We made it!

The baby can come anytime now!  It is safe.  She will be able to breath all by herself without assistance!  Whan an accomplishment for her!  I'm hoping she comes sooner rather than later...  Trevor is taking time off starting Oct. 1st, and we really dont want him sitting home with no baby!  He had a chat with her this morning and told her to come out today!  I told her to stay in a little longer because I have a very messy house (we cleaned out the garage and brought everything inside that needed to be...I just have to finish unpacking it all), I need to find the connector to fill the birth pool, and we have some tinctures to get yet (Trevor's only hesitation about a home birth was that he wouldn't have access to his drugs...so I did some research and found some herbs that will do the same things as his drugs will do...stop excessive bleeding, etc.).  Last night I had lots of Braxton Hicks... four of them in about twenty minutes, then the peetered out and this morning I'm still having them once in a while....  So I think we're getting close!!!  I'm guessing three weeks.  She is still up pretty high, needs to rotate a little to the right as she is still in LOP position.

Today we are going to pick out a birthday outfit for her.  I have an outfit that, if it fits (it is for up to 3 months), will work really nice if SHE is actually a HE.  :)  But we dont have anything that looks like girl.  And since Trevor is being so agreeable today (he put a hualt to my baby clothes buying about 3 weeks ago), I figured today is as good a day as any.  Maybe I can talk him into a back up boy outfit in a smaller size!

I'll update tomorrow with some bump pictures!  Have a great day!

Time is Flying

Wow.  I cant beleive we're over halfway through August already and I haven't posted anything.  We just got internet in our new place today.  It is still a mess or I'd take and post some pictures.  It is pretty nice, even Trevor agrees, and he is hard to please... housing-wise atleast!  ;)

We ended up signing a 6 month lease on a one bedroom that comes with a garage.  We're not planning on staying long.... we're ready to buy a house.  Hopefully by the end of our lease agreement, we'll have saved the other half of our house fund (we're anticipating whatever we buy to need immediate repairs...roof, flooring, etc).  Moving was a little crazy.  My poor little car was packed to the brim (suprising how much it can haul) for many trips to Portland.  Thankfully moving expenses are tax deductible, because our gas bill for the month was outrageous.  Our next move we're renting a giant U-Haul and making one trip!

Gotta get some dinner going, but here's a quick update on the baby.
She weighs aprox. 5.5lbs, and is over 20" long (this is average of all babies born at this time, not necessarily OUR baby).  She's just sitting in there developing her brain and lungs and putting on the ounces!  Her favorite thing to do is get up under my ribs and make it so I can hardly breath.  Her second favorite thing is to lodge her heel at my rib and push.  Not a pleasant feeling! 

More later!

32 Weeks!

Baby:  YAY!  We've finally reached the point where we will make efforts to save the baby if she is born early.  Before this point, we didn't feel that she would have a "life" if we attempted to saved her and were successful.  Now, she may or may not be able to breath on her own, but would probably have difficulties and require oxygen as she is just starting to get surfactant in her lungs.  She would probably be able to suck, meaning she could nurse rather than having a feeding tube.  Because her liver is so under developed at this point, she would need to be under special lights to help her body process the Bilirubin (Jaundice) to prevent mental retardation.  She has a minimum of 5 more weeks before she can make her entrance and most likely be OK.  At this time, she weighs over 4lbs and measures about 18 inches.
Moving:  Trevor got a new job in Hillsboro a couple of weeks ago.  He gave over two weeks notice at his current job, and we gave our 30 days notice on our duplex.    He has worked up there three days so far, and I hunted for a place for us to live.  The first two days I had ZERO for luck.  Everywhere was either full and only had 2 bedrooms for super expensive and required a 12 month lease, or had rather expensive 1 bedrooms and charged $50-100/month extra to do anything shorter than a 12 month lease.  Yesterday, however, I widened my search radius to include Beaverton, and found two places with rent in the $600 range and 1 month free if we sign a 12 month lease!  To break the lease, they charge 1.5 times one month's rent, so really, we'd only have to pay an extra $300 or so to move out if we couldn't find someone to take over the lease.  Also, both of these places have pools!  Sunday, I'll show Trevor and let him decide!  We will be moving in the morning of the 7th because Trevor works the following three days in a row, but we dont have to be out of our duplex until the 12th, giving me plenty of time to put the non-essentials in a storage unit and clean so we get our deposit back.

