Who gets gifts?

My friend Heidi and I were talking this morning, and she asked me about two things I'd never heard of regarding gift-giving when babies are born. I've heard of the "push present" and have some pretty fun ideas, which I will share with Mike soon:) However, does Daddy get a present when the baby is born too? Heidi said some of her friends have bought their husbands gifts as well. I understand that our husbands have been great to put up with support us during pregnancy, but I've never thought about buying Mike a gift. I'm not opposed to it; I've just never heard of it. I don't want Mike to miss out in any of the new daddy fun. Did any of you moms buy your husbands gifts when you had babies?

On to the next gift question... what about hospital nurses? Heidi said a girl in her birthing class asked the nurse what gifts they prefer, and the nurse recommended bringing food. I never really thought about buying anything for the nurses; but again, I'm not opposed to sending Mike or my mom out for snacks to show a great nurse how much I appreciate her help. Has anyone heard of nurse gifts?

Trent is due in 36 days!! I will be 35 weeks pregnant tomorrow. I only have 5 more days of work before I will be off for Christmas vacation then maternity leave. Here is a picture of my large belly taken this week...

Am I really going to keep getting bigger for 5 more weeks?

Coming along

Here are the nursery pictures I promised. The window treatments are not up yet, and I'm going to frame the pretty name print you see in one of the pictures; but, we've come a long way. Special thanks to my mom and sister, who came over and helped me organize everything. I thought it was cute to have everything sitting out, but Tracy informed me that we have drawers and cabinets in furniture for a reason:)

About half of these clothes came from a friend of mine that has great taste and two boys:)

The worst thing about his room is getting to it... up these stairs...

And our room is downstairs. Maybe the stairs will help me lose the pregnancy weight {trying to stay positive here.}

Since we obviously can't put him up there as soon as he comes home, he will be here for a while...

I really need to move the ironing board; I can't don't iron. The dryer gets out most wrinkles:)

This is a sitting area off of our bedroom. Bailey's pillow is on the other side of this room. She said she'd share; we'll see what happens when Trent starts crying in the middle of the night. B has been sleeping through the night for 4 years, so she probably won't like the noise her little brother makes.

My 34-week appt. went well yesterday. Trent is already head-down {he'd actually already turned at my 32-week appt; does this mean he's more likely to have a cone head?} He still gets the hiccups 2-3 times a day, and they are now strong enough to wake me up {I realized this at 4:30 this morning when the little man started hiccuping.}


This post is getting crazy long, but I have one more story. I went to Starbucks today and ordered a grande caramel frappuccino light {my all-time favorite, and since I sweat all of the time now, I can drink cold drinks in cold weather.} I pull up to the window, and the sweet employee asks, "Oh, did you say decaf too?" I politely respond, "No ma'am." I wanted to tell her that I've checked the website and know that my drink contains 90 mg of caffeine, and that they say not to have more than 250-300 mg/day when you're pregnant. I also wanted to tell her that it was my one caffeinated drink of the day. But the hormones weren't raging today, so I didn't get defensive. The drink was fabulous, and I don't think Trent even noticed the caffeine:)

Catching Up

First, thank you all so much for your prayers while Mike was in the hospital! We had a crazy week, but we're thankful he is home and recovering well.

I have several things to blog about, and I should probably write multiple posts. However, none of these topics are really worthy of their own post, so I'm combining them:)

In case you haven't been to Piccadilly recently, it's now "all you can eat" instead of "pay per item." I've never really liked Piccadilly, but my parents love it! They convinced me to go with them by telling me I could try as many items as I liked without feeling guilty if I didn't eat everything. I definitely tried a lot of things {so many that my whole head couldn't fit in the picture with all of the food.} I also got a free "belly rub" from one of the employees, but we didn't capture it on film.

The big piece of meat is fried chicken, and it was great! The pumpkin pie, however, was not a winner.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we didn't put our Christmas tree up this year. However, we did pull out a few decorations {thanks to my mom and sister} and even found a place for the presents.

We recently purchased gas logs, {for three years we had an empty fireplace} so we've been enjoying lots of fires. Thank goodness the gas bill wasn't high, or my sweet husband would have started limiting the fires. This is what I saw when I walked into the den after putting up laundry last night...

