Hold Up, We're Having a Baby!

We went to the doctor today and he said that my blood pressure was high again and since I am 39 weeks along, it's time to have this baby! He told us to go have lunch and then get over to the hospital for the first part of induction. We've been there all afternoon and they just sent us home until 7:00 a.m. tomorrow (unless I am in full blown labor before that). Although we are quite surprised, we are extremely excited and can't hardly believe that Mason will be with us tomorrow. Hooray!

Be Prepared!

As some of you know, I am the emergency preparedness coordinator for our ward, and way back in November I volunteered to have a couple of tables at the preparedness fair. Fast forward to me the end of April and I obviously needed some help to pull this off. I of course wrangled Jake into helping me and by the end of the fair he was completely versed on the shelf life of MRE's and the importance of 72 hour emergency kits. We met some very interesting and strange people at the fair, like the lady who said to us "You better have some ketchup in this kit if you have kids because children will literally starve themselves to death if they don't have ketchup". We must have looked at her disbelieving because she followed it up with "I am totally serious". Jake and I can't believe how lucky we were to get this advice just moments before having a child. Can you imagine what would have happened if we had tried to give Mason some kind of life sustaining food without ketchup? We don't even want to think about this tragedy so narrowly avoided.

In Mason news all is well after a little high blood pressure scare last week. I was secretly excited when the Dr. said "Come back in two days and if your pressure hasn't gone down we'll talk about having this baby next week." Well, my blood pressure went down and here we sit, waiting not so patiently. Jake does have finals next week though and seems to think that having a baby before those finals is somehow going to affect his performance. I assured him that it would not, and that I would take full responsibility for Mason until he is done. He won't even realize there is a third person in the house. He seems unconvinced.

A Rough Week So Far

My week has gotten off to a rocky start, although the second half is certainly looking up. On Monday I was very shocked and saddened by the shootings at Virginia Tech. Although I am usually aware and empathetic to things like this in the news, this event hit me very hard for some reason. I know that I am extremely hormonal from the pregnancy, and that has something to do with my heightened emotions, but what kept running through my mind is "How do you explain this sort of thing to a child?" My focus has shifted from Jake and myself being the center of my universe to Mason, and the fact that we are bringing someone into a world that at times defies logic and explanation. I know we have a few years before we'll have to answer the hard questions, but it has really given me pause the past few days.

As if Monday was not emotionally draining enough, Tuesday was worse. On Tuesday I lost my job with Albertsons. I was laid off due to a restructure that caught us all by surprise. I am still a bit stunned by the whole turn of events. I was a total wreck for 24 hours and then we went to the doctor and he said that my blood pressure was high, my heart rate was high and I had lost weight and that if I didn't calm down I could have this baby right away. I knew that my stress was affecting Mason, but hearing it from the doctor made me try even harder to get a handle on things. I don't want Mason to be stressed or feel that he is stressing me out, so I have a much brighter outlook today. I also know that everything will work out just the way it should, and more than likely better than it was. I do have to praise Jake for his amazing patience and his knack for always saying the right thing at the right time. I woke him up at least 5 times Tuesday night crying and he was up with me every time calming down until I fell asleep again. He's going to be such a good dad!

So now it's Thursday and I feel much better about things, haven't cried in almost 24 hours, and I am looking so forward to having a baby! I certainly have time on my hands to get things ready for him!

A Lovely Shower

My dear friends Sunny and Dana hosted a baby shower for me the weekend before last. Everyone told us to wait until after the shower to buy anything for the baby because we would receive a lot of the essentials we would need. Well that was an understatement! We have the most generous friends and family and now have a fully stocked nursery just waiting for baby Mason to grace its presence. It was so great to have my grandma there and the whole affair was very classy. We didn't play any cheesy games at all and the food was to die for! I thank Sunny and Dana from the bottom of my heart for being such great friends.

In other baby news, we took our childbirthing classes a couple of weekends ago. I sat there enthralled with the information that was being presented as Jake was thumbing through the manual we were given. He says "Yeah, I learned all this in 8th grade Health". What? I don't recall my health class going into much detail about childbirth, and I probably wasn't listening anyway. Anyway, I got a lot of useful information out of the classes and now I am fully educated and ready to have a baby. Hopefully we won't have to have a C-section though as we both decided that we would rather have lunch at Johnny Carino's than sit through that portion of class.

