This pregnancy has not been nearly as fun as my last one. A couple days ago my back started hurting, and today it feels even worst. Tim is gone today and tomorrow in Kansas City and then hopefully going to try to see his littlest sister before heading home. I have our next baby check-up on the 17th, so I’m wanting to hold off until then to see how I do, but I’m getting really nervous. Every time I pick Hannah up I really feel the pain, and it doesn’t seem to go away. Even just leaning over the tub this morning to bathe Hannah was a struggle. It’s times like these when I wish we lived closer to family. I hate feeling helpless, so I push myself, but then I don’t want to injure myself. Please be praying for me through this. We have a YMCA opening next month, which I would love to get a family membership for, but it’s still a little pricy to add to a monthly bill even though we just canceled our tv and home phones, hoping to free up some money for the Y. It might still be a good investment anyways so I can spend some time in the pool to get some weight off and work out on some light weight machines to strengthen my back.

It’s crazy ’cause I had no problems at all while in Haiti. Everyone watched out for me, which was nice and I felt very undeserving of it. But I slept great and never got ill or felt bad. My biggest prayer is that I can get my body working well so I can be well when our Mexico mission trip gets here in July. I wasn’t pushing for Hannah to learn how to crawl until my back started hurting. It’d be awesome if she could get herself around the house for me. So now for mother’s day I would like a break from picking up Hannah so I can rest my back after this weekend. Hopefully that’ll be easy enough to get.

On a good note, Baby Schmoyer has been very active lately. It’s fun to feel him/her move around. I can’t wait to be able to watch my belly move and be able to feel the movements on the outside, so Tim and Hannah can feel it too.

Tim, Hannah and I have all been feeling bad lately. I think Hannah got sick first, then me and now Tim. Yesterday I was feeling the worst, running a fever a couple times, and now today Tim has been in bed all day. I’m hoping I’ll continue to feel better even though I’ve been holding down the house today and haven’t fit in a nap. God is looking out for us though, and we have had 2 offers of people bringing us soup by. Such a blessing! So now we’ll be good for a couple meals while we recover. Hannah has been a joy to have around with her sweet voice and smiles to cheer us up.

Hannah had her 2 month check-up since she turned 2 months yesterday. We got to do the fun weight and height measurement, and then came the not fun immunizations. Hannah was in such a good mood for the first part, then while waiting for her shots she started getting tired and hungry, but I made her hold off to eat until after her shots, knowing she would want the comfort. The doctor’s office got new computers so we had to wait a little longer for her shots, and by the time the nurse came back in Hannah was already putting herself to sleep sucking on her pacifier. She had to take some type of oral medicine first, which she really liked, and then came the surprise of the shots. She looked shocked at first then let out a terrible scream and turned bright red. I handled it better than I thought, which was good, but felt so bad for her. Tim was unable to go because he had a meeting that got planned two days in advanced. I was really hoping he would be there to comfort me too, but God had everything planned out. Before the appointment I got to see two ladies from church and one of our youth. And then when the appointment was over I saw two more ladies from church. God knew about the meeting Tim would have, and knew to send these special ladies for me, surrounding Hannah’s appointment.

I had Hannah’s bottle ready for her to eat after the shots, and she quickly ate her 4 oz bottle, and cried for more. Luckily I thought ahead and had an extra 2 oz of formula to give her, which was just enough. Hannah fell right to sleep (which the picture above is from), and we went home. Tim was home to welcome her and get Hannah out of her car seat and in to her crib. Hannah woke up in the process and gave her Daddy some of the sweetest smiles ever.

Our little girl is 11 pounds and 2 ounces now, 23 inches long and her head circumference is 15.5 inches. She is in the 50% for weight, and length and head I get mixed up, one is 70% and the other 75%.

Pretty much all that’s on our minds now days is the baby. We’re one week from the due date, and patience is starting to wear off. I have done great for the last 9 months with being patient about Baby Schmoyer’s arrival. This is the first thing that I have ever been patient about, and that has been a struggle the last 2 weeks. About 2 weeks ago almost everyone I came in contact with started saying, “Any day now!” And I know/knew that they were wrong, that it wouldn’t be “any day now,” that God isn’t done growing and strengthening Baby Schmoyer before s/he is suppose to come and join us. I am still patient with the baby waiting until the birthday God has planned, my patience with people is almost gone though. It really bothered me when one of the ladies at the doctor’s office that we make appointments with even told me, “Any day now!” And I was really turned off because they see pregnant women all the time and know that there is no for sure way of predicting what day any baby will be born. It just really bothered me that she even said it, I expected anyone in the doctor’s office to be the last one to say such a thing. I have been trying really hard to stay patient with everyone’s comments not making me eager to see our little one. I am excited for the day to come, but know that God has his timing all planned out, and I figure come Monday, it’s going to get a lot harder to be patient.

