of my pregnancy journal and likes hearing what the baby is up to – developmentally.


It warmed up to around 20 degrees this weekend and we took the dogs down to the state park for a little walk.

A Great Trade!

We said goodbye to the 'ol Subaru Forester and are excited to announce the newest member of our family…a 2003 Chevy Trailblazer! Thanks for the great trade Lena, Aunt Merna and Uncle Ron! It is an amazing blessing for our family. We are in love!

The last ride in the Subaru!

Lena driving off in her Suby! Look at that smile and all the gear piled up – the way a Suby should look!

ups and DOWNS

Life isn’t always a bundle of roses. Ups and downs are apart of everyone’s life. We all have some sort of hurdle to overcome. Sometimes we are forced to deal with grown up situations and make hard decisions.

Dylan and I are feeling discouraged. Discouraged by the amount of student loan debt that is haunting us. We are completely unsure of what to do next. We totally understood the amount of student loans it would take to get Dylan through school. Now that the bills are rolling in it is almost too much to deal with.

We are happy that we were able to remain in Montana after he finished school, close to our home and family and friends. Dylan loves, loves, loves his job right now. He is doing an amazing job and has moved on from legally having to be babysat all the time and now often works alone as the sole provider in the clinic. He truly enjoys his work and is so happy with the people he works with. He loves his schedule – three 12 hour shifts a week – yay, who wouldn’t! The people Dylan works with just love him. Whenever I am in the clinic someone is ranting about how wonderful and how smart and how much of a joy he is to work with! I am very proud of him. He had a goal in mind and achieved it and works very hard to provide a wonderful life for us. Not only that, he loves his job. How many of us get to say that and mean it? There are two downsides to his job. One, they don’t provide or offer health insurance and two, in my opinion they do not pay him what he is worth. Occasionally he is able to pick up an extra shift, but they are weary about paying him too much overtime.

I miss so much being a stay at home mom. I miss having a clean house, having healthy food in the house and making healthy dinners every night. I miss not having a huge pile of dirty laundry in the basement. I miss taking the dogs hiking everyday. I miss having the freedom to go visit Sara pretty much whenever I wanted to! But most of all I miss my Addi. I miss our art projects and nature walks and trips to the park. I miss listening to her talk all day long. I miss her jokes and silly dances. By the time I pick her up after work, get dinner made and give her a bath it is time for her bedtime story and I am saying goodnight to her.

Ideally, I would love to work part time. Allowing Addi to go to preschool 3 days a week and allowing me adult connection outside the house. Part time jobs that pay anything are hard to find.

Most days my cubicle feels like a torture chamber. I am so grateful for a secure job with wonderful benefits – especially in this economy. Without this job I would not have been able to get pregnant right now. But spending 40 hours a week stuck in a cubicle doing a job that means nothing to me is torture. I still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up, but I definitely know that answering 40 calls a day and getting verbally abused by the people on the other end of the phone is not what I have dreamt about. I am really regretting the decisions that I made regarding my education and career path. IF only I had known…

When we moved here we said after 6 months we would re-evaluate our situation. The time has come.

These are the options we are now considering:

We had always talked about finding a loan repayment opportunity to help alleviate some our student loan burden. Should we move our lives to literally the middle of nowhere for 2-3 years for a loan repayment job? We look for an opportunity weekly. But these jobs are usually in the most remote, rural parts of the country with the nearest town 130 miles away.

Should we give away our dogs? That would allow us to move into an apartment and save a ton of money each month. The thought of doing that breaks my heart. We made a commitment to those silly animals and abandoning them is not right. Kya has been apart of my life for 6 years. She was the one who cuddled me unconditionally when Danny died and any other time that I needed her. How could we give Mason away? He would go literally insane without Dylan. And Pug-Pug, that little fatty has had a hard enough life without his family abandoning him again.

Should we move to a bigger city to make more money? Most places outside of Montana pay more. Back to Salt Lake City? Somewhere near Seattle?

Should we stay put? Once Dylan gets 2-3 years under his belt, job salary increase and more opportunities are available because he would no longer be considered a new grad. If we decide to stay here maybe I could take in a couple kids to watch during the day. But then how do we afford insurance?

Should I go back to school? I have been debating returning to school so I could get a job that I actually enjoy. The thought of having 2 kids and going to school full time scares me. I am considering Ultrasound Tech. The nearest school is in Bellevue, WA and it would take 2 years to complete.

How am I going to be able to stay home for at least a few months after the new baby is born? Where will we get health insurance? How will we afford to send an infant and Addi to daycare fulltime? Thinking about sending my new baby to daycare tears me apart…I can’t do that. So should we hire a nanny to come to the house?

I am also considering Sara’s idea to sail to a remote, un-inhabited island and live off the land!

