36 Weeks and feelin' the pressure...

Well I am 36 weeks today and I been having a lot of contractions. I am not feeling most of them, but the home monitor is catching them. At this point it feels like I have a bowling ball between my legs when I try to walk. The pressure is intense. I was really hoping we could make it to at least Halloween before he came, but it's seeming less and less likely. The medication maybe able to hold me off until Friday, but I strongly doubt I am making it another week unmedicated with this much pressure and contractions with it...but only time will tell I guess. If I had to guess the baby is about 6 and a half pounds now so we are in a good weight range, and if he came he is in a great age range, he may have a little breathing issues, but not likely a hard time. Will update when I can.

So far so good...

The appointment today went very well. The baby was measured and right in the 50th percentile. They were also estimated to weigh 5 pounds 15 ounces, so basically just shy of 6 pounds. He has been moving around nicely as well. Normally they would have taken me off the medication this week, however since it's been working so well for me with out really any side effects, and the insurance is still paying for it, they are giving me an extra week on it. Down side I need to still do site changes (i.e. stab myself ever few days). Up side, it's likely the medicine will keep me from going into labor at least for the week. I was given the okay to make a quick trip to the store so we can get a few baby things we need before he gets here. So things are shaping up really well.

New Dose

Well the new dose seems to have been doing the trick. I am still contracting but much less. I will be 35 weeks along tomorrow so we are making great progress. I am to the point now however I am ready to have this baby. Even though I know he'd be early I am getting sick of the bed rest and sick of the huge belly, and I am just ready to hold my baby. The crazy part is I could potentially go another 5 weeks with out having him and that makes me insane to think about. I went 6 weeks with out medication with Nicholas before my water broke, but they also took me off the medication a lot sooner with him. They are going to get me as close to 36 weeks as they can with the medication so I am almost done with that at least. It will be nice to not have to stab myself in the leg ever 3-5 days to change the site. It be kind of neat to make it Halloween and have him them, and it be nice to make it to my due date because I would be recovering over the holidays, but I don't know if I can really wait that long. I guess it's a good thing it's not really up to me...hehe. Ok, I am done ranting now. Will update again some time soon.

My appointment...

My Friday appointment went well. I let the doctors know I been feeling more contractions and they upped my dose a bit. It seems to really have helped. Although the nurse staff for the pump didn't have me set all the doses correct the first time around and I had to call back and ask if they meant to leave out one of my doses or if we just missed one. So now that it's fixed and I am getting the extra dose I am feeling a ton better. I did pass a little mucus ball this morning but that could be because I was contracting a little over night due to the missed dose. Now that I am back on track we'll see how things go. Baby has slowed down on movement a lot, but really I am sure it's because he is so darn big. I am getting ready to put the DVD in and upload the last two ultrasounds to youtube. He has these HUGE chubby cheeks in the one, it's too darn cute. I am starting to get nervous he is going to be like a 10 pound baby if I go to term. We do a growth check this coming Friday so we'll see how big he really is. I am guessing he is over 6 pounds now, and that is a bit of a scary idea...hehe. If nothing exciting happens between now and then I will post an update Friday after my visit.

Yay we made it to 34 weeks!

Today I am 34 weeks pregnant. This is now the longest I have ever been pregnant...lol

If the baby was born today they should have very little complication, if any related to being premature. We are very excited to have made it this far. The p17 shots and the T-pump along with the bed rest seem to really have done the trick this time.

It will be really nice to go to term and be able to take a healthy baby home from the hospital with out having to have a NICU stay. That is our hope at this point. A nice easy birth and a nice healthy baby to bring home.

The last Ultrasound we had showed the baby having very chubby cheeks so we are hoping he doesn't get too big for me...hehe. I get another growth check not this Friday, but the following Friday.

I am totally bored at this point, and still have at least another week of the pump, but we are making progress. Almost there...

33 Weeks!

Well we made to it 33 weeks. I can't believe it really. Last night I was playing on the computer with Jeremy and all of a sudden I got a baseball sized lump show up, it was huge, and hurt. I don't remember Nicholas being this active or strong. And Nicholas was a very strong baby when he came out. My pelvis has been really sore. It feels like his head is sitting right down on the bone. I have a feeling we are going to go soon, but just hoping to hold off as long as possible. It be nice to be able to bring the baby home with out a NICU stay. I am also starting to feel a little panicked. There is a crap ton of stuff that needs done and I can't do it being stuck in bed. I haven't even packed a hospital bag yet, the babies room isn't done, we haven't washed any of the old baby close yet, or sorted even by size. Not to mention the house is getting a little behind, and we have all that freaking wood to stack. I am stating to have a bit of anxiety about all the crap I am going to have to cram into the 6 weeks of recovery time just to catch up. Jeremy can only do so much and he is working full time, and caring for himself, Nicholas and I, so there isn't much time for all the extra stuff. Hopefully some family can make it in when the baby comes, or before. That should give me a little help at least on getting some of the behind house stuff done.

