Counting Down

When I was pregnant with Brizzy, the last few weeks I walked around singing, "It's the final countdown!"  (I watched a lot of arrested development during that pregnancy).  And since then, whenever I get to the end of pregnancy, I can't get that song out of my head.

Here I am at 34 weeks.  When I text this pic to my family they told me I didn't look very big.  But trust me, when you've seen me waddle it takes on a whole new effect.  I  am waddling like I've never waddled before, and it makes the belly grow about 5 times in size.  Besides the fact that my face and hands are pretty swollen now.  It's not pretty.

My wonderful ward threw me a baby shower.  I don't normally love baby showers because I don't like opening up presents in front of everyone.  But it was SO fun.  It was very low key which I love, and my friend Annette made these adorable cookies for me to bring home.  The food was SO good and I got so many amazing, cool presents.  It really helped me get excited for the baby and have a desire to get stuff together.  I felt like I didn't really need one, but I'm glad they forced me to have one because it allowed me to have some new things for just her.

I came home and opened all of my presents and spent the next two days getting all my baby crap together.  I of course couldn't walk the three days after that, but it was worth it.  We have this little room just off of our master; its the absolute perfect spot because she will be close but will still have her own space.  Nick and I keep joking to each other, "Why have we ever taken up a whole room for  a baby before!"

 Briz is getting ready.  She has a constant countdown going.   First on the countdown is how much time left in preschool, categorized by both days and weeks.  And then a much lesser priority on her countdown is how many days/weeks until the baby comes. She made a special necklace for her baby sister to wear post delivery.  And yes, it does say, "Club Glitz" on the bottom.  Perfect.

This is me at 35 weeks.  The last couple weeks have become even more miserable.  I started getting migraines about every other day, and am constantly throwing up because of my severe heartburn.  I am itching of course, and sleep usually not more than about 5 hours at night.  I pee about 20 minutes and I struggle walking, standing, sitting, pretty much all of it.  She is headbutting and punching me in the cervix fairly often which is one of the most painful things ever.  I randomly start screaming and it definitely has led to some awkward moments.  But its amazing how getting close to the end makes it feel bearable.  It helps that Nick and Briz make me laugh all of the time.  I am trying to soak up the one thing I love about pregnancy which is this baby's crazy ninja moves inside of me.  She is a hype I can tell, and while her kicking hurts me, I love to just sit and watch her be a maniac.  

I had my ultrasound yesterday and discovered that the placenta has moved slightly but still not enough, so C section here we come!  June 10th at 7:30 a.m. they will be slicing me open and pulling my little girl out (Nick has requested to help with surgery, what a weirdo). I was really hoping I could do a regular birth, but I am just so excited to meet her that I'm not sure how much I care. at this point (I may have a different perspective after delivery when I can't do the things I want to do ).  I am constantly daydreaming about her, holding her, kissing her, figuring our her cries.   This little girl's arrival has been highly anticipated  and she has so many wonderful people that will love her.  We can't wait for her to join our family!  

Putting Briz to Work

Briz was so excited to turn 5.  She talks about when she was 4 like it was ancient history.  One of my favorite things about her getting older is using it against her . . ."Oh well five year olds know how to do that."  She usually responds with a surprised, "Really?"  But either way she totally believes  Nick and I and feels like she has a challenge to rise to.   I will be sad when the day comes that she doesn't believe everything I say.

She thought the idea of cleaning my car was so great!  Until she started.  She cleaned about 1/3 of it and then gave up.

We are working really hard over the last few months on being more clean.  We have designated clean up time every morning where I set the timer and turn on music.  After trying  a few different strategies this one for sure works the best.  But she still loves having me around, even if I'm not doing anything.  Here we are learning how to match and fold socks.  We are starting to work on tying shoes, mostly because my big belly gets in the way of me trying to bend over and tie them.

Love how proud of herself she gets when she does something little.

