Well, it happened… my water broke at about 1:30am last night (7/9/09).  We had gone to get the ultrasound yesterday and the dr was telling us that the baby was still measuring small and that he wouldn’t want to see me go past my due date and would probably induce next Tues or Wed.  Well, Baby M decided he/she didn’t want to wait that long.  So we headed to the hospital this AM at about 2am.  I’ve been hooked up to a monitor watching the contractions but nothing major happened on my own- so they just started some pitocin about 5-10 min ago.  We’ll see how these contractions start revving up now   Therefore, i”m updating stuff now b/c i’m assuming i won’t be in the mood for that in a short while!!!  We’ll keep everyone posted!

Chris dropped the dogs off (we had brought them in the car w/ us to the hospital) at a local Camp Bow Wow (where we take them in Castle Rock) at about 8am and booked them a suite til Sunday   He said they were crazy as usual when he took them in.

Love, Deb, Chris and Baby M

We had our weekly appointment on Monday- still nothing really going on.  My blood pressure is still low and the baby’s heartrate is still strong- so no worries there.  My belly is still measuring small so we have an appointment for another ultrasound today @3pm just to make sure all is still OK.  I’ll update on that later today.  Maybe we’ll get a cool ultrasound photo today to share with everyone- if Baby M isn’t feeling shy again and has his/her hands in front of his/her face.  By the way, Chris and I have just started calling Baby M a “him”- so if I ever slip and just say “him” instead of “him/her”- that’s why.  It’s not that we found out the sex of the baby and are just keeping it a secret from everyone

I decided that my last working day before maternity leave is going to be this Friday, 7/10.  This decision came after an absolutely HORRIBLE night of (no) sleep on Monday.  I was burping up dinner (not necessarily heartburn but the actual food is coming up- ew!!!) for the longest time and then I just couldn’t sleep.  I think I finally fell asleep at about 3:30am only to have my alarm go off at 5:30am in order to go to work.  Talk about being a zombie at work… I was originally going to tell my boss that either Monday, 7/13 or Wednesday, 7/15 was going to be my last day.  But after Monday night- I was done!  I just really wanted to be able to rest and take a nap to catch up on my sleep if I felt like it during the day.  Can’t do that too easily at work… I guess I could go out to my car to nap- but it’s getting pretty hot here and the thought of trying to nap in 97 degree weather isn’t very appealing   So Tuesday morning I talked to my boss and told him- luckily he’s very understanding and flexible- so Friday’s my last day.  Seems kinda odd to think about it… the time has flown by so quickly!  How can it be July 8th already?!?  I’m sure I”ll be saying that even more after the baby arrives… “How can he/she be a year old already?!?”…  Anyway, I’m pretty happy with my decision to make Friday my last day.

My mom has her plane ticket to come to CO after Baby M has (hopefully) arrived.  She gets here on 7/20 and leaves on 8/5.  Then Chris’ parents arrive on 8/8 and stay til 8/24.  They’re going up to the mountains with some friends for about a week during that time- Chris and I would like to go up to visit with everyone but we’re going to wait to make that decision until after Baby M arrives and see how everything goes.

I’ll update more later today after the ultrasound…

For the 4th of July we decided to make a quick trip up to the mountains since we hadn’t been up there since March for me and April for Chris.  We spent Friday going to the pool and doing some stuff around the house.  Then we headed up to the mountains Saturday at about noon- walked around Breckenridge for a bit, they had the Budweiser clydesdale horses there- here’s Chad, 1 of the horses :)

We also went over to Copper and walked around there a bit- but not too much was going on.  Not sure if the rain that fell earlier in the afternoon scared everyone away or if people were just over at Frisco and/or Breckenridge. 

 

I was wearing Chris’ jacket since it was kinda chilly and none of my jackets fit me anymore

Oh yeah, we also went to dinner at Chris’ “local spot” restaurant so he got to catch up with his peeps who he hasn’t seen since April.  I managed to stay awake late enough to watch the fireworks that were set off from the Frisco marina.  We watched them from the Dillon marina side though since our hotel was closer to Dillon than Frisco.  After that we headed back to the hotel because I was pooped.  On Sunday we got up and went to breakfast at a little “local” place we like- The Mountain Lyon Cafe.  Then we headed back to Castle Rock to meet our friend, Gayle, for a late lunch.  Traffic was already bad at 11:30am when we were driving back- I would’ve hated to see it later on in the day when the majority of people started heading home.  The mountains were crowded this weekend- good for CO tourism!  Our late lunch with Gayle was good fun- we had not seen her since my baby shower about a month ago.  She biked in the Ride the Rockies ride a bit ago- she rode 320 miles over 5 or 6 days- how impressive!  So we got to hear all about her trip. 

