Good morning, world.  

   We are quickly approaching the home stretch here at 38 weeks (minus two days).  Which is exactly the kind of pregnancy talk I would have completely ridiculed before I had any kids.  "Why don't they just say 8 months pregnant?  They're getting so close why does it even matter how many days/weeks it is?  After being pregnant that long, do a few more weeks even make a difference??" 

All I can say to that theory is......YOU HAVE NO IDEA.

   First of all, I don't mean to be insensitive if you are struggling with infertility or longing to be pregnant.  That is not, and would never be, my intent at all.  I only wish to shed a little light on these last days/weeks of pregnancy, which some blissfully tend to sugar-coat in their intent to "count it all joy".  And hopefully, you realize that it is all very tongue-in-cheek.

   In reference to the previous statements, we count the days because yes, EVERY DAY MATTERS.  Just like you count the days when you're battling a migraine or the flu.  3 days feels like absolute eternity, and you wouldn't just say, "Oh, I've felt sick for a while".  And so yes, we count and it matters.

   Being pregnant in the home stretch wouldn't be so bad if you could just sit around all day every day and do nothing.  And after the fact, I always wonder why I didn't just do that very thing more often, because after all, when in life do you have more of an excuse/reason to sit around and do nothing than when you literally almost can't even reach your toes and you involuntarily waddle when you walk?  

But that's not the way it works.

   The last 5+ weeks of pregnancy are also the time that everything in your brain screams "THE BABY IS COMING SOON.  DO ALL OF THE PROJECTS.  DO ALL OF THE CLEANING.  DO ALL OF THE THINGS, ALL DAY, EVERYDAY."  You know that feeling in the evening when you just can't quite fully relax until the dishes are clean and the kids are in bed?  O.k., now take that feeling and multiply it by 100x, and imagine feeling that feeling all of the time.  

I can't relax until the baby's room is painted.
The girls' room organized.
The furniture rearranged.
The walls decorated.
The spring cleaning done.
The laundry caught up.
The car clean, inside and out.
The freezer meals cooked.
The strawberries preserved.
The baby clothes washed.
The library books returned and exorbitant fees paid.
The hospital bag packed.

   And the list goes on and on.  As soon as I cross a few things off, 5 more crop up to replace it.  The to-do list never really shrinks with all my efforts, it just sort of maintains.   And since, of course as far as cleaning and laundry go, things never really STAY that way, it results in an endless whirlwind of activity during the last few weeks when you feel the biggest, sorest, and worst you can possibly feel.  Sounds like a dream, huh?

   And so over the past weeks I have been painting and cleaning and organizing and laundry and scrubbing our bathroom within an inch of its life, all the while reaching the end of the day feeling like a sore, beached whale whose most valiant efforts still would not be able to achieve painting one's toenails.  

    And the guilt?  Oh the guilt trips!  You sincerely just want to crawl in bed and hibernate until the baby comes but the internet is telling you to drink more green smoothies and red raspberry tea and do squats and kegels and exercise and prepare for labor a do approximately 1,000 other things that make you feel at any given moment like you're just being a failure of a pregnant woman.

   And all this of course, goes without even mentioning the basic care and maintenance of a home, husband and two toddlers.  And while this baby is certainly growing on calcium and folic acid I feel certain he must also be feasting on all my creative juices.  I haven't felt one SPECK of energy left over for this blog, or for writing.  This space has suffered, and I have felt powerless to do anything about that.  So I'm afraid that is just the way it is going to be for a while.

   But lest you feel like all I'm doing is complaining, let me just pause and GIVE A HUGE THANKS to some dear people who have made these last weeks more endurable.  Thanks to my dear sis-in-law Jessi, who shocked me by throwing a darling baby shower, thanks to so many friends have given such darling little gifts for our son and some freezer meals too, and thanks to everyone near or far who has encouraged me with comments or messages or texts that helps me feel not so very, utterly alone in it all.   I am SO GRATEFUL for you, and you truly cannot even know how much it has meant to me to have your support during this time. 


YOU are what make up community.
YOU are what make up "my village".
YOU are what help me remember that I can do this, it won't kill me, I can make it.

Blessings to you.  

   

    It is another summer of babies, with a few I know expecting their little bundles any day now, a few of us (including myself) due in a couple of months and a few more due later in August.  I feel like each of my children so far has been born in a wave of little ones among my peers, and it is so sweet and special to share this sacred time of growing new life with others.

   I cherish pregnancy a little more each time.  That is NOT to say it is "better" each time, because rather I have found the opposite to be true.  My first was my "easiest" (as easy as pregnancy can be), the second a little bit harder, and this third one, a little harder yet.  But I say that I cherish it more each time because, truly, I do.

   With Jocelyn everything was so new and foreign and I sort of floated along in a magical fairy land and didn't really take the time to appreciate it.  I was just getting started and with your first it feels like you will be pregnant for 1,000 more times and you just don't really take time to savor it.

   Jocelyn was only 9 months old when I discovered I was pregnant with Charlotte, and so "taking time to savor pregnancy" was the last thing on my mind, needless to say.  I was a little bit whirling from surprise and "what have we dones" and slight embarrassment at having two so close together.  I didn't tell tell people for a really long time for some reason, and so that helped the pregnancy fly by and before I knew it?  She was here.

   But this time, it's different.  With a long break in between this pregnancy and my last, and the realization that I will be turning 30 this summer and will not be young forever, and also with the realization that no, I actually won't be pregnant a thousand times like it seems at first and my days of carrying life in a womb are numbered......I find myself cherishing it.

