Scary

So I have never been one to listen to all the birth horror stories and get scared. In fact with Matthew the only thing I was worried about was managing my pain.

This year however I know of so many people who have had really scary experiences with childbirth. Some having to be induced early, some complications during labor, some complications with recovery.

In at least three they involved emergency blood transfusions.

In another one an emergency c-section.

In one of those the baby had to be delivered 6 weeks early and was in the NICU for a couple weeks.

In most of them if the doctors/nurses had not been paying close attention someone would have died if not both mom and baby.

Knowing all of these people personally makes it all seem more real, it really does worry me. I am trying to push it all out of my mind. I am trying to remember that there once was a day when these complications would have been deadly but now they are just setbacks which tend to prolong healing time.

It is still scary, but I am very thankful that each one of them had a full recovery.

On another note happy Leap Day :)

 

Hiding Diapers

I have made a resolve to start cloth almost exclusively beginning today. So far it has gone great :) Yup I have made it a whole 5 hours!

I washed and stripped Matthews cloth diapers last night because they were stinky and it needed to be done before we started using them again.

After that was done I took one of his diaper boxes cut the front and top off to make a nice, easily accessible and organizable area just for cloth diapers. This will help a ton because all the supplies are organized and in one place right by the changing table (which is on top of our dryer so finding a place to keep them was a challenge), I will know when we are getting low and need to start laundry, Chris will always know where to find the diapers also.

Today I am going to make a washing guide for the diapers so that Chris and anyone else who decides to help me wash the diapers will know exactly what to do. Diapers are surprisingly finicky to wash right.

The last step: Hiding the disposables. Now mind you I know exactly where they are, but they are not in the bathroom, they are not in his diaper bag, they are not easily accessible. I have them when I need them because sometimes you just need disposable diapers, but they are out of sight out of mind! 

On another note: My poor boy is sick today :(

Maybe?

Here are a couple pictures of the house we are hoping to rent in Forest Grove, they were asking a little more than we could afford per month so we are in the process of seeing if the rent can be lowered any. I would love to work with the owners, they have been great in just the little bit of time we have interacted with them. They have done wonders with the house, including this nice new kitchen, new bathroom, new hardwood floors, vinyl windows, they put in forced air instead of baseboards.
This house is across the street from a brand new elementary school and a park, which would be awesome for us and the business! It is 3 bedrooms 1 and 1/2 bathrooms, and would be great for us. 

Now we wait to see if they can afford to lower the rent for us, it is only by a couple hundred but that is a lot for us, it could be a lot for them too. They are going to work out the financials and see how much they actually need to get for it per month, and if they can lower it they will for the first two years, and then the second 2 years we would pay the price they originally asked (since tuition is lower the last two years we can afford to pay a little more- which they understand). Please keep us in your prayers, or send us good thoughts, or whatever you can do :) I am really hoping this will work out for us!

Decisions

This came with Chris's admission letter to Pacific University and I thought it was pretty neat. He will think I am crazy for posting it, but then he already thinks I am crazy so why not? I am allowed to be proud of my husband and his accomplishments right?

We sent in the deposit to Pacific University yesterday, he was going to call and make sure his seat is secure before he turns down Indiana. However, it is super exciting to know where we will be moving! I am very glad I went with him for his interview so I have at least spent a weekend where we are going to be moving in just a few short months.

I am trying to get prepared for this baby girl, which is very hard to do when we are in transition. Moving right after having a baby is really no fun, we did this with Matthew too, and the timing is just not ideal. However I have made a few decisions for her. The first being that I am going to cloth diaper from the beginning. I have been going back and forth on what my plan was, mostly because I have had such a hard time getting into the habit with Matthew. I always seem to resort back to disposables for one reason or another. However budget wise I am committing to cloth. I am hoping to order some of the Thirties Duo Wrap Covers:

I will use these with some fitted diapers and prefold diapers. These should fit her from birth to about 18lbs (unless she has really chunky legs). Then we will switch to the flip system that I have been using with Matthew. I am now planning to get 6 assorted colors, 3 fitted cloth, 2 hemp prefolds, and 2 bamboo inserts for about $160.00. I will just need to either make some more fitted cloth, or buy some prefolds from Green Mountain Diapers. I know I am also getting some cloth diaper supplies from one of my friends for my baby shower, that will help a ton. It will be nice to have to buy minimal disposable diapers for this little girl. If I spend around $200.00 diapering her for the next 6-12 months that is not bad, when you consider the cost of disposable diapers. I am sure we spent way more than that diapering Matthew in his first 6 months.
Other than that we are going to have her in our room in a cradle until we move, after we move hopefully we will switch her to the crib in her own room. That will be decided depending on how well she is sleeping, and the place we end of living.
Yup that is what I know so far... we are hoping to have our housing, financial, and moving plan figured out before she comes. It is kinda tough currently. We have to wait to figure out how much financial aid we are getting from the school, and then make the rest of our plan from there. It is hard no knowing.

