I'm back!

I know, it's been a long time... But seriously? Nobody reads this. Maybe if I updated once in a while. Or once ever. I think my entire pregnancy I wrote on here like 15 times. Maybe I'm being generous.

Whatever.

The point is: I'm here. And I promise I'll update more often. Besides, I have LOTS more to talk about now. Now that the constant nausea and bathroom breaks have come to an end. THANK GOD. I don't know what I would do if I were still pregnant. No, I do. I. Would. Die.

Ok. So. Nathan is 5 months. Good golly. When did that happen? I seriously feel like the past 5 months have absolutely flown by. I don't know where my tiny baby went. Now I have this giant thing who rolls over and constantly pulls on the dog's ears. Oh. And he sits. On his own. He has likes and dislikes. And I suspect he is forming little baby opinions in his little baby head. Thank God he can't talk yet. I'm not ready to hear those little baby opinions.

I'm good, Zach is good. The dog... Well, he is great. I have a feeling Max and Nathan like each other more than they like Zach and I. They are like soul mates. I've caught Max licking Nathan's face a few times, and what does Nathan do? He opens his mouth. Lets the dog get a nice taste of Enfamil and sweet potatoes. Awesome right? It's disgusting, really. But they love each other. So it's good. I was worried there would be problems... Nope. Not in our house. They are obsessed with each other. I cannot give an accurate enough description of how much they love each other. It's kind of weird.

Other than that everything is good. I'm getting more and more tired of California, and our recent trip to Ohio doesn't help. I miss the seasons. I miss thunderstorms and rainy days. I have a pair of rainboots that decorate our patio because you know what? It doesn't rain here. Ever. In Nathan's short little life it has rained maybe 5 days. I need to clarify. When I say rain I mean sprinkle. Drizzle at best. It sucks. I miss the anticipation of fall and those hot days where the only thing on your mind is the cooler breeze and the changing leaves. When you long to pull out your sweatshirts and make a pot of chili. When grilled chicken and corn on the cob get old. I miss Christmas. This past Christmas we had the patio door open and I wore jeans and a thin turtleneck with flip-flops. FLIP-FLOPS! On Christmas. I need piles of leaves and frosty windows. I need April showers and fresh-cut grass. Don't even get me started on the earthquakes and fires. Over the weekend there was a fire on one of the ranges across the street from our neighborhood. Too close for comfort if you ask me. It's been cold lately too. That stupid June gloom won't go away. Needless to say California has lost it's appeal. It's nice, don't get me wrong. I'm just an Ohio girl to the core.

With that said, it's actually warm here for once, so I'm going to go on a walk with my baby man and some of our friends. And later on I get to catch up with a very old friend who happens to be in the area for a few days. I love when that happens!

I'll post a few pictures later. I can't for the life of me figure out what I did with the stinkin' camera.

See ya!

Bean is here!

This is just a repost of what I put up on facebook after we got home from the hospital. After I make dinner tonight I'll give you all an update from the past 2 weeks and his 2 week checkup and I'll put up a few NEW pictures of him! Enjoy!

Since we are finally home and starting to settle into a little routine I figured I would post an update on here about our new little family member (:

Nathan was born on Sunday night (January 24) at 9:05, weighed 6 lbs 10 oz and was 18.25 in long!

Saturday night Zach and I decided to drive down to San Diego to get some yummy fried seafood, do some walking and just enjoy what I hoped would be our last weekend as a couple. Everything went well and I was having contractions but they weren't painful or particularly close together so I assumed (like every other time) that I wasn't going into labor anytime soon. After going to dinner, the mall and target to pick up a few last minute baby things we headed home and watched a movie on the couch together and went to bed.

I woke up at 5:30 the next morning with some painful contractions and went to the bathroom (where my water broke as I would later find out), came back to bed and woke Zach up. I told him I thought my water broke and we might have to go in and he woke right up and started timing my contractions to see how they were progressing since I wasn't sure it actually was my water. They were closer together than they had been, but still not very regular and we just laid in bed and watched tv to see what was going on. After a few hours I decided that my water definitely had broken and told Zach we needed to get ready to head in to the hospital. We called our parents and let them know and finished packing the bags for the hospital and we left around 8:45 or so.

When we got to the hospital a nurse took me into a triage room to check me out and took one look at me and walked me back to my room. I got all hooked up to the monitors and she started my IV and we waited for the dr to come check my progress. Well wouldn't you know that I had made ABSOLUTELY NO PROGRESS since my 38 week appointment! I was still a "fingertip" dilated and about 50% effaced. Since my water had broken, they couldn't send me home so they monitored me a little longer and decided give me pitocin to actually put me into labor, which made the contractions come much stronger and closer together. After a little while on the pitocin I was starting to feel a lot of pain so they gave me some morphine in my IV and a shot in the butt to help take the pain away since I was still a long way from pushing.

After a few hours with the morphine my contractions started getting stronger and the morphine started wearing off and I was prepped for my epidural which I was very grateful for. It actually didn't hurt at all and I would absolutely do it again in a second. Once I got the epidural it was smooth sailing and I actually made a lot of progress really quickly. The dr came in and checked me around 8:20 and I was fully dilated, 100% effaced and ready to start pushing! I only had to push for about 20 minutes and Nathan was born at 9:05. His apgar scores were 8 and 9 and the only problem we had was that he didn't cry much after he was born so they were worried he wasn't getting the fluid out of his lungs. It turns out he was just fine though.