Update

Lets see....

N. Umpqua Fishing Trip
We went fishing up the North Umpqua.  Trevor had never been fly fishing and got a bite on his very first cast.  The second cast he caught this fish:

And a few casts later he caught this fish:

He fished the remainder of the day, at three different spots along the river but didn't catch anything else.

Job Hunt

Trevor got the job with Metro West Ambulance in Hillsboro.  He has decided he is not going to work both jobs, so I have been packing our house.  We plan to put everything in storage except the essentials, and find something cheap to rent in Hillsboro or Beaverton until we can find something more permanant.  Right now, there is only one house on the Good Neighbor Next Door Program list and it would take Trevor over 40 minutes to get to work....  So, we wait.  So far, Trevor really likes the job, and LOVES getting EMERGENCY calls!  He will continue his current job through the end of the month, then is on the schedule for August with Metro West.

Baby

The baby has been moving around a lot.  Not many kicks but TONS of stretching and buldging.  Her heart beat was 140bpm (138bpm last month), and she is still measuring about two weeks ahead.  Her fingernails have reached the end of her fingers now, and it's possible for her to scratch herself... poor thing!  We have one more week until she is developed enough that we will try to save her if she is born early, but she really, really, needs to wait annother month and a half to have no problems.  She is about 17" long and weighs about 3.5lbs.

Here are some bump pictures:

30 Weeks

And I finally figured out how to set the self timmer on my camera, so these should be much clearer from now on!

31 Weeks

Here is the Belly Map from today:

And here is the interpretation of it:

If the interpretation is correct, she is Left Occiput Posterior.  She has flipped, but is not in the best position for birth.  There some exercises I will do to help her face backwards closer to birth.

3 WEEKS!!!!!!!

WOW!  I cannot beleive it has been three weeks since I posted on here!  Time sure does fly when stuff's a happen'.

Lets see....

Briana's Graduation party went well, we had pizza and of course cake (dont worry I didn't eat the frosting...it had High Fructose Corn Syrup - why does everything have to have that stuff in it?).  She got her quilt finally.  :) which she was pretty happy over...unfortunately, I forgot my camer and dont have any pictures of it finished to post.  Today is my Mom's Birthday (HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!!!) so I'll be going over and will take a picture then.

We took a trip to Roseburg for Trevor's Job Hunt.  Eighty-one people were invited to take the Physical Agility Test, 60 showed up for it and only 30 passed.  Those 30, including Trevor, then went and took the Written Test, which Trevor did awesome on and now has an interview!  We also stopped at the Umpqua Dam.  Trevor had never been there and enjoyed seeing the fish!

We went to the lake this past weekend, and I ended up sewing a swim suit top because all the "Tankini" style ones are waaaaaay to short to cover the bump.  It worked well, but I think it will be too tight across my belly in about 3 weeks, so I'll have to make annother, or break down and pay $35 for a "Maternity" swim suit top.  Old Navy has them a little cheaper than that online, but I like to try things on and they're conveiniently NOT available in the store!  Ugh.  To the left is a picture of the ONLY fish Trevor has caught this summer.  Mom was also the first person to ski, but I only have a video and cant figure out how to put that on here (which I"m sure she doesn't mind!).

We went fishing the other day to Cottage Grove Lake.  Trevor caught Nothing.  He wasn't a very happy fisherman.  Plus the wind came up and blew the boat into shore after each cast.  Next time we think we'll go in the evening.  We know there are fish in there because we saw a huge dead bass.  It was huge.  And just floating there with its eyeballs all puffed out.  Yuck!  We finally left the lake, and got some very late lunch at Arby's where I had a Ruben (YUM), and we lucked out with the DMV being right across the parkinglot (Trevor needed a copy of his driving record for a job he's applying for).  Never again will I go to a Eugene or Springfield DMV.  I'll spend less time driving down to Cottage Grove, having our number called before we even have a chance to sit down, and driving back home, than I would if I just went to the DMV up here!  WOW!

