The crib is here!!!

It's here, it's here, it's here!!! We haven't taken it out of the box yet, but hopefully we have the right one and there is nothing wrong with it. I'll post pictures once we get it put together.

Yippee!!!

Furniture Frustrations, Part II

I am not very happy with the company we bought Cooper's furniture from. When we bought the furniture, we were told it would be here in 6-8 weeks, and we were pleasantly surprised when it was here in 3 weeks. We were not-so-pleasantly surprised when we opened up a box with the wrong crib in it. I know I posted about this several weeks ago, but we are STILL waiting on the correct crib. I called last week and was told it would be here this week. I had Karl call this afternoon and gave him specific directions to not be very friendly with them...I want them to know we're frustrated. Of course, he was as nice as could be (I should have called myself!), and they said it will be here next week. This momma-to-be has a lot of work to do in Little Man's nursery, and it's hard to do anything when you're missing the main piece of furniture. Sure it was nice to save a little money on it since they charged us for the wrong crib, but at this point I would gladly have payed the correct amount to have the right crib here.

In all fairness, I have to say that they have been very nice and that this is more of a reflection on the furniture company than their store; however, they mixed up the invoice numbers to begin with. I feel like at this point they should at least pick up the wrong crib and deliver the new one for us free of charge.

Also, in all fairness, I know this outburst is probably a little irrational and completely related to pregnancy hormones, but I'm in major nesting mode and I want my baby's crib!

Doctor's Appointment Update

I went today for my routine 2 week check up, but things went so well I decided to write about it! This was our first ultrasound to see Little Man open his eyes, and it was so neat to see those eyes open and close. He was holding the umbilical cord in his left hand, which showed us how he can grip things. He had his chubby little face looking at us, so our wonderful ultrasound lady switched the ultrasound to 4D, and that was incredible! He really looks like a baby! He seemed to get a little annoyed with us because after just a little bit, he put his hands up by his face and even covered one eye with his fist. He clearly takes after his father and doesn't like having his picture made...I'll have to have a little talk with him after he's born about that... :) He even yawned a couple times for us and we saw his little tongue. He has a big head, which Karl said he did too, so maybe with the exception of the chipmunk cheeks, he'll look like Karl. His tummy is still measuring really big, so we know that we have a baby with a big head, big cheeks, and a big belly. I wondered if he'll look really funny when he's born! He doesn't appear to have much hair at this point either, but there's still plenty of time for it to grow.

Also, my cervix was back to measuring really well, and I always sigh with relief at a good measurement. Dr. K. seemed very pleased with how things are progressing, and I told her I'm trying very hard to just be a normal pregnant lady. I've had enough drama with this pregnancy! She looked at my blood sugar chart from the past week and said since I've stayed in the "normal" range (once again, I really like that word!) with my diet, I can start just testing my sugar levels twice a day instead of 4 times a day. That is just fine with me!

Baby Shower

On Sunday my sweet friends threw Cooper and me a beautiful and special baby shower. All last week I counted down the days until Sunday, and waking up Sunday morning felt like Christmas! There is something really special about having so many of the people you love in one area to celebrate with you. Not very long ago, I truly didn't think baby showers would ever be something I experienced in my honor. In a strange way, that made Sunday all the more special.

Donielle was sweet enough to have the shower at her house. Everything was so clean and beautiful!

The wonderful hostesses (and me)

Donielle, Anne Marie, Lauren, Melissa, Maleah, Jennifer

My mother-in-law, me, and Cooper's "Aunt Resa" (Teresa)

My mom and me

Ingram, Gigi, and my cousin, Stephanie

(Ingram was in my class a couple years ago, and since the first time I met her family, I have loved each of them!)

My Cousins and Me-Stephanie, me, Hannah, and Olivia

Anne Marie, Donielle, Carlee

My fellow kindergarten teacher friends-Heather, Jesse, Denise, and Me

Emily, Leslie, Anne Marie

The Food-My favorite part of any social gathering is the food...you all know my passion for eating...but the food on Sunday was really exceptional. We had a fruit trifle, chicken salad sandwiches, cheese straws, cinnamon pita chips with a fruit salsa, ham and cheese pinwheels, and corn muffins. I thought the diaper cake Jennifer made was so precious, and as an added perk, there is a bottle of champagne in the middle holding the whole thing together. I'm sure Karl and I will greatly enjoy that bottle while Cooper enjoys his own different kind of bottle!

The cheese straws were shaped in C's for 'Cooper', and there was a big blueberry C on top of the fruit trifle. So clever!

Gift Time-Cooper got some really great things! Jennifer did a great job taking pictures of me opening gifts, but my facial expressions in a lot of the pictures were too embarrassing to post! Here are just a few when I didn't look crazy!

The hostesses went in together and got his swing, jumping thing you hang from the door, and a bag of baby necessities.

Sweet little monogrammed blanket

Little Man is ready for game day!

Precious monogrammed elephant

I thought this was such a good idea. Along with a gift, everyone brought a book so that Cooper has his own little library now. This kindergarten teacher believes you can never start too early with literacy!

Yummy cookie favors with a C sticker on them

Thank you so much to everyone who came! It was so fun to celebrate and catch up with everyone!

