So yeah... this ^^^ happened!
This little man entered our lives almost 4 months ago now! I can't believe so much time has passed! He's a pretty happy guy. He currently loves chatting with anyone who will listen, looking in mirrors, peek-a-boo, and a few days ago we put him in his walker for the first time and he had a blast! When he was born he weighed a whopping 6lbs 4oz. After we left the hospital he dropped to 5lbs 7oz. I constantly worried about his weight for the first few months, but he nurses like a champ and puts on weight wonderfully! He's still small on the percentile chart, but the doc says he's proportional and is totally fine. Right now we are dealing with a few issues with his nursing, though. He has been showing some symptoms that our doctor tells us is classic for milk protein intolerance. So for the last week Ive been trying to cut out all dairy- the obvious sources as well as the hidden ones. After reading more about it, Ive also cut out soy, since that can cause problems, too. I didn't realize how many things have soy in it! Reading the labels on all our food, there's about 80% of stuff I now cannot eat. It's going to be a huge challenge to keep up with this change in my diet but Im going to give it my best shot!
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I won't lie, it is weird and unnatural scheduling one of the biggest days of your life. That's pretty much what I did today.
My doctor called while I was in the middle of baking some Christmas goodies (great timing, right?) and all of a sudden we were talking about scheduling our C-section! I can't decide whether I like knowing the time this baby is coming or not. Its great knowing when you have to have everything prepared by, but its also crazy scary. I doubt I'll sleep at all the night before. Our pregnancy has been wonderful and problem free up until just recently. Everything is ok, baby and I are both healthy, but he just never turned. At our last ultrasound he was still in breech position and our doctor told us he is measuring small. She advised us not to try to turn him, which is something we were going to do with our OB. Both of the doctors we have been seeing think that the reason he is small and in breech is that I have a bicornuate uterus. Basically, my uterus is abnormally shaped. It is commonly referred to as a "heart-shaped" uterus, but there are many different variations and severities of it. I found many different online resources about it and THIS ONE was quite helpful. Having a bicornuate uterus can make it hard to get pregnant, or it can increase the chances of miscarriage. We have been blessed not to encounter these obstacles so far. It also makes for a higher likelihood of pre-term labor and babies that don't turn. The reason for this is because since the uterus is heart-shaped, it has two sides and the baby can only grow in one side or the other. So really, the babies have a lot less room to grow in. Isaac didn't have any problems being breech, probably because he was much smaller and he turned before he ran out of room. I did, however, go into early labor with him. Our current baby still has not flipped, and the doctors don't think he will. He is probably too big now to turn. Also, if he is running out of room that might be a reason why he is smaller. So, because of his size, and my abnormal uterus, it would be unwise to try to turn him and dangerous for us both not to have a C-section. I really do not like the thought of being cut open while awake, but I know it will be fine. Baby is coming one way or another- a lot earlier than we expected! Prayers are appreciated, both that the delivery goes well and that I DONT go into labor before the C-section! According to my pregnancy app on my phone, we have 30 days left until my due date. 30 DAYS! Hard to believe that about a month away we will be bringing home our tiniest family member! We have been busy getting things ready. I've been planning and freezing meals so it will hopefully make the sleepless nights a little easier. We have everything we need (I hope!). Kaiwi assembled all the nursery furniture together and he installed the car seat in the vehicle. All the baby clothes are washed and put away and we have our hospital bags *mostly* packed. So yeah... we at the final countdown! I put a few finishing touches on the nursery today, so Ill share some pictures with you. We have been accumulating airplane-themed items since I was pregnant with Isaac, so this kid was doomed to an airplane nursery whether he turned out to be a boy or a girl. Of course, Moki and Leonardo are best buds. :)
