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| Our girls showing no fear |
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| Feeling Micah move |
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| Pigtails! Wish she would wear them for longer than 5 minutes... |
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| Cora and Jillian reading together :) |
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| Sliding with Jillian |
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| Baby Cora :) |
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Waiting for baby
This pregnancy has been completely different from my pregnancy with Cora. I was much sicker in the first trimester this time around, and having Cora to keep up with has definitely made things more challenging! I am so grateful that the end of the pregnancy has also been different. With Cora, I was diagnosed with pre-eclampsia just shy of 38 weeks, was sent to the hospital, and was induced that night. I am so thankful that it has not been an issue this time around. However, this is the longest that I have ever been pregnant, and I've never had to wait and wonder when I might go into labor. My doctor had told me that he would be willing to induce as early as 39 weeks. I really wanted to try and let things happen on their own, but this last week has been very uncomfortable. We went ahead and scheduled an induction for the morning of the 28th if Micah doesn't decide to come before then. In the meantime, we've been enjoying our final days as a family of 3. Here are some fun pics of play dates with cousin Hayden and our friends Miss Brooke and Jillian.
Friday, February 24, 2012
Preparing for Baby Part 2
As mentioned at the end of the last blog entry, we have really been blessed by the generosity of our friends and family in preparing for the arrival of our little boy. Two of our church orchestra friends, Jaime Lacey and Megan Taylor, had a baby shower for us. Cora went with me and was such a good helper in opening all the gifts for Micah! I thought she may be jealous of all the stuff for her baby brother, but she would usually say, "Ooohhh, how cute!" or "It's for Micah!" I think she's going to be a great big sister. We had a wonderful time visiting with friends and eating some good food. Megan is very talented when it comes to crafty stuff, and one of the neatest things that she did was had everyone write a message for Micah on a fabric square. I was also able to take squares with me for our family to write messages. She's going to use the squares to make a quilt for Micah. I thought that was such a neat idea and I know it will be something that he always cherishes!
We got together with all of our local family to celebrate Micah's near arrival! It was great to get everyone together - guys and gals alike. Again, we enjoyed some delicious food. Jeremy's mom also did a great job making a diaper cake and a diaper wreath for us!
Jeremy and I have been teaching in the youth department at church this year. I am an assistant teacher for the 8th grade girls. Every so often we schedule a time to eat lunch together after church. Two weeks ago, we were supposed to have pizza at church. Little did I know that the girls in our class had asked the other teachers, Lana Leonard and Hope Poe, if they could have a surprise baby shower for me! I went with Lana to pick up the pizza, and when we got back, they had hung up a banner which they all signed and had balloons and blue velvet cupcakes made by Hope. We got more wonderful gifts, and it was so sweet of them to think to do that for us. Unfortunately, I did not have my camera with me, and I had even forgotten my ipod that morning, so I don't have any pictures!
We are so blessed to have so many people in our lives who are just as excited as we are for Micah to arrive! We cannot wait to meet him very soon. :)
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| Yummy food! |
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| Adorable cupcakes - Cora was obsessed! |
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| She wouldn't rest until she ate a cupcake |
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| Think she enjoyed it?!? |
We got together with all of our local family to celebrate Micah's near arrival! It was great to get everyone together - guys and gals alike. Again, we enjoyed some delicious food. Jeremy's mom also did a great job making a diaper cake and a diaper wreath for us!
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| Ring around the rosies |
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| Hayden was testing out Micah's monkey rocker :) |
Jeremy and I have been teaching in the youth department at church this year. I am an assistant teacher for the 8th grade girls. Every so often we schedule a time to eat lunch together after church. Two weeks ago, we were supposed to have pizza at church. Little did I know that the girls in our class had asked the other teachers, Lana Leonard and Hope Poe, if they could have a surprise baby shower for me! I went with Lana to pick up the pizza, and when we got back, they had hung up a banner which they all signed and had balloons and blue velvet cupcakes made by Hope. We got more wonderful gifts, and it was so sweet of them to think to do that for us. Unfortunately, I did not have my camera with me, and I had even forgotten my ipod that morning, so I don't have any pictures!