Karl and I are very blessed to have such wonderful friends and family. I know people throw that sentence around often, but it could not be more true for us. God has blessed us with many wonderful, exceptional, loving people. The same people who surrounded us in prayer, comfort, and encouragement through our infertility journey have also surrounded us in celebration and joy these past 6 months. It warms my heart constantly to feel other people's excitement and happiness over this baby. We are blessed.

Donuts, Cake, Cookies, Pie, Etc.

Those are examples of the foods I'm not supposed to eat anymore. It's funny how much you want things when you find out you can't have them! I failed my glucose tolerance test today after griping all morning long to Karl about how silly it was that I was having to take this test because I was sure I didn't have gestational diabetes and asking a pregnant woman to not eat anything after midnight until at least 11:00 in the morning was a form of torture. My mood was lovely! However, I did get a little chipper when the nurse said if you pass the first 3 tests, then you could leave and not do the last one. I passed the first two, and even said to Karl before the third one that "it was in the bag". Well, my level on the third was the exact number that it was supposed to be less than. The nurse said maybe the doctor would still let me go though. No such luck. My fourth test wasn't close to passing, so then we had to wait to talk to the doctor about gestational diabetes. I felt like a failure. Tomorrow morning I have a meeting scheduled with the diabetes person about my new diet; however I prefer to call it a "special eating plan" because I despise the word diet. ;)

This and That

Since it's been so long since my last post, I feel like I should offer excuses to make up for my laziness...I mean busyness. In my defense, Karl finished our upstairs room (I was fairly certain we were going to need counseling or a mediator to help us through the last month of this project :)), which is our new office, and I keep forgetting to bring the camera upstairs with me to post pictures. I figured without pictures, no one will read anymore, so I keep delaying my updates until I can triumph over the pregnancy brain and remember the stinkin' camera! To add to that, I'm just too lazy to walk back down and up the stairs once I remember I've forgotten the camera. Anyway, this post is just random stuff that's been going on lately. This might get long because I tend to get wordy!

Last Day of School-May 27th was the last day of school for the kids and the 28th was our last day. It was a bittersweet week for me. Karl and I packed up my classroom the weekend before, which felt unreal. I remember standing in that empty room 5 years ago and getting giddy over planning where everything would go and spending countless hours decorating and preparing. Then there I was that last day, looking around at the same 4 empty walls of a room that was no longer mine. It just felt weird. Actually, I did leave one thing on the wall, one thing that was too special to me to tear down. When I found out I was going to be teaching kindergarten, I wanted a coconut tree like the one from the children's book Chicka Chicka Boom Boom to go in my cubby/sink area. Due to my lack of any artistic ability, my dad came to the school one afternoon that first summer, and cut one out of butcher paper for me. We hot glued it to the wall, and it's been there ever since. That tree is just another example of my dad being there and helping me. I just didn't want to know what the room looked like without it.

My Chicka tree in the background

Furniture Frustrations-We were told when we bought Cooper's furniture that it would be here within 6-8 weeks. Imagine my excitement when they called after only 3 weeks and said the crib and dresser were here! Karl picked them up and called my dad to come help unload them. I was so excited seeing Karl pull up with those 2 boxes in his truck! As we waited for my dad to get to the house, we talked about how great it felt to see our baby's furniture, to know that was the dresser we would be spending the next 2 1/2 years changing diapers on, to finally have the crib we were going to watch our baby sleep in, oh the joy! Well, that is until we got the crib unloaded piece-by-piece and realized that it was not our crib. The store had written down the wrong stock number. They told us the correct crib will be here within 6-8 weeks... I'm just hoping it'll only take 3 like the other one! As frustrated as I was by the mixup, it did work out to our advantage. Our crib was more expensive than the one they wrote down, but since that was their mistake, they're not charging us the difference in price. That made this penny-pincher very happy! :) Despite having the wrong crib, we put it together anyway as "practice" for when we get the right one.

Sadie was very involved in helping Karl. What you can't see in these pictures is her barking at each piece-the WHOLE time. She definitely thought this was a game for her!

Pregnancy Updates-Things are going very well. My cervix is starting to shorten again some, but it is still a good, safe length. Little Man is not so little and is still measuring well ahead of his due date. He is consistently measuring 8-9 days bigger than he is. His stomach is consistently measuring even bigger! In last week's ultrasound we could really see those chubby cheeks. I'm looking so forward to kissing and pinching them! :) I had my glucose test last Thursday, and I didn't pass. I was pretty embarrassed (I just don't like failing things). Then I almost passed out on the ultrasound table, which left me even more embarrassed. I get another try at the glucose test this coming Thursday. I'm not very interested in being on the gestational diabetes diet, so my fingers are crossed that I pass!

My favorite thing in the whole world-Each time I feel this baby move and kick my heart fills with a joy that I've never felt before. His active time is between 8:30-9:30 at night, and I look so forward to it each day. Little Man also gets very active any time I drink juice. I ate a donut this afternoon, and those feet starting kicking. Apparently he likes sugar! (Note to self-I might want to skip these sugar rushes until after my gestational diabetes test this week.) Sometimes I can rub where I think his feet are, and he'll kick back for me. Karl and I like to sometimes just watch my belly move in weird ways as the baby wiggles and turns and somersaults underneath. It's pretty special.

I know belly pictures were expected somewhere in this post, but I don't have any! I will try to get Karl to take one and get it posted some time this week. I still love my belly (and the boobs) and enjoy looking at it in the mirror in the mornings to see if it looks bigger!