Then we headed home and unpacked and got caught up on some stuff.  We used our webcam with Chris’ parents that night to make sure that it’s working OK.  We’re planning on bringing Chris’ laptop and the webcam to the hospital with us so we can use it after the baby is born to talk with family.  So let me know if you have a webcam and would like us to contact you

Hope everyone had a good holiday weekend!

It’s been awhile since I’ve posted some photos of my belly (not since Week 33) so here are some of the latest:

Week 34:

Week 35- apparently I was wearing the same shirt the next week :

Week 36:

Week 37- sporting an almost 44″ waist:

 

Love this face

We had our weekly OB appointment yesterday- no news on that front.  My blood pressure is still low and the baby’s heartbeat is still strong- so all is good there.  We discussed a bunch of questions with the OB but I totally forgot to ask about compression socks/hose for my swollen ankles… how could I have forgotten that?!?  Oh well.  I called them today to ask if there was anything I should be doing about my puffiness and they said to increase water intake and decrease salt.  The nurse gave me a rough estimate to go by to determine how much water I should be drinking- she said to divide my weight in half and that’s how many ounces of water I should be drinking…. holy crap, that means I should be drinking about 80 ounces of water/day!!!!  I better get drinking!  I know it doesn’t all have to come from strictly water- juices and water-content in things like fruit count as well… but still!  80 ounces is alot!

Our high school friend, Brian, and his family were driving through CO yesterday (relocating from Vegas to outside of DC) and they stopped to say hi.  We hung out with them for a couple hours before they headed south to the Air Force Academy and to have dinner with another friend.  It was great to talk to them and get to meet their kids.  I totally forgot to take any photos, unfortunately.  The kids (theyhave a son who’s 4-ish and a daughter who’s 2-ish) loved playing with the dogs and the dogs LOVED all the attention.  Honeybrown was so pooped after they left because they kept throwing the ball for her and chasing her around- how fun!

Short work week this week- we have off on Friday for the holiday- yay!  Safe travels to Cindy, Sergio and Bella- they’re returning to Italy tomorrow.

Oh mygosh- I woke up this morning and had almost regular looking ankles!!!  For the past couple days my feet and ankles have been horrendously swelled/puffy.  Not sure if it has been the heat and humidity (high humidity for CO anyway) or just the fact that it’s getting close to the end, but my ankles and feet (even the tops of my feet!) were swollen beyond recognition- ew.  So I had to take a picture of my almost normal looking ankles

Then, I had to take this photo of Nittany- -does this look at all comfortable?!?

We have had a good weekend.  I got a massage on Saturday morning- ah, how relaxing!!!  Then we went to the pool for a couple hours- swimming felt good.  We got pizza and rented a couple movies Saturday night- “Paul Blart- Mall Cop” and “Body of Lies”.  Mall Cop was a bit much- it was like they were trying too hard to be funny- I wouldn’t really recommend it.  Of course, all the commercials looked quite stupid so I wasn’t expecting much- but I was expecting a bit more than it delivered.  “Body of Lies” wasn’t bad- I’d recommend it.  Today we went to the pool again until the clouds rolled in.  Then we went to Lowes and Home Depot and picked out a new kitchen faucet to go with the sink we chose last week.  Chris has alot of projects around the house he’s working on   Installing the kitchen sink and faucet, re-grouting the shower in our bathroom, and installing ceiling fans in the extra bedrooms… hope he gets them all done before the baby comes!

Speaking of the baby, no news on that front.  We have our weekly appointment tomorrow.  Our friend from high school, Brian, and his family are moving from Las Veagas to outside of DC so they’ll be passing through CO and are stopping by to say hi.  They’re in Grand Junction tonight and are stopping at the Air Force Academy (Brian went to the AFA) and we live close to there so we’ll get to see them.  How fun- looking forward to seeing them!  Hope everyone had a nice weekend.