Yesterday, we went to Hillsboro for an interview with an Ambulance Company.  They're hiring 1-6 of the six they interviewed...depending on who they like.  Trevor HATES Portland, and would be getting paid less if he takes the job, so I'm not sure what will happen with that.  However, it is EMERGENCY, which is the issue with where he's at now (not emergency), and he really wants emergency, so the draw to it is pretty strong.  He thinks he can continue to work where he is and drive up there to work that job too.  I dont want that because he already works 48 or 72 hours every week, add to that annother 40 hours in Hillsboro and 12-16 of driving every week and we will literally NEVER see each other.  I told him we could put everything in storage and get a studio apt. or something and just "stay" up there rather than "live" up there....  The traffic was pretty bad (I thought the closer you got to California the worse they drove, apparently, Portland is the exception), and the rodes are so close together we turned several times where the GPS told us to turn then it ended up being the wrong rode and had to "Recalculate" us with it's attitude it gets (both Trevor and I think it has an attitude with it says "Recalculating!"), didn't help that we ended up getting on the high way instead of taking the rode NEXT to the highway, where we proceeded to sit while we waited for the all the cars in front of us to get the green light to get off the on ramp and onto the high way...  I really dont like those things, but I think maybe River Road and Delta Highway in Eugene need them!  Might keep Beltline flowing a little better!

Baby Update:

And here's what you've all been waiting for!  :)

Our baby will start to vary now from the average as the average is just that.  A computation of all babies' statistics at this point in pregnancy, some weight less and/or are shorter, and some more and/or longer.  But, she now weighs about a little under 3lbs, and is nearly 17" long!  She'll continue to put on the pounds for about 7 more weeks (when she is more than welcome to come out), then she'll slow down considerably (and we try to wait with patience for her to come out).

She blinks her eyes, and can see lightness and darkness (I put my tummy in the sun while we were fishing and she squirmed all over the place!).  She knows my voice and most likely knows Trevor's voice.  Funny thing is, when we're (baby and I) are around other people, she hardly moves at all... maybe she is listening?!!??!  She is still giving Trevor a hard time.  Everytime I tell him she is moving so he can feel, she stops moving when he has his hand on my stomach, then as soon as he gives up, she starts moving again.  However, if he lays his head on my stomach, she has no problem kicking him in the face!  Poor Daddy!  He says it's ok, she wont be able to avoid him much longer, but I still feel bad for him.

Also, this past week I've been noticing some Braxton Hicks.  They're really strange.  I think I've been getting them for a while (you're supposed to start getting them some time in the 2nd semester, but some people dont notice them), but didn't realize that's what it was.  Some times my tummy just felt uncomfy and "tired."  Now that my tummy is bigger, I've noticed it gets very hard when it feels uncomfortable.  I've also noticed they go away much faster if I sit down and rub it.

Found the cord to connect my camer to the computer...it was in my camera case... so here's the bumb @ 29 Weeks!

Baby

Today marks the start of week 26 and I thought I'd write something about what the baby has been up to.  We're going on four days of TONS of movement.  Before it would move alot and then have a day or two where it was pretty quiet.  However, it ALWAYS moves around in the morning.  I dont wake up from it (I wake up from starving to death), but the days I've been awake early, movement has gone from around 6:30 to about 9.  The last few days have been near constant movement all day long!  Maybe she's just running out of room and I feel all of them now?

Anyways, she now has nearly completely developed blue eyes, and they will open this week.  Her nails are growing, and the blood vessels in her lungs are beging to grow.  Alot of growing still left to do, but if she were born now, she'd have a 70% chance of making it....of course she'd be immobile with drool running down the side of her face for the rest of her life if we tried to save her, so she can just stay in there until atleast September 2nd, when it is safe for her to come out.  So far, no Braxton Hix contractions so atleast the baby and my body are in agreement that she should stay in there longer, however she has been measureing about 1-2 weeks ahead.  I'll start the Raspberry Leaf Tea in a couple of weeks though.

It looks like it has been a while since I've posted any Bump pictures so here ya go!

Almost 23 weeks... laying down.

About 24 weeks.

Almost 26 weeks.  FYI - That shirt is size LARGE!  And I'm having a terrible time finding maternity pants that fit.  Finally found those ones at Ross - they're super comfy, but the lack of a butt makes it so I have to pull them up quite a bit.  I was really hoping I'd get a butt out of this!

Same day - 26wks - laying down.

1 Pound!

According to several "fun" websites, the baby now weighs about 1 pound, and is aproximately 11 inches long.  The enamel is forming on its teeth and the air sacs in its lungs are growing.  We will begin to gain weight rappidly now, the baby gaining an entire pound, and me about five over the next month!