Doctors appointment...

My appointment today went well. Since we are 32 Weeks now I am starting to get non stress tests. Basically they check for contractions, listen to the baby's heart and make sure he is moving around well, and measure the fluid around baby with an ultrasound to make sure it is were it needs to be. My next goal now is to make it to 34 weeks. 34 weeks is when Nicholas was born so I would consider that a huge success.

I am however starting to feel ready to deliver in the sense that I am done with being in bed all the time. My patience with being stuck in bed is running thin, but at the same time I know it is too early for the baby to come now. I guess I am just starting to get bored finally.

On a home note, we did finally get our wood stove installed completely. We have been test burning it the last few day. It is going to be great this winter. We had to do a few burns now to burn off the smell new ones have, kind of like breaking it in.

Unfortunately not all of the hard work is done, even with the stove installed. We got a really great deal on a lot of wood, only issue is, the wood needs to be stacked in the shed before it gets to be winter, and it's a lot of wood. Here is a picture and keep in mind there is already a bunch stacked in the shed.

I am hoping I will be able to help stack once the baby comes, but if I go to term it maybe too late for me to help. Unfortunately for Jeremy this means he needs to stack it all himself. It's pretty crazy, but needs to get done, but over all I think we are both happy we won't need to rely on oil heat this year. Although we may fill the tank once before the season starts to have it as a back up if needed, but I think we would almost use electric back up before oil this year. We haven't decided if we should make the investment or not yet. I am sure we will make up our minds soon. Winter weather isn't that far away.

32 Weeks and still counting...

Today is an exciting day...I am 32 weeks pregnant today! This is really a very comforting feeling. Today the baby moves into a percentage that if it came today, and lets hope it doesn't, but if it did it would have the same chance of survival as a full term baby. I feel like having a party in my room today to celebrate. I am still hoping to get at least 2-4 more weeks before he comes, but today is a big milestone. With less then 60 days until my official due date it is starting to feel a lot closer then it has. I added a tracker to the top of the page as well. My doctor told me last week if I make it to 35 weeks my medicine I am on can stop. The medicine is to stop contractions. So I have a feeling we'd have it shortly after that if we make it that far. We shall see.

Nicholas got to go visit with Thomas

Jeremy got to take Nick to see Thomas the Tank Engine at Strasburg Railroad. You can see a few pictures Jeremy put up on his blog here. You can also see some videos of it on here

31 Weeks today

Well made it another week. We are 31 weeks today. Nothing exciting going on for me. My good friends Steve and Doria are in Labor and Delivery. It looks as if her twins are coming with in the next day or two. She is 34 weeks, which isn't too bad, but I know she was really hoping to make it full term. I just want to keep them in my thoughts and prayers. The she is fine and the babies get here happy and healthy.

Check up went well.

So I am 30 weeks and 2 days today. They checked me out and I am still holding strong at 1.3cm. They also checked the baby's growth, he was in the 61.7 percentile for over all growth, and 3 pounds 12 ounces. All looked well, and they don't even want to see me again for an ultrasound at this point until mid October. I will still have weekly prenatal visits to check blood pressure and for contractions etc. It is starting to feel like we are in the home stretch. We have single digit weeks left (9) until our due date so I guess really it is getting closer. I just hope we can make it at least another month, that would get us to when Nick came and I feel comfortable things would go well at that point. Of course 2 months be better. I have a lot less anxiety and stress as each day goes on, and feel for secure each day the baby will be fine, but as with anything in life, you don't know what you will get till it's here.

30 Weeks Today!

Today I am 30 weeks pregnant, what that means is today if the baby were to come it would have the same chance of surviving as a full term, 40 week old baby. It be more likely to have other health issues, but it could possibly be fine as well. It is little to hold on to, but it is something. Every day past today is a blessing and means the baby has that much more of a chance to be healthy.

Some Random yet Adorable Pictures of my Son

We did a lot this summer...

Jeremy and I knew it was extremely likely for me to end up on bed rest again with this baby so we packed a lot of stuff into this last few months.

We went to the Baltimore Zoo with Grandma and Grandpa Shives and my cousin Tracker.

We took a day trip out to Hershey area and visited Indian Echo Caverns and Zoo America.

We took a trip to Pittsburgh and went to the Pittsburgh Zoo and the Pittsburgh Children's Museum

Nick got to play in the water area, and got to play with "trolley" from Mr. Roger's

We took another day trip out to the Strasburg railroad and Dutch Wonderland

and Nick even got to hug a Princess

We have had a really good time, and done lots of other things too. Now we just need to get his new brother here safe so we can share all these wonderful things with him too.

