Week 26: June 30-July6th Happy Independence Day

Happy 4th of July, everyone! As you're enjoying parties, cookouts and fireworks this weekend, please be sure to remember why we celebrate Independence Day and how we obtained and maintain our freedom!

It's been a busy week. It was a little rough for me with work-- Just lots of issues in general, but the week definitely got better.

We had our 25th week dr appointment on Friday. Everything is great, baby is growing fast, and looking good. 128 heartbeats per minute. My bloodpressure is still right where it should be, so that is good, too. I have to go in at some point for a glucose test. Yuck. We're almost exactly on target for our due date of 10/9/08! He said it was about a day off, which is about as perfect as they could hope for. I've started swelling periodically. Thursday night was especially bad. I looked like I had tree trunks for feet and they were alternating between being very painful and going completely numb. I ended up calling the OB department at the hospital to make sure this wasn't a sign of a blood clot or something. They said that if I start getting spotty vision, a stomach ache or headache that just won't go away, that I should come in. Otherwise, they said to put my feet up and drink plenty of fluids. We talked to the doc about it at our appointment the next day, and he did an awesome job explaining to us what was happening (basically, because of my big ol'belly, when I'm sitting, the fluid can't drain from my legs as easily). He said that in the evening, I need to lay on the couch for a few hours with my feet propped up and a pillow behind me so I'm laying off to one side a little. Haha! Dr's order's to lay around! We've now met all of the OBs in our practice. We're happy with all of them for the most part. Obviously, we have our favorite, but we'll be comfortable with whichever is on call to deliver.

Evan's had GREAT days at school both Wednesday and Friday this week. We're SO happy. He was on green all day. We made him a deal. As long as he stays on green all day the days that he comes to stay with us, he earns a baseball. if he's on red (very, very bad), he loses a ball that he's earned. If he's on yellow (an OK day, he doesn't lose, but he doesn't gain, either). Once he has 5 baseballs on this chart we made, we'll take him to see a MudHen's game. We decided to do this because it seemed like the bad days were always happening when we were picking him up. So, we've given him a goal. I hope it works! It did the first two times! Keep your fingers crossed!

Friday, Evan and Greg started working on taking down the wheelchair ramp here at our house. Yeah!! Evan is an AMAZING helper. He was actually taking the bolts out of the railing himself! Of course, he had to wear his toolbelt, hardhat, gloves, ear protection and eye protection-- but those didn't last long, and from time to time he'd have one or more pieces on, but never all at once. It's fantastic. They managed to get all the rails down by the end of the night on Friday. Great job, guys!

Saturday morning, they continued to work on the ramps, and started taking the floorboards off. This, it turns out, is more of a challenge than we thought it would be. The screws are literally embedded into the wood, which has expanded around many of the screwheads. Consequently, the screwsheads are stripping as they are being removed. Dad had a solution, though- a drillbit that grabs onto the head and pulls it out. Evan was so stinking cute. He came in, went to the refridgerator on his own, grabbed two beers and walked out the door with them, stating "I think Daddy needs TWO beers". I had to rush out and get a picture of him giving those to Greg. I think he knew Greg was getting a little frustrated. I can only imagine the words that flew out of his mouth in front of Ev.

We had Sami's 5th birthday party at 1pm. I still cannot believe that she's now 5. It was a great party, with lots of presents, food and people. I managed to find an American Girl doll- Samanatha, no less. I think she was a little excited about it. Cute moments-- Devan, another little boy her age, insisted on buying her jewelry for her birthday-- apparently, he wanted to get her a ring (!!!) and Pam, his mother, said no.. he ended up getting her some beautiful little gold heart earrings. Very sweet. We got her a new dress for school and a bunch of earrings. She was very excited.

The kids had a ton of fun- they had a pinata! everyone took turns and eventually, it burst open and the candy fest began. I think Cole had about 30 pieces of candy in him by the end of the day. We could tell, too. He was spinning like a top! Dad took him outside, and he went right to the monster mud puddles and literally jumped it! He did a buttflop into the biggest one, soaking him from head to toe. It was fantastic. He had a blast.

We surprised Evan and took him to see Wall-E last night at the movies. It was a great movie. About halfway thru, we looked over at Evan and realized that he'd eaten about 1/2 a tub of popcorn. That was a mistake that we will NEVER allow to happen again. Around midnight, he started crying. I was still awake out on the couch, and went into see what was wrong. He started gagging and threw up a little on the floor. We went back to the bathroom to clean him up, and he had to throw up again. By this time, Greg was up and able to help me. He projectile vomitted all over the back of the toilet and then into the toilet itself. It was all popcorn. Can I just tell you, it's going to be a while before *I* can eat popcorn again? I think Evan feels the same way. Well, he crawled into bed with Greg, and I just slept on the couch-- or at least attempted to. Evan was up 2 more times before 1am, and we thought it was over, but at 3:30, he was awake again and threw up 7 more times-- dry heaving and bile, for the most part, according to Greg. We tried children's pepto, but that didn't work, and Greg finally ended up calling Grandma G to see what she thought we should do. Unfortunately, there wasn't a whole lot- we had to let nature take its course. It appeared to have ended around 5:30ish, for a total of 9 trips to the bathroom and one episode of throwing up all over the bed in our bedroom.

Evan was a trooper through the whole thing. He even chuckled after the first time he threw up and said "I guess I had too much popcorn". We both had to laugh and said "yeah, I think you did". He's doing well. We started out very slowly this morning and he ate a few crackers and had some sprite. At 12:30, he'd managed to keep both down. I'm now letting him have a small bowl of chicken noodle soup, and he's happy as a lark. As soon as he's done, it'll be nap time.

Everything else seems to be going well. Greg is continuing to work on the deck, though taking the floorboards off is still not going as well as we would like. He just talked to our neighbor, who had great ideas for him. So, we'll see how that goes. I'm keeping my fingers crossed so that we don't have to buy new wood.

I'm kindof hoping we can get started on Evan & the baby's room sometime soon-- maybe at least get Evan's new bed up and a few things moved around. I'd feel better about it, anyway! Greg's dragging his feet, though. He's afraid that Evan will see it as loosing his room. He not losing his room. He's just going to be sharing it. And he's not losing his stuff, either! Greg & I are making major adjustments so that doesn't happen-- which is why we're re-configuring the living room! And the longer Greg takes to come to terms with this, the less I'm going to be able to help him! I think he's having a harder time with it than Evan ever will.

Anyhoo!

love y'all!

jenn