We are so blessed to have so many people in our lives who are just as excited as we are for Micah to arrive! We cannot wait to meet him very soon. :)
Preparing for Baby
Well, it has been a very busy 2012 for us. To give some highlights - we're in the process of finishing our basement, Cora had her first haircut, I passed my dissertation defense, and we've got everything ready for our baby boy to arrive.
I'll start with the basement. We are thankful that we have not had to hire much outside help so far to finish the basement. Jeremy and his Dad studded it, Jeremy and my Dad ran the electric, Jeremy, my Dad, our friend Raun, and my brother hung the dry wall, and just last week, we hired someone to finish the drywall. Jeremy is downstairs slaving away as I type this, putting primer on the walls. He is desperately trying to at least get the room painted before our little guy arrives. There is still much to do (ceiling, floor, figuring out how to heat/cool), but we are really pleased with they have been able to accomplish so far!
Cora had her first real haircut in January...yes, I'm a bit behind. :) I have cut Cora's bangs numerous times and evened out her hair when she was little, but this was her first professional haircut. For those who aren't around Cora much, she is very shy around people she does not know. She has been known to try and cover her face with her hands or jacket if a cashier talks to her, which is an improvement from the total meltdowns that she has had before. So, the thought of taking her to an unfamiliar place for someone to come after her with scissors was a bit overwhelming for me. We were fortunate that our friend, Kirby Kitchen, was willing to come out to our house to give both Cora and Mommy a trim. I let her trim mine first, hoping it would help Cora feel more comfortable. When it came time for Cora's haircut, she did great!! It helps that she likes Miss Kirby. :) We didn't cut a lot off, just enough to try and even it out a bit.
I am also happy to report that I successfully defended my dissertation on January 20th! I was really nervous about the whole thing. It started with me giving a presentation of my dissertation work, which was supposed to be 45 minutes long. My presentation was closer to an hour which I like to attribute to the fact that I just had so many fascinating findings to share! :) After the presentation, I waited for my committee to converse with each other, and I was then invited back in for a time of Q&A. This was probably the part I was most nervous about. We talked for probably 45 minutes or so, and then I left again for my fate to be determined by the committee. My adviser, Joy, then came to get me and told me I passed! After the years of work and all the stress of the defense, it really was kind of anti-climatic. It was over just like that. It is such a relief to have that behind me, and I am so glad I persevered and finished.
While we were in Lexington for the weekend, we stayed with our good friends, the Waldroup's. Dana was a great babysitter while we were having to do school stuff, and Cora had a blast playing with Joshua! I am ashamed that the only picture I took all weekend long is the one below:
Those two ran around and had so much fun together - it was exhausting just to watch! We were also so glad to get to see several other friends while we were in town visiting. We are grateful to be back home close to our families, but we do miss many of our dear friends.
We also have done a lot of work on the nursery since the new year. We had decided on a theme for the nursery - Carter's Monkey Rockstar. We were able to use a lot of brown pieces from Cora nursery, and then mixed in some of the decor from the monkey rockstar line. Because the monkey stuff matched the already beige walls, we decided not to change the paint color. Instead, I decided it would be fun to have one accent wall painted with stripes. I set out to design the accent wall using windows "paint" to experiment with different color combos etc. The next step was measuring the wall in the nursery to see how long it was, decide how many repetitions to paint, and figure out how wide each stripe needed to be. Finally, I measured on the wall and marked where each stripe began/ended. With the help of my very patient husband and mom, we were able to eventually mark guides for the stripes up the wall and used frog tape to tape off the stripes. I was wise enough to plan to have a beige stripe between each color, so we were able to paint all of the lines after only one tape job. It ended up being a lot more difficult than I had anticipated!
