Tuesday, January 27, 2009

whoosh whoosh whoosh

Went to the midwife today and we heard our baby's hearbeat! She couldn't find it right away and started talking about how sometimes they don't hear the heartbeats this early because the baby is nestled or tucked away. Anyway, then we could hear it...not to clearly, but Andy and I and Sarah all heard the 140 beats/minute whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.So cool. I was very thankful we could hear the heartbeat today because we were looking forward to that.

When she was measuring the fundal height she held my hand down there so I too could feel the firmness of the uterus. Cool.

We hadn't met this midwife before and her name is Sharon. There was also a student midwife in with us during the appointment.

We had a tour of the Baby's Inn today too. It's a new house in a new subdivision in "the Mission" part of Kelowna. It's not as decorated as I thought it would be which could be a good thing, but there is some furniture and it is very spacious and clean. They have a full kitchen with plates and cooking stuff. Also, the bedroom people birth in has an empty closet, walk-in shower (and tub in other bathroom), big bed and she's hoping to add another end table and table for the midwives to put their things. in that room as well.In the backyard there is a plum and a cherry tree. You can see them from the bedroom window.We have priority for the time around our due date and I hope to move in there when I'm in labor.

Other things we did in Kelowna include dropping off stuff at the thrift store, picked up containers from a water anaylisis place so Andy can test camp's water, drop an electrical heater off for repair for camp, go out for Japanese food and go shopping at save-on and two health food stores. We also heated up borscht soup in the parking lot of a strip mall for dinner before heading home.

Very tired so it's time to turn in. Thank you God for a safe trip and bare and dry roads on the way home in the dark.

Monday, January 26, 2009

more daily life

Hello.I forgot to mention these things in my last post:

Andy and Sarah sorted our recycling. In our town (living out of town) you have to sort your own recycling (or maybe everyone in town does too...not sure), colored #2 plastics, glass, tin etc. So, we have boxes in our kitchen closet to do this. Sometimes they get overflowing...sometimes life happens and after our 2nd child died we never got around to sorting the closet. We had friends over and I'd put a sign on the door that says, "Do not open, unless you want to sort our recycling." Sometimes it would be cascading down and out of the closet and I would slam the door shut on it. So, last Sun. Andy started sorting it. Now we have the sorted stuff in the garage and we are taking it in trunk loads to the dump, when it's open and I have energy. Andy has not gone in to town on an open dump day yet. It is nice to have the closet clear again after half a year or so of recycling added up. So fun to recycle now...hmm, which box do I throw this into?

I also got a call last week that I won hockey tickets to our team's home game. I entered a contest in the local paper before Christmas. I picked up the tickets and we won 4 tickets so we'll either go twice as a family or invite another family to join us. Cool.Last week at skating Sarah and I got to see our sopped (made to look cool, industrial like) up Zamboni do it's magic on the ice.

Things from this week: Sarah has been enjoying making bugs out of construction paper. I found a story/craft book that shows how to do this at the library.

Andy has been researching cheese making. He got a book before Christmas and is getting set to order some bacteria starter packs. We're thinking goat's milk cheese I think.

Go to Kelowna tomorrow for the midwife appt.

We had a fellow stay at our house last night...he did a bit of plumbing on the guest cabin at camp today and talked with the building inspector who also came out today. So, that means the guest room got cleaned and organized too and the house tidied.

The upper bathroom is now siliconed and dry so now all our tubs (all 2 of them) have no old unscrubbable black mold showing it's ugly face from the crevasses of peeling silicone. I bought some new tub and tile cleaner (spray bottle, natural stuff) and 2 new scrubby sponges so cleaning is fun with those.

Been having some good naps lately as well as some good sledding times with Sarah.I outgrew my jogging pants and dug through my maternity box to find a nylon pair of athletic pants from my Mom or Dad that I wore when preg. with Sarah and I took to Crowsnest for hiking and such. To bundle up for sledding the other later afternoon I wore my stretch pants, maternity cords, and those spiffy (think 1990s) Brook's athletic pants, 2 sweaters and my down coat, thick socks with my boots...I was much more comfortable and warmer than other times when I have the wind whistling through my jogging pants.Sarah's been enjoying sledding down the field. Near the highway she starts. I stay on the driveway, because I sink down to my knees in the deep snow out there, but Sarah, being only 36 lbs, stays above. We are borrowing a 'snow surfer' sled that is more slippery than the toboggan and she goes down on her stomach.

Speaking of lbs., we are hoping Sarah will be the required 40 lbs by the time our next baby is born, because then the baby can use Sarah's car seat and she'll get a booster seat. We are thrilled that she's gained the weight she lost during her Dec. sickness back. Her little arms have something to them again. If she's not 40lbs, which I think she'll be, we can get another convertible type car seat...and we need to make sure they'll fit in the back of the car too. The babe will be in the middle facing backwards and Sarah next to him/her.

We have a lot on the agenda for tomorrow including seeing a place called the Baby's Inn - a B and B that people from out of town can use for a home birth. Also, the thrift store (to make a big drop), Michael's, couple stops for camp, save-on, health food store.

Today is Chinese new year (we had fortune cookies at Strong Start) and I wish I could cook Chinese food, but we were at the grocery store...I just have never cooked Chinese before, so I don't know where too start...another food to look into.

Andy completed the home-made memory game for Sarah, made with pictures we've taken and they've played it. She loves it. It's called 'Family Memory.'

We had potluck Sunday at church yesterday and Andy made a big potato salad. I was very tired in the evening and my family delivered kisses to me as I laid on the couch...one from Andy, multiples from S., during 1/2 hour.

Sarah's been enjoying drawing on her paper on her easel lately too...especially when I'm napping. It's upstairs in our bedroom right now.

The temperature has plummeted here and it was minus 25 this morning.

The craving for this evening would be Chinese or samosas again...but leftover turkey noodle soup and/or pasta and tomato sauce (that I made:) will have to do.

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

doing stuff

Hi. Just thought I'd make a post of what's been happening lately.

It seems Sarah's social needs are increasing and so we've been getting into more of a rhythm of doing stuff in town. This week and last week we did Strong Start Mon. and skating on Wed. (we are going today, skating at the arena again).This Mon. at Strong Start she had a blast and spoke to the teacher during circle time. That was the first time. She gave an idea about what we do in winter. First she told me when I repeated the question and she said, "sledding," then I said, 'tell Pam' and she did. She really enjoyed the actions of the circle time activities too and got into it. Every once in a while she would bump into me, as if she noticed she was being more outgoing, but she had a blast...and it made the teacher's day too. :)

We've been doing more sledding and borrowed a 'snow surfer' from our neighbors. We found the sun at the end of the driveway yesterday and I laid in the sun on the sled while Sarah crawled in the snow and near the fence. Then she used the sled, on her stomach and enjoyed the gentle slope of the field, sledding through tall grass and burr plants that are still sticking out of the snow.

I made dinner last night...kind of went all out I suppose, but I can't remember the last time I made dinner, Andy's been doing it so much. I made wraps (from scratch), sauteed cabbage/onions/garlic/canned tomatoes/chili powder to put in the wraps, maple glazed parsnips with walnuts on top, boiled beets, rice for in the wraps, and we had salsa, beans and grated carrots in their too. Sarah helped me make dinner for over an hour...peeling skin of garlic and onions, putting water in the pot for the beets, putting the beets in the pot, rolling out wraps, grating carrots together until we decided it was too dangerous (no one got hurt) and taking loads of veggie tops and scrapings to the compost bucket for me. She also fetched the onion from the guest room and checked for parsnips. Her Dad brought a new batch from the root cellar just in time.

Andy is working on making a memory game for Sarah out of pictures we took. He's been mounting them lately.

I am pretty tired this morning as the night was rough and Sarah woke up at 6:41am.

It is very sunny again and we are looking forward to going to the BC Camping Conference at Stillwood Camp in early Feb.

I vacuumed yesterday cause the floor was bothering me and also Sarah and I began tackling the silicone in the upstairs tub.

It seems like we may have a few visitors in Feb...3 groups of people have expressed interest in coming. That's good cause we'll get the guest room organized again. It tends to explode every once in a while when someone is looking for something.

We go to see the midwife on Tues., which I'm excited about. Andy has the day off that day which he traded for Sat. so we'll do some shopping too.Sarah continues to give us gifts everyday and we've been enjoying playing Penguin Pick-up (new card game from Abrahams for Christmas).

And James we finished Charlotte's Web already. We were reading it about 2-3 times a day. She really enjoyed it and looked forward to each chapter immensely...and Andy, if he read or overhead me reading could often be found chuckling too.

Thursday, January 15, 2009

12 weeks, just about

So, many of you have heard, we are expecting again. I will be 12 weeks on Fri., tomorrow.

Pregnany so far:

So, I've gone through the extremely tired phase, and easing into being pregnant in terms of what to do with my brain, after having our last pregnancy end at 15 weeks. I have now landed in a excited frame of mind. The major nauseousness I think is behind me, although I still feel nauseous from time to time. Breakfast is very important...eat in the morning. Yeah.

When we first told Sarah she was hesitant and it was just as she was getting better from her Dec. sickness. A few days later she asked me, "Do you think we'll have to do another balloon?" and then the next day, "Do you think we'll have to make another scrapbook?" (both things we did to remember Karina...letting a helium balloon go off into the air at her memorial and making a scrapbook). I told her I we don't know, but I really hope we don't have to do those things and I also explained people make scrapbooks for many reasons...even to celebrate people who are living. We've talked about how we are praying that the baby will be healthy and grow to full newborn size and be born then, so we can meet him/her but that if that doesn't happen, God will continue to take care of us.

Sarah has seemed to be excited and very giggly lately and I wonder how much of that is her excitement about a new sibling. She often says "3 people are dancing" or baking or skating, whatever we are doing, meaning me, her and the baby.
She also loves to put together gifts, almost daily, and now is giving Andy and I some gifts that are 'for the baby' (from her old baby toys and books).

We already had our first midwife appt. on Dec.23rd, making it an epic day of driving to Kelowna for the appointment, then to Abbotsford for Christmas. The midwife was very understanding and showed an appropriate reponse when she heard of our loss...there are a few midwives there, so we'll alternate between two or so of them. We'd never met this midwife before.

I've also gone through a bit of food craving stuff. One craving was samosas, encouraged by Heidi's blog, I think. We've learned how to make them which is wonderful and make them not too spicy so Sarah enjoys them too. I do not enjoy the smell of oil heating up in the cast iron and eating greens I do, but not the full serving I used too. I like mixing them in with other things (kale in spaghetti sauce, for example).
I've had itchy legs too and my bladder is definately smaller (or pushed on or something), making my nightly bathroom trips double from 2 times to 4 times a night.

I'm definately being more cautious and have a few boundaries in place like not pulling Sarah on the tobaggan uphill. Sarah's been enjoying some more adrenaline rush-like runs on the togaggan. We climb up to the top of a hill or snowbank and I send her down. Yesterday we were polar bears and we used the sled for 'the first time,' since we're bears.'

I've trimmed back how long we stay in town too. We were going to two programs a trip, but now it's mainly "Strong Start". I think Sarah enjoys that the most. It's more structured and she's been getting really excited about going lately, including crying one day when I told her it wasn't in the plan to go.

I've been really tired, as I've had trouble sleeping at night...sometimes I can't get comfortable, I'll just lay there awake...and I'll be dizzy sometimes during the day too. Dizziness is what happens to me when I'm too tired.

Anyway, we went ice skating at the arena yesterday and today I need to do some housework as we have a little friend (4 years old) coming for a visit tomorrow...and her Mom and one month old baby brother. The weather forcast said, "freezing fog" here this morning.

Been resting and napping too and some reading too.

I've already grown too, of course, in size and am in some maternity clothes already.

Friday, January 09, 2009

some smiles

Sarah made me laugh a couple times this morning. I made her a pb sandwhich with lots of honey and as I gave it to her I said, "I may have put too much honey on. It may be too sweet." After she'd been eating for a while she says, "It's not to sweet. In fact, it's just right." Reminded me of this spin-off story from Golilocks (Baby Bear's Chair) that we'd been reading when little bear says something is 'just right.' I love how she used 'in fact' as well. :)

Then she saw me cleaning under the stove burners and said, "Why are you doing that?" and I said, "The stove has to be cleaned every once in a while." And she says, "I need to be cleaned every once in a while too."

The snow has been melting here and that is amazing.We were skating on the lake not more than 3 or 4 days ago and now we can't go on there. We were also able to make a snowman because the snow is more wet. We built him in front of the living room window so we can keep an eye on him or visa versa.

We met a new family at Strong Start yesterday and Sarah had a good time with the four year old in the family, Natasha. The Mom, Nikki, also has a one month old, named Jonah. Sarah had a good time there playing with the other kids and actually talked in front of them to me, so that was neat to see.