Week 29

Weighing in at almost three pounds, Gray is now a little over 15 inches long. His brain is growing a lot these days, which means his head is too. His lungs are continuing to mature and his bones are getting stronger. Get this crazy fact-every day about 200 milligrams of calcium is being deposited into his skeleton. Good thing this big mama has been drinking lots of milk lately.

I went to the doctor on Friday for my monthly check-up and glucose test. The juice for the glucose test wasn't nearly as bad as everyone told me it would be. Matter of fact, I thought it pretty much tasted like normal fruit punch. They said unless I failed the first screening, I wouldn't hear anything back from them. I haven't heard anything back from them yet, so I'll take that as a good sign. The doctor told me she was pretty certain the back pain I'm having is from my sciatic nerve. And like I was told when I went last Monday, there isn't anything they can do for it other than recommend massage therapy and/or a chiropractor. I plan on getting as much rest as possible while we're out for spring break this week, hoping that will help get me through three more weeks of work until I go back to the doctor. Everything else checked out good at my appointment. I had gained a few more pounds in the last month putting me at 23 so far. Yikes! That is really close to what I wanted to gain total and I still have a ways to go. I guess that bowl of ice cream I had yesterday means I'm not stressing out too much about it ;)

No picture to go with week 29 but just imagine me bigger than I was at 28 because I swear I'm growing by the day!

We got our glider in yesterday so hopefully by the end of this week I can get a few pics up of the nursery.

Baby Shower #1

We had our first baby shower yesterday at my work. Since I teach both 4th and 5th grade, I have the pleasure of working with two grade levels so there were a lot of people involved in making this a very special day.


Look at that sweet GRAY elephant on the diaper cake :)



My good friend Kristen and her sweet little Grace surprised me and came to the shower. Kristen and I taught together but now she works as a stay at home mommy, another profession we will soon share.




Gray got a lot of really nice things. His first set of beach gear


This huge, fluffy hand-made elephant that I am completely in love with


Some big boy essentials


Some sweet, sweet little outfits




A hand-made boppy. Daddy was excited about the masculinity in this particular item ;)


His first monogrammed bag


And that was just to name a few. I work with some really great people and was very blessed by their kindness and generosity.

3rd Trimester Baby!!!

Welp, I am officially two-thirds of the way through my pregnancy. Only 8 more weeks until Gray is considered full term, only 12 (ish, of course) more weeks until we get to meet his sweet self.

At 28 weeks, Gray weighs about two and a half pounds and is getting close to 15 inches long. I continue to feel him move more and more every day and I still can't get enough of it. I love imagining exactly what body part I feel or what specific movement he is doing inside of me every time I feel him. He got the hiccups again the other night and they were a lot more distinct and lasted longer than the last time I noticed it. Baby boy's big skill of the week is blinking his eyes regularly. His lungs and brain are continuing to develop, coming very close to being done with their over-time work load.

I am slowly starting to enter the "miserable" phase of pregnancy. Between my back hurting and my belly making every day necessities a challenge, I can tell I am approaching the final stages. I went back to the doctor yesterday about my back. The muscle relaxer isn't working and I just wanted to see if there was anything else I could take or do. Other than recommending a chiropractor, they basically said "it is what it is" and "get as much rest as you can". Going to a chiropractor and paying a specialist rate co-pay once a week for the next two and a half months isn't really in our budget, especially when she said it might relieve some of the pain but wouldn't fix anything. She also said that I am carrying Gray pretty low already and the pain would only get worse as he drops more and gets bigger. I wasn't surprised by what she said but it was still a little discouraging because I don't have the kind of job that allows me to "rest" during the day and I have the entire 4th quarter yet to go. By the end of the week I truly feel like I cannot physically keep going. Despite the back pain though, I can say I am still loving being pregnant and I certainly don't ever want to take a minute of it for granted.

Here's mama at 7 months...


And since that shirt isn't very tight, I had to get one in a tank so I can remember what I really looked like this week.


We had our first baby shower at my work today. Hopefully I'll get a post up of that soon.