Her daddy moved her pillow in front of the fire so she could stay warm. She was sleeping within minutes after this picture.

Now that I'm finished writing thank-you notes, I've given myself permission to read books again. I'm waiting on the 3rd Karen Kingsbury series to arrive, {I won it on Ebay last night} but I bought this book today at Target. I wonder if it will live up to all of the hype. Has anyone read it?
And last but not least, I am 34 weeks pregnant today! I am going to the doctor tomorrow, so my next post will be a "Trent update," complete with nursery pictures.

Much Better Thanksgiving

In case you don't remember or haven't been reading our blog for very long, last Thanksgiving was not one of our best. Thankfully, this year was great. We spent time with people that I thank God for every day- my family!

Last night we started out at the same place- the land. At 8+ months pregnant, I didn't ride 4-wheelers this year. I did, however, eat a lot of this...

After these sweet people {and fabulous dog} prepared it so well...
We woke up this morning to some yummy blueberry muffins and bacon, and a few hours later we ate an incredible Thanksgiving lunch. My mom even made a strawberry cake for dessert!

This afternoon, we went back to the land, where Mike had fun doing this...

We tried to take pictures for a Christmas card, but it didn't work out very well. I'm liking the idea of a birth announcement/belated holiday card better every day. We eventually turned to humor...

I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!

How cute are these?

Are these not the cutest letters you've ever seen? They will probably go above Trent's crib. The glider came in last week, and it looks great. {Thanks Mimi and Papa!} I will post some pictures of the nursery soon!

Today is 32 weeks! And I think Trent likes music. He moved around the whole time we were singing at church this morning. Mike says he was trying to hold his hands up, which is funny because I've never been a hand-raiser {though I don't see anything wrong with it.} He also gets the hiccups daily. It's normally at night around 8 or 9:00; maybe it has something to do with my nightly snack, which is usually ice cream:)

Shower, Christmas prep. and sweet Bailey

My friend Candy made this wreath- isn't it beautiful?! I can't wait to hang it on our door when Trent arrives!

Trent isn't due for almost 9 weeks, but he is already so loved! His second shower was yesterday in Auburn, and he got so many cute, fun gifts. It was great seeing family and friends, and the food and punch were wonderful {food is always on my mind these days.} The hostesses opened the presents and displayed them {this was a great idea} so I didn't look at everything until we got home last night. It felt like an early Christmas! Special thanks to the fabulous hostesses- Sarah, Scarlotte, Maggie, Candy, Mindy and Tracy.

The great hostesses

Mama D and Mimi
Aunt Debbie and Grandmama (Gigi)
Christy and Aunt Connie
Trent's gifts... doesn't it remind you of Christmas?

Speaking of Christmas, I am almost finished Christmas shopping! I'll be 37 weeks pregnant for Christmas, and I knew I wouldn't feel like shopping in December this year. I wrapped presents this weekend. They probably won't go under a tree this year, as we have decided not to put up our tree. {PLEASE don't make me feel guilty!} We are putting up all of the other decorations:)

Wrapped presents {color-coded by family; I'm almost finished with the Reeds}

Bailey was great while I was wrapping, so I decided to give her an early Christmas present. We call this toy "Tree," and she can already "Go get Tree." What a smart girl:)
This is Bailey's FAVORITE toy- "Hissy" the cat. She sleeps with her most nights! Unfortunately, I can't find this toy at Wal Mart anymore, and Hissy has seen her better days!

Water

This is a 32 oz. bottle. I drank TWO of these filled with water today. I don't like water. I drank 64 oz. of it today. And I probably went to the bathroom 64 times. I heard the two things that help braxton hicks (BH) contractions are drinking water and putting your feet up. I can't sit around with my feet up all day, but I can drink water all day. I think the offices I visited today thought that I had a problem because I used their restrooms on the way in and again on the way out. Hopefully my body will get used to this excessive water-drinking. I'm giving it at least three days. {Yes, I'm impatient, but shouldn't that be long enough?} I also bought two cool new water bottles at Kinnucan's today that are BPA-free. I guess the whole BPA issue isn't just for baby bottles:)

This is random, but I've been craving sausage balls for a while now. I think I'm going to buy the ingredients and make some. I think I can use my cool mixer to make sausage balls.