Still Pregnant...

Well I'm a day away from my due date, and we still haven't had this baby! I was really hoping that I would have gone into labor by now, but no such luck!

I was spoiled with Naomi. She came exactly when I wanted her to. I had planned on having everything ready for my long-term substitute at work a week before my due date, just in case. So I finished everything for him on a Friday, 9 days before I was due. I went home and had a nice, relaxing weekend with Jacob. On Sunday afternoon, we went to the park and then went for a walk. I showered and got ready for work the next day (just in case), left a note on Jacob's facebook page telling him to make the baby come because I didn't want to go to work, and then I woke up at 3 am with contractions! It was perfect.

But this baby is apparently not as eager to be born as Naomi was. I've been telling her to come out for about a week now, but she is just not listening! I wouldn't be in such a hurry to have this baby except that I've had a lot of pain with the end of this pregnancy, and it hasn't been too fun. I felt fine at the end of my pregnancy with Naomi. As I mentioned earlier, Jacob and I went to the park the day before she was born. We played on the swings, went for a long walk, and then went home and did something else that couples sometimes do if they want to stimulate labor (if you catch my drift...). (Side note: We weren't trying to stimulate labor with the day's activities, but we were happy that it happened!) This time around, I hurt so much I can barely move. It feels a lot like how I felt after giving birth to Naomi. Walking, sitting up, sitting down, standing up, rolling over in bed, getting in or out of the car, putting on shoes.... everything brings pain. I sneezed today and thought I was going to die. So going for a long walk or anything else that requires movement is definitely out.

I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow, and my doctor told me last week that we will schedule a date for induction at tomorrow' appointment. I really want to avoid being induced unless it's absolutely necessary, so I am hoping this baby will come on her own before then!

I will end this post with a picture of Naomi... we took her to see Santa today for the first time! Bass Pro Shops gives you a free 4x6 photo of your child with Santa, which is AWESOME. There was no way I was spending 20 bucks on a photo package at the mall just so Naomi could sit on Santa's lap! And Naomi didn't scream and cry like Jacob and I expected her to! We didn't get a smile from her because she wouldn't let us take out her pacifier, but for this year, I am just happy that she wasn't crying!

Bring on Christmas!

Thanksgiving is finally over, which means it is officially the Christmas season!!! Yay!

Before I talk more about Christmas, however, here is a picture of my little family on Thanksgiving: (Please pay no attention to my fat pregnancy face!)
Speaking of pregnancy, I only have 2 1/2 weeks left until my due date! Yay! Then hopefully my feet will stop looking like this:
Gross, I know. And they hurt. So hopefully this baby girl decides to make her appearance sooner rather than later!

Now, on to Christmas!

Jacob and I plan on listening to fun Christmas music tonight, putting up our tree, and watching Elf once Naomi goes to bed... photos will follow! I have been in a cleaning frenzy the past week or so to get ready for the holidays and our new little baby, and I finally feel like I have our townhouse ready to finish decorating for Christmas. So hopefully in the next few days, I will get the rest of our decorations put up!

When I got my Christmas decorations out of our closet, I found 4 pages of holiday window clings. I don't usually like window clings--I think they mostly look tacky and stupid. I only had them in the first place to decorate my classroom when I was teaching. But Naomi loves playing by the sliding glass doors in our living room and looking out the windows, so I thought I would put some of the clings on the sliding glass doors for her to play with. She's not very good at putting them back on the windows yet, but she's been having a lot of fun pulling them off!

Baby Names

As of the 13th of this month, I am in the third trimester of my pregnancy! This pregnancy feels like it's going by much more quickly than the last one--I think it's because I have Naomi to keep me distracted and busy. I'm at the point now where I am extremely uncomfortable all of the time and every inch of me hurts, but I much prefer this pain & discomfort over the nausea and vomiting I had just two months ago.

Jacob and I still haven't decided on a name for this little girl! Jacob claims that we have, but he just gave in to the name I wanted because he didn't want to think about it anymore. Jacob has always wanted the name Aurora... like in Sleeping Beauty... and although I think it is beautiful, I can't get past the Disney reference. I'm afraid that everyone will think of Sleeping Beauty as soon as they hear it and that she'll get made fun of. If I ever give in and let Jacob use the name for one of our daughers, we have picked the middle name Noelle to go with it--Aurora Noelle. But as of right now, I want to find a name that we are both really happy with.

