Pregnancy

Alright - I love being pregnant. I enjoy feeling a baby move inside me. There is no way to explain it but it is such a wonderful feeling. I can only imagine what Mary felt as she carried the baby Jesus within her, or what Elizabeth felt as her child John leapt within her. My little child isn't leaping, by any means, however, it does feel like this child never stops moving.

I see being pregnant as such a miracle. My body is creating another person. I know it is not thru happenstance or luck that my body is able to create. I know it is thru the power and plan and grand design of our Heavenly Father. The precise function of our bodies is glorious and absolutely awe-inspiring. The way our eyes work, our hearts work, our nervous system, our skin. What a blessing we are!! What a miracle we are! And the fact that a man and woman can come together to form another human being, that a woman's body has the ability to provide a nurturing place for a baby to form. That the heart forms, the lungs form, the reproductive organs form, that a whole person forms!!! 

I am so grateful for the opportunity and blessing of being pregnant. I feel like I complain a lot, or that I have with this pregnancy at least. My pregnancy with Danger went very well, aside from my heart issues and the same issues have happened with this pregnancy. I said with my 1st pregnancy, it was very easy. People disagreed with me, fervently. I see where they're coming from. And I admit it, my pregnancies are not easy ones. They aren't the worst pregnancies I've seen or heard of, but they rank up there. I'm not on bed rest, I don't need to be on an IV, I don't throw up the entire time, my hips don't separate. I've heard horror stories from other women. When compared to those, my pregnancies are easy. But I know my pregnancies are not easy. Pregnancy itself is not easy. It is hard. It's hard on the body, it's hard on the emotions and hard on those around you. It leaves a wake of depression and pain. But it also enriches the lives of those around you and blesses you for eternity. It's not easy, but if things were easy, then end result wouldn't be as cherished or cared for. 

I see what my fellow moms go thru during their pregnancies. It just reaffirms to me : just how blasted tough we are! We're freaking awesome! This is one of the hardest things we will ever do, but we do it, and even tho it's hard and we struggle, we smile thru it. We enjoy it. We cherish these feelings. We see the blessings. 

Alright, back to me complaining. Danger is nonstop. He is always going, always moving, always into stuff. He never slows down. Which also means, I never slow down. I'm always chasing him around. With Danger's pregnancy, my hips started hurting at 3 months. This one, it fells like my hips started hurting right away wen we found out, at 8 weeks. I have been hurting when I walk, when I sit down, when I stand, when I bend... The headaches have always been around, just now I can't take anything for them, so I can't even pretend that what I'm taking will help. And Lovenox freaking sucks. I inject the shot into my stomach, and it burns. For like 5-10 minutes. And instantly bruises. So I have little speckled bruises all over my belly, and my shirts have little speckles of blood on them. My belly is Danger height, and he's always poking me, saying "baby" which is cute but also painful. The doctors have said the words over and over : for the remainder of the pregnancy. I don't look forward to that (pretty soon, I won't ha e belly fat to pinch and will have to find a new location!) but when the other outcome is a blood clot, yup I'll take shots. Sucky crappy shots sure do beat a blood clot any and every day. Alright, the last thing that sucks for me right now : emotions and hormones. I have noticed I've been more emotional and hormonal this pregnancy than I was with Danger. I have had more sever mood swings and been more easily brought to tears. (VeggieTales made me cry!) I have been so crazy emotional and so reactive lately. It has been so strange. I gave Shark a disclaimer after the first few outbursts. Apologizing and giving warning. Now, if I'm feeling in an odd mood, I let him know right away. And he is really good about tiptoeing and being careful with what is said. He's very good about thinking of my feelings anyways, pregnant or not, but he is so wonderful and amazing now. I have an awesome husband, who even tho he doesn't fully understand why or what happened, he is so good. 

Alright - all of this being said, all the complaints, all the struggles - I absolutely LOVE being pregnant. I love feeling the kicks and punches. I love waking up and putting my hand on my stomach, to feel my baby RIGHT there! It is such a beautiful thing. I am truly blessed to have one child and it is a miracle that I am pregnant with our 2nd. I love it. I am so excited for this baby. So excited for Danger to have a little brother. So excited for Shark to have 2 kiddos to toss and hold and play with. I love the look in his eyes when he hugs Danger. When Danger runs up to him and cheers "daddy!" It is the best feeling in the world when Shark hugs me and Danger and he says, "I love this little family." I love my boys. I am so excited to have 2 children. I look forward to hugging both my kids. I am already so in love, just as I was with Danger, much earlier than his arrival. I love the feeling of hugging Danger and having baby kick and punch. 

Alright now how about some pictures?

First ultrasound. 

Second ultrasound. 

Third ultrasound. The little bean wiggled and squirmed soooo much, the doctor couldn't get a good image. I think this is an arm? Leg?

So very in love and so very grateful. 