I have gotten the question asking if our doctor has said anything of when she thinks the baby will be born. I’m okay with that question, and my reply every time is no, she knows better than to play with the due date. She just had her first birth about 12 weeks ago, so this whole experience is very much still in her mind and knows not to play with mine.

Since we have started going to the doctor weekly I have been very happy to hear every visit how me and baby are progressing week to week. It makes me very happy to know that my body has less work to do than some people once labor starts happening. I did find out 2 weeks ago that I have been having contractions. All along I just thought it was Baby Schmoyer curling up until it happened during one of our doctor’s appointments, and we were told, “Nope, that’s a contraction.” So I have been very aware of the many contractions I’ve been having the past 2 weeks. Of what I can tell they’re not regular, so we haven’t timed them. I rarely notice when I’m having one anyways, I usually just get a tight feeling in my chest and am more aware of my breathing.

Yesterday I accidently tricked Tim into thinking I was going into labor. I stubbed my toes on our bathroom heater and did a little yell, of which he came running in to check on me, which I thought was very sweet. Until he found out that I hurt my toe, and in his dissapointment turned to leave me in my pain. He did stop and comfort me though, and bent down to check out my toe since that’s a little hard for me.  It didn’t even occur to me that he would’ve thought it was the baby coming, I guess we’ll find out soon enough as to how the whole thing will go down.

Last week I made a daily cleaning schedule for me to follow. I really want to get in the habit of keeping our house clean, and I only have a few weeks before Baby Schmoyer gets here to make this a habit. I did great for my first week. Yesterday got thrown for a loop because I cleaned carpet all day and neglected my regular schedule, but I think that’s okay. And today so far I’ve only done a little bit of my cleaning and went to the grocery store mainly for bananas, ’cause I’m pretty sure I pushed myself too hard yesterday. I need to make myself relax and take it easy today. My hands and feet are sore, and I woke up with the worst cramp ever in my left calf. Luckily Tim was already semi awake when I woke up freaking out. Tim tried to get me to relax by saying, “relax relax relax” that didn’t work too well, but once he said, “take a deep breathe” I was able to get under control. It was not a fun way to wake up, but I think now we know that when the baby is on the way Tim will have to be specific in his directions to get me to relax and calm down.

I was so worn out after working and sweating in our hot and humid house all day. I got everything piled back into the nursery and wanted to do one thing that I enjoyed yesterday, so before going to sleep Tim helped me put Baby Schmoyer’s crib together. I didn’t put any of the bedding on though ’cause I didn’t want to touch it with being so filthy. And still today I haven’t gotten around to putting the bedding on. Part of me is just too worn out, and the other part would really love to put it all on with Tim. He should be home soon, so hopefully we can get it done before we have company over this afternoon. Hopefully this evening I’ll feel rested enough to do some of my daily chores and get back into routine.

Yesterday I had to go in to take the 3 hour glucose test ’cause earlier this week my one hour turned out a slight bit positive. I went in at 7:30 since I had to fast before it, and then got the test started a little before 8, and was done around 11 and I was eating soon after! It was not fun at all. I’ve had Tim come to all my baby appointments, but since I’d only be sitting in the waiting room for 3 hours with getting my blood drawn every hour I figured he didn’t need to wake up early too and sit through it with me.

The first hour of the test was the worst after drinking the sugary fruit punch drink. I felt pretty queasy for the first hour and was not happy at all. I was also really tired going in as early as possible to get it started and over with, which wasn’t fun. I brought 5 books with me to read so I wouldn’t get bored, but I was so tired I couldn’t concentrate on what I was reading to make it worth the time. Instead I ended up playing on my ipod the whole time with and listening to the tv on in the background.

I called today to see if I could get the results of the test. My doctor is out of town for a few days so I got passed around a little bit until they got me to another doctor that could tell me the results. I’m glad they were able to tell me, and very happy to hear that I passed and do not have gestational diabetes.

