A little THANK YOU...

To my husband...

I haven't really written about any problems during my pregnancy and I mostly say that it's been great, but I can't deny that I've definitely had my share of ups and downs through out.

• Morning sickness in the beginning of my pregnancy
• Not wanting to eat anything because it all just didn't sound good
• Hip and back aches at night, and just not finding a comfortable position to sleep
  
• Heartburn
• And now.. my most recent.. feeling a little queasy again

I don't know if morning sickness was a thing that came back for any of you other pregnant ladies in the third trimester, and I'm not sure if it's even that, but let's just say we had a very UNPLEASANT experience yesterday while I WAS DRIVING to church. No further details.


While lying in bed I just got to thinking of how much support Nicholas has given me through out my pregnancy.

In the beginning of my pregnancy each time I threw up in the morning he was by my side out of bed just helping me through it, I can't remember a time where he just stayed in bed, because he never did.

Or the times when I would be right about to walk out the door to student teaching in the morning and have to turn right back around because I had to throw up, he would make sure I would get all cleaned up, and get back out the door in time so I wouldn't be too late.

He always cleans up after me and tells me to just go lie down and relax until I felt better.

He gives me foot rubs.

He rubs my back and hips when they are sore.

He bought me a body pillow so that I would be more comfortable at night.

There are so many big things and little things that he has done for me, I could go on forever. I'm 30 weeks this week. 30 weeks is a long time, but he's been helping me every step of the way, and I couldn't do it with out him. I appreciate Nick so much and he has helped me out tremendously, more than he probably knows. I'm so glad that I have the support and love I need to get through this. I know there is much more to come, especially labor, but I am positive that Nicholas will be what gets me through it all just because I've seen how much he does for me already. I love you Nick!

Spotlight...

I'm going to embarrass my sister, but I've been wanting to for awhile and you'll see why! Lately as I've been cleaning my house I've been finding numerous of the same items (from my sister) and today I found another one.  I decided that was another signal for me to get on the ball and thank her! :) I only have a picture of a few of the items that she has given to me and Nick, however there are countless that she has made for Nicholas and I as well as other family members and friends.

Cards. She makes AMAZING cards. Which I am quite jealous of ;) She is so crafty and creative. I try to steal her ideas sometimes, but she always comes up with something new. I keep telling her she needs to start her own business, and make MONEEEY, but she is just so cute and happy with having it as a hobby of hers :) which I think is great. The picture looks blurry now that I see it, but these cards are just a few of the many spectacular ones she has made!

What makes it so great is that each time I see one of these cards it reminds me of what a great sister I have. She is caring and takes the time to do these sorts of things for people. I owe her like a million thank you cards back, I'm just quite behind on my part. However I'll say....... Thanks LU!! You are great and I love you :)

p.s. if you want a card made for you call her at 555-card, cards start at just $1.99!!!! just kidding, that would be cool though....I could advertise for her. :)

Mrs. Jensen......

So.. why, might you ask, did I decide to be a teacher? Obvious reason: I love children. They are so innocent and often random and say funny things. I've definitely been reminded of how funny kids are and the things they say and do while substituting out here in Oklahoma. The following comments are all about my pregnant self and all come from children under the age of 10. They are so innocent and cute, I wish we all were a little more like them sometimes! :)

2nd grader: "Are you having a baby?"
My response: "Yes I am."
2nd grader: "I can tell."
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Kindergartner:  *Staring... Still staring (for about 10 minutes, not kidding)* Runs over to her teacher, points at me. "She has a baby".
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2nd grader: Hugs me... "What happened"
My response: "What happened to what?"
2nd grader: Points shyly to my belly..
My response: (Laughing) Oh, because my belly is big?
2nd grader: Yes
My response: I'm having a baby
2nd grader: "Oh a baby! Wow.."
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3rd grader: "Is your baby a girl?"
My response: "Yes"
3rd grader: "I knew that you know why? Because I guessed my mom was having a girl when she was pregnant and it WAS a girl!"
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And one of my favorites-
2nd grader: "Your belly is kind of round..."
My response: "Ha.. You want to know why it's so round? Because there is a baby inside"
2nd grader: "Oh, I knew it!"

So there you go. Little kids are great and they make me laugh. I also get the occasional taps, pokes, brushes of the belly while walking down the hall or in class, and most often, they seem to always want to hug me right smack straight on my belly...

