34 Weeks

Hello my handsome little ball of love! This post is a day late because you decided to give us a little scare yesterday! I'll talk more about that later. Lets talk about how this week went and then how you decided to make it an eventful Monday. 

Tuesday night was a fun night. Your Dad and I have been meaning to do this for a while but we finally got around to actually getting it done. We went to Build-A-Bear and built you a little airman teddy bear! We named him Tim. Because of where we got your name from, his first name is Tim. His last name is your name! (Which I'm not sharing on our blog, or Facebook, or Instagram until you make your grand entrance) So, meet Tim the teddy bear. We got him because your Dad is going to be in the same airman's uniform 1300 miles away during the first few weeks of your little life. We can cuddle with this little airman until ours gets back home. Kinda fun! And he's super adorable if you ask me!

On Wednesday (I don't have any pictures dangit) I met up with a few friends I used to work with on Mom Baby for a little baby shower! They bought you the cutest things, and a few of the gifts were even handmade! We sure have some awesome people around us. We met for lunch at 1 and we ate yummy food and talked and laughed way too hard. Before we knew it one of the girls looked at her watch and it was 4:45! Holy cow! It was so fun to catch up and laugh with those girls. I miss them (and working) a lot! 

On Thursday I spent some time with Savannah. We went up to City Creek and went shopping and we hit a few baby stores on the way back. We found this little gem in American Fork. After this purchase all that we have left to get for you is a baby monitor! You will be sleeping in my room until your Dad gets back from boot camp in July so we will probably just buy it then, when we need it. 

On Friday night we invited Scott, Sarah, and Adi over for a BBQ. We had hamburgers and we even grilled fresh pineapple. Why pineapple? Because that's how big you were last week. What better way to celebrate?   Your Grandma Stika gave us a wagon and some blocks for you to play with that used to be mine when I was little. When Adi started to get bored and needed something to play with your Dad brought them out and she loved them! He pulled her around in the little wagon and it sure was cute! I hope you like them as much as she did!

Saturday and Sunday was General Conference. I had been looking forward to it for weeks. For the Saturday sessions your Dad was on base at drill so I decided to bring out my sewing machine and work on a few projects I'd been meaning to get to for awhile while I listened. I made a dress for a friend's little baby, a plastic bag holder, 6 burp cloths for you, and a camera strap cover for Savannah's birthday present. I think they turned out pretty good!

Before the Sunday morning session started I headed over to Grandma and Grandpa Stika's house for breakfast. Your Dad was on base again for the day so I decided to watch the morning session there. That session was definitely my favorite one. Full of awesome messages and lots of quotes to put in my journal for sure. 

Afterwards I headed home to get things ready for Adi's first birthday party. I was in charge of bringing the meatballs (which turned out to be delish!) and I had to wrap her present. I watched the second session of conference, your Dad got home, and we got ready to head on over. We had a lot of fun! Sarah had yummy food there for everyone and it was so fun to watch Adi get spoiled and devour some cake. Sarah even hid some chocolate pudding in the middle. I think that was Adi's favorite surprise for sure. We are so glad to have Scott and Sarah as such good friends and glad we could spoil their sweet Adi a little bit!

My mom texted me to let me know a family friend had dropped off a few things for us at their house so we headed over to pick them up. Um ... a few things was a HUGE understatement! Our friend, Annie, has 2 boys and was getting rid of all her stuff. I'm pretty positive that everything those boys ever used from brand spankin new until they were a size 4T was in those boxes! Clothes, toys, shoes, dishes .... seriously. How awesome is that?! And that's what I spend my Monday morning doing. Sorting through things to keep and things to donate. We ended up keeping 3 and a half huge tuppeware bins of clothes not including all the toys and cute boy accessories. After keeping all of that we still donated 4 boxes of stuff. We owe Annie big time. Not to mention all the things Beth gave us  a few months ago. Pretty sure I don't ever have to buy you clothes until you are 24 months! Of course I will cause I can't resist a cute new outfit for you but hey, at least I don't NEED to. It'll just be because I WANT to :)

So ... Monday morning was spent sorting and relaxing but the day changed pretty quickly. To set things up ... I actually spotted some (bled) and was having some contractions on Saturday and Sunday. I wasn't too worried about it until Monday morning when I wasn't feeling you move around very much. I called the doctors office around noon and they asked me to come in at 3:15. When your Dad got off work he came to pick me up and we headed on over. There was a little bit of a wait because they were squeezing me in so while we were waiting I met with the lady that does their scheduling and look what we did! 

That's right pal. We scheduled your arrival! Well ... As long as you cooperate and those little lungs are developed enough. My fingers are crossed! I hope so badly you are ready so your Dad can spend time with you before he leaves on the 14th. Here's hoping! 

After some more waiting we were finally called back. I got weighed and have officially am out of the 'teens' as far as the gain goes. I've gained 20 lbs even. I know that's great and right on track but ooh it sure is hard to see the scale keep going up! At least I know it's mostly you. I say mostly because my butt and boobs definitely get some credit for the weight gain but like I said, mostly you :) After the weight and blood pressure check they took us into the ultrasound room. The doctor checked to make sure the placenta wasn't causing the bleeding and that it was in an okay position. That, thank heavens, was not the problem. That'd be worse case scenario for the bleeding. The doc then did a vaginal exam and said I'm dilated to a 1+ and 60% effaced. That's not suuper far but heck, I'm not supposed to be dilating at all at 34 weeks. So after that the doc sent me over to the hospital for what's called an NST (non-stress test). To pass that your heart rate has to look good for a solid 20 minute strip. I thought for sure we would be in and out of there in no time. The nurse came in, asked me some questions, and put you (and my uterus) on the monitors (The blue one was measuring any uterine activity and the pink one was picking up your heart rate)

Since I have worked on Labor and Delivery I was watching the monitors and knew that we weren't seeing what we needed to see from your heart. A baby's heart rate is supposed to be around 150, which yours was, but there is supposed to be variability. The variability of going up and down and acellerating at times is what's called a reassuring trace. Your heart rate was staying right around 150 and not deviating much from that mark. I kept rolling from side to side and poking you a little to see if your heart rate would show you awake and active. You were moving, but your heart just was still staying the same. After about an hour the nurse brought in some juice and cookies for me to see if a little sugar in my system would help. About 15 minutes later your variability started to increase some and the nurse and doctor agreed that it looked okay enough to send me home. That was great but I knew there hadn't been an acceleration on the strip and that made me nervous. I paid extra close attention to your movements that night and this morning. I still felt you moving but not as much as your normal wiggly worm self. As the day has gone on I've felt you more and more and haven't had spotting but have definitely been cramping if I'm up on my feet too long. When that happens I just sit myself down for a while and they go away after a bit. So there is the story of how you gave your Dad and I quite the scare. We have a follow up appointment on Friday afternoon which I'm definitely looking forward to. The doctor will check to see if I've dilated any more. I'm interested to see if I have or not. Who knows, you might just get here even before May 6th! I would love for you to get here early but please make sure your little lungs are ready! I know you are probably so excited to finally meet your awesome parents but 34 weeks is much too early for that my friend. Stay healthy and you keep growing strong for us okay? At least for a few more weeks! 

Here's your Dad a little while after getting home from the hospital. He's done a good job of making sure that I stick to the doctors orders of taking it easy. No excessive walking, no lifting, laying down lots, you know, the fun stuff. 

Here's a picture of us right before we headed to the doc's office. I tried to hide my nervousness and just show off how HUGE you are getting :) Not sure where you are going to grow from here because you are definitely hanging out in my ribs and pelvis at the same time now days. Guess the only direction you have to go is out! Oh the joy! :) I love you little man!