My Mother's Day Gift

Jeremy got me a new necklace for Mother's Day. Not something everyone knows, but when we lost Grace, the hospital gave us a memory box with a DragonFly hand painted on it, since then the dragonfly is a nice reminder of her. So I though this was very nice.

More Baby Hats

I found this really cute pattern for a baby cabled hat. I decided to make one for all the boys. The new baby to come, nick and even Jeremy. The smallest one I followed the patter for newborn size, for Nick's I use a larger yarn and needle to make it big enough for his head, and for Jeremy's (which I haven't started yet) I will use the same large yarn and needles, and just add some length so it will fit on his head.

Oh yeah, isn't he the cutes damn kid you ever seen...LOL

Nick's splippers

I made these a while back, they are felted slippers. He really enjoyed them last winter. Not sure why I never uploaded the pics. I had them.

Sue's project

Before Sue left for Florida she asked for a winter set, a head wrap, slippers and a scarf. I am done the head wrap and slippers, not sure what I want to do for the scarf yet, so haven't started it yet. But here are the slippers and headband. The slippers need felted still, but I am waiting to do that with Sue so they will shrink to the right size.

Knitting Backlog

With all this bed rest it's a good time to catch up on some things that have backlogged a bit. This was a hat I knit for Heather's new baby and it ended up being too small, more a preemie size then a newborn, so I held onto it for now.

Doing nothing can be hard.

It's amazing, we work all our lives to achieve a life a pure leisure and then then it's forced upon us it's quite a different story. I guess my case is a bit different because I have the fear to deal with. Everytime I sit up, or go to the bathroom, take a shower all I can think about is that my water might break, and the baby would come too early. If he does come early will he be okay? If I get a tickle in my throat,I dread that I might have to cough, and will it be too hard and make my water break, and forget about sneezing. When you lay in bed all day you get sore, your back, neck, hips, legs, even your feet hurt because they can swell a bit from laying. I you get so weak, turning over becomes a monumental act and you start to wonder if all this is worth it. I hate my self for questioning that. With Nicholas I was so scared I never had a chance to doubt. All I was focused on was getting him here safe. Now I have Nicholas and we are past the first danger zone for the baby it's hard to focus on anything. I am scared, and I want a healthy baby, but I can't do this again. The weird thing is I want more kids, but I think adoption will be the way we go if we do this again. We can't take this down time as a family. It's hard on all of us. Jeremy is basically a single parent right now taking care of two kids, Nicholas and me. I can't do anything by myself. Even a simple shower I need his help to get set up. He is taking care of the house, all the means, and all 3 of us. His Grandmother and Aunt Nancy came to visit the other day. It was really nice to get a visit. It helps break up the time of constant nothing. You can only watch so much TV, read so much, play games, etc before it all becomes the same thing over and over. They did bring some pre-made food which was really nice. It helps Jeremy a lot to have quick things he can just pop in the oven to feed all of us. So Wednesday will be 29 weeks. we are making progress, but it seems like the days are each a week long. Jeremy doesn't get to spend a lot of time with me, between working, cooking, cleaning, taking care of Nicholas, the house, shopping I don't really get to see him that often. It kind of depresses me, and I feel at times like he is avoiding me, but I know it's irrational. I know it's just all Te crap he needs to do in a day, but I guess being alone all day and night for weeks at a time can cause some irrational thoughts. Ok enough of my insane rambling, just glad to still be home, and making it a day at a time. Hopefully this baby will get here and be as happy and healthy as our last.

One more week down

Today is the start of our 28th week. One more week down, hopfully at least 4 more weeks to go. I have another check up this Friday so I am just praying all stays well. I feel good and I can feel the baby moving a lot. As excited as I am t get the baby here I am hoping we still have 2 more months before he shows up. I am still shooting for Halloween that would be 37 weeks and 2 days, well with in the safe time to have the baby. Only time will tell. And we'll take it a day at a time.

Preterm Labor

Well a lot has been going on since my last post. On the 8th I went into preterm labor. I went to the local Carlisle hospital. The doctors were able to stop it for a few days, but I started contacting again. My local doctor decided to move me to the bigger hospital in Harrisburg, in case the baby came early. Harrisburg has a NICU that can support a baby that was 25 weeks, and the specialist I see are also practice there. They tried a new medicine and got me to stop contracting. They felt safe sending me home on the new stuff on bed rest. I had a check up last Friday and things were looking a little worse. So they checked me again today to see how things looked and things looked better. So for now I am home on strict bed rest. I am even typing this laying down in bed. I only get up to use the rest room at this point, and once a week for a doctors visit. Today I am 27 Weeks 5 Days along. For those that may not know a normal pregnancy is considered 40 weeks. Some information I have read have said a baby "can" live as young as 24 weeks, but likely will have many issues and have a high mortality rate. At 30 weeks, the baby is just as likely to live as a full term baby, but still likely to have other issues like lung issues, etc. At 32 weeks with a good NICU many baby's will be fine, but there is still a chance of issues. By 36 weeks there is very little chance of any issue at all. So our first goal is to make it to 30 weeks. As long as I stay down on bed rest I think we can make it. I did get a chance to update our ultrasounds on youtube, the post below has the new ones showing in it already so you can access it from there. I will update more when I have any information or we make a mile stone. I may also try and update some of the knitting I been doing. Bed rest has allowed me to get some stuff in my queue done.