Both Dylan and I are craving stability. We are always thinking 6 months ahead. Where are we going to go? Where are we going to work? What, when, who….We want a house that we can move into and never have to leave again! I want a garden. I want to watch newly planted trees grow big. I want swing set! I want a door frame with notches in it, marking the growth of our children! I don’t want to think, “Well, in 6 months our life can actually begin.” We want to think about planning a vacation, not planning another possible move.

All we can do is have faith in prayer. Have faith that the right opportunity will present itself to us - where we are meant to be is where we will end up.

Weekend at the Lake

Addi and I spent Saturday and Sunday at the Placid Lake Cabin. The whole fam-damily was there, including Moni, Mike and Madi and Mom, Mark and the kids! I was so great. I kept it low key due to being so sick and still so tired and weak. Addi had a blast playing with Grandma Bobbi and all her cousins and aunts and uncles in the warm cabin. We played a bit in the snow, sledding and walking on the lake. Addison wasn’t too sure about the snowmobiles. Uncle Rick harassed her constantly with his snowmobile helmet on, trying to coax her onto a snowmobile. No thank you! She wouldn’t get anywhere near those loud, fast things! Uncle Ron was gleaming, showing off his new Rubicon! I tried convincing him that he actually bought it for me, but he wouldn’t acknowledge those comments!

Watching the big kids sled, ski and snowmobile.

Dancing in the cabin.

Sledding with Grandma Bobbi.

Uncle Rick - the dictator!

My adorable snow-bunny.

Reading books with Grandma Bobbi.

Great-Aunt Shelly!

Perfect Addi-sized sledding hill!

Snow Angels on the lake! Yay!



Keeping a close eye on Uncle Rick and his snowmobile!

ADDI-ISMS

I have been thinking lately that I really want a bunny. I haven’t mentioned it to Addi because I didn’t want to get her hopes up. Well, the other day I had made up my mind that we were going to get a baby bunny. Dylan was out of town, so that hurdle was absent!! I said to Addi, “Mommy really wants a baby bunny. Do you?” Addi replied, “No. I mean they are cute and everything, but I don’t want one. We already have three dogs!” I almost collapsed. I was not expecting her to say that! What three year old says no to a baby bunny! That was enough to curb my dreams of a baby animal in the house, for now!

Out of the blue Addi said to Dylan, “Dad you are not the boss. Me and my mom are!” He was not impressed with that. He acted like I coached her. No way, she just knows the way things work already!!

Addi and I were reading a bedtime story. And part of the story talked about a sheep's wool being used for making sweaters. Addi was confused and I tried to explain to her that farmers shave off the sheep's wool and then make sweaters. First she replied, "Sheep wear sweaters?" She kills me. I said, "No, the sweaters are for people." Confused again, she said, "Well, my sweatshirts are not made out of wool they are made out of sweatshirt." Maybe you had to be there, but it was so funny.

Auntie Sara and Ellie mailed us a huge box for Valentine's Day. It was full of all sorts of goodies. The other day Addi and I came home and I was unlocking the front door. Addi said, "Oh darn. No giant box from Sara today!"

Addi was being all crazy in our tiny bathroom the other night, dancing around and swinging her head like a punk rocker. I warned her to stop or she was going to hurt herself and sure enough she smacked her eyebrow/face on the sink so hard. I thought for sure she would have a giant black eye. All she got was a little purple dot below her eyebrow. So yesterday she picked out an all purple outfit - purple dress, purple shirt, purple sweater and purple tights. She said she needed to match the purple dot on her eye!!

Addi was having a teenage moment. We were out to eat and she was not obeying. She got in trouble and was not impressed with us. She said with a big pouty lip, "I don't like you guys anymore. I want to go to Papa's house, because I like him." Oh, dear. Sometimes we get a nice little preview of Addi in 10 years! Lord help us!!!

Sick of Being Sick

Besides my foot surgery a few years ago, the past two weeks have been the most awfully painful of my life. I have been so sick. On top of horrible morning sickness, all-day and night-long sickness, I came down with a terrible flu-like virus that literally knocked me down for a full week. I was throwing up, had a mild fever and was so weak I couldn’t stand in the shower. I lost 6 pounds. The following week, after returning to work for one day, I got a horrible sinus infection. It was so painful it felt like all my upper teeth were abscessing and my jaw hurt so bad I couldn’t chew or yawn. Luckily, twenty-four hours after getting antibiotics I started to feel better. Now over two weeks later I am back to work and feeling pretty normal. My morning sickness seems to be passing. As long as I eat all the time I don’t get too nauseous anymore!

Before I got the virus Dylan had it. He fully recovered a full two weeks later. Luckily, Addison only developed a little cold.