Nursery, take 1

We started on Gray's nursery this weekend. As I've mentioned before, we bought all of the furniture from my BF Lindsey. She and I played with her little ones while her hubby and Paul were upstairs putting the crib back together and whatnot. I had been so excited all week about getting the furniture and had been imagining exactly what it would look like set up at our house. When we went upstairs to see the finished product, I thought I was going to burst into tears. Apparently the room was even smaller than I thought it was and the crib was even bigger. It looked awful and there was barely any room left for our glider, if it was even going to fit at all. It didn't seem like there was any other way to arrange the furniture and other than leave out the chair or crib, which both seem pretty essential to me, it was flat out not going to work. Later that evening as I was pouting and resting my back, sweet Paul went in there and played around with the arrangement and found a way to make it very close to perfect. The room is still very cozy, but considering the space we have to work with, I am very happy with it. A few of these pictures were taken with my brother's wide angle camera and believe it or not, it makes the room look bigger than it is.

This the view looking into the room. Ignore the floor lamp. One of our nursery projects includes installing an overhead light/ceiling fan. The empty space on the left is where the glider will go, which will be here in the next week or two.


There is a tad more space in between the changing table and the crib than it looks like.


And we actually can open the closet door despite how close it is to the crib.



Paul's parents have the rest of the bedding at their house and we'll get it at our shower there this weekend. I can't wait to put it on!!! For now I've been enjoying this sweet little pillow.


Lindsey gave me this scrap book board thingy as a wedding gift when we got married. I love it so much and haven't been able to use it since we moved thanks to the whole "don't have too many personal pictures hanging" rule that comes along with having your house on the market. Well dang-it if that rule ain't gonna be shoved out the window now that we are having a baby. For now I put up some baby shower invitations and ultrasound pictures but soon this thing will be crammed with pics of a precious newborn.


I'll put another nursery post up when we get our chair and bedding and tackle a few more little projects.

27 weeks

This week Gray weighs a little over two pounds and has grown about another half inch since last week. Although his lungs still have a long way to go, his survival chances if he were born now increase to 90% around this week. It's a relief to have gotten this far but we are still praying every day that our sweet boy will continue cooking for quite a while longer. Gray now has a more normal sleeping pattern and he is opening and closing his eyes. He is still the most active at night. Almost the minute I get in bed he goes to town. His movement becomes more distinct by the week but it isn't keeping me awake at night yet so I'm not complaining about it one bit. I still just live for the evenings when I can finally be still and feel our active little guy practicing his soccer moves inside of my belly. I got to experience him having the hiccups for the first time last week. Paul and I were in bed watching American Idol and he was dancin and scootin all around. All of a sudden we noticed a constant, kind of jerky movement and as hard as it is to explain, we knew that's what it was. It was so exciting that Paul was able to feel them too. Have I mentioned how amazing this all is to me? I mean seriously, every day I am in awe and find it harder and harder to fathom. What an amazing God we serve!

I don't think I'd say I'm feeling great these days, but definitely still pretty good and have very little to complain about. I've had some pretty bad back pain for about two weeks now. I went to the doctor last week and they gave me a muscle relaxer. After almost a week, I can tell it is helping some, but it's still pretty painful. I am on my feet for at least 10 hours every day and by lunch time I am in quite a bit of pain. I go back to the doctor next Friday so we'll see if there is anything else they can give me or recommend for the pain. My guess is that they will just say it's due to this ever-growing front load I'm carrying around and that I might as well get used to it for the last 10-12 weeks. I've had such a great pregnancy though and feel blessed that this is the worst I've had to experience so far.

And now for the reveal of this week's heavy front loader...