We stayed in the hospital for about a day and a half. Nathan has a little bit of jaundice, but his levels were low enough that they sent us home a few hours early on Tuesday with instructions to come back and have his levels checked Wednesday morning. At his appointment the nurse told us his bilirubin levels had dropped and he gained 2 oz since his discharge and that everything looked really good.

Now we're just hanging out at home getting adjusted to our new lives as parents. I'm very tired and still pretty sore, but I couldn't be happier with everything. Zach has been absolutely wonderful and is so excited to be a daddy. He is absolutely in love with Nathaniel and so am I. I can't wait to introduce him to all of our friends and family, and really wish we could be closer to share him with you all!

I am too pregnant to live

Not much has been happening over the past few weeks. We moved to our new house (: If you want the address let me know and I'll get it to you! There are pictures up on facebook and I'll post some more one day when its all clean and I can take some with our actual stuff in it.

Now for the baby: As of Thursday I am 39 weeks, which means he could come any day now... but we have come to realize that he probably won't. I'm having plenty of contractions but nothing timeable enough to warrant a trip to to L&D. At my 38 week appointment I was checked and hadn't made much progress. The dr said I was a "fingertip" dilated (not even a whole cm!) and 50% effaced, but those numbers don't mean much. She also told me that if I don't go into labor on my own by my next appointment at 40 weeks (this coming Thursday) that they will schedule an induction that will most likely be a week after my due date. So we're looking at absolutely having him out here with us around February 4th or so. I really hope he decides to be born soon, because I would like to avoid having to be induced. And trust me, I've tried just about everything I can do on my own! So I guess it's all up to the babe at this point. Anyway, there's a new belly picture up that Zach just took today, and I'll probably try to take one every day until he's born. Not sure if I'll post

those, but I will probably post at least one more before he's born.

So that's all I have for now. I took a shower and got dressed and actually pulled out my straightener and some makeup. We're probably heading downtown for some walking and some yummy dinner and, chances are we'll get down there and Bean will finally decide he's ready. Especially since I went through the trouble of putting on a nice shirt and doing my hair and makeup. Here's to hoping I guess...

Hope all is well at home! We love and miss you all!

36 weeks 1 day

Hello! Here are the pictures I promised (: They are all from the past week or so. And the last one is from tonight.

Oh. The stretch marks have finally broken out on my tummy. I have a few down low on either side of my belly button. I'm pretty sad, but not surprised!

Happy New Year

Because I am exhausted and would rather be doing ANYTHING but cleaning and packing. And we don't have pictures yet...

How far along: 36 weeks!

Maternity clothes? Yep. But even the jeans are not so comfortable anymore.

Stretch marks? A few on my tummy. I can't see them unless I perform incredible pregnant acrobatics... And I know you don't want to see that. I have some on my legs too.

Sleep: Its all I want to do.

Best moment this week: Reaching 36 weeks. And getting a move-in date for our new house.

Movement: He is hurting me. He has his feet in my ribs and I can feel him drag them across my tummy. He also gets the hiccups a lot and I can feel those too!

Food cravings: Dr. Pepper still. Otter pops. Gatorade.

Gender: Still a boy I hope. I just took off the tags and washed all his clothes through 3 months!

Labor signs: Lots of Braxton Hicks. Mostly 10-25 minutes apart. They're starting to hurt and its hard to breathe when I get them. It feels like he dropped too.

Belly button in or out? Out and its so ugly! I can't wait for it to go back in.

What I miss: Sleeping on my tummy and being able to bend over.

What I am looking forward to: Moving and having this baby!

Weekly wisdom: Its mostly advice for myself... STOP PUTTING STUFF OFF. You'll regret it!

Milestones: I'm finally in my 9th month. And I guess he can be considered full term now.

We're moving!

Zach and I went to the housing office today after calling and calling for 2 weeks without being able to reach anyone. Luckily we went in because I guess they had a wrong phone number for us and had been calling us for a few days. When we got there we asked about our application and the girl told us they had something available for us on the 26th of January. I freaked out a little bit but we told her we had to move in before that because of my due date and she was able to shuffle some stuff around and find us a place we could move into after the 8th. So we went and signed a few papers and made an appointment to sign our lease and walk through our new place. We're moving in anytime after January 11! It is such a relief to have that taken care of, and to know that we won't be scrambling to extend our lease or find something else. Hopefully the move goes smoothly and Nathan waits a little longer to come out so we have time to get everything ready. Right now we have a feeling that he might try to make his debut a little early. I've been having a lot of nausea and the braxton hicks contractions are starting to hurt and come a lot more frequently. Bean has also dropped a little bit, and I'm definitely feeling like he might come any time now. Zach is convinced he's coming in the next week or so. I'm just praying he stays in until after we get the keys to the new place since we have a lot to do to get ready for the move.

I have some pictures to put up, and some more to write about, but tonight I am absolutely exhausted so you'll have to wait a little while for those. I hope everyone had fun over Christmas!

I have pictures (:

This picture is from 31 weeks and 2 days!

The rest of these are from 33 weeks and 1 day!

From the front...

And a bare belly picture because I'm so happy I got this far without stretch marks all over! I'm just waiting until the morning I wake up with a road map on my tummy (: