A time for rest...

A few weeks ago, while my niece and nephew were here, we had a really nice relaxing afternoon at my grandparent's house. All the kids insisted on fishing even though it was about a million degrees. Well, all the kids wanted to fish except Brenna - she's like her mama, we'd rather just sit in the air conditioning and make the cole slaw for the fish fry! That's Levi sitting down waiting for a bite - hopefully that patience will start to spill over into some of his other pursuits:)

My grandparent's house is kind of my home base. I'm an army brat so we moved a lot while I was growing up. Staying with my grandparents in the summer or between moves or while my dad was deployed gave us a real sense of stability though. So now it's the place I go to when I need to "go home." The yard is beautiful and the house is always neat (except when my tribe and I have been there awhile). There's always family coming in to visit. It's just so restful for me. Which I guess is why I'm thinking about it now...I could use some rest! NewBaby will be here in just a little over a week (unless he makes an early appearance) and I'm feeling so swamped with things to do. I know a lot of it is not truly necessary so I'm doing my best to prioritize and let things fall off the bottom of the to do list. But I'm so huge and tired and puffy and did I say tired already? that I can hardly do anything. Getting to church yesterday took every ounce of energy I could muster (and I had to wear tennis shoes with my dress because they are the only things I can get on my feet - they don't fit, but they're slide ons so I can make them work if I don't pick my feet up when I walk). Anyway.

I have gotten lots done already. The freezer is stocked. There are still a few meal I'd like to add if I get around to it, but if I don't we won't starve. Casey and I also made a big grocery trip this weekend to stock up on convenience foods - Hamburger Helper (on sale for $1 a box!), frozen pizzas, breaded chicken tenders, and bottled spaghetti sauce - that he can throw together while I'm in the hospital. I think his mom and my granny will stay with him most of the time, so they'll probably be eating a lot better than that:) I made myself a big batch of granola to take to the hospital for breakfast or snacking. I don't know how they expect anyone to recuperate on what they feed you in there! I also have outfits planned for the kids and my bag is all packed ( a first for me! I've never packed a bag ahead of time before!).

Now if NewBaby (maybe Caleb?) will hold out a few more days so my mom can finish a paper she's working on for her doctorate, we'll all be set:) I'm so impatient to meet this little guy (and see if we can tell what his name is!) and to get started recovering already. I can hardly wait!

Two Weeks and Two Day To Go (at the most!)

The meds I'm taking have completely stopped the contractions. I'm only planning to take them until Sunday when New Baby will be 37 weeks old. I'm so grateful that they've given this little guy more time to grow and develop. Jack was only a little early, but he still had a little difficulty with breathing at first which led to some feeding problems at the beginning and then (I think) to pretty serious jaundice. Oh, how I'd like to spare this little guy all that! But the brethine is still causing me quite a few side effects - awful insomnia and the shakes being the biggest two, I guess. I'm very nauseous, too, but who can tell if that's from the medicine? :?
In the meantime, my to do list seems to grow longer as the days get shorter! I am managing to get some things done - the freezer is getting well stocked, the baby clothes are washed, my bag is (almost) packed, and we have plan in place for the kiddies. But there's so much more I think I need to do and even more that I want to do. Dawn had a great post on cleaning your plate that was very helpful to me. There is a limit to just how much is even possible for me on a good day and these days, when I'm carrying an extra twenty pounds in each foot and who knows how many more in this baby belly (I don't know because I don't look at the doctor's scale!) AND when the weather outside is unbelievably hot...well the list of what's just not possible is getting longer and longer, too. So my lesson for this week (and probably next week and the one after that and after that...) is on accepting my limitations. But isn't it in our weakness that we see how much we need Him? I hear people all the time say "God won't give you more than you can handle..." But He gives me more than I can handle every single day! There's nothing He can't handle and so I can do all things through Him, but when I'm trying to do it on my own it's a whole different story!
So I'm sitting here looking at this list of 40 things that I need to do and I'm praying that He'll show me which of these are important and help me get them done. The rest I will let go of without guilt or stress since if it's not important to Him, it's not important to me.

A glitch in my plans

Somethings just can't be controlled. Like babies! My day yesterday started with big plans - a little cleaning and organizing, then I planned to move on to some fun school stuff for Levi and making up some cookie dough for the freezer. But at lunch all my plans came to a screeching halt when I started having serious "can't talk through them" contractions. So it was off to the doctor, where they stopped (just like when you take your car to the mechanic and it suddenly doesn't make that noise anymore). Everything is fine - it wasn't officially labor. But my cautious doctor started me on brethine anyway to be on the safe side - I really want to keep this little guy on the inside for a few more weeks! The brethine is working like a charm on the contractions, but, boy! The side effects are something. I'm shaking like a leaf! If all goes well today we'll ease up on the dosage tomorrow - but for today I guess I'll just deal with it. At least it's amusing the kids:)

Packing the freezer

In my big effort to be somewhat prepared this time around, I've been doing my best to pack our extra freezer with meals and snacks for after the baby gets here. Unfortunately I've also had lots of sick days when it was just too easy to grab something out of the freezer instead of cooking extra to put in. I'm consoling myself with the fact that we didn't make a Zaxby's run on all those nights. But my freezer is filling so slowly!
So far I have 1 pan of browned hamburger meat with taco seasoning layered on top of refried beans (for 7 layer dip that we eat more like a casserole with chips), a roast turkey breast I shredded and packed in meal size portions, one dozen blueberry muffins, 1 meals worth of Salisbury steak (yummy!) and 2 ziploc bags each containing 1 kielbasa sausage and 1 bag of diced hash browns (also yummy and fast).
Today I'm making 2 big pots of vegetable soup - one for supper tonight with garlic bread and one for the freezer - and pepper jack cracker dough to freeze. I'm hoping to bake some poppy seed muffins, too, but it is so hot today that I hate to turn the oven on. Maybe if I wait to bake them until it cools off some.
Soon I'm hoping to make a batch of granola to take to the hospital. I'm always starving those first few days (after nine months of getting queasy at the thought of food!) and let's just say I didn't choose this hospital for the food - even the vending machine pickings are slim!

Now if we can just decide on a name...

He wouldn't move his little hand from his face, but isn't he gorgeous:)!? Just a few more weeks! By the way, I think he has my nose - poor kid!