It's the Final Countdown...

Before I talk about baby stuff, here are a few family updates. First, we have some new health issues going on in our families which I won't go into detail about, but please keep us in your thoughts. Jeff and I aren't sure if we should have more children because so many bad things have happened during this one. As for my father, he is in a rehab center at UVA now and they say he should be heading home on Thursday! It has been a really long road but he is doing so much better and only has a few lingering problems to deal with now. On a happy note, Laura (my sister) and Caleb celebrated their first wedding anniversary a few days ago! It is hard to believe that a whole year has gone by since the "wedding month" we had last year.

Well today the ticket above says we have 20 days to go. I find it funny to say that now when people ask, because of course there is only about a 5% chance the baby will be born exactly on the due date, so I feel kind of like a fraud when I say "oh I have 20 days to go." Because who knows!!! We are very fortunate to have had a very healthy and easy pregnancy so chances are we won't need to schedule a c-section or induction, so it is just a waiting game from here. I'm full term, so I would say the baby could come tomorrow, or in 35 days or so! Who knows. I talked to someone at work Friday who said her second baby was ONE MONTH LATE! Geez. I certainly don't think this little one is going to wait that long. I have been having some uncomfortable feelings here and there, but certainly nothing to make me think anything is going on yet. Tomorrow the doctor will do my first exam to see if there has been any progress yet, I will let you know. I'm thinking nothing is going on yet.

So my belly is now 42.5 inches. That is nearly 4 feet around! I feel pretty good these days, I have quite a bit of energy. The belly button is still in there, but getting shallower every day. I think it would be too funny if it popped out the day I have the baby, like a Thanksgiving turkey timer! It is getting much harder to do simple things like get into my car, roll over in bed, and put on underwear. Especially when I am having a Braxton Hicks contraction, I made that mistake today trying to get into my car while having one and it hurt! I now only have one pair of work pants that will go on so I have been wearing more skirts and dresses. My low back continues to hurt but it hasn't gotten any worse, and thanks to seeing my chiropractor, my neck has gotten a lot better! No more headaches, just random sciatic attacks where I have to hobble around like an old woman until I loosen up.

Here are my pictures from today:

The maternity pants that come up to my rib cage are HOT. Oh, they used to come to my rib cage but don't now, never mind... I can't really wear the other maternity jeans that come down lower because they now dig into the bottom of my belly every time I sit down and that hurts.

So I was happy to have gotten through my pregnancy without swelling up. Until now. Ugh. My face is swollen, I have no more chin, I have carpal tunnel symptoms from wrist swelling, my thumbs hurt and I can't bend them all the way anymore, and my feet swell so bad now and I no longer have ankles. Yes, you heard it here first, i officially have CANKLES! Below is a picture of my feet earlier today, after pretty much laying around with my feet up all day, they were much worse yesterday after cleaning all day then entertaining dinner guests. I don't even know whose feet those are anymore, certainly not mine. I have decided that I no longer look like the Grinch, now I look like Princess Fiona (in her ogre form) from Shrek! Geez. I will probably miss feeling the baby moving inside me, but I certainly won't miss the swelling!

Me looking miserable and swollen in my rocker. Note the tons of cords coming out of my laptop beside me, both my battery and my wireless card have died, and instead of replacing them, I just keep them plugged in now, much cheaper!

So we officially decided to give cloth diapering a try, and I ordered a bunch from Target using our remaining gift cards and a 10% off coupon from the registry. We now have 22 Bumgenious 3.0 one-size-fits-all diapers in white, green and yellow. They have already arrived and they are very nice and soft and I look forward to using them. They can be worn from the time the baby is 8 pounds to I believe 35 pounds which I guess is potty training time, and from what I hear they hold up well so can be used for multiple children. I figure when I'm home we will just use cloth, then once I'm back to work and when we travel we will mix in disposables as needed. I'm excited to give it a try, I figure since neither of us have ever changed a single diaper in our lives and don't know what we are doing, we will just start of training ourselves on cloth diapers and it won't be too much of a shock to the system. We shall see. Here is a good website I found about cloth diapering: http://simplemom.net/resources/cloth-diapering/ We shall see.

Ok my hands are starting to go numb now due to the carpal tunnel problems, I think it is time for bed. More to come soon!