This girl has been playing extremely hard and working hard.  She is playing all of the time over at friends houses.  She is wiped out a lot.

But never too tired to pose for a picture.

She has a few more weeks of tennis.  I  bought her a Nike tennis skirt so she always talks about how we're twins.  She is a decent little tennis player, when she wants to try, that is.  She loves to talk about playing tennis with Grandma Julie this summer.

Briz lately, I swear, has turned into a little pre teen.  Her favorite things to say are, "Seriously?!" (think teenage girl with the influx) and "What the!!!!"  all of the time.  A lot of  "Are you for real" and "like,"  A couple weeks ago I was ready to lock her in her room for a few days because she constantly had an attitude. I would ask her to do something and she started mumbling things under her breath as she talked back.  Yes  I know, this is slightly concerning.

But most of the time we have fun together.  I love how excited she gets about the baby coming.  She is very specific about not wanting to see blood or any kind of gross substance on the baby.  She only wants to see her after she has taken a bath :)  But she talks all of the time about all of the ways she is going to help with her sister.  Even when Briz is being a stinker she gives me and my belly constant hugs and kisses and tells me about ten times every day how much she loves me.   

Flippin' Funny

This is one of my favorite videos.  I laughed so hard I peed myself (not hard to do these days).

Mother's Day

I had a wonderful mothers day.  Friday night Nick and I went out on a date.  He asked me where I wanted to go, and I adamantly chose Burgerville.  I am trying to justify as many greasy hamburgers as possible before pregnancy ends.  Plus they now have their fresh strawberry shakes which are better than anything in the whole world!  

Nick asked me what I wanted for mothers day and I said sleep.  I have started taking on the sleeping patterns of mom to infant.  I sleep about four hours at night and then take a nap during the day.  I can't fall asleep until really late because of the itching, but once I'm up I can't seem to sleep more.  So I wanted to at least try to be able to sleep without Briz constantly interrupting me.  Didn't work out so well on the morning of mothers day because Briz was SO excited to bring me breakfast in bed way too early.  I was pissed and had to pretend that I liked it.  I was grumpy until I experienced a mothers day miracle and went back down a bit later for a great nap.  Hallelujah!

After church, we went to visit Holland's grave.  It was a beautiful afternoon, and it was nice just being there together as a family.  

Nick was wonderful.  He cleaned and cooked and got everything ready for Briz.  He made me a delicious dinner of German pancakes, fresh berries, and bacon.  I've never enjoyed a meal more in my life.  

Mothers Day is an interesting day because motherhood is a complicated thing.  Motherhood entails a lot of sadness, heartache, frustration, and as I currently think of right now, physical sacrifice.   I felt gratitude for being a mother, but also for just all of the wonderful women I know, kids or no kids.  Today, I felt blessed to be a woman (which was a rare occurrence these days). 

Baby Pains

Warning: big bare belly showing!

I had my highly anticipated doctors appointment this last week.  The ultrasound was so fun.  This little one continues to amaze me at how strong she is.  We got to see her from a lot of different angles.  She loves to move nonstop.  We saw her blowing bubbles and practicing her breathing rather intensely.  She was really working hard at her breathing.  We could see a lot of hair on her head.  She loved putting her little hand on her forehead and kicking me in the ribs.  

I got conflicting results back on the ultrasound: doctor told me the placenta had moved slightly and the technician told me it was the exact same as last time after pulling up last time's ultrasound.  Either way, I have a little bit of hope of delivering vaginally.  It's probably still slim but it would be so nice to have a quicker recovery!  Either way, I am so excited to meet this little mover and shaker. Can't wait to hold her and give her nonstop kisses.

In the meantime, my doctor told me to quit working which I was not excited about.  I had to spend some time at the hospital last week to be monitored and get some shots for contractions.  When I get hooked up to the NST machine, it really is deja-vou from previous pregnancies.  Its nice to know she is healthy but I get a little annoyed just hanging around when it doesn't seem necessary.  The contractions have subsided  a bit however and that has helped.

