I caught a whopper!

Fishing and babies are very different. When you go fishing you want to catch the biggest fish possible, right? Catching a really big fish boosts your self esteem. It is a great accomplishment. And it makes a great story.

It's just not like that with babies. You don't want to have the biggest baby, the longest, the biggest head circumference. There is no prize for the biggest baby. And it certainly doesn't boost your self esteem.

I just had my dr's appointment today, and I caught another whopper! I am 34 weeks tomorrow, and I measure 33 weeks, but I asked the dr to estimate the baby's weight and he told me....... 5.5- 6 lbs. Already! Goodness sakes, we're in for another whopper. If I made it to my due date, and he gained .5 lb a week like the text books say they do, we'd have an 8.5-9 lb baby. Yikes!

The good news is that I am right on the same schedule that I was with the other babies. I am dilated to 3 cm and 80% effaced. He said the baby might even be at 0 station, which I've never had him say before. He said he'd see me next week one way or the other, with an appointment or a baby. He's hoping for 2 more weeks, and at that point he said he won't stop my labor. He told me he really didn't think it would be any longer than 3 weeks, which just isn't that long.

I am feeling pretty good these days. I stopped taking my miserable shots and I really am not having many contractions. So I can almost say I'm enjoying these last weeks of pregnancy, aside from getting up in the night several times, life is pretty good.

Free Quiznos Sub

http://www.millionsubs.com/Reg.php?x=1

Hopefully this link still works. Register and get a coupon by email for a free Quiznos sub. Mmmm.

My Isaac

My little Isaac is a budding romantic. Last night he saw me lying on the couch resting and he decided I needed a little refreshment to get me moving. He went down to the storage room, got my favorite drink, and a can of potatoes. He got his favorite bowl and a spoon ready for me. I had to take a picture of that. Isaac really is sweet and always taking good care of me. He is an incredible big brother too. He plays with my hair every day, and frequently tells me how beautiful my hair looks even though it rarely does look beautiful.


Lately everything is Indiana Jones. His grandpa gave him this special hat, and he found himself a bag, coat, and whip to make him look like Indy. He is hilarious.


Isaac is doing quite well in his reading even though I get kind of frustrated sometimes. He can read 2 short sentences at a time in his reading lessons such as, "This is a rock, Sam is at the rock." His little friend Caleb has been doing piano lessons for quite some time, and does very well. So Isaac's dad was inspired to start piano lessons with him, and Isaac voluntarily practices every day for a penny! He can do scales with both hands, and play the top hand of the Indiana Jones theme song. I am amazed at how much he has learned in just a few weeks.

We are so proud of our oldest boy! He is one good kid!

Thinking about birth

http://www.wombecology.com/epidural.html

This link states that epidurals lead to more posterior babies. Well, I've had 2 of 3 babies posterior, and it is something I'd REALLY like to avoid again.

With my other babies I have gotten my epidural upon showing up at the hospital. I really never waited for the pain to come. This time I am planning on going as long as I can comfortably go without one. That way I can move around longer and try to keep the baby from being posterior. I sure hope it helps! If I make it too far to get the epidural, oh well, I delivered Henry without being numb, and the actual delivery wasn't the painful thing. It was the posterior thing that hurt.

So I've been reading natural childbirth books, especially since I've been on partial bedrest, reading has become a lifesaver. I read the Bradley Method and Hypobirthing. I feel like I have learned a lot, I don't know how good I'll be at either of them, but I'm going to try some methods I have learned from both.

If anyone has any advice for me, I'd love to hear it. I'm just going in to this thing with a more open mind than I've had in the past. But I have to admit that I do love those epidurals, so I have a hard time imagining NOT getting one. We'll just see what happens. I do know I don't want to lay in bed for 10 hours like I did with Henry.

Up in the night?

Are you up in the night? If so, feel free to call me, because chances are I'm up! Okay, so I only get up for a minute, and I try not to open my eyes even. But last night I was up at 1:30, 2:30. 3:30, 4:30 and 6:30. I was very excited to skip my 5:30 bathroom trip, I still don't know what happened. I told Dave this and he told me it was time to have a baby.

Other than the frequent night potty trips, I am doing quite well. Really, my contractions have been very sparse, and I'm feeling pretty good. I had the steroid shots last week, so I feel like I have done everything I can for this baby.

Dave had the day off of work on Monday, so we spent the day "nesting." Our house is remarkably clean in places it hasn't been for awhile. The nursery got a very thorough cleaning, and the baby clothes are out.

I need to buy a few more newborn diapers, but other than that I am pretty much ready for this baby. I still need to pack a hospital bag, but I think I'll wait 2 more weeks or so

Our paper chain only counted down until 35 weeks, so I think we'll need to add some links. I think those progesterone shots will keep me from having another pretermer. I'm going to feel like I'm overdue!!!! In the meantime, I'll enjoy not having very many links on that chain, it makes me feel a little better.

I got out the little monkey suit for the baby to wear home from the hospital, and Dave walked into the room asking about the baby gift I had bought for our friend who just had a baby. I snapped at him so fast! My mother bear instincts were unstoppable. With a horrified look on my face I shouted, "THAT'S FOR MY BABY!!! I bought that for my baby, not someone elses!" He just laughed at me. He really meant no harm by it, but for some reason it set his pregnant wife off!

