Week 38

I do realize, even as I write this blog entry, that I am in fact closer to Week 39 than 38, but that's the way it goes at the holidays, right? The picture was taken on Wednesday (the usual day) but I just haven't had time to sit down and write the blog entry until now.

So, since last week, there's been a little bit going on. Apparently I'm at 1 cm (for any who don't think that's too much information to share!) Everyone keeps asking me if they've told me how big they think the baby will be, which they haven't. I'm fairly certain this baby is going to be HUGE, I seriously and honestly feel like every square inch of my belly region is baby, which can only make me think that the baby is large... I guess time will tell.

Since last week the whole sleeping thing has been getting a little more difficult, thankfully (at most) I have about 15 days until the baby comes, so I think I'll be able to manage. At my doctor's appointment last week I was chatting with one of the nurses as she took my blood pressure and I said something about being glad to have the long weekend off from work for Thanksgiving and she looked at me with WIDE eyes and said "You're still working?" and I said "Um, yea" and she said "She hasn't taken you off work yet?" and I said "Um, no" and she said "Oh, well she'll probably do it today." I said to the nurse, "Well my last day is Thursday anyway." Then when Angie (the NP) came in, she didn't say anything about my working, we'd talked about it before and I'd told her as long as I felt good enough I wanted to keep working, and she'd said that was fine. I just thought the Nurse's reaction was funny.

So, I've been getting lots of questions like "So, are you ready for the baby?" or "Is the nursery ready for the baby?" and most of the time (especially to the second question) I just kind of chuckle and say something along the lines of we're ready enough, or we will be when the time comes. I figured I'd post some pictures to put people's minds to rest that we are in fact getting prepared for the arrival of Baby Brimhall (granted most of this has been done in the last week or so... but still, it's progress!)

We have a way to bring him/her home from the hospital

We have a place for the baby to sleep (currently in our room)

I will probably be spending many late night hours in this very spot

We've been washing, folding and sorting all the baby clothes, blankets, bedding, etc.

And this is what the nursery currently looks like...

We at least have a crib mattress, that's something, right?

I think we're going to purchase the actual crib this week at Babies R Us, we just have the get the crown molding done before we move along with anything else. Besides I figure the baby will bunk up with us for a couple of months, so we have a little time.

So I've been doing a little more sewing lately. I made my first baby blanket recently for my friend Crystal who just had the cutest little boy a month ago. Here are a couple of pictures of the finished product.


It was much easier then I thought once I got into actually doing it. I just think the idea of making something without an actual pattern was a little intimidating.

So, almost every day Bryce asks me if I've packed my bag for the hospital and every day I say "it's on my to-do list" and then it doesn't get done. I've been gathering the stuff together and it's all in a pile in the living room, it just needs to get put into an actual bag... so I figure if my water randomly breaks, it won't be too hard to throw it all in a bag and run out the door... but I did promise him I'd do it today and since I'm not at work I guess I have no excuse.

Yesterday, we celebrated Thanksgiving at Bryce's brother Preston and his wife Ann's house. It was fun, all of Bryce's siblings came into town and will be here at least through the weekend. Preston and Ann have tons of pictures up around their house and I was looking at one Brimhall Family picture we took about 2 years ago and I was looking at it thinking "Dang, I was skinny back then!" and I shook my head and put the picture back. A little while later Bryce walked up to me, holding the same picture, and said "Look how skinny you were!!" -- It was pretty funny, but why does it seem so much worse when someone else points it out to you?! :)

So, I've been getting lots of advice on how to induce my own labor - everything from bouncing on an exercise ball, to jumping off a curb, to pulling weeds and sweeping my driveway. I'm not quite THAT desperate yet, I think I'll wait it out a little longer, but we'll see how this next week goes! Maternity pictures to come in a separate entry...