November/December Appointments

Our next appointment was November 21, 2012 and it was super short. Dr. P told us this would be a quick check of heartbeat and size. He was still measuring about a week ahead and his heart rate was still around 150.  Everything was moving along!  In December my appointment was on the 19th. I was 27 weeks. This was the blood glucose test. I was a little nervous about how that would go but the drink was way better than I had imagined and I got good news that I passed which was great! This was also the month of my biggest weight gain jump but I had kind of figured that Thanksgiving/Christmas wasn't going to be good as far as the scales were concerned.  I had started having some Braxton Hicks type contractions and some major hip pain that made a good night of sleep pretty impossible but other than that, I was doing great! Luckily my wave of energy lasted through Christmas Break so I was able to get some stuff done around the house. 

Originally my plan was to document the pregnancy by taking a picture every week and journal what was happening that week but that didn't happen! I did manage to take quite a few weekly pics but never posted them or wrote about them and didn't keep up with what week was what. So here are the pics I did take. Most parents do all this detailed stuff for kid #1 and then can't keep up with it for kid #2, #3, etc....I'll be the opposite. I had all these plans that didn't happen and so maybe I'll do that the second time around.  :)

Those last 3 were from January. I pretty much ballooned between December and January....Christmas goodies and being home from work probably didn't help much!  Just for my memory, I gained 26 lbs during this pregnancy. However, Will was 4 weeks early and so it could've been much more if I'd be given the full 40 weeks! :)

Big Ultrasound

October 24, 2011 was the big ultrasound day!  We were excited and nervous....see a pattern here? :)  We were excited to find out if we'd have a boy or girl but we were more anxious to make sure everything was good with the health of the baby.  We got there early and they got us right back. The ultrasound tech was so friendly and explained everything that she was doing even when we didn't  see everything she did. :) She'd say "Here you can see the kidneys"....me thinking---"ummm...nope not even sure what a kidney actually looks like and what you're pointing to seems like a black blob but okay!" We did see the heart beat and were able to locate the heart so we were proud of that at least!

UAMS is the state's high-risk pregnancy center and so they routinely do very detailed ultrasounds. They informed us that they do all ultrasounds that way and so it was very detailed and took quite some time but we felt good that they were looking at everything to make sure our little one was healthy! They measured the different bones, organs, brain, etc. and made sure they got good pictures. Little man was being stubborn (another early sign of his little personality...haha) and so she had a hard time getting him to move around so she could look at everything. She'd dig the wand into me and he'd move for a second and then he'd go back to his original position. She got everything but a few angles of the heart that she couldn't get. She told us Dr. Wendel would look at it and if he felt he needed to see more they would schedule us for another ultrasound. **He ended up seeing everything he needed to and felt completely comfortable with little man's heart which was a relief!

Next up was time for us to see if we were having a little he or a little she. She asked if we had a preference and we really didn't. We were just so happy that our baby looked healthy and we really hadn't had a feeling either way throughout the pregnancy.  So once again our little man was being stubborn. He was squatting down like a little frog and wouldn't move. Finally after moving around to get him moving, he did a little hop and she was able to see his little man part. It was so fast that she couldn't capture it on film but we all saw it. We were excited but we spent the next few minutes trying to get a shot so that we could really "document" that this was a boy.  We got the documentation and there was no doubt we were having a BOY!  She switched over to 3D to get us some photos of his little face. He was covering most of his face with his hand but we did get a little look! We also got some great little video of him moving around. This appointment definitely made everything more real. He looked like a baby and moved like a baby and now we knew his name!