I was also glad I got a chance to go to the hospital before labor.  It was sort of surprising how hard it was for me to be there, but the last time I was there was when I was delivering Holland, so after the fact, it made a lot of sense.  It all came rushing back and I felt overwhelmed with grief.   So I am glad I had a chance to deal with that before actually delivering.  I am very nervous about it all still but those hormones are kicking in and helping me feel ready.     

Sunny Days

We've had some sporadic nice weather lately.  It makes me excited for when I can walk for more than 20 minutes!  But in the meantime, we are trying to do fun simple things.

Decided to start Briz on golfing this summer.  We have practiced a bit in our front yard and she is way more into it than I expected.  She gets very focused and spends a lot of time trying to get the ball in the hole.  Might help if we mowed our lawn :)

I love it that she still loves bubbles.  Cheapest and easiest form of entertainment in the sunshine.  I hope she likes bubbles until she is 16.  That's realistic right?

We signed up for the Lake Oswego Lake Run.  And when I say we, I mean Nick and Briz.  I was jealous until I heard how hard the 10k was.  I felt like I got a good enough workout just walking to the finish line.  I was definitely doing my own huffing and puffing and sweating!  I admittedly sort of like freaking people out when they see.  Most places I go people look at me very concerned as if I am about to drop a baby right there.

Nick is a maniac and doesn't train at all.  I am excited for him because he gets to run in two Epic Relays this summer.  He has spent so long working at them, but now he gets to enjoy them.  It will be fun next year when we can run in them together!

The Papworths joined us at the Lake Run.  Briz was a little brokenhearted when she realized that her Dad is not the fastest in the world.   Michael is a running fool.

In between the 10k and the Kids Dash, they had a festival, or as Briz pronounced it, a "Vestibal."  They got balloon animals, face painting, blow up slides, dance party, etc.  

Here they are attempting to pose with their face painting, but they just look like they are in pain.

Getting pumped at the start of the race.  Briz and Ella started out holding hands.

This race was a bit wimpy, it was like 4 blocks of running.  But I was still surprised at how focused Briz was.  I had to prep her before that she wasn't going to win (cause I didn't want to deal with a meltdown afterwards), but she seemed to understand.  Even still, she booked it.  I think she was like the third or fourth kid to finish out of a lot.  Maybe she does have Nick's genes after all.

She wanted a medal, but had to settle for a lousy ribbon.

Here Briz is doing some outdoor painting with some homemade paints.  I love how she wants to be my helper most of the time.  She was getting really frustrated when her painting wasn't as neat as she would have liked, so we worked on doing "messy painting"  with this activity.

Love the sunshine!  Will love it even more in a month or two when this big baby is out of me.

Crazy Crazy Crazy

Nick went out of town last weekend to go backpacking and fishing with friends.  I was so jealous but also so glad that he got to go do something fun.  He has been working a ton and he has a crazy pregnant wife, so it was good for him to get a break.  In the meantime, I was getting a little anxious about the weekend.  It was supposed to be crappy weather and I didn't know how I was going to entertain Briz all weekend by myself.  So I decided I needed to get out of my house before I lost my mind.  Briz and I took a weekend trip up to Seattle.

I picked Briz up early for school.  But I got there just in time to see her summer water party.  I have been letting Briz do a lot of things on her own lately. So most days she picks out her own outfits and gets her backpack ready for school.  She loves swimsuit from Grandma Julie and decided to bring the whole ensemble to school, hat included.  I kept giggling at this hat. 

She is very dramatic when she plays in the water.  She flips her hair into the sprinklers as you can see.

It was so fun to see these kid Hugh kids.  Perhaps the best part though was eating at Cafe Rio!  Yeah!  

I love Palmers goofy face in this picture.  What a funny kid.

