35 weeks and 2 days

I've been minorly concerned that turbo is up-side-down for the past three weeks.  He sticks that great big lump out and the bigger he gets, the bigger it gets, and it's very round and hard.  

Today at the appointment, my sweet dr just gave me an extra look at him so that we could look to know for sure.  She felt and said it looked and felt like a head to her too.  It's not.  It's his butt.  

And I'm not dialated and he's "sky high" still too, so you all can stop worrying about me delivering him early.  

He's a precious little guy with whom I can hardly wait to meet.  When God is ready for us to meet...

Interesting

I learned that when your face is tense, your cervix is tense.  That is, if you indeed have a cervix.

Today at the grocery store, I was tense.  I remembered what I had learned and purposely relaxed my facial muscles.  I could FEEL the muscles at the bottom of my uterus relax!  I could FEEL my cervix relax!

How cool!  Right?!  Good to know since I know that I show tension in my face first.  

Here are s few precious ones that I got to hang out with today:

Today was our first of just four days that all the kids have off together for spring break.

Binkles and Danke made dinner tonight for me.  What a blessing!  I love my kids!!!!! 

34 weeks

The little mister is adjusting differently.  My bras are feeling more comfortable and my pants are feeling less comfortable...  

He is still tumbling around like a turbo though, so all is well inside!  

Two 16-y-o under one roof

We now have TWO 16-year-olds!!!  Happy birthday, Danke!  

What else this March?

We are for sure getting into the busy season!  Every year I'm amazed at how busy our non-busy-type family gets each year around the end of school.  I hope turbo doesn't hold it against us that we made his birthday for this time of year!  At first thought, I thought it'd be a splendid time to have a baby (and indeed, it will be), but boy of boy are we going to be busy!!!

Girl Scout cookie sales are over, (we still have most flavors for sale if you get a craving) and our girls sold a grand total of 600 boxes together!!!  I'm glad to be done.  It was a lot of work for all 3 of us (and my mom too)!  We have them signed up for camp this summer though, so that means we made goal.

Binkles loves participating in track and field in the Spring.  What is pleasant, now that we moved, is that we're two blocks away from the track that they practice twice/week on!  Boo and Danke both decided to join the club too.  Danke is just doing it for excercise, but I was surprised to see my little boo running her heart out and enjoying it!  She has asthma the worst out of all our kids, so I was unsure about how she'd do with track.  Apparently the asthma is NOT exercise induced, and that is something to praise the Lord over!!!!  She loves competition and she shows daily interest in physical activities and especially sports.  God is good all the time.  Another blessing in track starting up is that I can go walk the track during practice.  With half the kids IN the practice, that cuts my work in half, but little buttercup LOVES the one-on-one time with me and she walks just at my pace!  So I've got it good!  The excercise is excellent for this growing mama!!!!

Otter pop and I started our 5-week birthing class.  I had a great birthing dream last night too.  I'm very excited to kiss this little dude when he's good and ready for me to!

A big change happened last week when the charter school that Wolfe, Danke, and Boo attends called to tell us that they have a blank spot open in third grade if we wanted it for Jones.  That was an emotional phone call for me.  I've been very thankful for my kids' school situation.  For the most part we have a pretty sweet set up!  Jones' teacher has been showing extreme effort to catch him up to his potential and his 3rd grade level.  It's been a team effort with her, but together we have seen huge progress and growth from him!  He had an awesome teacher last year too, but HE is catching up this year.  Anyway, since we moved, I've always hoped that all the kids could attend the same school.  Besides the obvious advantage of the school schedule being in sync, the charter school that has k-12 is way above the standards in the regular public curriculum.  We've been VERY IMPRESSED with everything about this school from 1st to high school!  But I was very heartbroken to leave the 3rd grade teacher we've grown to adore, who has put so much effort and energy into our son.  She has become a friend to me too, so that made me sad as well since she's the only friend I've made since moving.  😒

Anyway, jones made the switch and he is adjusting superbly!  I'm in awe of his character growth.  This is the same guy who has been missing our old house 6-8 month after moving here...  He loves his new class and his new school.  He misses his old class, but is happy.  What an unexpected blessing.

My sister and nephew travelled across the country AGAIN to spend more time with our family before her baby arrives near the end of July!  We drove down to spend a weekend with them at my parents house.  Unfortunately, they had been fighting bad germs for the past month and weren't feeling well.  And then double unfortunately is that we all got sick when we arrived back home.  😷

We have 2 birthdays this month in our house (this year, at least).  Danke turned 16 on Wednesday, and buttercup will be 3 on Monday.  We are going dirt bike riding tomorrow to celebrate!  

Last Tuesday, we celebrated St. Patrick's day by eating green food:  

Today we went bowling!

The pics of the older kids must be too dark, because I know I took some, but I can't see them as thumbnails.  Anyway binkles had the high score of 97, with boo in a close 2nd.

I hope that ended up being a good recap of March (so far).  Sorry I haven't been as faithful as I was hoping to be.  

Despair

I'm in despair.  I feel as if I must be missing the mark...  Doing something wrong...  Messing up horribly...

I'm surrounded with deception and manipulation.  I'm torn in too many different ways.  I can't do it all.  I'm not sure what to do.

I can't give up.  I must press on.  

3/15

Today was the day, 3 years ago, that princess buttercup was due to arrive.  She came later.  I'm glad she came.  She's such a delightful daughter.  I do love her.  

That's what she says, "mom, (or dad, or whoever) I DO love you."  It's heartwarming.

Today I'm not having a baby either.  I am making a yummy treat!  

The treat is called, "to die for thin mint brownies".  It's brownies with thin mints crushed up into the batter, with a think mint icing, and then melted chocolate for the top layer and Andes mint-chips sprinkled over the top.

I got mint chocolate ice cream too.  

I might just be having a moment...  It's going to be a tasty moment with a painful aftermath.  Maybe I'll just be the baker.  

33 weeks

32 week appointment story

The nurse was teaching a new nurse her job.  She started by telling her to feel around for the baby's position.  Turbo always has that big head or butt up and visible with the eye, so I was easy.  

She told her at 32 weeks sometimes it's hard to tell the butt from the head, but when I felt, it was a very obvious head and she agreed.  

She was explaining that it helps to find the position, do you know where to start listening.  For example, you wouldn't want to start down near the bottom of the belly at this late in the game...

So then she had one hand on the side of my abdomen and the other with the Doppler hearing the heartbeat.  Turbo rounded off and gave one of his doozy kicks right to her idle hand.  She just about jumped out of her shoes as she exclaimed, "I don't think I've ever been kicked so hard!"  

After they left the room you could hear them laughing about how funny my son was.  😂😂😂

I love that he already has a personality.  

32 weeks +1 day

It's true, I'm becoming very very large.  Or, well, turbo is...  He's not slowing down a bit though, don't you worry about that!

31 weeks +1 day

This is how a sick mama spends her day off: