Momma's Comin' to Town

My mom is coming to visit on Tuesday and I am so excited! But why is it that whenever my mom, or dad for that matter, comes I seem to have a to do list for them?! This time I feel worse because I'm going to have to sit back and watch her work instead of doing it with her. I feel lucky to have such capable parents, and hopefully I will pay them back by giving them a beautiful grandchild. :)

She's going to cook (and freeze extras), organize, shop, decorate, sew and give me lots of chat time. Can't wait to see you mom and I will try not to work you too hard!

Another Belly Shot

30 Weeks!

I am so happy that I made it to the thirty week mark. A couple weeks ago my cervix length shortened a little more so I was put on stricter bed rest, meaning more laying rather than sitting. It's kind of a bummer but these past couple weeks things have held steady so it's worth it. I was told a normal cervix length was around 5 cm and mine was 1.8 cm, so I understand the concern. Just 6 or 7 more weeks until the stitches come out and I will have freedom! Well, for about a week until I go into labor. I have big plans for that week though, mostly having to do with organizing and shopping. I will be too huge for the beach, which is where I wish I could be every day.

By the way, I am holding the top shirt up and showing the tighter shade shirt because it is a little flowy and Chris said it hid my belly too much. I'm not just being weird...intentionally. :)

So I made a goal that my next post would not be about pregnancy or babies. It's just that all I do is lay around so there is not a whole lot to share unless you want to hear what I am watching or reading. (Watching: lots of World Cup soccer, Reading: Enders Game). I will be more interesting soon I hope.

They're Just Dreams, Right?

Why is it that during daylight hours I am confident I can be a good mom, but while I am asleep, I am the worst mom ever? I have been having the weirdest dreams lately, with last night being no exception.

I believe it started with me having the baby but having no memory of having had the baby. I couldn't remember my labor, delivery, how much she weighed...or her name! I remember being very concerned that I didn't know her weight. Maybe because I have been willing her to grow fast since I'm in a high risk pregnancy. Someone in my dream asked me her name and I had to think about it. Then I called her Aubrey. Chris and I have been planning on calling her Lila for months now!

Next in my dream, I was holding her and looked down to see that she was wearing a white onesie and was horrified at myself for not putting her in a cute outfit. This actually does make sense since I have been fantasizing about dressing this little girl ever since I found out the gender. The part that doesn't make sense is that in the process of trying to dress her (in a Christmas outfit, no less) I dropped her three times! I have never dropped a child! She didn't cry in my dream but I did look around to make sure no one saw me do it.

The last more coherent thing I remember from my dream is that I realized I hadn't fed her yet. Since I couldn't remember when she was born, I didn't know how long it had been since she had eaten but I knew it had been a while. I tried to breast feed her but had no idea what I was doing and didn't know if she was getting anything or not.

I woke up numerous times last night very upset and kept having to remind myself that they are only dreams! It is just so strange to me because I am not nervous (yet) about when she comes nor about my or Chris's abilities. Maybe my subconscious is having a little fun with me or something. Hopefully I will remember my child's name, dress her in appropriate clothing, NOT drop her, and be able to feed her! I am crossing my fingers for these dreams to end.

I really will take care of you little one, I promise! Just look at all the cute clothes waiting to be worn by your cuteness!

(Most of these clothes are courtesy of my awesome sister who happens to have a little girl of her own!) I can't wait until Chris finishes clearing out the office, soon to be nursery, so I can hang up all of these adorable clothes!

26 weeks

I've been promising my family an updated pregnant photo. It's not my favorite picture, but oh well. Apparently I look a lot more pregnant when I look down at myself than in this picture. I really do have a bump though! Everything is going well on this little adventure known as bed rest. I have weekly appointments which is a pain, but at least I get to hear the heartbeat every week and see her in a sono every other week. Last time she was sucking on her little hands and that was so fun to watch. My cerclage is holding well and she is the right size and all that jazz.

You may have noticed my little countdown on the side. We did decide on Lila for her name and love it, so if you don't, don't tell me! :) I waited until now to do a countdown because I didn't think I could stand seeing so many days left in the beginning. Now it is under 100 days and should be less because I get the cerclage out at 37 weeks and am SUPPOSED to start labor soon after that. I am hoping these doctors are right about that! Right now though we celebrate each week Lila stays in there and even though we are anxious to meet her, we hope she decides to make her appearance after the 37 week mark.

Greatest Gift!

Right now I am laying on my bed while my house is being cleaned for me! It feels soooo good to have a clean house! Since my parents live too far away to help while I am on bed rest, they really wanted to do something. They are making sure my house gets cleaned so I don't go crazy staring at the dust, etc... and can't do anything about it. Now I won't be embarrassed when people come visit me. It feels really weird to lay down while other people clean but this has to be one of the greatest gifts ever. Thanks mom and dad!