I've always wanted to name a daughter Aleta. It's my middle name, and I've always loved it. I think it's pretty and unique, but not unique enough that it's weird (like all of the "unique" things celebrities are naming their kids these days). Jacob didn't like it, but I guess he got tired of me looking at baby name websites and asking him, "What about Diana?", or "Do you like the name Megan?". (I really do love the name Diana, by the way, but we could never use Megan--it's the name of a girl or two that Jacob once dated/kissed.) At any rate, he finally gave in and said we could use Aleta, so we came up with the midde name Deanne (which is the name of one of Jacob's aunts, who I just think is awesome, and we had our wedding reception at her home!). So the closest we've come to agreeing on a baby name is Aleta Deanne, but I really want to find a name that Jacob loves as much as I do. We've got 3 months!

Lately

I have started about 10 blog posts in the past few weeks, but I haven't been able to finish a single one... either because our internet kept crapping out on me, or because I realized after writing two sentences that I had nothing to say. I still don't really have anything to say, but I was asked to post Naomi's newest videos on here for the family members who don't have facebook, so here I am.

First, a quick family update:

Jacob is taking some online courses this summer, and he's been looking for a summer job. He spends most of his day playing with Naomi and being the world's best dad and husband. :)

I've been doing my best to survive Pregnancy # 2, but so far, it is kicking my butt. This pregnancy has been even worse than my first, which I didn't expect--I was so certain that I would be less sick this time around. No such luck! My doctor gave me a prescription to help with the nausea, so I take a pill almost every day. They help quite a bit to keep me from throwing up constantly, but I still feel really sick most of the time. I hate having to take medication when I'm pregnant, so I try really hard not to take them. But the last time I didn't take one, I threw up 3 times just in the first hour I was awake... so I usually give in and take a pill. Another reason I try not to take them is that they have all kinds of fun side effects, like major migraine headaches... but even daily migraines aren't quite as bad as the constant nausea/throwing up.

Luckily, I have an awesome husband who has been able to be home the past few weeks and help me out with EVERYTHING. The diapers, the dishes, the trash... if it upsets my overly-sensitive stomach, he's on top of it!

Naomi is getting more and more fun every day. She does the silliest things and has the funniest facial expressions--I never get bored of watching her play. She throws tantrums any time she doesn't get what she wants, which probably shouldn't be funny, but it often is. Last night, I wouldn't give her something she wanted, so she looked around the living room, located a pillow on the floor, and then threw herself facedown into the pillow for a little tantrum. She usually tries to find something soft to throw herself onto... either a pillow, or her giant stuffed caterpillar, or a teddy bear. She loves to look at books, and she has a few books that she will have Jacob or I read to her over and over and over again until we can't take it anymore. She LOVES Baby Einstein dvds, and although I vowed that I wouldn't be a mother who let her kids watch tv every day, I have definitely played more dvds lately than I would have liked. (Hopefully when I'm not so sick, I will be able to entertain her more myself and rely less on Disney). More than anything, Naomi loves going outside. When she wants to go out, she will find her sandals and bring them to either Jacob or myself. And when she can't find her own sandals, she brings us a shoe that goes to one of our teddy bears. She'll even try to put the teddy bear shoe on her foot. She understands what it means when we tell her something is "all gone". When we finish eating something and she notices that it's gone, she throws up her hands to say "all gone". She's also started doing it when we finish reading a story and I say, "the end" and close the book.

Here are the latest videos of Naomi (one is new from the ones I posted on facebook):

Here is Naomi playing with her cousins... listen for Naomi's crazy laugh. :)








Naomi LOVED the wind chimes at Jacob's parents' house.




Naomi can say "ball". Yay!