I swear this kid gave me five hugs in about 10 minutes today. Every time he would just come up, smile, hug me,  and put his little head right on my belly, (they are short enough their heads fit right perfectly on top of it ;) ) and eventually I would say, "Ok, ok :) thank you." to get him to let go.

LIttle Paper Bag Picture Book!

I went to a Relief Society interest group last week and I'll have to admit, it was one of the first groups I've actually wanted to go to for awhile and what I made turned out really cute! It is SO easy to make and all made out of 4 brown paper lunch bags, scrapbook paper, ribbon and embellishments of your choice! Here's my close to final result of the book..  I'm just waiting on a name to put on the front and cute little pictures of our baby girl to go in the book! :)

Front Cover

The ribbon ties off the book to close it all together.

Each side opens up

Therefore each side has a front and back covering, so this is my front

And the back-- you don't really look at the back this way, once you start opening the book you see each side of all the pages anyways, but once all the pages are open some face down and others on top.

Anyways, this post has been written for a few days I just had to upload the pictures, and I was going to...but this past weekend I got extremely SICK :s And it hasn't been very fun.

 That's a really blurry picture, but it's the best I can do getting it from my cell phone :) I'm still feeling exhausted, sore, and coughing quite a bit, but things have gotten a lot better since Friday night, except that these past few nights I haven't slept at all. We spent Friday night in the labor and delivery room. My doctor told me to go in and be checked right away so I met Nicholas there and went in. They made us wear those blue masks while we were waiting in case I did have the flu. Quite embarrassing.. haha. This little girl just kept staring at both of us and kind of mumbling to her mom "Mom, they sick." She was like 3.

They tested me and everything turned out to be alright. They had me hooked up to a monitor to monitor the baby and she looked fine as well. I think that was the scariest thing for me, was just wondering if everything would be alright with her. I love her so much and I'm constantly thinking about her and feeling for her moving to make sure she's alright. I usually don't have a problem feeling her, she moves ALL the time. I'm not joking either. Nick can basically feel her almost whenever he wants because she's so active. I love her so much.

Anyways, hopefully I will be completely recovered in the next couple of days here. I don't like being sick.

12 weeks..

I feel like counting down the weeks now instead of counting up the weeks in my pregnancy.. but I'll still tell you what week I'm on until 40 weeks :) This week marks my 28th week! That means, 12 weeks left until my due date. If we want to have everything ready for the baby by the beginning of December, then that's only 8-9 weeks that we have left!! My belly keeps growing... as you can tell from the picture.

I can feel our baby girl moving all the time now. She'll often give some strong kicks and move around like crazy. It's funny to watch sometimes. Nicholas loves talking to her and feeling my belly when she moves.

We are still undecided on a name yet. We'll keep thinking though.

I bought my first pair of maternity jeans last weekend! I don't mind them. I heard all these things about them and how they were so.. I guess not form fitting... but I don't seem to have a problem, if they fit, they fit! And my regular pants were definitely not comfortable anymore with a little hair band holding the button together.

We still have a lot to do. Starting with clearing out our baby room. Right now it's our storage room full of extra boxes and things we aren't using. So that's our first step on my list of things to do.

Oh.. want to know about how big our baby is at 28 weeks?? About the size of a chinese cabbage! I think that's pretty neat. I hope she is chubby with cute little cheeks I can squeeze. At both of my ultrasounds the due date has come up a couple of days early, which probably doesn't mean a lot, but that means she's not measuring small. So that's good :) Well... I mean.. I hope she's not like a 10 pound baby!! But you know what I mean.

Which reminds me. Our baby will for sure be here by (hopefully) December 31st, if not earlier, depends on what she wants to do ya know??
My doctor is all about scheduling and asked if I wanted to be induced. Not a question I get asked everyday.. but I thought about it and talked with Nick and we decided we would go ahead and schedule an induction right around my due date, the 29th of December. Things just seem more real now... Now that we know the gender of our baby, an exact date to go in to the hospital, and the weeks are winding down. It's all kind of nerve racking, but still makes me happy to think about. :) I still got all of these fun holidays ahead to enjoy before she comes!!.. Halloween, Thanksgiving (I'm going to get huge) and Christmas!! And we'll be spending a wonderful New Years with our brand new baby girl :) How precious.. what a way to start out the new year.. :)

He's what keeps me entertained...