Next we met with our doctor and she said everything looked great! He was measuring about a week ahead but we were still keeping our due date and she said she'd call us if Dr. Wendel had any concerns with the ultrasound. So next we had to do a big round of blood work. This wasn't something I was really looking forward to but I guess no one really gets excited about it..ha!  However, I am a difficult blood draw because my veins are abnormally thin...awesome fact! I was actually not worried at first because UAMS' lab has been able to get it the first time for all my previous appointments (which was amazing and made me so happy) but as soon as I heard the nurse say the lab was unexpectedly closed that day, I knew it wasn't going to be pretty.  Originally I just told them I'd come back but they hated to have to me do that and so they were going to have a nurse do it. Well they needed a lot of blood and so 1 hour and 3 nurses later we finally had enough for everything they needed. Who knew the blood draw would be the longest part!

After we left, we called our parents to let them know! Everyone was excited! We stopped to have lunch and buy a little boy outfit. Now it was time for the planning to begin!

 

I know these scanned pics look horrible but I'm doing good just to get them posted! At a later date maybe I'll make them look pretty! :)

When would we tell....

Again the big gasp from our pregnancy was how long we took to tell everyone...including our family! Darlene had said not to tell her until we were pretty close to telling everyone (so she wouldn't have to try to keep it a secret so long) and we wanted to tell our parents around the same time. We had planned to do it around a time we could go to Fayetteville to tell my parents/sister in person. However, September was a crazy month schedule wise. Daniel and Lauren had several wedding showers, David had hunting trips and I had a 5K for Open Arms and so it just didn't seem like there was a weekend to get there and give the news! I finally told David I thought we would have to do it by phone or Skype or something but he was determined that we would do it in person and so that meant waiting a few more weeks. Luckily it was my first pregnancy and so I wasn't showing too much, although I felt HUGE! Everything was getting a wee bit snug for sure.

It was finally our annual Pumpkin Patch weekend in Fayetteville and so we knew it was time to finally tell. I found these cute little frames at Hallmark and we put in a picture of the ultrasound.  We told my family Saturday morning before headed to the pumpkin patch. We had wrapped the frame and gave it to my mom to open. She immediately knew but was surprised and thought my dad and Meg already knew. Dad was confused and thought it was a picture of my ultrasound I'd given to mom (not possible since they didn't have ultrasound pics of me from then). Once everyone figured out what was going on, they were super excited!  When we got back in town on Sunday, we went over to David's parents and gave them their present. They caught on a little quicker and the screaming and celebrating began. We then told Daniel, Lauren and Paw Paw and then it was time to tell friends. It happened to fall in a crazy week when I was in Hot Springs for AECA and I just didn't have time to call each person in between sessions and volunteering at registration. So I made some personalized notes for each person, took a picture of the note and sent it in a text. Not the most personal way to tell but it worked for us and everyone was excited! 

Second Appointment

Our second appointment was September 26, 2011 (my dad's birthday) at 9:45.  We had been told that this would be a pretty quick appointment. I was almost 15 weeks at this point. Around the 13-14 week mark the nausea had stopped which was a nice break. It wasn't horrible (I knew it could be MUCH worse) but feeling sick everyday and throwing up a few times was not the most fun thing either. Although I did panic a little because when I was sick it was a sign to me that things were going well and then one day I felt 100% and I hoped that things were still going well. My doctor had said it would probably subside around this time so that was comforting. I was still anxious to hear things were going well!  We came in and she warned us that sometimes it takes a little while to hear the heartbeat and not to panic if it took her a second to find it. We were quickly put at ease when she found it immediately. She kept laughing at how much he was moving. We laughed at how he'd probably be a busy body like his daddy....and we weren't far off! :) They did a little more blood work and we were ready to go. It was crazy that our next appointment would be the BIG appointment where we would get our big ultrasound to find out health, sex, etc. In some ways it was like it was going by so slowly but in other ways it was just moving at a rapid pace. 

First Appointment

Wow...so so behind! Hoping to get caught up this week. I thought if I put it on my Christmas cards it would force me to get caught up before they went out....but no...that didn't happen! 


Our first baby appointment was August 29th at 10:00am with Dr. P.  We were excited and nervous!  She came in and did an ultrasound and we were able to see the heartbeat and the little baby moving around. It was crazy to think he has was so active in there and that I couldn't feel any of it! She commented right then how active he was and it has proven to be a good predictor of his little personality!