I have been wanting a treadmill for about a year now since we canceled our gym memberships to get out of debt. I figured right now would be the best time to find a good deal since it’s finally starting to get nice outside again and this is when people are more likely to get rid of their treadmill. I was able to find someone selling a treadmill with everything I was looking for and in my price range! I wanted an incline, up to 10mph, programs, calorie and mile counter, and the one I ended up with even has a heart rate monitor! All of this for a brand with good reviews online and sold to me for only $100. The owner had originally paid $1,100 for it, nothing wrong with the treadmill, just hadn’t been used in a while and they wanted their space back in the house. We were both thanking each other over and over for helping each other out! I found the treadmill on craigslist, and was pretty nervous about getting it ’cause this was my first purchase using craigslist, but it worked out great! We were able to borrow a truck from a youth’s family and go pick up the treadmill Friday night. We also brought another youth with us to help with the heavy lifting, since I’m not supposed to be doing any of that with Baby inside. So we had a good evening getting my treadmill and investing some good time in to one of the youth. We were able to get the treadmill because Tim hadn’t taken any money as profit from his online ministry, and we finally paid ourselves this week with getting fitness equipment for me for in the winter, and a new bike for Tim this summer.

We were blessed to find this treadmill and to get such a great deal on Tim’s bike, and in perfect timing. The day we went in to purchase Tim’s bike, his old one that he had for almost 16 years finally bit the dust. Luckily it held up for him as he rode it to and from work, and then it gave out after getting home. It was pretty foreign to spend so much money this week, but I think it’s important to invest in our health. With Tim’s records on bikes we’ll have this bike for a really long time, and my treadmill will over and beyond save us on what paying a monthly membership at a gym would cost, plus with Baby Schmoyer coming, it would be pretty hard to get up and go to the gym to work out, and we like to go together, which wouldn’t happen because one of us would have to stay home and watch Baby. I even had my first work out on it yesterday ’cause the temp outside got cold again.

I went to the library this morning to check out some more birthing books. I had to of been standing there for about 5 minutes when I all of a sudden got so worn out. I finished looking at books while I sat on the floor. Luckily I’m not embarassed by that ’cause I would do that if I was tired before I was pregnant. I’m still pretty fatigued being home for 30 minutes afterwards, which scared me, so I started looking things up online and contemplating if I should move my monthly checkup back to this week. I have my checkups on Mondays, and would normally go in this Monday, except our doctor wont be there the next 2, so I’m scheduled for the 27th. I did find a website that said that about this time in the pregnancy fatigue will start back up. Hopefully that’s the case, but if I have a rough weekend I think I’ll try getting in later this week. Tim took this picture of me last Sunday. I was excited to fit into this shirt, and finally had something to wear with the really cute and fun jewelry my brother, Jon, got me for Christmas!

We finally made it to above freezing! The news doesn’t cover our town specifically, but for the Minneapolis area (about 2 hours southeast of us) they usually stay 5-10 degrees warmer and they hi 50 degrees for the first time since the first week in November. We have yet to hit 50, and I’m guessing we weren’t in the 50s when November started. It will be a fabulous day when we get that warm!

Today was my first attempt ever to count calories. I’m using www.healthylivingonline.com. It has most foods in it’s system so you choose what you ate or what you will eat and it’ll calculate pretty much everything for you. Today I entered things as I ate to see how many calories I had left. While at school I was estimating what I thought I ate and ended up eating my alotted 1200 calories of the day in only breakfast and lunch. Then when I got home I noticed I messed up on my cereal this morning, and ended up being 500 calories off, giving me calories to use for dinner and a snack of popcorn after small group!

I already went through and entered in what I’ll eat tomorrow, and I have it worked out to eat a snack after each meal, so I’ll get to eat 6 times a day, which is ideal. I’m kinda excited to see how I follow this, and really not looking forward to it at the same time. I’m wanting to quickly finish this so I can go to sleep and put off eating for the night ’cause I’m still hungry.

My Dad has been a huge encouragement with me wanting to be healthy. He is able to limit himself and have amazing self control. Right now, I am really struggling with that. Tim can tell you, I was so whiny about being hungry!

This website also sets up a workout schedule for you of what different activities and days you choose. That looks like it should work really well. I’m mainly just nervous about the food part because I really like to eat!