36 weeks!

Mardi Gras belly

As I heard several times at church today, I'm now in the "home stretch." I completely agree and feel intensely sorry for any woman whose body chooses a 41-42 week pregnancy. Yikes. Ow. Ouch

Or at least that's how I feel, since I'm feeling intensely pregnant now and doubtful I can possibly stay pregnant much longer. It's always dangerous to say/write something like that, but it's very much how I'm feeling.

I've actually never seen 39 weeks pregnant as Jack came one day before that mark and Cora came at 38 weeks even. When will baby Luke come? Only the next few weeks will tell!

I do have moments of feeling pretty good, but the hard parts of pregnancy are taking over and include:

• Standing - aiiee!! my back!
• Sleeping - it's so hard to get comfortable (I use 5-6 pillows depending on whether Jacob will share that final one or not) and it's painful to roll from side to side.  I have to pee at least twice a night and it HURTS to haul my bulky self out of my little cocoon.  I feel like my abdominal muscles are broken.
• Contractions - when my baby pops out in 30 minutes, it will be because I've put in the time with early labor contractions these last few weeks/months. I've been to the hospital twice with contractions coming every 3 minutes for multiple hours (having contractions has been such a consistent part of this pregnancy that it took that threshold to get me worried enough to actually go in to the hospital).  They are low down and painful and I really feel like they aren't going to leave much work left for actual labor.  Again, we shall see.

It is surreal to be so close to meeting our baby!  We are all four eager to meet this little guy. I feel like we've been preparing to meet him for so long, and I hope all of us, especially Jack and Cora, will be ready! I still am ticking off items on my pre-baby list (i.e. why there are no nursery pictures to share yet) but our hearts are definitely ready and that's what matters most.

A Big Girl Room!

I'd love to say that moving Cora into a big girl room has been all positive, but life with Cora right now is decidedly challenging.  It's possible the big girl room/bed has played a role or it's possible it's just a difficult month for her.  But we can safely she loves her big girl room and so do I!

Santa moved Cora's belongings + set up new bedding for a fun surprise in the morning.

We've since moved some pictures around, purchased what I anticipate will be a well-utilized bookshelf (if she's anything like her brother) and settled in.  The result is lots of flowers and lots of color.

I had worried that it would be naps that would be the roughest part of transitioning from a crib to a big girl bed.  I would have been wrong.  She does pretty well staying in her bed and napping, or at least playing quietly in her room for a solid chunk of time.

Nights have been absolutely horrible around here. It's hazy, but I feel like there were a few good weeks where nights in the big girl bed were going well.  Then we started noticing a nightly pattern of little feet padding into our room and a bed upgrade around 5am.  We said, "okay," we need to nip this new trend before it becomes a habit. So we started walking her back to her bed. But at the same time, she started waking more, coming into our room more, not wanting to actually go to bed, and having wild night terrors to top it off.  There have been a few nights where she had one of us up more than 10 times.

This little girl continues to charm us and delight us with her wit and smiles, but when she's rotten, she's really rotten.  She doesn't back down and will keep crying, keep getting up, keep pushing back, etc.  We've threatened a return to the crib and done this several times.  The first night she worked herself up so much that she threw up everywhere.  (And thus was moved back to the big girl bed.  Cora: 1, Mom and Dad: 0)

We hope to sort out her sleep in the next month before baby Luke arrives.  Otherwise, I think it could be a rough spring!

*Jack, to his credit, goes to sleep by 8pm and usually has to be woken up around 7:15. He sleeps like a log and doesn't seem to notice the screaming toddler in the next room.