That's the nursery! Thank you to everyone who gave us stuff to put towards it. We have tried to incorporate everything we were given. It's so special to look at everything and think about the people who already love this kid! It has been so long since I've written! Our life has been super busy lately! We just made the big move from Washington state all the way to Oklahoma. The last month or more has been filled with a million and one things to do... pack up our stuff and ship it out, make endless phone calls to utility companies, find a new house, unpack everything (still working on that), change addresses, make more calls to our new utility companies... the list could go on. Of course there was also the hotel hopping on our drive here. I just love living out of a suitcase (that was sarcastic, just so you know). Everything went smoothly though. No major problems, maybe just a few hiccups :) I am glad that the AC in the car waited until we got here to go out though (not that there is really ever a good time for that to happen). Now that we have been here a few weeks I'm finally starting to feel settled. We still have things to do but we are slowly getting into a routine. I know a few of you have been asking for some pictures of our new house. Well, yesterday I dusted off the camera and snapped a few. Keep in mind that we are still working on the unpacking and organizing. Most of the house has been converted into livable space, though. So here is the kitchen! I absolutely love it. The kitchen is the first room I always unpack. I feel like if I have a functioning kitchen, I can live there. To the left of the picture is our pantry (I have a pantry!!) and the door to the laundry room... The laundry room has got to be my next favorite room in the house (right after the kitchen). I absolutely love the counter space and the cabinets, because I have a room that now functions as a laundry, crafting, and sewing room. AAAANNNDD... to the left of the picture is a huge storage room! STORAGE! Here is our dining/office room. Yes, we are setting up the office area in the corner of the dining room. I don't think the pictures do a good job of showing the massiveness of this area. Even with all this stuff in here (pardon the boxes, we are still working on it), it still echoes. I wasn't sure about the office right out here in the open, but I'm kinda beginning to like it (except for those cords... I didn't realize until looking at this picture how hideous they are... please ignore...) Here is our living area. Also working on the boxes. This room is also very big, so half is for the couch and tv and the other half we are figuring out what to do with. Yes, we still have the ugly green couch. Feel free to hate it (I know I do), but just so you know... its SUPER comfy. This lovely room is for all you guests that would like to come stay. Bring your own pillows, we don't have any for you. This room is a second guest room for now, but later on we will be getting a crib in here. Sometime before January for sure :D
So that's about it for now. I didn't take pictures of our bedroom because basically, its a just huge room with a bed in it. We are seriously lacking in furniture. Hope you enjoyed the mini-tour. If any of you ever wants to come down and visit us we would love to have you! I can't believe we are down to only a few more weeks before we hit the road for Oklahoma! We have done a lot of planning already, but the next few weeks are definitely going to keep us on our toes! Just looking at our calendar keeps reminding me how much we have to do yet. I have a bunch of to-do lists and yet I feel like I'm forgetting something. I'm not going to stress out about it though. I figure as long as Kaiwi and I get there safely, the rest of our stuff is just that... stuff. "This world is not my home, I'm just a-passing through." I am excited for the trip to Oklahoma, though. We are taking a little extra travel time and going to see some things like the redwoods and the Grand Canyon. You can bet your britches I will have my camera in my hand along the way. I've already been snapping pictures of the area around here so we can look back on it after we are gone. I went to the Lilac Garden at Manito the other day and got a few (ok, a ton of) pictures of the lilacs. They are absolutely gorgeous! They remind me of the lilac bushes that grew at the neighbor house when we were growing up. The smell was just divine, as well. I'm so glad we got to stick around here long enough to see them bloom. I'm definitely going to miss this part of Washington!
Im sure I will find plenty on new things to love in Oklahoma, though, too. Why is it so hard to figure out what to get my husband for his birthday? You would think I'd know exactly what to get him. The problem is, he has everything he needs. He loves to fly, but unfortunately he doesn't always get to. After struggling with this dilemma for a while, we came up with a plan. Kaiwi has been wanting to do a cross-country flight for quite a while, and since his parents are in Portland now we thought it would be a perfect birthday weekend if we flew in to see them. The flight over was amazing! We flew right through the mountains. Mt Rainier, St Helens, and Adams was on our right, and we could see Mt Hood, Jefferson, and just the tops of the three sisters on our left. We took off later than we had planned, but it worked out perfectly because the sun was setting just as we were flying by the mountains. It was so beautiful. But why am I telling you when I could just show you pictures? Amazing- even with the plastic plane windows leaving a sort of hazy look to the pictures.
Now, for some reason I can't post more than three pictures on this entry, so I'll have to post in two parts... It was so fun visiting with Kaiwi's parents. We were able to see their new place and explore some of Portland. They took us to the Japanese Garden. Gorgeous! The cherry blossoms were in full bloom, and it was so green! Out here where we are its still dry and brown, so it was a wonderful change of scenery. Its pretty much torture trying to narrow down which pictures to share with you. The gardens were so gorgeous- hopefully I captured a fraction of the beauty.