Baby ultrasounds...

This is all the ultrasounds from 12 weeks to current. I been updating them weekly on youtube. Enjoy! He is due November 19th 2008. We plan to name him "John Lee"

Old Video of Nicholas

Learning to walk...

12 Weeks and 1 Day...

So if you know me, you know pregnancy is not the best time for me, but one of the very nice things about having a complicated pregnancy is you get to see the little guy or girl in your tummy a lot. In addition to that, seeing super state of the art specialist has it's perks too. One of the nice things my MFM office does it give you a DVD of your Ultrasounds. Me being a computer geek of course can rip this so you all can see it too. This is our new little "lightning" (as Nicholas as named it) at 12w 1d gestation. Most of the best baby shots are near the end. Oh and if you turn your sound on you can hear the heart beat too...ENJOY! I know I did.

Hope

Does he look like me here or what?

OMG he is just too darn cute some times...

I love it!

Nos it's not just for your car any more it's an energy drink. I about feel over laughing when I seen this in the store. It's priceless, but for $3.00 a bottle it was worth it as a novelty...hehe

My Hottie of a Hubby....and the cute kid too...

Got some new pictures up to share finally...

Hat revisited

So I wanted to see how it would look if I made it just as a head wrap and not a pony tail hat with the decreased top. I used only the Cashmerino this time, in a plum and pink. This yarn has totally spoiled me, I love it's soft yet extremely warm feel, it is simply awesome.

Pony Tail Hat

Ok made my descsion here is what I got.

My Hat Delima

OK so I got this cute hat pattern from Kym, for the Maddison hat. So I decide I am going to make it with some of the awesome yarn I picked up in Tennessee when we were there, but I look over the patter and I decide I really don't like the rolled brim, so I am going to modify it a bit, hoping I have enough yarn to cover the changes. Well, I didn't so I said hey, I know my local yarn shop carries this brand of yarn so I send Jeremy out with the skein wrapper and tell him to go pick me up some. He gets there and is told we have this yarn, but not in that chunky weight, we only have the Aran, the Chunky is on back order. Now I understand why the yarn shop I got it at had it marked down to 40% off and only had one skein left. So now I am debating, do I use the aran and just double up on the strands to finish off the top, or do I g to a smaller gauge needle and knit the remaining rows, slowing down on the deceases... over all I am not sure which is going to look better. I guess I could check the yarn shop near Harrisburg, but man it is a haul for the little bit of the skein I need to finish off..Any words of Wisdom? The yarn by the way is Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Chunky

Haven't written in a while...

Well I haven't written in a while and wanted to sit down and get a chance to update this a little. The holidays were really good. I think we went a little crazy on the presents, but hey, he's an only child and we love him. We spent Christmas morning at the house with my brother Vince and my brother-in-law Doug. It was a nice time. Then we packed the family up and went to Grandma's house for Christmas dinner. Came home after dinner and opened the stuff he didn't get to open before we left. He opened one gift and was done, he just wanted to play with that. We then went down to Tennessee to send a week with Jer's mom and sisters. It was a nice visit, we ended u staying two weeks however because me and the baby got sick and who wants to do a 10+ hour drive with a sick baby and mommy... I know Jeremy didn't. While we were down there I got to go to a nice yarn shop called Imagiknit, and we took Jeremy to the Jack Daniels Distillery. It was a very nice tour. It's free and takes 1 hour, if you are in the area I highly recommend it, it was a lot of fun. The tour guide we had was great. Did you know the employees get a free pint each month as a perk for working there? And at any time they can have nearly 75 million gallons on site. Also it's funny the distillery is in a dry county, but they do sell bottles in the gift shop. We got Jeremy 2 differnet bottles.

(We are down on the bottom right)

Jack Daniels has a funny history in our past so it was a nice trip for us. I been knitting a little too, I made some snow boot socks for the baby. He really loved this yellow yarn in my stash, and kept pulling it out and playing with it, yellow is also one of the colors he can say when he reconizes it, so I figured I'd make him some long socks to go with his snow boots (if it ever snows) They turned out since and he really seems to like them. He wore then around the house and broke them in a little.

Over all things have been good, still missing my dad a lot but I feel a more like my old self again. I been focusing on losing some weight so Jeremy and I can start trying for another baby. We will see...

Stolen

This was stolen from a friends blog, but just too darn funny not to share...lol