One more photo I had to add- Chris wanted me to take a picture of the pile of pillows I’ve been using to sleep… Chris says that’s the thing he’s going to miss the least after the baby is born- the pile o’ pillows I’ve been using to try to stay comfortable.

It’s been awhile since I’ve posted pictures of the baby’s room so Chris and I took some photos last night.  We hung a couple things on the wall last night- 1 was a hanging with a teddy bear on it that Chris’ grandparents made for him 30+ years ago.  I remembered we had it in a box down in the basement and asked Chris if he’d like to hang it in the baby’s room- he didn’t even remember we had it   We’re also hanging photos of our families in the room so we can point out photos of Grandma and Pop Pop Condliff and Grandma and Grandpa Mellinger and the aunts, uncles and cousins.  That way when everyone comes to visit- their faces will be familiar- can a baby remember this stuff???  Oh well, we’ll try.

Here’s the wall hanging:

And us making the crib- me with Chris’ cool new wrist bands

Chris with the crib- don’t worry, the rabbit won’t stay in there once the baby gets here

The bookshelf with all our books from everyone- thank you!

Me in the recliner- check out those swollen feet!!!

And, last but not least, Chris playing with the video monitor:

As you can see in the photo above, we still have a bit more organizing to do- but the room is getting there!

We had our Week 36 (Week 35 according to me?) appointment on Tuesday and my “fundal height” was still measuring small- so we went ahead and scheduled an ultrasound for today, Thursday, 6/18.  Everything else on Tuesday looked and sounded OK- my blood pressure is still nice and low and the baby’s heartbeat was nice and strong (I think it was 160/min).    They also did the Group B Strep test (we should get the results back next week) and then checked to see if I was dilated at all- I wasn’t.  Nothing happening at all yet.  That’s fine by me  

During the ultrasound today, the technician lady told us that all looked well.  She measured a bunch of stuff- head size, femur size, amniotic fluid amount, looked at the placenta, etc- and said everything looks good.  We’re not going to have a huge baby or anything but Baby M definitely isn’t undersized.  According to the ultrasound, the technician thought he/she weighed about 5.8lbs-ish right now (give or take a 1/2 lb)- the tech was guessing that Baby M would probably be around 7lbs when he/she is born.  It was fun to see the baby again- we could see a front-on view and could see the eyes, nose, mouth, etc as well as the other parts- heart, stomach, etc.  Very cool.  But then when she tried to print out a “picture” for us to take with us, Baby M curled his/her hands up in front of his/her face and wouldn’t move them- darn it   So no good keepsake photo from Week 36 but it was a good appointment to learn that all is OK with Baby M.  I probably just won’t be one of those gigantic pregnant women you see- and I think I’m OK with that!

We have all the rest of our weekly appointments all set up already- pretty much every Monday from now til 7/13 or whenever Baby M decides to make his/her entrance into this world.  Hope everyone’s having a great week.

All is still well here.  Had a good weekend- no photos from the weekend to share though.  I talked to Cindy on the phone for over an hour on Friday night since she’s in the US- had a great chat.  We went to a “Breastfeeding 101″ class on Saturday morning- holy tons of information again!!!  But it was great that we went to the class because it changed our thinking on a couple things.  We were originally going to just try to put Baby M in the nursery from the start- however, we learned that some research shows that it’s better to have the baby sleep in the room with mom/dad because when the baby wakes up, he/she can smell (apparently baby’s sense of smell is 1 of their best senses in the early days) that mom is close and isn’t as freaked out.  So we decided that Baby M will be staying in the room with us for the 1st couple weeks.  Also, I always sorta had a “…I’ll breastfeed as long as it works out…” attitude and this class convinced me that I should try my hardest to continue breastfeeding as long as possible because of all the benefits to baby (and mom!).