What better way to spend a birthday than with family? I'm so glad it worked out to take this spontaneous weekend trip. OOOOk-lahoma, where the wind comes sweepin' down the plain,
And the wavin' wheat can sure smell sweet, When the wind comes right behind the rain OOOOk-lahoma, Ev'ry night my honey lamb and I, Sit alone and talk and watch a hawk makin' lazy circles in the sky. *** When we were kids, my sister and I used to watch Oklahoma ALL THE TIME. All the girls in their beautiful dresses, dancing and singing and twirling. Riding to social gatherin's in their surries. And of course, no romantic musical is complete without someone gettin' hitched at the end. That movie has set the bar high for my expectations of Oklahoma. There had better be some dancin' and surrey ridin' when we get there (Also, I think I am going to start calling Kaiwi "honey lamb"). Its hard to believe we are going to BE there in 3 months. We are packing up and heading out to a totally new place I've never been to before (except for if you count driving through there). Our first move- the one out here- was pretty crazy. We were given two weeks notice that we had to be out here. We basically dumped our stuff on Kaiwi's parents and left. Once we got here, we were sent to TX for 3 months. I never saw the movers pack up our stuff, or drop it off, so in many ways, this feels like our first official move. I'm so excited to be moving on to a new part of our journey, and yet thinking about leaving here gets me a little sentimental. I've never thought of this house as our "home", since we are just renting, and we always knew we were only here for a limited time. I've never put a nail in the wall to hang a picture (just push pins), never painted a room, never bought curtains- I've always thought, "we are only here a while, why bother?". But now that we are leaving I'm realizing that this is the first home we have built together since being married. It was hardly a month after our wedding that we were out here. I'm realizing that all the things that have become familiar to me here won't be in Oklahoma. We are starting over. Everything will be DIFFERENT. Maybe not bad, but different. Its exciting, and its scary. And in another 4 years, we will be going through this all again. Leaving Oklahoma, going somewhere new. Its crazy, I tell you. Just crazy. Yet... in some twisted way, I'm looking forward to it. I always struggle to find what to write about. I would really like to make the "Blog" part of my blog a bigger priority, but we just don't have much going on! Or at least, not much of what anyone would find interesting enough to read about.
We have had some exciting things on our minds this week, though. We are waiting to find out where we are moving to, and when! We were told we should find out on the 11th... still waiting (and probably not as patiently as we could be). Just knowing that we WILL be moving sometime this summer is exciting. I feel like we should just go now, since we know its coming. Just go NOW and get it over with. I am already planning the move. What goes with the packers, what goes with us in the car. All we should need to keep with us is a few suitcases, a few dishes, and some of our valuables. We lived like that for three months in Texas, so I figure we can do it again. We have even been looking at houses in all the possible locations that we could be going to. Yes, I know, they probably won't even be available to us by the time we get there, but its so fun to look! I've got my eyes peeled for any house that has STORAGE! Our little house here is pretty much a good size for us, but it seriously lacks in the storage department. I'm sure I drive my poor husband crazy by trying to shove things into every nook and cranny. Out of sight, out of mind, right? Its kind of a goal of mine to be more organized at the next place we move to. I know, all you spouses that have been through a few moves already are probably thinking, "That's not going to happen", and you will probably be right! But, I am determined, and will try my hardest to make it come true. :) So I am totally open to any organizing tips anyone would like to share with me- whether it be how you organize your move, or how you organize your home. What do you find works well for you? Its March!
I'm so happy about it. Not because I really love March, but because it is a step closer to spring! Every time a new month rolls in I tend to think of it as "what's the classroom theme for this month?" I loved decorating and changing the themes in my classrooms while I was teaching. January would be all snowmen and penguins and all things wintry and cold. February would be Valentine's Day with love and hearts and all things red, pink, and white. And then March... Rainbows and green shamrocks and pots of gold. If only I were given a pot of gold each March. But it gets me to thinking. What IS March? Is it still winter? Or beginning of spring? In our classroom the kids would come walking back in on the first day of March and it would be all bright and colorful and GREEN. If only it were like that for reals. Wake up on March 1, and BAM! The world is green again! No more snow! But its not. In fact, we got enough snow here that the plows are actually out. Since moving here Kaiwi and I have noticed that they do things a little differently than Wisconsin when it comes to snow removal. Basically, they don't. We are lucky if we get de-icer. Or beet juice. I'm still confused about the beet juice. I don't think it really helps much. Anyhow, I kinda REALLY wouldn't mind if the next place we move to didn't have snow. Which is another reason I'm excited about March. I have the 11th marked on the calendar because that is an exciting day. The day I have been waiting for for a long time now. Kaiwi will find out when and where we are moving to! I'm so excited to move. Not that I totally dislike this area, its been nice while we have been here. Its more because I know we are going to move, so I just want to go NOW. I want to find a new house, and unpack all our stuff and organize. I want to explore our new surroundings and settle in for the next four years. I know I'll get all sad and sentimental when its actually time to leave though, but for now, Ill be excited. And I'll leave you with this: A pot of gold. Happy March! |
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About Us...Welcome! My name is Marie, and I have been married for 5 years now. We have one beautiful son, Isaac, waiting for us in Heaven and another son, Hayden, here with us! I hope to share with you more about our journey- where we have been and where we are going. Archives
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