Paul and I had a super busy weekend getting ready for the nursery furniture. We didn't stop moving from the time we got home from work Friday until about 9:00 Sunday night. We cleaned out closets at our house Friday night and loaded the car down with things to take to our storage unit my mom's garage. Saturday morning we were up early and in line at 7:30 for a local preschool children's sale. It was well worth the sleep sacrifice! We got a car seat and base that look brand new for 40 bucks! It wasn't the car seat we registered for but one we'd looked at and later that day we stopped by Bed, Bath and Beyond to take our car seat off of the registry and found out it had been discontinued. That made our car seat deal even more exciting! That my friends is not a "coincidence", rather a straight up blessing from God! At the sale we also got an exersaucer, bouncer, Baby Bjorn, two pairs of shoes, and a pair of pants and shorts...ALL for 100 bucks (including the car seat)!! We were so excited about the good deals we got. Then we headed to Babies R Us for a one day only diaper sale and stocked up on some Pampers. I become more like my Gram every day-good deals get me almost as excited as eating and going to the beach! The rest of the day was spent taking every. single. thing. out of my mom's garage and re-arranging it to make more room for some of our stuff so we can make room for this little person that will soon come to live with us. Paul and my mom wouldn't let me do much so I mainly supervised and ran to Target a few times to buy more storage bins. We got the last of our stuff back in there about 5 minutes before the storms came Saturday night. Now we have room to move a little more of our stuff this weekend to make room for the nursery furniture, which I can hardly wait for!

Sunday I went maternity clothes shopping with three other preggo friends at Concord Mills. I didn't have much luck with clothes but it was fun and I got a few good deals for Gray. Carter's was having a huge sale and I could have easily gotten everything they had. We've bought very few clothes for Gray because we are getting a lot of hand-me-downs, so I can't resist buying some things for him here and there.

I promise that everything he has and wears will not be elephants, but dang they are so cute!



Paul and I had seen and loved this little outfit in Babies R Us but they didn't have a newborn size and we are pretty sure this is what we want to bring him home from the hospital in.


Okie dokie, I guess this is more than enough blogging for one day.
Y'all have a good week!

26 weeks y'all!

I feel like I say this every week, but this pregnancy really is going by fast. It seems like yesterday I remember thinking about how I couldn't wait to be 15 weeks, and then 20 weeks. Now I'm almost seven months pregnant and only have a couple months to go. I've loved being pregnant and still do, but the closer I get the more ready and excited I am to meet our sweet baby boy.

Gray is almost two pounds this week! The estimated weight starts to really vary depending on the baby source, but two out of three of mine lean towards two pounds so I'm going with that. I don't know about Gray, but I sure feel bigger this week.


The rapid weight gain that he is putting on is not only evident in my belly, but also in the feel of his movements. I cannot even tell y'all how much I love feeling him move. It's the most amazing thing in the world and every time I feel him I just try to imagine what he's doing and how he's positioned at the time. The other day I could feel and see the strangest movement yet. It felt like he'd just woken up from a long nap and was stretching those sweet little arms and legs of his. I don't feel him as much during the day since I'm on my feet and moving constantly, so I live for the moments I get home and can see and feel him gettin jiggy with it in my belly.

Big boy is about 14 inches long from head to heel. His lungs are still super busy working to prepare for life in the real world and he is even starting to inhale and exhale small amounts of amniotic fluid. Our boy now has his very own fingerprints and footprints and all of the components that make up his eyes have developed and they even are starting to open.

I started having some major back pain about a week ago. It feels like I've maybe pulled a muscle or something, rather than typical pregnancy back pain. Laying flat on my back or on my right side is the only thing that relieves the pain. Standing and even sitting are what makes it hurt the worst, which makes teaching and being on my feet 10 straight hours every day cause for some long days. For most of the day today it was finally starting to feel better but by the end of the day I was in quite a bit of pain. I plan on calling the doctor tomorrow to see if they can give me something other than tylenol, because that is not even touching the pain. Other than that, I am still feeling pretty good.

I found out today that we are getting the nursery furniture not this weekend but next. I AM SO EXCITED!!! I'd been thinking it was going to be the end of April before we got the furniture but my friend Lindsey (who we're getting it from) is moving her two year old to a big boy bed and his new room is going to be ready sooner than she thought. We're going to spend this weekend cleaning out closets and moving some furniture around to empty out what is now our office but will be Gray's room. We'll have to store a couple pieces of the nursery furniture until we move one day since our office/Gray's soon-to-be room is not much bigger than a large closet. But I'm just so excited to start working on his room I don't even care.