Here are some pics of the finished nursery!
We were so blessed by our family and friends who bought stuff to help complete the nursery and also to buy us lots of boy clothes, blankets, and towels to help us prepare for Micah's arrival. That will be covered in the next blog entry. :)
I'll start with the basement. We are thankful that we have not had to hire much outside help so far to finish the basement. Jeremy and his Dad studded it, Jeremy and my Dad ran the electric, Jeremy, my Dad, our friend Raun, and my brother hung the dry wall, and just last week, we hired someone to finish the drywall. Jeremy is downstairs slaving away as I type this, putting primer on the walls. He is desperately trying to at least get the room painted before our little guy arrives. There is still much to do (ceiling, floor, figuring out how to heat/cool), but we are really pleased with they have been able to accomplish so far!
Cora had her first real haircut in January...yes, I'm a bit behind. :) I have cut Cora's bangs numerous times and evened out her hair when she was little, but this was her first professional haircut. For those who aren't around Cora much, she is very shy around people she does not know. She has been known to try and cover her face with her hands or jacket if a cashier talks to her, which is an improvement from the total meltdowns that she has had before. So, the thought of taking her to an unfamiliar place for someone to come after her with scissors was a bit overwhelming for me. We were fortunate that our friend, Kirby Kitchen, was willing to come out to our house to give both Cora and Mommy a trim. I let her trim mine first, hoping it would help Cora feel more comfortable. When it came time for Cora's haircut, she did great!! It helps that she likes Miss Kirby. :) We didn't cut a lot off, just enough to try and even it out a bit.
I am also happy to report that I successfully defended my dissertation on January 20th! I was really nervous about the whole thing. It started with me giving a presentation of my dissertation work, which was supposed to be 45 minutes long. My presentation was closer to an hour which I like to attribute to the fact that I just had so many fascinating findings to share! :) After the presentation, I waited for my committee to converse with each other, and I was then invited back in for a time of Q&A. This was probably the part I was most nervous about. We talked for probably 45 minutes or so, and then I left again for my fate to be determined by the committee. My adviser, Joy, then came to get me and told me I passed! After the years of work and all the stress of the defense, it really was kind of anti-climatic. It was over just like that. It is such a relief to have that behind me, and I am so glad I persevered and finished.
While we were in Lexington for the weekend, we stayed with our good friends, the Waldroup's. Dana was a great babysitter while we were having to do school stuff, and Cora had a blast playing with Joshua! I am ashamed that the only picture I took all weekend long is the one below:
Those two ran around and had so much fun together - it was exhausting just to watch! We were also so glad to get to see several other friends while we were in town visiting. We are grateful to be back home close to our families, but we do miss many of our dear friends.
We also have done a lot of work on the nursery since the new year. We had decided on a theme for the nursery - Carter's Monkey Rockstar. We were able to use a lot of brown pieces from Cora nursery, and then mixed in some of the decor from the monkey rockstar line. Because the monkey stuff matched the already beige walls, we decided not to change the paint color. Instead, I decided it would be fun to have one accent wall painted with stripes. I set out to design the accent wall using windows "paint" to experiment with different color combos etc. The next step was measuring the wall in the nursery to see how long it was, decide how many repetitions to paint, and figure out how wide each stripe needed to be. Finally, I measured on the wall and marked where each stripe began/ended. With the help of my very patient husband and mom, we were able to eventually mark guides for the stripes up the wall and used frog tape to tape off the stripes. I was wise enough to plan to have a beige stripe between each color, so we were able to paint all of the lines after only one tape job. It ended up being a lot more difficult than I had anticipated!
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| Starting on paint after hours of taping :) |
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| Taking off the tape was terrifying, but it did great! |
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| Finished wall |
We were so blessed by our family and friends who bought stuff to help complete the nursery and also to buy us lots of boy clothes, blankets, and towels to help us prepare for Micah's arrival. That will be covered in the next blog entry. :)
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