This last one is just Naomi being crazy.

little family update

I started this blog so that I could keep my family and friends on the other side of the country updated on our lives, but I never update the blog, so I've done a pretty crappy job of that. I'm hoping that after I have the baby, I will be more motivated to take pictures and post updates... we will have to see. For now, we just have a couple pieces of news:

Jacob was offered a full-time job about a week ago at Provo Canyon School, where he has been working on-call for the past 6 months or so. He is also now the lead supervisor on his shift, which comes with more responsibility, but sadly, not a pay raise. We are both extremely grateful that they were able to finally hire him full-time, because we've been worried about what was going to happen after I have the baby and quit my teaching job. We're relieved to know that Jacob will have a guaranteed income and especially that we can get benefits through his work!

Jacob also passed his third and final exam to become certified as an EMT, so they should be sending him his certification soon. He aced the EMT course he took last semester (despite not buying any of the textbooks/materials), and I am so proud of him!

Even though we've been worried about how we will survive when I stop teaching, I cannot wait for my last day at work. I have really hated my job this year, which is sad, because last year I really loved it. My dad's advice to me has always been "Do it for the students", but the sad truth is that the students aren't always enough to make it bearable. Every other aspect of the job has sucked so much this year that helping my students hasn't been enough to make it worth it. I'm so relieved that I only have to make it another 6 weeks, because I don't think I could make it to the end of the school year. I really hope that if I go back to teaching someday, the work environment and the politics won't be as bad as they are right now at my school.

In baby news, I am about 34 weeks along with 6 more to go. Everyone tells me that I'm not very big, but I feel so huge compared to how small I was just 8 months ago. Jacob likes to make fun of my belly and laugh at me when I can't sit up from a reclining position (although he always helps me up after he's had a chance to laugh). Our baby moves around all the time, especially when I am trying to sleep, but most of the time I love it! I like having the reassurance that she's still ok and moving around. My back hurts constantly now, but Jacob has been a good sport and will rub it for me whenever I ask. He has also given up fighting me for his pajama pants... I wear them all the time when I am home because I have no pajama pants of my own that I can fit into. He has also been a huge help with cleaning around our apartment, and grocery shopping, and all of the other little things that I haven't felt up to doing as often as they are needed. And he's been very understanding with my crazy emotions, which have been out of control lately. I don't know why... I guess it's a combination of a lot of different factors... but the past few weeks have been incredibly hard. There were a couple days every week where I came home from work and sobbed for no good reason, and every time, Jacob came into the room and laid on the bed with me, rubbing my back and listening to my rantings, even though most of them were ridiculous. And for the few things that were legitimate worries, Jacob knew just the right thing to say to help me put things into perspective and stop stressing out so much. I'm so thankful for my loving, helpful husband! Being pregnant has been a thousand times harder than I expected, both emotionally and physically, and I would never be able to get through it without him.

With Valentine's Day coming this weekend, I was feeling a little bummed because Jacob and I weren't going to get to spend any time together due to opposite work schedules. Unknown to me, however, they cancelled Jacob's Friday night shift, so he made plans to surprise me with flowers and candy! He left the house before I got home from work, and he led me to believe that he was at work and was going to be there for his entire shift. So when the doorbell rang an hour later and I saw someone standing to the side with flowers, I honestly thought that it was someone who just had the wrong address. I was pleasantly surprised to open the door and find my husband holding flowers and chocolate, not only because I thought he was supposed to be at work but also because I had told him that we should probably just stick to cards this year to save money. So I really hadn't been expecting anything!

Jacob managed to surprise me last Valentine's Day, too, not with the fact that he got me roses, but because he snuck into my apartment in the middle of the night to leave the roses and chocolates in my room. My first thought when I woke up and saw them was, "Who are those for?!". It's funny to me that both times he gave me flowers, my first thought was that they were sent to me by mistake.

So there is our update! Happy Valentine's Weekend and Happy Birthday (yesterday) to my wonderful mother!

12:00 Tomorrow!!!

We find out if we are having a girl or a boy! We are SO excited!!!

After all of my students, some fellow teachers, friends, and family all took their guesses, the final tally was:

28-Boy
27-Girl
1-Twins

Halloween

I know I've been a horrible blogger lately. Pregnancy has been kicking my butt and making it hard to do anything besides work. But here are a few pictures from our Halloween!

