Ford F-150 vs Honda Civic . . . and the point goes to the F-150

Short version: 

What began as a quick trip at 4:30 pm to Walmart for some last minute Cub Scout craft supplies ended with a long wait in a gas station parking lot and not leaving the hospital until 10:30 pm.

Complete, unedited and extended version:

(This is for me to just type it out and stop thinking about it so it is probably boring for anyone else to read)

Turning right at a four-way intersection, I had a yield sign so I stopped due to an oncoming SUV in my lane. Somehow the truck behind me did not see me stopped and must have thought he could have gun it to in front of the SUV . . . not sure. One second I was waiting for the SUV to pass and the next my head was hurting and I thought, "Did I get hit by the oncoming SUV?" Luckily for me, the SUV had quick enough reaction time to swerve out of the lane my car got pushed into otherwise I would have been T-boned by him at 55 mph.

As I sat there stunned for a few seconds while pulling off of the road with my hazard lights on, I looked around the car. Somehow the flip flop that was on my right foot was no longer there and my hair tie was mysteriously knocked out of my hair. My open water bottle had been in my right hand so there was water all over the inside of my car, as were all of the contents in the console (and I decided I will no longer keep scissors in there).

Not knowing what else to do, I found my flip flop and exited the car to survey the damage and talk to the other driver. We decided to pull into the gas station to get off the shoulder of the road. As this is my first accident (and I'll attribute my being emotional to my pregnancy), I began shaking and crying. I texted Allen because I didn't want to disturb him during his class. He called back immediately, which made me cry harder to talk to him. :)

I felt dumb for crying because other than a head ache and sore neck/back, I knew I was okay. Caleb (Announcement: that's what Junior's name will be!) was kicking a lot so I knew he was okay for the time-being. The man who hit me was very kind and apologetic, especially when he saw I was pregnant. He even bought me a water while we waited for the police to arrive.

The accident happened at 4:45 pm and by 5:30 the policeman hadn't shown yet and I was anxious to get to the hospital because I felt a lot of pressure where the seat belt had been buckled, felt like I was having an almost constant contraction and my doctor told me to go get the baby monitored. So I called 911 to ask where the officer was and explained my situation. When I was told that the officer was still half an hour away due to traffic (? I thought that was why they had lights and sirens!?), I got permission to leave all of my information with the other driver and go to the hospital.

At 5:45 (not more than 5 minutes after I left) the other driver called and said the officer had gotten there so I turned around and went back. In the meantime Allen had called our bishop so when I got back to the gas station, he was there waiting to give me a hug and moral support. (He also let the cub scouts that I wasn't going to make it that night to our activity!) By 6:25 I was on my to the hospital. I was in a maternity triage room by about 6:45 and our bishop's wife was there a few minutes later, brought me food and stayed for about an hour. I don't know what I would do without the church and such loving members!

I was told they were going to monitor the baby's heart rate and my contractions for two hours and as long as everything was good, I could go home. Caleb's heart rate was great the whole time but the nurse came in after about half an hour, concerned, because I was having contractions every 2 minutes. At 8 pm they gave me an IV to see if giving me fluids would stem the contractions . . . nope.

At 9:30 they gave me a shot of a smooth muscle relaxant that they said would stop them and were going to give me another dose 15 minutes later if it hadn't stopped the contractions. Ten minutes after the first shot the nurse came in to check on me and make me lay on my side to slow my pulse as it had shot up to over 125 bpm. They decided not to give me the second dose . . . but by 10:30 they decided that with my contractions now being 5 minutes apart, Caleb having a healthy heart rate and me being 35 1/2 weeks along that I could just go home. I was really glad about that because my phone battery was almost dead so I couldn't even talk to Allen or my mom for more than 5 minutes a piece while I was in the hospital for almost four hours!

At 10:55 pm I drove my poor, beat up car into my apartment parking lot, and feeling pretty beat up myself, went inside to charge my phone so I could call Allen.

Congratulations if you stuck it out through that whole story! Sorry for the lack of pictures to accompany it and make it more interesting.

We enjoyed our "geeft card"!

Last Saturday Allen and I went to our apartment's end-of-summer pool party and won a prize in the raffle! Winning, in and of itself, was pretty exciting because I don't know if I've ever won a raffle that more than 10 people entered. We won a $25 gift card to a local Mexican restaurant called Lupe Tortilla. I took a picture of the gift card because it was so funny. Unfortunately, that picture is with Allen on its way to Chicago for the week. : ( I got a not-so-clear photo of their gift card from their website:

In case you can't read it, it says "Geeft Card" and below that it says "Es Preeety Goood". Racist, maybe. Funny, yes.

On Friday night we went to Lupe Tortilla and highly recommend it! (Of course you probably need to come visit us to try it because it's only in Houston, I think.) The food was delicious and we will have to go back sometime. While there, I drank at least 5 glasses of water because they kept refilling it. I made some offhand comment about how I would drink more at home if someone always refilled my water glass. 

For some reason Allen remembered that comment and all day Saturday, as soon as I would take a drink of water and set my glass down, he would go top off my water glass for me even if it was almost all of the way full still! Haha! It was so cute and so funny! It made my day! I have a great husband.

Writing a blog makes me realize I need to document things better because blog posts are always more fun when there's an associated picture. If I uploaded pictures from my camera more frequently, then I might blog more frequently instead of making a long super-post . . . until then . . .

DATE NIGHT

Friday we went on a date (not just to Arby's and Walmart)! We were in the mood for some meat and almost missed out due to TomTom (our GPS) thinking that Texas Roadhouse was in the middle of a parking lot about 2 miles away from where it actually is. Luckily "eagle eyes" Allen got lasik in April and spotted the sign as we were about to give up and eat elsewhere. 

Texas Roadhouse! I should have asked the waiter to take the picture for us.
Can you tell who has to go to work inside all day and who goes to the pool a couple of times a week?

I was not disappointed with my first ever Texas Roadhouse steak and I love that they keep bringing more of those delicious rolls! After dinner we decided to make it a real date by going miniature golfing. :) It was a pretty cool blacklight mini golf place but I don't think we'll be going back anytime soon since it was a little pricey for miniature golf and because I won! Apparently my big belly helps to stabilize my arms and I am able to putt much better . . . it's all in the hips since the arms can't swing through. And just in case Allen actually reads this: we stopped keeping score because it was more fun so I don't actually know if I won in the end.

My belly during week 34 - can you see Allen in the mirror in the back?

CRAFTINESS

I guess the boredom of no job plus the "nesting instinct" (or whatever they call it in the pregnancy books) have helped me come up with some creative (and some useless) things to do.

Preface to the crafts: My mom and I chose fabric for Junior's baby quilt in April and loved all of the Dr. Seuss  fabric we found so it was decided that Junior's room motif would be Dr. Seuss. As I continued looking online for more Seussy things to decorate his room with, I discovered that everything is overpriced. 

Exhibit A: They charge $45 for a mobile that is cute, but not that cute. 

 

And so began the quest to make cheap, cute things for Junior's room. Although, if you include the price of the sewing machine into the cost of the crafts, I don't know how much we actually saved! ...other than my sanity. 

Craft #1: Dr. Seuss Mobile - not yet finished

Prior to the sewing machine purchase, I made these letters out of old T-shirts, an old decorative pillow and good ole needle and thread. That was so fun that I decided to make a Cat in the Hat hat. Here is what I have so far, plus some Dr. Seuss fabric, wooden dowels and fishing line to figure out how I'm hanging it. 

Don't worry - the flip flop will not be in the mobile, it's just to give you perspective to see how big the objects are.

Craft #2: Dr. Seuss fitted baby sheets - done

Sewing elastic onto fabric is much harder than it looks or should be! I got better by the end but refuse to take close up pictures of the terrible sew-manship. They look great from a distance though! 

That's the quilt my mom made hanging over the back of the crib 

Sheet number 2

Craft #3: Seuss-ified canvas storage bins - one down, one or two more to go

$10- $24 per storage bin (depending on which size you got) was pricey for the bin below.  

I bought a plain colored one at Walmart for $6.Then to Seussify, I simply had to sew more strips of Allen's old T-shirt onto the Seussy fabric and iron onto the canvas bin. Unfortunately the sew-free bonding stuff did not like the canvas or the cotton for some reason and did not bond very well. So, out came my needle and thread and I reinforced the edges. Voila! I know, have too much time on my hands.

Craft #4: Sheet savers - one down, ? to go (I'll make more if they are actually helpful)

After realizing how much fun it wasn't to make the fitted baby sheets, I did not want to make more and sheet savers seem like a great idea to not have to change sheets in the middle of the night when they're covered with spit up/blow-outs. 

But who came up with the idea to charge $10 per sheet saver, which in reality is a 1 ft by 2 ft piece of fabric with ties in each corner to attach to the crib bars! And according to most of the reviews, is not very water resistant so you end up having to change the sheets half of the time anyway.

Walmart to the rescue! I bought a cheap towel (in a much better color than these are offered in), cut it in half,  hemmed the edge and attached ties made from extra Dr. Seuss material. Mine also covers twice as much area in the crib as the true sheet savers do. They are made for one end or the other... bum or mouth, but not both at the same time. 