Come on weekend!!!

Weekend Recap

It's been forever since I've had a chance to blog about our weekend. Life has been so busy and I've made the pregnancy posts a bit more of a priority.

We had a very busy, but great weekend.

Friday night started with dinner at my friend Kristen's house with her hubby, Jimmy, and their sweet little one, Grace. I taught with Kristen for two years but she retired last year to be a stay at home mommy. I actually took her teaching position and classroom this year. We haven't gotten to see or even talk to each other as much as we both wish we could because "life" has just gotten in the way. So it was so, so good hanging out with them. We joke but yet are very serious about planning an arranged marriage for Grace and Gray. It isn't every day you find a couple who shares as many of the same beliefs and values and they are definitely one of them. Jimmy is in medical school and will actually find out this Friday if he matched to do his residency here at Wake. We are praying so hard that he does because Paul and I both could use them around for many years to come. Plus, Grace and Gray need to go ahead and start getting to know each other so Kristen and I can get on some early wedding planning ;)

I hate I didn't snap any pics of sweet Grace but check out this adorable bib that Kristen got for Gray


It couldn't be more perfect! It was the first thing I've gotten with his name on it and I nearly peed my pants.

Saturday morning Paul and I headed out to get some baby things done. We ordered Gray's glider thanks to my very generous Mom and Gram! The gilder is the only piece of furniture we had to worry about since we are buying everything else from my friend Lindsey. We've been looking at them and pricing them at several different stores for a couple of months now, so it was so exciting to finally get it ordered. It will be here in just a couple of weeks! Babies R Us was having an expo this weekend so we went there to check it out. It wasn't much of anything, but we got to show my mom some things we registered for and I went ahead and got my diaper bag. I'd been thinking I wanted a really cute one and just haven't found one that was "it" and that didn't cost an arm and a leg. I wanted to get something that wasn't too girly, since we're not even having a girl, plus I know Paul will be helping me carry it a lot (sweet man already carries my purse when it starts to hurt my shoulder). I ended up getting a plain black one that is in the shape/style of an over-sized purse but with lots of good pockets. I don't know what Paul was more excited about-the fact that it was only 40 bucks or that it didn't have flowers all over it.

I may have mentioned before that my good friend Abbie and her husband are foster parents and have been fostering two twin four year old boys since August. Paul and I have babysat them before but we got to keep them overnight this weekend. Chris and Abbie hadn't had a night without the boys since they got them and they went out of town for a night. We were so excited for them to be able to get away and even more excited to spend time with those precious boys. I won't share their names or any pictures in order to respect their privacy, but just picture two of the cutest, dark hair, dark eyed boys you've ever seen. It's been a very challenging time for Abbie and Chris, to say the very least. Besides the fact that they went from a family of two to a family of four in less than a day's notice, these boys came from a pitiful situation all around. They knew very little when they first came to live with Abbie and Chris. They barely knew their names, let alone any colors, shapes, numbers or letters. And they definitely didn't know what any type of structure or discipline was at all. Just a half of year later, you'd barely know it was the same two children. They have learned so much and come so far. We took them out to eat Saturday night and to church on Sunday and they were far better behaved than most of the children we saw who are twice their age. The weekend with them was truly a delight and a blessing. I don't think Abbie and Chris will ever know what a blessing they are and what an impact they are having on those two precious boys. I respect them so much for what they are doing and have no doubt that they are pleasing God in their obedience to be foster parents. It just makes my heart smile.

Sunday evening was busy playing catch up on cleaning, grocery shopping and laundry. We were scheduled to have a showing today so we were up really late getting the house spotless and everything put it its place. I had one of the crappiest days today that I've had in a long time and the icing on the cake was when our realtor called an hour before our showing to tell us that the people had cancelled. It's times like those when our house being on the market is really difficult. It's been three years now. THREE! And today is certainly not the first and probably won't be the last time that has happened. But if that's the worst thing that we have to face all day, I'd say it's a real good reminder of how very blessed we are.

Signing out, gotta get busy on week 26!