37 WEEKS

Had my appointment today and I'm already dilated to a 3 and 70% effaced. I was SO surprised. When I was this progressed with Harper last time, I was 39 weeks, and delivered her the next day. I am suddenly starting to feel so unprepared and still have so much to do. We don’t even have our hospital bags (or Harper’s things) packed up yet-so we’re hoping to get some things done this weekend and take it a little easy. I’m starting to feel so nervous and anxious about the delivery too, but more so, the long nights and nursing woes that come after. My official due date isn’t until Oct 17^th so I’m just fine if this baby stays in for a few more weeks.

How Far Along?
37 weeks
Weight Gain:
30 pounds
Sleep? 
I have to have pillows all around me, and I still can’t sleep! My mind is just turning at all hours of the early morning-about the most random things.
Best moment this week?
The best moments I’ve had was definitely the baby shower that my Aunt’s threw for me. I felt so loved and the food was SO good. I’ve also loved putting the nursery together. I love decorating and this is starting to make it feel more real.   
Weird pregnancy moment?
I don’t know if I’ve had anything weird, just super emotional lately. Our niece Sarah left on a mission last week, and I was released from my calling in Young Women’s. I had some serious tears! And then the next minute, I was ok. So I feel like my emotions are all over the place with being sad, happy, nervous, stressed…I’m blaming everything on these pregnancy hormones!
Movement:  
The doctor said she’s head down and feet up! So I am feeling so many strong kicks, especially whenever I lay down.
Food Cravings:
Jelly beans and chocolate
Gender: 

We still can’t come up with a girl name. Lots of names we like, just nothing that feels right-which is starting to make me a little nervous! With Harper, we had a pretty good idea at this point. I always use to joke about parents who couldn’t come up with a name in 9 months…and now we’re one of the them. 

What I'm looking forward to: 
Still feeling like SO much needs to be done before the baby gets here. We’re finishing the nursery this week, doing laundry, and taking all of Harper’s old baby clothes out of storage. I love looking at all the small outfits Harper use to wear and thinking about putting this new babe in them!

TWINKLE, TWINKLE, LITTLE STAR

My aunts put together a lunch to welcome the newest Baby Henry last week. It was quite the ordeal because the original venue decided to close its doors without informing them. Luckily, they called to confirm a week before and noticed the line was disconnected, so they were still able to find another place to have it. They are pretty much amazing for not cancelling at that point! The theme was “Twinkle, twinkle, little star, do you know how loved you are?” and looked like it could have been pulled off of Pinterest. 

The lunch was held at Anthony’s along the river and when they sent me the food list to choose from, I knew it would be an impossible task! Especially, being pregnant! Everything sounded so good. We had coconut prawns, tenderloin slices on bruschetta, shrimp stuff mushrooms, an array of fruits and cheeses, and crab & artichoke dip served on bruschetta. And of course, a Desserts by Kelly cake (I don’t think we can have a family gathering without something from there!). 

I felt so loved, and it was so nice to visit and welcome this new baby into the family. Even Harper walked away with presents and a new “baby” for her to take care of too. We are so spoiled. My only regret is with everything going on, I somehow managed to not get a picture with just my two aunties! But I was able to get a 4 generations picture with my mom, grandma, and Harper which is pretty special too.

FIXER UPPER

Marcus was supposed to leave on a campout for three days, but the night before he came down with the flu. So for three days we stayed cooped up in the house. When along came the show, “Fixer Upper.” After the first episode, I turned to Marcus and said, “We really need to turn this off, this is just making me want to do home projects.” Five episodes and a few days later, we were headed to the Home Depot. We grabbed what we needed for new trim, shiplap, and lots of paint. Ashley said, “It’ll be easy!”  and Marcus said, “It’ll probably be expensive.” One thing about Ashley though is she does do her research and it always turns out great. One of these days, she’s sure she’s going to have a total fail and wonder what she was thinking. Fortunately, it was not this time. 

One thing we have learned is it always takes double what we budget, and twice as long as we think. We were right on both this time. But we now have our ideal craft/laundry room and we were so proud of ourselves for finishing the trim in this room. Which makes us so thankful that the trim is already done everywhere else in the house-thank you previous homeowners! It’s so fun to see the before and after pictures side by side.

PORTLANDIA 2016

 

Labor day weekend we drove down to Portland to attend the Hero Up Run.  Marcus’ work helps to sponsor the race and all the money goes towards the fight against childhood cancer. The Smart family runs the entire race to honor, Keith, who passed away at the age of 3. It's so inspiring seeing their family come together for such a great cause and to honor his memory. Marcus even got first in the 5k for his age category- apparently, it does pay to get older! Even if we missed him crossing the finish line because Harper was too busy "swinging."
 

Over the weekend we decided to bring out our inner kids.  We had grilled cheese for dinner, read children’s books at Powell’s, and ate PB and Jelly doughnuts for lunch. Harper, and Ashley, were in heaven! Especially, Harper. We gave her a doughnut and she just went to town on it! Blue Star Doughnuts are definitely our new favorites with some of the craziest flavors like passion fruit with a sprinkle of cayenne pepper-We’re already dreaming of going back!  Ashley was also excited to hit up some baby stores while we were in town too. She had heard of a store on 23^rd called “Oh, Baby!” and when we walked up, she immediately turned around.  Marcus started to take the stroller downstairs when he noticed Ashley wasn’t following. Turns out “Oh, Baby!” was a lingerie store! Oops. We shared a good laugh about it and made a U-Turn down the street.  

Seeing all the green trees really made us miss our time we spent living in Oregon during law school, but we’re still happy Portland is so close because it makes for a great place to visit.