After the class we went and recycled a bunch of old computers that Chris had in the basement at an electronics recycling event- yay!  Getting stuff out of the basement is a GREAT thing   Then we met a friend of mine (she used to work at IR with me) and her husband for lunch- haven’t seen her in awhile so it was nice to catchup.  She has kids who are in their early to mid-20’s so it was cool to hear her experiences with childbirth from back in the early 80’s.  We were also meeting a friend of ours for a birthday dinner in downtown Denver Sat night so after lunch Chris and I went home and took a nap because neither of us had slept very well Friday night.  I’m not a very good napper but I actually managed to sleep for an hour or so- I must’ve been tired  

Dinner Saturday night was at an Italian restaurant in Denver- it was a good time.  There was a Rockies game that night too so downtown was jumpin’.  I realized we hadn’t been downtown in quite awhile!  I always enjoy going up there for dinner or just wandering around- but I wouldn’t want to live in downtown Denver- I’m just not a city-type person.  I much prefer the suburbs.  So Saturday was quite the socializing day for Chris and me.

Sunday was way less hectic.  We organized the baby’s room a bit more- took tags off of more of the clothes and filled the hamper with laundry again.  The room still doesn’t have anything hanging on the walls but there are way fewer piles of stuff on the floor now!  It’s getting there… after that we headed to the pool for a bit.  We got about 15-20 min of swimming in before an early storm rolled in at noon and the lifeguards were forced to close the pool because they spotted lightning.  Bummer.  It felt good to be in the water but it was defintely harder for me to swim with the extra weight and shortness of breath.  If it’s nice weather after work, we’re going to try and get to the pool more often for some low-impact exercising.  After the pool we went out and ran some errands and then got Chipotle for dinner- yum!

So that was our weekend- it was nice but quick (aren’t they all???).  I just called in this morning to start my maternity leave short-term disability claim.  The HR department told me to call about a month before my due date- yikes, how did that sneak up so fast?!?  We have our Week 36 (according to the Dr office- according to me it’s still Week 35!) apppointment tomorrow and then our last Childbirth Prep class tomorrow night.  Our hospital (Littleton Adventist) offers for you to meet with an OB/Delivery nurse prior to your delivery so they can get a feel for what your thoughts/hope/expectations are for your delivery.  Chris and I don’t have too many “strong” feelings about how we’d like the delivery to go (except for hoping for everything to go smoothly and having a healthy baby!) but we still thought it would be a good idea to meet with a nurse to talk and get any leftover questions that we may have answered.  So we have that set up for next Saturday to meet with them.

I think that’s about all that’s new here.  Sounds like the party in Ocean City at my parents’ house for everyone to meet Bella went well.  Glad to hear it!  Hope everyone has a nice week.

So you know how I said we had our Week 34 appointment yesterday?  Well, turns out it was really our Week 35 appointment!  How’d that happen?!?  It seems that I’ve been “measuring” our weeks wrong all along… oops.  The OB’s office has our weeks starting on a Tuesday and I was starting the new week on Thursday- so we were 2 days off.  Really not that big of a deal but during yesterday’s appointment everyone kept saying “We’ll see you next week…” and I finally said “We don’t have an appointment for next week- our next 1 is in 2 weeks.”  So that’s how we figured out our “miscommunication”.  Anywho- so we’re now at the weekly appointment stage.  

My “fundal height”- height of the uterus measured from pubic bone to top of uterus- has been measuring small for the past 2 appointments so they also wanted to see me next week to check on that.  So we have our Week 36 appointment next Tuesday- not sure if they’ll definitely do an ultrasound then to make sure all is well with Baby M or if they’ll wait another week.  I guess we’ll see what the measurements say next week.  I’ve definitely been gaining the proper amount of weight- not too much, not too little- maybe it has just been the heartburn that has been holding me back?   Who knows.  Everything else looked good during yesterday’s appointment- baby’s heartbeat was nice and strong and my blood pressure is still nice and low. 

We also had our 2nd Childbirth Prep class last night @6pm- so after our dr appt we headed to TGI Friday’s for dinner- Friday’s Shrimp- yum!   Dinner was good and so was class- we saw a video about epidurals, talked about pain and what its purpose is during labor, and also worked more on breathing and massage techniques.  I was realizing I should maybe practice this stuff at home too

Cindy, Sergio and Bella arrive from Italy today- they’ll be here for a couple weeks.  They’re having a family party at my parents’ house in Ocean City this weekend- wish I could travel there for it!!!  Have fun for me and take lots of pictures!