So, my husband is just so amazingly interesting and funny (that's one reason I have so much to blog about). He keeps me very entertained even if I only see him for a few hours at night due to the fact that he is very busy in school.

This last Saturday afternoon Nicholas came home from studying and said he was going out to try and fix something on our car. It’s a used car and there was this rattle in the back. I came out about half an hour later to check on him and this is what I saw:

 

 

 

I just had to get this picture I thought it was so funny you could see his legs dangling out through the trunk.. haha.

 You should have seen what he had done. I was SO shocked. I think what was running through my head was “Wow, I’ve never seen anything like this. I really hope he can put it all back together” I knew he could, I mean come on.. it’s Nick. He is very careful at what he does. But, it’s like he knew exactly what he was doing, which most people wouldn’t unless you worked in an auto shop or something, he had everything taken apart. The seat was out, the back panel was off, the side panels on the door, and the seat belts were out! And I’m sure there were many other things removed I just can’t remember.. but it was all very confusing to me when I helped him (more like watched him) put everything back together. Anyways, he DID fix the rattle! I was amazed. It was the gears in the seat belts that were making the noise, so he bought this ‘sound dampening material’ I know exactly what it’s called because I went to every auto parts store in town with him ;)

Anyways, Nicholas just amazes me sometimes. I think he could do any job he wanted and catch on very easily. I’m just glad he is going to be a dentist because then he can work on my teeth and I don’t have to worry about telling the dentist “THAT HURTS!!” because I usually never say it hurts when it really does… But when it’s my husband, he’ll be extra gentle and I’ll be very comfortable letting him know when I’m in pain! And he will be more careful… right NICK??

 

Journal Writing..

I love the challenge from President Eyring about writing in your journal about how you’ve seen the Lord’s hand in your life each day. I’ve actually taken it up and I feel like it has already blessed me and opened my eyes in many ways. I recommend that anyone does it especially because you really see how blessed you are, even by simple things.

Here is what he says:

“As I would cast my mind over the day, I would see evidence of what God had done… that I had not recognized in the busy moments of the day. As that happened, and it happened often, I realized that trying to remember had allowed God to show me what He had done.”

He urges each of us:

Tonight, and tomorrow night, you might pray and ponder, asking the question: Did God send a message that was just for me? Did I see His hand in my life…? I will do that. And then I will find a way to preserve that memory for the day that I, and those that I love, will need to remember how much God loves us and how much we need Him. I testify that He loves us and blesses us, more than most of us have yet recognized. I know that is true, and it brings me joy to remember Him” (“O Remember, Remember” Oct. 2007 Conference Address).

So anyways, going along with that, here’s a story for you which is one I wrote about in my journal, just thanking the Lord for helping me get through the day.
 
I started substituting out here in Oklahoma. My second day I got a call at 7:50 in the morning. Surprisingly I didn’t ignore it and just go back to sleep, I accepted it and jumped in the shower to make it to the school by 8:30 (I know… I didn’t know I could get ready that fast either!) Well, the job was for kindergarten. Not joking… I wanted to walk straight out of that building after about the first 20 minutes. Oh my goodness. I had 19 kids for the whole school day and by the end they were on the floor crying saying they wanted to go home. Kids were running around, another kid throwing his shoe at others, another kid slamming the chairs on the floor, and so on. I cried a little on the way home from school, haha. I was so exhausted from bending down, picking up kids all day, trying to give directions that just seemed to float right over their head, and the worst, was that the teacher hadn’t filled out any plans for me so I was basically scrambling trying to figure out what to do next the whole day. I was seriously just praying that I would make it through the day.. and I did!

So, I’m still subbing, I just probably won’t do kindergarten again ;) The day before was actually bliss I rotated through 2nd, 3rd, 4th and actually a small kindergarten class, and that went well, but we all have bad days right? So to go along with the journal thing, sometimes the Lord blesses us in even the simplest ways… like just getting me through this whole school day without giving up or breaking down! I really am just thankful that I even have a job, one that is easy going and flexible for me until the baby gets here. Now I can keep myself busy and I think it will help the days go by faster until December 30th!! (My due date)