The towel with the ties attached

Progression of ties: fabric, sewn fabric, turned right-side out

Then to solve the non-water resistant issue... I got a cheap shower plasticky shower curtain that will be cut into the same size as my sheet saver and rather than sewn onto the towel (because I don't know how it will hold up in the washer/dryer) I will simply attach ties to each corner of it as well! In theory, it should work well, but I'll let you know in a few weeks when I've actually tried them out with Junior.

Junior

As I warned in the first blog, I may post more than once a day and today is one of those days! I just want to give some updates on Junior, as our son is being called until further notice. I am now 34 weeks along, feeling big and grateful for AC. Just 6 more weeks of slow-cooking left, although I wouldn't mind him coming a week (or two) earlier than his due date of October 3rd.

At 31 weeks, as a "welcome" to our new doctor's office, they did an ultrasound to check up on our little guy. It turns out he's not so little! In fact, the ultrasound tech couldn't stop mentioning that he has a "really good sized head". . . comforting. He is measuring big for his "age," measuring normal for a baby due Sept. 28th. Unfortunately that doesn't mean that they're pushing my due date any sooner.

Based on the ultrasound images, he weighed somewhere around 3 lbs 13 oz, had lots of hair, had the heel of his foot pushing directly on my bladder (I knew it!), looks slightly alien-esque and oh, did I mention that he had a really big head?!

This is our baby boy two and a half weeks ago; he even made a cute pouty face for one of the pictures!

I've never felt so loved!

When Allen and I decided to move to Texas for his new job we were both very excited to start a new adventure. However, in the back of my mind was the thought that no one would be around to celebrate our new baby with us... no baby showers or visitors or anyone who cared that I was having my first baby! Selfish, I know, but true!

I could not have been more wrong! This has just meant more chances to celebrate our soon-to-be-born baby. Before we left Utah I got to celebrate at a special breakfast with the young women in the ward. Then my extremely talented cousin Brynn arranged an amazing baby shower/going away party (see her blog for more pictures- July 1st entry).

Pictured here with the talent (Brynn)

Brynn's adorable daughter Taevea joined us to enhance our pictures

In true little kid fashion, Tae is trying to look under my shirt to see the baby in my belly!

Whitney and John gave us an invaluable book on Baby Handling Tips

Helping take the flags out of the tree after the party. These are going to be hung in the nursery as part of the decoration... pictures to come.

The set up

After a crazy move to Houston (with the help of Allen's parents) I left Allen here working while I went back to Utah to see my family. While in Utah I got to celebrate again with my Cottonwood 2nd Ward friends! I could not have felt more loved than to know that people care that much about me... thank you!

Sweet baby themed, with lots of sweets to eat

Thank you Michele and Maree for doing this!

Such a cute cake!

I love that my mom and Lizzi could be in Utah for this one.

This is the front of the amazing quilt my mom made for Junior (as baby is lovingly called until further notice)

And the back

 Well, I was wrong about that statement about not being able to feel more loved... because now I feel even more loved! At Allen's work they had been planning a baby shower for another co-worker and when they found out I was pregnant, I was added as a guest of honor. So on Wednesday I got to visit Allen at work, meet his friends I hear about every day he comes home from work and celebrate again. Unfortunately the other pregnant woman couldn't attend since she had her baby 6 weeks early and was still in the hospital (both mom and baby are doing well).

A sand castle cake!!!! I thought the brown sugar on the outside was such a clever idea for a "fun in the sun" theme!

Allen got to help open presents this time

And yes, I did wear the same shirt that I wore to the last baby shower... I guess I should have planned better for more variety in my pictures.

Allen's cube at Mercer

It's all new to me!

This summer marks a lot of new beginnings for me... moving to Houston, getting ready to be a mom, getting used to staying at home while my husband goes to work, attempting to be a domestic goddess (sew, cook, be crafty, clean), and so I decided to add another new thing to the list... blogging!

I like looking at other peoples' blogs but can never remember what their blog names are and don't know how to find most of my friends' blogs if they have them since they're all private! So I figured I may as well join the blogging world for several reasons: 

1. Try to actually follow friends' blogs without feeling like a stalker 
2. I enjoy writing and this will give me an outlet to share some details from my mostly mundane life with someone other than a kind husband 
3. To feel like I have a connection to the outside world (when, in all actuality, the only times I usually leave my air-conditioned apartment to enter the Texas heat are when I need to go grocery shopping or swimming) 
4. Maybe someone needs a good laugh at my mistakes... 

By way of warning, my posts on here may be sporadic, with a couple posts in one day followed by months of silence... not that anyone will be holding their breath to see what I put up next! Hello blogging world!