Here are some pics from the shower...

A Diaper Cake Made By Dana

Dana, Sunny and Donna (who lent us her house)

Look how comfortable that baby is with me!

Me and My Grandma Wood

Me and My Mother

Someplace New!

Last week I had to go to Spokane, Washington for some meetings. I had never been to Spokane and was excited to see a new city. It seemed as though everyone I encountered had been there and about 80% of people who had spent any time there said it was not very nice. The words "dump" and "dive" were used. Needless to say my expectations were low. Perhaps that is why I was so pleasantly surprised. I really liked Spokane! It has a whole bunch of trees, doesn't seem too big and the best part is the downtown area. It has a huge river and falls running down the middle of it and as a dam enthusiest I could hardly control my excitement. I also learned that the Grand Coulee dam, which is the largest concrete structure in the United States, is just a short drive away! Fantastic!

Speaking of driving, my only option for vehicles was a minivan, which I never really warmed up to. I don't see the allure. Anyway, for some reason my internal compass has been thrown off (I blame the baby) and I was constantly lost. I mean, there is only one freeway but for some reason I got my east and west all mixed up. This is not normal for me and I didn't like it one bit. I was trying to get back to my hotel, and the next thing I knew I was in Coeur d' Alene (is this the most difficult city in the country to spell?). For those of you not aware, this city is in Idaho, 40 miles from Spokane. I had to call Jake because I used to make fun of him when he would zone out on the way home from LA and end up in Mexico. Anyway, lucky for me I had nowhere to be and I had never seen Coeur d' Alene, which happens to be very beautiful. So it was kind of a two for one.

Spokane is definitely a place I would like to revisit with Jake. It appeared to be a very lovely city with plenty to do. Although when I returned and told my secretary about it she said "oh, so the hundreds of meth addicts hanging out downtown didn't bother you?" Um, either I missed them entirely or I was not actually in Spokane, which is a real possibility.

Jake's thoughts on being a Dad:

Poop filled diapers will be gross
Knowing he works will be pleasing

Urinating on himself, me, the changing table and anything else in range will be gross
~Recognizing that he is so helplessly out of control that even the basics are too difficult for him
~Knowing that I am charged with his safekeeping and knowing that I will be there to teach him all the basics throughout the rest of his life

Drooling on everything and anything will be gross
~What can I say, it is just gross

Dripping snot 24 hours a day will be gross
~Ditto

Watching everything on the floor eventually find its way in Mason’s mouth will be gross
~Watching his curiosity lead to exploration and eventually lead to learning could give me no more joy

Cleaning a scabby umbilical stump will be gross
~One of the many scars of life that I will help to heal

Hearing my newborn child screaming at max volume will be hard
~Hearing my son take a breath for the first time and cry will be my crowning achievement in my life




I don’t know you yet Mason but I know I will love you and everything about you. I will see you soon but it won’t be soon enough.



Dad



As promised here is the long awaited belly picture!!!

The 2 Month Countdown

On Saturday we will be 2 months from Mason's due date, but who's really counting? A couple of weeks ago I was nearly on bed rest because of a pinched nerve and overall back pain. After 5 straight days of chiropractor and an extremely painful massage, I started to feel better and now I am just going to the chiropractor once a week and getting an extremely painful massage once a week. Things are definitely looking up. You never know how great you've got it until you don't have it so great anymore.

With the weather being so warm and pleasant we are looking forward to our summer of baby love! Jake started painting the nursery and this weekend we will put up a wallpaper border and the crib. I think it is also time to take some belly pics as I am now very obviously pregnant. This has been manifested to me several times in the past week, most notably when I went to register for baby items at Target and Babies R Us. Other mothers will say "is this your first?" and then give me more advice on everything from the actual birthing process to what kind of high chair I should buy. So far I don't mind it at all because everyone on the planet knows more about children than I do. Plus I know all I have to say is "no, this is actually our ninth, can you believe it?" to stop the advice.

Last Friday was the 4th anniversary of our first date, which took place at the Olive Garden on Sports Arena Boulevard in San Diego. We have eaten at the Olive Garden every year since and though we eat there often, it's always different on March 2 because we talk about that first date and how far we have come since then. Good times.

This weekend we will post nursery and belly pics for all to see!