Gaius Says

"Thanks Leia. You're my honey!"

Superpowers! Part One

No matter what anyone says. Pregnancy can do some WEIRD things to you.

Take for instance your sense of smell: Non- pregnant, no big deal. Maybe your sniffer is slightly better than your husband's but nothing to really phone home about. Pregnant, HOLY COW, we live in a smelly stinky world! Yikes! I can sniff out a rotten apple from 4 rooms away.

Now take your general adding skills: Non-pregnant, nothing crazy you can add along with the general public. Pregnant, you can now add 40 weeks forwards or backwards at any given time in 5 seconds flat. I stunned this poor lady at church the other day because she told me how far along her Daughter-in-law was and I told her approximately when she was due in a matter of seconds (she does happen to be only 4 weeks behind me, so it was pretty easy). But from the look on her face it's safe to say she will never be the same!

How about your personality: Non-pregnant, you're a pretty docile, passive person. Pregnant- YOU ARE ALWAYS READY FOR A FIGHT! I'm not sure if it's your inner protective mama bear coming out or what. But let me tell you, it is scary! I cannot stress this enough- DO NOT cross a pregnant lady.

Sleeping- Non-pregnant, you're fine keeping up (sometimes running past) your 3 kids, as long as you get your 6-8 hours sleep at night. Pregnant- you can literally not make it through the day without a nap. And even the thought of exercise makes you want to curl up with your blanket.

MUCH more to come...

Red Light!

I LOVE hand-me-downs! I love when one of my kids goes through a growth spurt and I can just go down to the basement and pull out the next size up!

This time it's Leia's turn. SHE IS HUGE!!!! She's 5 and a half and wearing size 7. It's CRAZY! She's a head taller than all the other little girls in Kindergarten. I over heard Xavier explaining why he's so tall to some of his peers the other day and I think he says it best. "I'm a St****, we just grow bigger than other people". So now I guess it's time to go through Leia's closet and pull out all the 6's, yippee *sarcasm*.

These children really have to slow down on the whole growing and getting older stuff!

12 Weeks!

Whew!


*note- this is not my ultrasound but it is a 12 week old fetus. Pretty cool huh?

Dear Ebay,

Please, please, please let me win Full House season 3. I'm not sure how much more of season 1 and 2 I can take. We all have almost every episode memorized. Thanks so much.

Most Sincerely,
Korleen

At the moment 2 of my children are singing at the top of their lungs into spoons. Because, they're "pretending they are microphones". It's super cute!

On a unrelated note. Last week I decided to list some of my old bigger maternity clothes on eBay so that I can replenish my supply with smaller (5 sizes!) maternity clothes. My auctions end today and they are doing splendidly! I've never really had much luck selling clothes on eBay (I've only tried a couple times). APPARENTLY maternity clothes are the way to go! This is exciting! And from what I hear it gets really crazy the last hour of your auction! Can't wait for that!

The Name Game

I feel like this is just turning into a pregnancy blog. But nothing much is really going on. It's February so things are pretty quiet around here (well other than cabin fever). So, really, the only thing I have to report on is baby progress. I guess you can either bare with me or else tune back in on August 30th. But then again the blog will probably be bogged down with actual baby info not just fetus facts.

ANYWAY. We've officially decided that we don't want to find out the gender of our baby (all right give me all the "You're crazy! It's the 21st century! How can you stand to not know?!?" comments. Get them out of your system). I want to have it be a surprise (even though I have a pretty good idea of what I'm having). And since we know the birthday already I want to have some excitement in the OR (because you know having a brand new little person join your family isn't very exciting in it's self *sarcasm*).

I know it's early but with our track record it's going to take the next 28 weeks to figure out a name for our child anyway. With Gaius I dont' think we ended up deciding until the 7th month and since we are not finding out the sex this time it should take twice as long to come up with 2 names right?

I have a boys' first name that I love- but Marc hates.

And he has a girl's name that he loves and I can't stand.

This type of conversation will go on for months and MONTHS. I've considered the possibility of letting him name one gender and me the other. But i just can't handle turning over that much control. It's not because I think he has bad taste (he did come up with the names for both our boys, and he likes to take credit for Leia-which just isn't so!) :-). I'm just afraid that he'll decide this time that our child needs a boring name and I want veto power!