I'm 33 weeks tomorrow, and quite pleased with myself. My almost 34 week appointment is next Wednesday, I'll update you all then. Thanks for all the help and prayers we've had from everyone during all this crazy preterm labor. I feel like we've made it through all the bad stuff, I don't feel afraid anymore. It's a good feeling.

Valentine's Day

We started out our Valentine's Day with heart shaped pink pancakes (Inspired by a friend's blog). The boys loved them!

Then we headed down to Salt Lake to take the boys to the Joseph Smith movie at the Legacy Theatre. Here we are in front of the temple.

We dropped the boys off at the Biada household and enjoyed our Christmas present from Dave's sister (a P.F. Chang's giftcard) and a lovely Valentine's dinner with no kids. Thanks for watching our kids Biadas!

Prenatal Macarena

I think that's what is going on inside me right now. It is 12:15, and I would LOVE to be sleeping. I made Dave put his hand on my belly before he fell asleep. I asked him how I was supposed to sleep with this and he wished me luck, rolled over, and fell asleep. So here I am trying to figure out what to do in the middle of the night, and how to put an end to the dance party inside me. The upside to this is that my crazy fetuses turned out to be my easy babies. Dawson never even kicked me. But he gave us 2 crazy years to make up for it. So here's hoping that G. Jesse's relentless prenatal activity means he'll be an easy going baby. I won't get my hopes up too high though :)

The tooth.... *sniff, sniff*

My baby boy lost his tooth. Okay, so he's turning 5 in two months, but he's still my baby boy. Doesn't this make me old? I think it does. His front teeth have been wiggly for a few weeks now, and on Friday it became apparent that one of them was going to come out. He became obsessed. He had to leave his friend's house that he was playing at to come talk to me about the tooth, and we spent a few hours on an emotional rollercoaster until that thing came out.

First he was so excited about it coming out, so I showed him some You-tube videos of the old "door and string" technique (I saw this on a friend's blog). He almost jumped right out of his skin with excitement, but I didn't dare do it! Then he saw a little bit of blood in one of the videos. Then he cried and cried and said he didn't want his tooth to come out because bleeding hurts. I told him to just wait, but he couldn't! So he tried eating an apple. And that made it more loose, and even bleed a little (I didn't tell him that part), but it didn't come out. Then he regained his confidence in the "door and string" technique and we went for it. *A word of warning: Use a heavy, fast door when trying this technique.* The first three times we tried, the string came right off the tooth, I can't even understand how that happened. We finally tied it to the big, heavy front door, that has no carpet slowing it down, and the tooth was out. It did bleed, you can see it a little in the picture, but it wasn't an issue at that point.

Of course he wanted to go to bed at 5:30 so the tooth fairy could come. Instead he spent the rest of the evening talking about his lost tooth, and carrying it around in a bag. The tooth fairy did come. I had a rather forgetful tooth fairy growing up, and I am very nervous about our tooth fairy. Our tooth fairy doesn't keep much cash on hand, so she gave Isaac $1.50 which was all the small change she had. It is quite a responsibility, one that I'm sure she will make mistakes with, but kids are forgiving.

Isaac woke up at 5:00 am to check on his money, and came to tell us about his money.

Here is the video of the tooth pulling.

Funny Blinkie

I found this on the internet today. I thought it was kind of funny. "Taking it in the bum for love." I guess that's what I'm doing? I have a migraine today. I seem to get them once a week now. Just another fun side effect of shooting yourself up with hormones. I had a negative Fetal Fibronectin test on Monday after a whole day of contractions the day before. I was quite pleased with myself as that means I will make it to at least 32 weeks.

And the name will be.....

And the name which you shall be known on the records of the church... Isn't that a funny saying? But seriously, I'm going to tell you what we are naming this fourth little monkey. All of our boys have such awesomely significant names, and we just absolutely love the names we've chosen so far. But when you start getting to 4, and probably some day 5 of the same gender, goodness! It gets hard! We have friends with 10 boys, I don't know how they picked names for those kids.

Gordon Jesse Low was the fourth boy of Jessop & June Low (followed by a girl, I might add). He is an absolutely incredible man, whom we have a great respect and love for. He was the 1st district judge of Logan for a very long time, so many people in the valley know his name. He also serves as the Stake President of the "Golden Toaster" stake in Logan. He is one of the wisest, most spiritual men we know, and he just so happens to be David's father.

After loving every second of having our little Henry George named after my father (another really amazing guy!), and upon finding out that this baby would be our fourth boy, we couldn't imagine a better name for this baby than the name:

Gordon Jesse Low

So there you have it. That is what this baby will be named, and who he will be named after. David would also add (If he were writing, which he's not) that this boy will also be named after our beloved former prophet, Gordon B. Hinckley, and our bishop's name is Gordon as well. It's a pretty great name.

As great a name as it is, I don't want to call him Gordon. I can't exactly guarantee what we will end up calling him or how it works. I think we'll have to wait until after he is born and see what sticks. But the plan all along has been to call him

G. Jesse Low

G. Jesse might be a mouthful. Maybe it's too complicated and weird to call him that. Maybe we'll just shorten it to G. most of the time. But I just LOVE the sound of G. Jesse. I love it. I think it sounds like an expensive brand of clothing. I bet he'll be really successful! And we have noticed a trend lately in kids being called by two names, like John David (which is another name we love) I can't remember the other one we've heard of lately. So hopefully it won't be too weird, I don't want the poor kid going crazy trying to tell people his name.

So that's the baby's name. And if you don't like it, we don't want to hear it. Because we love it!