Ok, the rubber ducky isn't from Halloween, but we ate dinner at Pirate Island a few weeks ago, and we used the tickets we won in the arcade to get the rubber ducky. We were way excited. Jacob plays with it in the tub. :)

Dreams

I finally had a dream about the baby the other night. I had the baby, and it was a girl, but the weird part was that she was born talking. And I couldn't decide what I wanted to name her, because I haven't been sure that I wanted to use the girl name we originally picked. So I asked the baby, "Do you want me to name you Naomi?". And she told me yes.

So now if we have a girl, I guess I'll name her Naomi after all.

We find out Tuesday!

9 Weeks...

What is with that stomach bump that I've already got?! I read somewhere that typical weight gain in the first trimester is 3 to 5 pounds. I had gained 8 pounds by 6 weeks, which was the last time I weighed myself, so I don't even know how much more I've gained since then. But I have a little belly! People at work can tell I'm pregnant! I was not prepared for this... I thought the stomach wouldn't come until a little later. I already am too big for my clothes. I was not quite ready yet to say goodbye to my flat stomach! But I woke up the other day and realized that it had disappeared. So... Goodbye. I hope some day I will have the pleasure of seeing you again. :(

(By the way, don't pay attention to that weird little bump in the front... I had to unbutton my pants to wear them, so it's just the front of my pants poking through my shirt.)

Psycho

I have never been so emotional before in my life. I don't quite know how to deal with it! I feel like a crazy person. I get so upset over the smallest things, and even though I can feel myself overreacting and being completely irrational, I can't do anything to stop myself. I have no control over my emotions!

I cried the other day at work reading A CHILDREN'S BOOK about Harriet Tubman. And not just once... No, I cried multiple times while reading this book to myself. I just finished watching The Prince and Me, and I cried three times throughout the course of the movie. I have seen this movie plenty of times, and I have never cried. It is not a cry-worthy movie, and I am a complete baby, so I would know if it was. I cried multiple times while watching Bride Wars about a week ago. Ridiculous, I know! It's a comedy! And I cried.

And poor Jacob has to live with me. I'm worried that he's beginning to think I've lost my mind. Maybe I have. Two nights ago, I had some kind of mental/emotional breakdown. It was ridiculous. I went to bed at 8:30, as I have been doing all week because I'm completely exhausted. And when I woke up for the second time because I had to pee, I couldn't see Jacob in the apartment. So I looked around a little (it's not like there's anywhere in our apartment to go), and he was just gone! Now try to understand... In my mind, it was the middle of the night, and my husband had disappeared. After texting him a few times and getting no response, I became hysterical. As it turned out, it was only 11:30, and he was just upstairs playing a game with his friend. He hadn't even put on his shoes--they were still sitting on our apartment floor. But none of that mattered. Even after I realized it was only 11:30, I couldn't calm down. Even after I had finally gotten ahold of Jacob and found out where he was, I couldn't calm down. I sobbed for about an hour until he came home. I had cried so hard for so long that I couldn't breathe. Jacob had to calm me down and rub my back until I could stop crying enough that I could breathe again and finally fall back to sleep.

I don't like feeling like I've lost all control over my own emotions. And I really don't like knowing that people must think I'm psychotic. Our friends upstairs must have thought I was nuts, after I texted or called Jacob about 20 times in the course of an hour. How do people deal with these insane emotions?!

Venting

I hate being pregnant. I am so sick all the time. I can't do dishes, I can't do laundry, I can't clean the house... people come over, and it looks TERRIBLE, and I feel so embarassed, but I can't get anything done! Yesterday I felt sick basically for the entire day other than a two hour period, and I threw up twice. And the night before, I woke up 8 times because I had to pee. 8!! I don't think I slept for more than an hour and a half straight that night. I have had to stop showering in the morning because it always makes me feel worse and usually results in me getting sick. So I have to shower at night and have gross-looking hair all day. And eating all the time is not fun! I am so tired of everything that we have to eat. I have to be eating constantly, or else the nausea gets out of control. But I don't have an appetite, because I eat so much that I don't want food anymore. Even when I feel hungry, I still don't want food. Nothing sounds good. And if I can smell food, no matter what it is, it makes me nauseous. So I have to somehow find food to make and eat that doesn't have any kind of smell. I hate it. I hate it all. :(

*sigh* I don't know how I'll make it through the next month.