I put a lot of thought into our children's names and still 2 out of the 3 have names that people mispronounce all-the-time. Which is a little annoying to me. So this time I'm taking that into account. Also since our families are so large that takes out another 38 names (to tell you the truth I don't really like any of those anyway). Not to mention that as soon as a name reaches the Top 100 list it automatically drops off my list of possible choices. Who would've thought that our kid with a name beginning with X would be the exception to this rule? So as you can see it's going to be awhile before we commit to anything. However, I AM willing to take suggestions! So let me have 'em!

11 weeks.

*sigh* I'm 11 weeks today (my counter says 12 because I set it to when I'll actually have the baby so it's a week ahead). With my last pregnancy I had some complications between the 11th and 12th week and was put on bed rest for 6 weeks. Thankfully the rest worked and I was able to deliver Gaius 29 weeks later. But it was nerve-racking, scary, and very boring. So if you think of it, can you pray for me this week? I've been trying not to be too physical this time in hopes of avoiding that whole ordeal. But still that fear is in the back of my mind. I'm so thankful that God choose to bless us with our crazy monkey boy! But I'd like it to be a little less eventful this time around! Thanks so much!

Three At Last, Three At Last...

I can't believe the difference a year makes! Kids do a lot of growing up between the 2nd and 3rd year.
However, Gaius still wants to be my baby! In fact he's adamant about it!

Happy Birthday Baby!

You Might Be Pregnant If...

*you pick out the meal you're going to have 3 days before the date you and your husband are planning on going on.

*you can cry on cue.

*it's not uncommon for you wake up with a wet pillow from last night's nightmare.

*your kids, husband, dog, and complete strangers drive you absolutely nuts!

*you sit down on your bed to tie your shoes and wake up 2 hours later.

*the idea of eating take-out every night sounds heavenly because that means you don't have to brainstorm and cook the meal.

*the second you walk into your house you go and change into your pajamas.

*as soon as your Dr. tells you not to eat something, that's all you can think about.

*suddenly your 4 major food groups are: Oranges, Grapefruit, Raisin Bran, and Cheese Burgers.

Thought Soup: Part 1

Remember the days when people didn't have cellphones permanently attached to the side of their faces? It wasn't all THAT long ago, or was it (1998? 1999?)? The jury is still out on whether it really is a technological improvement or not.

Today's (which may actually turn into a week long process) Activity

I am trying to snipe myself a pair of jeans from ebay that will:

a. not fall down

b. not squish the baby

3. not look retarded


Wish me luck!

Oh and P.S. I'm a cheapskate so we'll see how it goes.

L: Mom!!!! You should name the baby Tiny!

X: Shhheeesh! I don't know how that would work when it grows up to be big. It IS a St**** and they are all big!





~Well if 5'10 and a size 4 is big. :-)

A Conundrum

I think this might be the last day I can squeeze into my favorite pre-pregnancy jeans.


I'm sad.




P.S. On the bright side, it looks like some shopping is in my near future. On the dark side, I'm less than impressed with any of the maternity pants I've seen online.

My name is. My name is. My name is slim shady

"Mom you're too picky! Every name I say I like you don't like."~Leia

Here's a couple of her suggestion:

Mary-Kate

Ashley

Rose

Francine Carruthers

My Husband is the Cutest

Here's why:

1. We keep our name a secret because Marc likes to "introduce the baby to the family".

2. He is planning on taking a full month off with this baby because "It's [his] all time favorite time of a baby's little life and he doesn't want to miss it. And it's the only time we've had enough vacation time saved up to do it."

3. He was as (if not more) excited and relieved to see our baby's heart beat and sono last week as I was.

4. He cares and takes a part in our children's education.

There's lots more, but these are the reasons that have come to my attention lately. I love him!

This is a model of a 10 week old fetus! Pretty amazing huh?

To do list.

Detention: check, check and CHECK


Apparently no one gave my art students the memo about not crossing a pregnant lady!


Yikes.

Mama Files: I did it!

I made my very first baby purchase today via Ebay!(I really think it's a girl, I've never been wrong about my own children)

Now to come up with a name...

P.S. It's WAY cuter in person!