Update

After my first week of bed rest I was given the okay to go back to work. I was so excited and was actually super careful to sit and teach and have the kids grab stuff for me. I also had other teachers walk them to lunch, art, pe, and music. Despite my best efforts, I only lasted two days until there was bleeding. It freaked me out and I got myself to the doctor only to hear that I was back on bed rest and done teaching for the rest of the year. I was grateful the baby was fine and nothing looked worse, probably just irritated, but I was so hoping to finish out the year.

I have come to terms with it though, and now have lots of time to catch up on blogging. Here are pictures from camp (pre bed rest) and a baby shower my work threw me and a co worker.

I was in charge of crafts this year for our girls camp and it was pretty fun. The first day we made headbands. I had the basic plastic headbands for each girl then they had tons of stuff to decorate them with. Think fake flowers, fabric, ribbon, felt, sequins, gems, butterfly, heart, and dragonfly embelishments, and tons more.

This cute girl decided to sew together two ribbons by hand and she was there forever! She then glued it on her headband and it was super cute!

All the hot glue guns taped to a long wall.

The next day we made boards. The boards were cut and painted before camp. Using one of those cricket machines a lady cut out laminate patterns for me that would go on the board then allow for the girls to pick out the outline of the letters from the laminate. Then they painted over what was left, peeled off the remaining laminate and were left with our camp theme. After, they could decorate the boards with embelishments. It was great in theory but the letters turned out to be extremely hard to pick out! The machine didn't cut through the laminate like it should have and it was a little hectic. I had lots of leaders that helped in a pinch though, and we were able to get a lot of it picked out for the girls before they rotated to me.

On the third day the girls switched off between making friendship bracelets and painting these tiles that we had helped lay down as a service project. I was over the tiles so I don't have pictures of the bracelets. The girls were very creative!

Here is my first baby shower! My second grade team threw it for me and another second grade teacher who is getting married. They were very creative in how they put the two themes together. There was food, games, presents, cake, and cute decorations. I got tons of great stuff for our baby girl and can't wait to put it all to use.

This is my, "Oh this is soooo cute!" face. Which I now see is not so cute!

This is my friend and suite mate Melissa who did most of the work for my shower. She is also taking on a lot of work to help my sub while I am gone. I don't know what I or my students would do without her.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

It has been an interesting past week for us in the Harris household. It started with me going to YW camp to do crafts with all the girls. That went great and I even was proud of all my walking and lifting to stay in shape during pregnancy.

Then I had a doctor's appointment on Friday that did not go quite as planned. The good: We are indeed having a baby girl (as was confirmed multiple times for us over the weekend), she is healthy and the right size for the 20 week point, all looks good on that front. The bad: the tech notices that baby girls hand is waving around way lower than it should be in my cervix. The ugly: The doctor comes in and confirms that I have an incompetent cervix (a term Chris keeps laughing at. Yes, my cervix is incompetent, honey.) I am told to go straight to the hospital where there will be a doctor waiting to further examine me and decide how bad it is.

The good: My sister had the same thing so I called her right away for some advice and explanations. The bad: The doctor says the membranes that line the cervix and help keep the baby in have slid all the way down to the opening of the cervix and if I had let it go for probably even a few more days, the membranes would have slid out or burst and I would have gone into labor. More good: they caught this in time, baby girl is still in my belly, they say I am a good candidate for a cerclage (stitches to close the top of my cervix and hold the baby in). The ugly: I get to stay in the hospital tilted backwards to let the membranes slide back, I get to experience a spinal (like an epidural but with complete numbing power), I get to be stitched up and put on complete bed rest for at least a week until I have a check up on Friday and they decide how i'm doing.

The good: Everything went really well, I have amazing family members and friends who have been taking great care of me, since they caught this in time I may have some limited mobility soon. The bad, let's face it, and the ugly: My poor students have a sub all week and maybe longer, in fact maybe for the rest of the year, I probably won't be able to take my trip to California this summer like planned, I can no longer try to be active to keep off as much of the oncoming baby weight as possible, I cannot follow through on the big plans I had to organize, clean, and put back together my house including the nursery.

Looking on the bright side: I cannot describe how grateful Chris and I are that we still have this baby girl growing healthy and strong and for the technology around us that saved her. I am forever grateful for a husband who stayed with me the whole time in the hospital and was positive and attentive and very loving. I have family who has offered to jump on a plane to come help me at any time. Especially my mom who has already volunteered herself to organize and paint my nursery and anything else in my house. And for a loving Heavenly Father who answered all our desperate prayers. I will take all the bad and the ugly to meet this girl in late summer. Let's hope this is all the drama she has to offer for a while.