In happier news, we think Jacob got a job! It's a part time, on-call position at Provo Canyon school, where he used to work. We are hoping that soon they will have a full-time position open up. Two different people that he has talked to there have said that they are planning on maybe hiring someone full-time in the fall. But in the meantime, at least we will have a little extra money coming in!

Sorry for the lack of pictures on my posts. I just have none that I have been wanting to put up, or I've been too lazy to take any. And I don't know the rules about putting up pictures that you find on the web, so I just avoid it altogether to keep myself out of trouble. :)

And so it begins...

It has started... the morning/afternoon/night sickness of the pregnant. *sigh* The last few days, I have felt nauseous about 80% of the time, and this morning I actually got sick. Hopefully that doesn't become a daily occurrence. I read somewhere that morning sickness is linked with less chance of miscarriage... probably just another pregnancy myth, but I'll pretend it's true because it makes me feel better!

Hunger

I am SOOO hungry all the time! We had dinner no more than 45 minutes ago... Italian chicken, cheesy garlic bread, and yummy buttery corn. I ate a ton. And I am already starving (and for some reason craving apples). I have to eat every hour or two, or else I get so hungry I start to feel sick. It's ridiculous. I started keeping granola bars in our bedroom because usually by the third time I wake up around 4 or 5 in the morning (I wake up 3 times every night now because I have to pee so badly... it sucks), the hunger pains are so bad I can't fall back to sleep unless I eat something to calm my stomach. *sigh* I can't afford to eat this much food!

We suck at keeping secrets.

Well, we weren't going to tell anyone yet, but since we got too excited and already told all of the three people who read our little blog, I guess I can make the announcement now: We're pregnant! Because of the higher risk of miscarriage in the first trimester, we wanted to wait until closer to the second trimester to tell people... but as I said, we got too excited! Here is the picture of the lovely stick I peed on:


I was surprised that it even showed up positive the day I took the first pregnancy test (I took 3... we got them all from friends as gag gifts, so I figured I may as well use them all). My period could easily still have been coming--it was no more than a couple days late. But I had just had this feeling for the previous week or so that I was pregnant, and I didn't want to wait any longer. Besides, we had 3 tests, so I figured I could waste one and take the test early.

I've been feeling SUPER emotional lately. I hate it. I tear up at the most ridiculous things. I was reading a Pregnancy magazine at the doctor's office yesterday because I had been waiting forever and was incredibly bored, and I read this story about a pregnant woman who started tearing up as she was unloading the dishwasher because she was thinking about how she would someday teach her child to unload the dishwasher. It sounded completely ridiculous! And yet as I sat there, thinking about how ridiculous it was, my throat started feeling tight, and I started tearing up! I hate not having more control over my emotions.

On a different topic, Jacob made dinner yesterday! I was very impressed. I have begged him to make us dinner a few times lately because I've been so exhausted, but he always tells me that "It's impossible!" and that he is "incapable of cooking". I always tell him that his excuses are ludicrous and that anyone can follow a recipe... but I did get a little worried when I asked him to make a can of tomato soup once, and he dumped the can in a bowl, stuck it in the microwave, and called it good. The first thing it says on the can is to add a can of water! But somehow he didn't even see that step. Silly boy.

Anyway, I have been sick for the past couple days, so I begged him last night to make dinner for us. He sent me to lay down on the couch while he made pasta and mashed potatoes, the two things in our pantry that he felt he could handle. Every few minutes I would hear a strange squeal or yelp coming from the kitchen, so I would jump up and run in to see what I could help with, but he would just send me back to sit on the couch. Despite whatever happened in there to cause all of his yells, dinner was delicious! So thank you, honey!

After dinner, we watched Rat Race and snuggled on the couch. Jacob laughed SO hard during that movie. I loved it. I love it when my husband finds something genuinely funny and laughs really hard... for some reason, I find it adorable.

Pictures of the hubby making dinner: (Please excuse our messy kitchen/table... I've been sick.)