A little excitement

Ok, so while I was back in Wisconsin, my heart went into flutter. It went crazy. I thought it had gotten out of the flutter tho, so I didn't really think anything of it. I had a cardio appointment scheduled for the Thursday we got back to Utah, so I didn't see it as an emergency. Well, when I went in for my cardio appointment, I was still in flutter. To get me out of the atrial flutter, the doctor's needed to do another cardioversion. I had 2 of these done while I was pregnant with Danger, so this isn't anything new for me. It had been 6 days since I went into atrial flutter, so the doctor's were concerned with blood clots. So, they needed to do another trans-esophageal echo (they take an echo of my heart by going down thru my throat), it's not really a pleasant thing, but this time, I was completely under anesthesia. So that was awesome. But along with everything this time, the doctors were more concerned for baby, so they did fetal monitoring and extra precautions. Also, rather than just shock me with the big metal pads, they decided to try to use the defibrillator function on my pacemaker. It worked. So, even though they put the big metal sticky pads on me, they didn't end up using them. The pacemaker did what it was supposed to, and they finally turned the defibrillator function on! So hopefully, it won't happen again, but if it does, my pacemaker will just kick my heart out of it! But since I needed to be shocked out of the atrial flutter, I am now back on the Lovenox shots. They are very painful shots I need to give myself twice a day. It wouldn't be so bad if the shot site didn't bleed and bruise instantly. But, it's not too bad, considering I get a child out of this whole ordeal. :)

 The shots. One more good thing: they are WAY cheaper than they were when I was pregnant with Danger. 

Saturday was Danger's birthday! My little guy turned 2!! Oh my goodness!! He is getting so big!

 He loved blowing out his candles!

He then gotta hand with uncle Kurt, who taught him to drink soda out of bottle. He loves being a big boy!

Oh Danger, you have blessed our lives so much, we are so grateful for you and love you so! We love you so much and thank Heavenly Father every day for blessing us with you! You are an amazing and wonderful boy! You are so curious and so smart. You enrich my life immensely. You make me laugh and remind me to take it slow and just have fun! Thank you!! You will be a wonderful big brother and you will teach your siblings everything you know! I look forward to see you play with them!! You are growing so fast, some days I wish I could slow you down, but then I would miss watching you learn and discover!!

To Wisco

So Danger and I flew to Wisconsin for my sister's wedding reception.

 We got to the airport, picked a seat by the windows to watch the planes come and go. He turned to me and said, "Mom, please, please, please, please!" Oh how I wish I could give that boy an airplane. But we got to ride in one, so that's pretty cool!

 I brought a neck pillow, hoping he could fall asleep and be comfy, he put it on and snuggled up to the window. He didn't fall asleep with it, but he looked like a very small but very experienced traveler.

 He looked out with window every chance he got. He looked at the planes as they were leaving, he looked at the trucks and the people. He watched as our plane moved and took off and landed. He giggled and clapped as the plane took off and landed. He loved every second of it. 

 I gave him his binky and I brought suckers and lifesavers for him to suck on to help his ears pop. He struggled with it at first, but I think he got used to it after a while. I think he figured out how to get his ears back to normal.

 We went on 2 planes to get there. The 2nd plane, we whipped out the DVD player, The Incredibles is his catnip and he zones into it. He eventually fell asleep.

 When he sleeps, he gets a sweaty head, just like his dad. It's cute and funny. I love my boys.

 When we landed in Milwaukee, momma was NOT going to chase him around an airport AND carry 2 bags and a carseat. So I rented a cart and loaded it up and put him on top. 

 Like a boss.

 His pants kept falling down, and we kept asking him to pull them up. This was his solutions to us nagging him.

 My mom has had these Marble Works for as long as I can remember, it was so fun to pull them out and play with them. It was great to have all of us play with them again.

 Gwen and I went to the Dollar Tree and we got Danger a shield and gauntlets. He was cute when he finally wanted to wear them.

 Danger and aunt Gwen, just cuddling!

 Danger and great uncle Clark.

 Catching some big air on the trampoline.

 Walking out to the pond!

 Danger and Great Grandpa Doyle!

 Danger and grandpa playing with the door.

 Danger and aunt Megan.

 Grandma and Grandpa gave Danger an Ironman toy for his birthday, he LOVED it!

 Danger smiling with a banana in his mouth!

 Danger coloring with aunt Gwen!

 As we decorated for the reception, Danger watched a movie.

 Danger and grandpa just hanging out at the reception.

 Danger and the bride, Alexa!!

 Danger didn't get a nap that day, but 5 minutes in grandma's arms and he was out!

 Eating breakfast!

 Danger and uncle Scott!

 Eating ice cream at the airport. Who is that handsome guy?!

 Waiting at the gate!

 Just hanging out, watching planes take off.

 Last flight of the night, he was out! So tired, so cute and he flew on the plane SOOO well!

We had so much fun!

 We had so much fun in Wisconsin! We cannot wait to come back for Christmas!!