It's a......

GIRL!!!!

We are excited, although it is a little weird. We are nervous for a baby girl, it's an unknown for us, but we are excited for our 4th child! We're eager to meet her!!

Balance

This is my final pregnancy, unless something unforeseen happens or God just really wants us to have another one. That being said, I am really trying to enjoy it and not wish it away. I always have said I would like to know it is my last pregnancy and my last baby so that I could really enjoy it and savor each moment.

However, now that I find myself in my last pregnancy, with full knowledge of it being just that, I am having a hard time savoring and enjoying it. I have always really enjoyed pregnancy, although towards the end I am always ready to deliver and be done with it too! This time, however, I just seem to be so much more uncomfortable, so much more tired, so much more sick, etc, (and I'm not even quite halfway yet) and it's hard to enjoy. Maybe part of it has to do with the fact that I'm 29 now and I was 23 with my first pregnancy! My body just isn't what it was (not that 29 is old, but my body for sure isn't the same).

So I'm trying to find a balance. A balance between being so uncomfortable and really just wanting to be done with this so I can hold my baby and stopping to savor each moment, good and bad. Savoring each kick, each milestone, each sleepless night, each afternoon nap, each weird craving, each food aversion, each maternity outfit I'll never be able to wear again when this is done, etc! It's harder than it has been in the past.

I am really trying not to complain about my problems, although I know some days I do a lot better than others in that area! It helps a lot that I have several friends that are due almost the same time as me, so we are all in the same boat and we have each other to compare notes and sympathize with. I thank God for that, I guess He knew I'd definitely need that this time.

Muscle man

Crazy hair

This week has been spirit week at Brayden's school. On Tuesday, it was crazy hair day and Brayden wanted me to spike all his hair up (which is ironic since usually he hates when we want to spike his hair just in the front). I just put gel all over in it and it was sticking straight out everywhere. Brayden loved it, he thought it was hilarious!

Relying on God seems to be a recurrent theme in my life right now. I am a little bit (okay a lot) of a control freak, so this is a hard one for me. It's nothing really major or life-altering, but it's just in all the little things that I keep being reminded that God is in control and He will work things out (in HIS time).

• We signed a contract with a roofing/gutter company in mid August. Just today they finally put the gutters on, completing the job. They told us it would take 2 weeks, and it has taken over 2 months. We have been frustrated during this process, not wanting to wait and deal with this. I feel like we have done all we could during this process to contact the company and get the work done on our house, but honestly the most effective thing I have found is prayer. We have been without gutters for 3 weeks, the time between when they put the roof on and now. With the basement flooding problems we've had this summer, we were very worried that we'd have to deal with that again. Luckily, we haven't received any drenching rain in that time and we received no damage to our house, even though any water that hit our roof just fell right off right next to the house. And who knows, maybe God has bigger plans for it taking this long (like more money off than we had planned on resulting in it costing us less)? Whether or not that is the case, I have learned that God even cares about the "little" things, like roofs and gutters, and while it might not seem like He has His hand in something, He always does.
• I was laid off from my MT job last week, effective 10/31. Finding another MT job may or may not happen, but that is in God's hands. I will definitely put forth the effort to look, but whether or not I get one depends not on my power or my strength or my abilities. That's a scary feeling. God has provided additional income for us recently, almost exactly the amount to replace what I was making, which almost seems too coincidental. God is good, He knows what is best!
• I found out this weekend that apparently Kaiser doesn't necessarily tell you the sex of the baby anymore when you go to get an ultrasound. I guess "if they come across it, they will tell you, but they aren't going to go looking for it". I think that's pretty dumb, but again, out of my control. Chris and I at first thought we weren't going to find out and then decided that we should and now this information just gets me all worried. Also, in the past I have been told that I could only bring two people into the room with me when I get my sonogram, but I wasn't told that this time and we really want to bring all the boys in with us since this will be the first, last and only time they will get to experience that. I have this bad feeling that, when we get there, they will just tell us we can't bring them all in and then Chris will have to sit in the waiting room with the boys while I go back by myself. I know, this is a minor one and something I shouldn't worry about, but I do. But, like Chris reminded me, God knows what is best for us and our family and all we can do is pray that things will work out for us that night and that there won't be any problems.

'Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,' says the LORD Almighty. Zechariah 4:6

Veggie lover

Preston has really been into Veggie Tales lately. He loves watching Veggie Tale movies and reading the books. Brayden also has a Veggie Tales Bible that I found Preston reading one day. He went quietly into Brayden's room, got his Bible and sat on the floor for a good 15 minutes, just flipping through the Bible and looking at all the pictures. Really cute!

Back to fall again

This fall has been crazy. 80's one day, 50's and windy the next, snow the next.... The snow we had this last weekend made a lot of leaves fall off our trees, so much that our front yard and driveway were completely covered. Chris got out there on Monday (with his new leaf vac!) and sucked them all up! That'll be round 1, with at least two to three more leaf-sucking days to come!

The boys have been waiting for the day when we could rake leaves (mostly patiently), and they were very eager to get out there and help Chris. They did end up helping a little, but mostly just ran around having fun and jumping in the piles of leaves.

First snow

Last weekend we had our first snow of the season. It was mostly wet and didn't accumulate a whole lot, but it was still kind of neat to see snow falling!

The boys were SO excited, they wanted to make snow angels, shovel the driveway and make a snowman. Unfortunately there wasn't enough snow for any of that, but they still wanted to go out in it. I decided to just bundle them up and let them go outside so I didn't have to hear them beg about it all day. They were outside for maybe 10-15 minutes and then wanted to come in because they were cold. But that seemed to give them their snow fix, till the next one at least!

Fall fun

I love spending time outside this time of year. There's a little chill in the air, but it's tolerable in the sun. And I know winter is coming, so I want to soak up as much outside-time as we can while it's still nice.

I love the changing of the seasons....spring and fall are my favorite. Just about when you can't stand one more cold day of snow and wind, spring comes and there is hope for warmer weather again. And just when you've had enough of the hot, hot weather with no rain, fall shows up with changing leaves and cool nights to remind you that things will soon be cooling down again!

Cravings

My pregnancy has been so strange this time in terms of what I can and can't eat. My comfort food of choice (when I'm not pregnant) is definitely ice cream, which I also ate quite often with my other pregnancies. In fact with Preston, I gained nine pounds in one month because I ate so many of those Drumstick ice cream bar things!! Oops!! However, I have had an aversion to ice cream lately, since about week 8. I can have a bite or two here or there, but that's not satisfying at all.

I am also having aversions to any kind of fast food or anything fried at all really. We went to Wendy's a couple of weeks ago and while the boys and Chris had french fries, chicken nuggets, hamburgers and frosties, I had a salad! And their food didn't even look good!!! Anyone who saw me must've thought I had some great willpower to eat a salad while surrounded by all that yummy food!! If only they knew....

So, want to know what my body craves for a "midnight" snack? Vegetables......ew! Not that I have anything against vegetables, but I think they should be reserved for lunch and dinner time. And maybe a snack here or there when paired with a fattening dip. I even bought two heads of broccoli at the grocery store last week and I can't wait to roast them up and sprinkle with lemon juice. It's such a weird feeling to crave something that doesn't really sound good to me.

I have also been craving carbs - pasta, bread, potatoes, etc. I didn't realize how bad it had gotten till one night last week Chris was asking what things we had in the house to eat. I listed off ravioli, lasagna and macaroni (that were either leftovers or easy to make). Then he asked what we had for a side and I said bread. Not what he wanted -- he wanted a steak. Poor guy, guess I hadn't been paying attention to how much pasta we were having. The next day I went out and bought him a big steak!!!

I'm wondering if this kid is going to come out a health nut or vegetarian or something. Or I've also heard that your body craves what it isn't getting enough of. I know I don't get enough veggies, but that was true with my other pregnancies too. Oh well, at least I'm eating healthy I guess!! I wonder if this will continue after the baby is born? I told Chris I want a big bowl of chocolate ice cream as soon as the baby is delivered, but I probably won't feel like it then either, huh?

Oh well, I don't mean to complain so much, it's just that I've always seen pregnancy as a time where I can kind of eat whatever I want (to a certain degree) and not worry about the weight gain (to a certain degree). And this time I get to be pregnant over Thanksgiving and Christmas, so I don't need to worry about the pounds I might put on during that time, except that this time I'll probably be putting the pounds on with veggies and rolls instead of pumpkin pie and candy!!