Induction tricks that don't work

Just in case you were wondering, the following are some things that DON'T work to induce labor...(or at least they haven't for me!)

• talking to your baby and telling them to come out
• having your 2-year old tell the baby to come out
• bouncing on the birth ball with your 2 year old
• eating whole pineapples and mangoes
• walking up and down the stairs until you are out of breath
• pizza and root beer
• sitting in a dark and quiet closet telling the baby "we are in a safe place" (that was totally Jason's weirdo idea)
• acupressure
• driving on roads full of potholes
• yard work

So maybe this baby just wants to come on his own timetable! Which is hopefully soon...

Working on the new house the past month

2700 square feet of work:

many hours, many people, a lot of money, and a work still in progress

We closed March 12 and moved in March 20.

The majority of the painting was finished by the end of March by Jill, my mom, Jason, Melody, Mark, and me. There are still three bedrooms to paint, a hallway, and all of the trim in the house....so plenty left!

I will let the pictures in this post speak for themselves....

Baby Update...39+ weeks

There is our little guy last week in an unexpected 3D ultrasound. Our new OB practice wanted to check that everything was fine since I was measuring a little small, but everything looked great. No cord, fluid or placenta issues, and the baby is the right size (about 7lbs) and in the right position! All good news, so we are still set for the VBAC. Now it is just a matter of waiting until he decides to come. The current due date is April 25, but babies come when they want....so we will see when he decides to join us!
We are praying that all would continue to go well and he would come on his own, relatively soon if possible. :)

Jason and I have been taking lots of walks around our new neighborhood to encourage this baby to meet us. (We really enjoy all of the trails and paths around this gigantic neighborhood, too! Beautiful ponds and lots of friendly people.)

Noah is very eager to meet his little brother, and will say, "Baby, come out!" to my belly. He says, "I want to see you and play!" So far, this is not a very effective method to induce labor!

Noah giving the baby a hug.

Noah is 2 years old

My "baby" is now two years old (as of a month ago actually!!). He definitely has a will of his own, but he is very talkative and generally a very social child. It is so very fun to teach him new things and watch him absorb language and learning. He is eager to be a big boy in many ways and can be very helpful to Mommy.

I wanted to share a few pictures of him and a few from his birthday.

His birthday breakfast was cinnamon sugar toast. He gobbled it up and asked for more!

When Daddy got home, we made a special trip after dinner to Maggie Moo's ice cream shop and got Noah an ice cream cupcake.

...which he desperately wanted to eat, not smile for a picture!

It was actually kinda gross cotton candy flavor, and very, very blue! One bite and the lips were stained blue!

A little birthday party time during moving day to our new house. Benjamin was an eager cake eater. He tried to eat the cake before Noah blew out any candles! :)

Birthday cake!

Noah opens his presents and plays with new toys.

36 weeks...the home stretch!

Well everything seems to be going great with this pregnancy, and we are so thankful for that! We are down to the last 4 weeks until this baby is due. (Or if he decides to be late, the last 6 weeks until he comes!) I am starting the weekly appointments this week to start monitoring any progress or changes. We are still set on track for the VBAC, and the baby seems to be cooperating by being head-down and not causing me any problems.

I can't say I love this stage of pregnancy, as it's harder to move around and chase after Noah now. Plus it's harder to sleep at night and I'm just generally more tired. But on the plus side, the end is near and we will soon be holding Baby ________ in our arms. (Though still not sleeping well...)

We are in the process of unpacking and readying our new house, so there is still plenty to do to keep me busy until this baby comes. I will post some pictures later this week after our Internet gets set up at our new house.

Boxes, Boxes, Boxes! & video

Well our house is looking a lot like this lately:

There are boxes packed and stacked in every room of our condo. I estimate we still have about one-third of the packing left, but it's mostly things we're using every day such as clothing, bedding, and kitchen utensils/dishes. We are set to close on our house next week and move out of our condo the week after. So we've got more packing (and later, unpacking!) in front of us. It has been quite an adventure to buy a foreclosed home! We have quite a bit of work waiting for us in our new house, and I think we are ready for the challenge.

It's funny what happens when I leave for the evening and Jason is supposed to get some things done....he engineers things like this.....(and yes, that IS our Christmas tree still standing! It's waiting to move, too.)

Video: Noah plays in the boxes

House update

Well the past few weeks have been interesting, to say the least. We have been in the house-buying process for a while now and are hoping to close shortly. In the meantime, this lady is starting to get a little worried with the amount of tasks to complete with only 8 or so weeks remaining before baby __________ makes his entrance into the world. (Not to mention the lack of energy that doesn't really motivate me to get much done!)

Jason and I have been busily doing whatever we can to speed the home closing process along. But due to the fact that it is a foreclosed HUD home and it had some plumbing problems needing to be fixed for an FHA-approved loan, it is just taking longer than we'd expected. Now it is up to the title company to get their act together so we can close. Jason got the insurance figured out, and I was quite proud of him for price shopping around to find the best deal. We bought a residential carpet cleaner on Amazon, kitchen appliances on craigslist, and found a water heater we plan to purchase at Lowe's. My family and several friends have been collecting boxes for us, so that has been helpful also.

Hopefully we will move in two weeks?! but I am not counting on it. I hope to continue working around the condo as much as I can, spackling picture frame holes, touching up paint, cleaning appliances, and spot treating the carpet. Once we are out of the condo we can deep clean the carpet in every room and do a final general cleaning. (Gotta leave a place cleaner than you found it! Plus Jason wants our deposit back =)

Once we get moved in, there is plenty to keep us busy: paint (in any room we have time for!), appliances to install, carpet cleaning/replacement, backdoor replacement, lights and fans to install, locks to change, curtains/blinds to hang, oh and general unpacking of course. :)

So needless to say, I hope we close quickly!! My belly is has an expiration date on it, and by then I would hope a good chunk of the work would be completed.

23 months: Our climber

Noah is now 23 months. I can't believe in less than a month he will be 2 years old. It's crazy how fast he has grown up. He is very talkative now and uses many toddler sentences, such as "Where he go?" and "Daddy bye bye." He says 90% of people's names now, which is really cute to hear (especially his little friends from Mops or the gym!). He is learning to say "thank you" and "please may I get out," and he will pray before dinner if Mommy helps him.

We are discovering that any semblance of babyproofing our house is completely gone. Noah has figured out ways around our safety measures. One of the ways he does this is by climbing up to things. Here are some pictures showing a few of the ways that Noah is a climber. Not pictured: standing on his riding toys (and falling usually), climbing on his coloring table, standing on the dining room table, climbing on the computer desk.

This is Noah during the Superbowl eating chips with his cousin Benjamin.

(His favorite activity of late is to watch the tractor plow out the driveway. With three recent snowfalls, Noah has had lots of chances to watch the plowing!)