The heartbeat was good! We were told our due date was March 21, 2012! A spring break baby...perfect for my schedule! I should've known then that was probably too good to be true! :) Later on we would find out that our little man is not a very patient little guy. :)

Before we knew he was a William.....

Wow...so much for my plan to get caught up on Will's life in my belly before he arrived! He showed up 3.5 weeks early and the blog wasn't the only thing that wasn't ready!  I've been putting life and sleep ahead of this but really want to do a major catch up before I forget everything!

So the big laugh is that it took us forever to tell everyone we were pregnant....but to be honest it took us a bit to figure out that we were! June was a crazy month with David having work trips, me going to Rhode Island for a conference, VBS, beach trip with my parents/Meg, teaching online classes and on my spare days helping with advising. July started off busy with David and I co-directing OMP at our home church for the first time ever. So the summer was flying by and there wasn't much "down time". OMP ended and after 1.5 weeks of 5-6 hours of sleep a night, I was exhausted!  It didn't help getting a stomach bug the Monday after OMP and having to work all week doing advising! I was super tired but I kept chalking it up to such a busy summer and never having a chance to catch up on sleep.  The last week in July I had a "free" week and I slept and rested quite a bit. So early August came and I was a bit surprised that I was still feeling so sleepy. I figured it was just because the school year was upon me and it's just a busy time. Then the nausea started.....it was at that point I started thinking about when I had my last period and realized it hadn't been since late June. At that point I knew. I took a test, it said positive, I took several more and they all confirmed it. I thought about doing some cutesy thing as a way to tell David but if you know me, you know I like to think and find creative ideas...and then get someone else to actually make/create/do...ha! :) So I resorted to showing him the test. He was super excited and we had our first appointment scheduled for August 29th. We couldn't wait! We were a little surprised we were pregant (our original "plan" was to be due after David finished his MBA) but when does anything go according to " our plan"! :)

 Thank goodness I was pregnant because I look ROUGH in this picture and choose to blame it on the sleepiness and nausea!!!! :)

Before our appointment there were three things I was sort of nervous about. The first being I had just ordered and received my bridesmaids dress for Jana's wedding. Luckily the wedding was in November but I had no idea how big I'd be by then and was hoping I could squeeze into the dress. Next was Jana's bachelorette party. I was pretty sure I had could go and not make anyone suspicious. I'm not a big drinker and so I figured it'd be fine. David, however, was a nervous wreck. He thought for sure people would notice. JMay even stayed with us that weekend and didn't suspect anything. Luckily the nausea seemed to lessen a little that weekend which helped! The third was our first appointment. We didn't really know what to expect and were excited, nervous, etc. I think the starting of school helped keep me preoccupied a bit which was good. I was just hoping I wouldn't throw up in class...ha! :)

Blog Title and Design

Since I'm doing this more to remember our life, I thought I better write down why I chose the design and name (in case in all the lack of sleep for the next several years, I completely forget)! Besides a time in my younger elementary years, I have never been super into the color pink. It was Grandma Kat's favorite color and mine for a bit but I never had to have the pink room or the all-pink clothing or anything like that. However, when looking through all the design choices this one kind of stuck out. I thought it was weird since I'm not really a "pink" person. However, I think maybe it's a little Grandma Kat coming out in me thinking that since I have a husband, two male dogs and a little baby boy on the way (she had a husband and three boys) that I might need a little "pink" in my life...at least at this point anyway! :)

My title of "This is the Stuff" is from Francesca Battistelli's song. It seems that whenever I think I'm having a "bad" day....running late, behind a school bus, crazy people at work, etc.......I hear this song and it puts life in perspective! I love the line "In the middle of my little mess, I forget how big I'm blessed." So true that my bad days really aren't that bad and I need to remember my blessings each day! This is my hope for the coming year!