Student Loans

I am not writing this to complain, or to accomplish much of anything, if nothing else it is to just get it off my mind. It helps me to write things down... and this is where I do that :)
We are super excited for Chris getting into his program, now I have gotten into the nitty gritty financial calculations and let me tell you the cost of professional school is scary! Then we add in higher rent in the area, and lower excess of loans available to us. Did you know that you can only get $39,000 a year in unsubsidized federal student loans a year for a professional program? The fact that I am even saying "only" that amount scares me. However the cost of the program is higher than that for the 2nd year. The first year it will help cover a little of our living expenses (I mean a very little). We have been getting by so far on my income plus student loans supplementing what I don't make, we need more than what will be left in his loans after he pays tuition, fees, books, and instruments. On top of that he is going to do a masters in education concurrently which will add about $15,000 to the total tuition costs (that is cut in half from what it would be because it is a dual degree).
We were really hoping to get on section 8 to help ease the budget, but we can't even get on a waiting list yet, I am not sure when they start accepting applications for assistance, it seems crazy that there is sooo much need out there. But when we are looking at a minimum of $1100 a month (we currently pay $615.00) to get into a house, a little help would be nice.
I guess we are going to have to jump into the scary world of private student loans, I was hoping to never have to do that, however I think it may be the only way to survive without being a burden on our family. The good news may be that the 3rd and 4th year the tuition decreases significantly and we may be able to pay off some of the private loans with the excess federal loans... since the first two years are going to be the hardest financially. I can tell you already we will miss the grants and scholarships he received at WSU!

This is New...

So the last few days I have noticed a lot of Braxton-Hicks contractions, especially today. I never had any with Matthew, at least none that I felt or noticed. I read up on them because I didn't really know when they were suppose to start or how frequently they are suppose to happen. Apparently I am right on track for them, I am just wondering if this means I will go into labor on my own with this pregnancy, or if it is not an indicator of anything different and I can just feel them better because it is my 2nd pregnancy? I guess it is a question for my doctor at next weeks appointment :)

Our Next Move...

Will be to Forest Grove, Oregon in June of this year!!!! Chris was just notified of his acceptance into the Pacific University College of Optometry!!!! Yes all the exclamation points are necessary :)

So Fun!

I am washing some pink and purple clothes today :) My parents gave baby girl clothes this Christmas and I have been waiting to wash them until I had room to put them in her dresser (was being used for art supplies). Well there is space now so I am washing them and some hand-me-downs from our friends Gary and Naomi.

I have this urge to paint her dresser, which I don't think Chris will go for because he is not a fan of painted wood furniture. Usually I am not either but I would love to paint it white and change the handles to some cute little girl handles. I blame Pinterest for this idea!

Matthew's dresser and night stand drive me crazy too, they are just dark and very grown up. I just wish there was some way to make that set more kid friendly also. I don't think it is one I would want to paint though, it is in really good shape as is, just too dark for my liking. I suppose he will grow into it so I will wait it out.

Anyways, none of that was the point of my post. I was just excited to be playing with little girly clothes :) 

** Update**
Chris doesn't care if I paint it, he thinks its silly, but said if I want to paint it I can paint it. :)

32 Weeks!

It is crazy to me that I have 8 weeks (give or take) left before I get to meet my baby girl! I am doing alright, sleepy and cranky at times, a little nervous about labor and delivery. I know I have done it before, but I have quite a few people I know who have had lots of life threatening complications during or after this process. Just adds to the nerves a little bit. Mostly I am excited though!

Right now we are anxiously awaiting news from Pacific University so we know whether we are going to move our sweet babies to Oregon or Indiana. Other than that we are still working on figuring the business plans out, we were talking about staying open but closing for the first week that baby girl is here, however when I told one of the parents that was what we were thinking. Her response was "well you only in the hospital for 2 days right?" so she expects me to be ready to start work again right after I get out of the hospital? Yes, I will have help, no I will not be able to sleep during the 10 hours that her son in here though, regardless of if I have help or not. I don't think a week is that much to ask for after having a baby... Plus it looks like we will be closing the first of May so that we can get ready to move, so Chris is just thinking it makes much more sense to close in April so that we don't have to worry about the extra kids, then I can get my rest, and we don't have to meet the new licensing standards that begin April 1st. It is going to be a lot of work for one extra month of a little income. We really are not making that much, it helps a little of course, but with all the extra stress we are thinking it is not worth it.