I hadn't seen Thatcher since Christmas, and I was happy to be able to be there for his first birthday.  He is the cutest kid ever!  Briz said, "He is the cutest baby in the whole world.  For reals Mom."  I asked her if she thought her baby sister would be as cute and she said, "No, cause Thatcher is the cutest baby forever."  This is most likely a true statement.  

He was not overly excited about his cupcake.  He was a little disturbed when I dipped his finger in the frosting and then even more so when the cupcake fell on his lap.  He liked the cake part of it, as long as someone fed it to him.

These girls loved playing with each other.  While I don't have to deal with sibling fighting, I am so jealous of how they will just go play.  Makes me sad Briz doesn't have that.  But so glad she has cousins for that.

We went to church with them on Sunday and go to hear Bri teach gospel doctrine.  I was excited to go to gospel doctrine and relief society.  Its nice to have adult interaction at church every once in a while.

So glad we could make a quick drive and see these silly cousins.  Saved me from a weekend of insanity and of course Briz has the time of her life.

My Five Year Old

I never thought I would be the kind of mom that got sad when her kids got older.  But I was wrong.  I'm sure a lot of it has to do with the fact that I am pregnant and emotional, but the night before Briz turned five, I had a good cry.  Nick and I always joke with Briz that she isn't allowed to get any older than four, but she responds with a sassy, "Sorry, but I'm gonna!"  I just love this sweet little girl who wants to cuddle and kiss me all of the time.  It makes me sad to know that won't last much longer.

We celebrated her birthday twice.  The weekend before, Aunt Brittany came to visit, so we got to do some fun birthday stuff.  Brittany picked her up early from school and took her to Chuck E Cheese, and then to get ice cream.  

On Saturday, we all went out to lunch at Canyon Grill.  It was my first time and holy cow, the shakes there are amazing!

Then Saturday evening we went cosmic bowling.  While we were waiting for friends, Briz played some arcade games with Brittany and Dad.

 Briz loves skiball.  She is pretty serious about her arcade games (hmm wonder where she gets that from).  But she was struggling a little bit, and I could not stop laughing.

The bowling commenced and it was fun to be with friends and watch the kids get excited.  Ella kept screaming, "You got a touchdown?!" (of course translating to strike).

Briz, however, had no nap and was a little poop.  I also think she was mad that she wasn't doing better at bowling. 

Piper was the real champ.  She dominated.  In fact, I think Piper beat her mom's score.

We then went back to our place for pizza, cake, and a couple presents.  Briz was quite generously offering for her friends to help her take turns opening her presents.    Nick and I have started calling her Monica, "Rules are good!  They help control the fun."

She got to open the present from Pops and Grandma Julie, and she was a little excited.

Ella was smart enough to run off with Anna the second it was opened.  We were all laughing pretty hard.  Sorry Briz, you snooze you lose.

Dad got Briz this rainbow butterfly birthday cake.  Nick did pretty much everything that day.  Briz loved her cake.  Rainbows and butterflies!  Doesn't get much better than that.

The day of her birthday Briz had school.  Nick woke her up with breakfast in bed, which is her favorite.

We came to her school for a little birthday celebration.  They sang to her, we had popsicles, and then all of the kids painted flowers (at Brizzy's request).

We ditched out of school early and I took Briz to get a pedicure/manicure.  This is not something I thought I would ever do with her, but I am big and pregnant and in pain, so it sounded like a good idea.  Plus, I kind of like that Briz is girly.  It makes me more girly.

She of course picked out all sparkly nail polish, and she was thrilled that they even put a flower design over.

After that, we went to dinner at IHOP.  Kids eat free Wednesday nights and she loves pancakes more than anything else, so it was an easy choice.

We came home, opened a few presents.  The two that we got her were boring (an alarm clock and a math game).  But she got some more frozen dolls from Papa and Nona.  She is now in heaven with all of her frozen dolls.

I felt a little guilty before not throwing her a party with her friends, but she felt loved and special and that's all that I really wanted for her.