Forest Grove

This last weekend I went with Chris to his interview with Pacific University in Forest Grove. Matthew and I joined them for lunch, a campus tour, and the dessert farewell at the end of the day. It was nice to be able to meet some of the people and see what an interview day entails. I could have gone to more, but I did not want to be a disturbance and with a wiggly 18month old, I would have been or rather the wiggly 18 month old who was with me would have been. We won't know how the interview went for at least a week which is going to drive me crazy because I want to know. More than just wanting to know, I am worried that we will wait so long for Pacific to get back to us and loose his seat at Indiana (they are filled first come first serve from their accepted applicants, if he waits too long he will be put on a waiting list and might not get a seat in the class, and since he cancelled all the other interviews that is a really big deal!) Never the less I am worried and would love nothing more than to just send the $500.00 to hold his seat... but it is non-refundable and we can't really afford to potentially throw that much money away.
Matthew had fun on this trip too though. On Friday morning while Chris was going through the first part of his interview day, Matthew and I went swimming in the hotel pool, and went on a walk, and then he got to take a nap (lucky kid). After all the interview stuff was over we went and saw my parents at their hotel in town and he got to play with Grandpa and Grandma! We all went out to dinner and then went back to our respective hotels.
Saturday, we went to breakfast at a place called Maggies Buns (famous for their cinnamon rolls, we all shared a cinnamon roll and I had the best omelet ever!) then we went and looked at a couple houses I had set up to view while we were in town. Matthew loved running around the first house because it was empty so he got to have fun exploring. The second house was not empty so he did not enjoy that as much. Then we went and explored this neat building in Forest Grove called The Grand Lodge. It was a neat place and Matthew loved running up and down the halls and dragging his grandparents up and down the stairs as often as he could convince them to take him. The halls of the lodge are painted with pictures and descriptions of local history, as well as the history of the building. After all this we took Matthew back to the hotel fed him lunch and he took an almost 3 hour nap (we wore him out!).
When he woke up we went and explored the town a little more, and he got to play in the park. He loved the twisty slide and I know he had fun playing with his Grandparents. After that we went to dinner and then a little while after dinner we went back to The Grand Lodge to watch a small band play (The Whiskey Puppies) not really my style of music but they were pretty good and Matthew loved watching them play and dancing to the music. We had a really yummy dessert while we listened to the show, it was a really great end to the day!
Sunday marked the end of our trip. We had breakfast with my parents at their hotel. Then Matthew spotted the pool and talked Grandpa into taking him swimming in the "WaWa," Chris and I joined them because swimming sounded like fun. After that we all cleaned up and headed home.
It was a great weekend and we had a lot of fun hanging out with my parents. Now it is back to reality and playing the waiting game. I really really want to be done and be able to start planning for our move in June, that is coming quick and we are having a baby in the middle of all this which will only make it come faster! On another note I think we may have settled on a middle name for baby girl, this makes me happy because then we can narrow down first names a little more :)

Another post I know.. but...

Potty Training...

Yup it has been a long few weeks but we are slowly making progress.

It seems every time I am ready to give up for awhile Matthew

takes another step forward.

After weeks of not going in the potty but twice,

he has gone pee and poop in the potty today,

both times he told us he needed to go!

Now if I could get him to stop screaming when he goes,

we really don't understand.

He wants to use it,

He knows what it feels like to need to go potty

(not all the time with #1 but he always knows with #2)

Yet he screams while he is going...

How long is it going to take to get over that?

We are still celebrating and I guess I will keep on keeping on,

no one ever said potty training was easy or fast,

especially with a young child.

Look what I did!

I found this pattern through Pinterest, and I was able to make the hat! This is the first crochet project I have done and it turned out cute :)

Here are some pictures of the finished projects:

The hat that I am holding is new born size, and my second attempt :)

This is the first hat I made, I read to pattern wrong so it ended up being way too small, but it still looks like the hat should so it is now a hat for my baby doll from when I was little, this will be passed on to baby girl so it is kinda cool that she has a pretty hat now :)

I am going to head to the store and buy the real colors I want to use for her hat. This is my practice yarn, but now that I know I can make this project I am going to go buy the color I want a a little thicker ribbon, to make her hat for her go home outfit :) Love it!

Here is the link to the hat pattern:

Baby Flapper-Girl Hat *Pattern*

Can't Decide..

I am trying to pick colors for baby girl and I can't decide between brown and pink or the lavender. I like them both. Here are some examples of the colors:

Matthew and the Toy Box

10 More Weeks!

Today marks 30 weeks! It is crazy to think I only have 10 weeks left before baby girl is suppose to be here, I am mentally prepared for 12 more weeks though because I want to avoid being induced if at all possible. I will be very thrown off if baby comes early, because I am convinced she will be late. 

I was suppose to start appointments every two weeks already but my doctor is awesome and said we can do one more 4 week interval. He just made me promise to come in if I felt anything was off. I was talking to him about how crazy busy our month was going to be with Chris and all his interviews, so he said we could go a month to lighten the load a little! I have to go in and do the 3 hour glucose test soon. I failed the short one again (I did with Matthew too). 

I really want to nail down a name for this baby girl, but we can't yet. Oh and I have a friend here in Pullman throwing me a baby shower and I am excited that someone wanted to do that for me :) Things are looking up and some of our stress is being relieved already. We still have many questions, but just knowing he is in an optometry program is a huge relief, and then to know that we don't have to send him on 2 more trips across the country is awesome!