  That doesn't mean that the nausea was any less awful in the first trimester or that sleeping in the 3rd trimester is any more comfortable or that I want to be done and meet my baby any less.  I still feel like I'm waddling through Costco and I carefully estimate the value of any item I happen to drop to see if it is even remotely worth picking back up.  And so it doesnt mean those things don't bother me, it simply means that I am trying to embrace the process, because I know it simply will not last forever.

   June will come, our precious son will arrive, and who knows if/when/how many times I will get to experience that magical, MAGICAL moment again in my life again.  Plus I need to write a post like this to look back on and be a gentle reminder to my June self, to not go completely bat-crazy.

   And so, without further ado, here are some of my simple survival tips for the 3rd Trimester:

• STAY BUSY.   

      I have discovered that nothing helps the time pass more quickly than a full calendar.   Some days I definitely overdo it, like the day that I decided to plant my flower beds on the same day of throwing a birthday party and hosting 12 people and cleaning my house....and I always pay for that later.  But like I said, it still makes time fly!  So say YES to things.  I have made a few simple changes to our schedule that have helped the weeks zip by.  I babysit twice a week and clean the mill where Randy works once a week. I attend a Bible study once a week and a small group of women 1-2x a month.  These things will obviously look differently for everyone, but the key is to just say YES to things.  Then of course you add in all the other activities and events a month can bring, and it fills up fast!  I am hoping I won't have to endure much time "overdue" with this baby, but if he's anything like his sisters, I can expect nothing else!  And so staying busy during that time is even more critical in preserving one's sanity.  I surprised Randy with a date to a college baseball game on Charlotte's due date and it was (and still is) such a fun, special memory.  I assure you, the worst you can do is sit around at home going crazy!

• BUILD COMMUNITY.

  I found this green skirt at a thrift store and while I normally love wearing it, I haven't been brave enough to style it yet this pregnancy.  However, I threw it on for this post because of the rich color, and maybe I will pull it out of the closet more often when the weather gets a little warmer.  Anything with a stretchy waistband and enough length can be pulled up over your bump to appear maternity. And hats are ALWAYS a good thing, as the last thing a pregnant woman feels like spending a lot of time on is her hair.

   This past weekend we decided to forgo tracking down babysitting and went out on a family date.  I always end up wondering why we don't do that more often!  Randy got a few groceries at Costco while all 3 ladies napped in the car (ha) and then we treated ourselves to burgers and fries and a little mall shopping.  Thanks to the man in my life, I even got to browse a little sans children.  Hence this selfie, because every child-free dressing room moment no matter how brief or fleeting,  is worthy of commemoration.
 
   We're just rollin' along here at 25 weeks, and trying to take it one day at a time.  Actually, I'm feeling pretty great, all things considered, but the anticipation with this pregnancy this third time around is KILLING ME.  June. Feels So. Far. Away!  But...we're only 3 weeks away from the third trimester so, hope remains.

   The littlest Smucker is getting seriously active at this point. Rolling and turning and round-house kicking and perfecting his/her Olympic gymnast tryout routine in there.  I have to admit it's definitely one of my favorite stages.  Towards the end they move less and less and you feel more and more like a beached whale, so it's just pretty great right now.  My lungs still have room to breathe, I'm still sleeping pretty soundly, and as long as the calendar months keep flipping by, we will all be just fine.

(Just don't ask my husband that if we happen to go overdue.)

Five things I'm looking forward to with Smucker baby #3: (other than the obvious snuggling, smelling their sweet little head, and covering them with kisses)

1. Reading books.  With Jocelyn I POURED through books because she was a super-slow nurser, and I didn't have an iPhone.  With Charlotte....I don't think I finished a single book because of aforementioned phone.  How sad is that?  I am really hoping to get back to reading with this little one.
2. Not sweating the small stuff.  I know that is probably what every pregnant woman says/thinks and then every postpartum woman forgets.  Because, let's be honest, it's super hard not to do.  You feel like your house is in the toilet, the laundry is a laughable notion, and supper just isn't even happening.  You feel like a failure in pretty much everything except for keeping babies alive.  And I know I did a lot of that with my first two.  But THIS time, I am determined to do some preparations before hand like frozen meals, and get myself into some sort of routine, and NOT freak out about how little it seems I am getting done.   Hold me to it.

3. Taking more pictures.  This one is kind of a no-brainer but for as many pictures as I think I take, I always look back later and feel like there is never enough of that itsy-bitsy teeny-tiny age.  So sad.

4. Getting lots of fresh air.  Still not sure how this is going to look.  Baby-wearing while pushing the double stroller?  Or maybe just getting Jocelyn a bike with training wheels so she could pedal along? However it happens, Oregon summers are wayyyyy too short to spend the days inside.

5. Watching my girls as big sisters.  I seriously CANNOT WAIT to witness them welcoming this little one into their lives.  I'm pretty sure they're planning on it being another girl, but I'm sure they will come to love a little brother just as much. ;) They ask me about the baby more often than anyone else, they plant kisses on my growing belly and they profess their love for this new sibling with reckless abandon.  I seriously get a little giddy thinking about sharing that milestone with them.....a new baby, a new name, a new family member, a new friend.

I truly, honestly wish the 20-week ultrasound wasn't mandatory.

   Because then I would just simply choose to not have an ultrasound, and consequently, not have to be in laborious dilemma over whether or not to find out what we are having!

   It seemed so simple with our first.  Neither of us wanted to know, and so we didn't find out.  I had a gender-neutral shower, we prepared a gender-neutral nursery room, we picked two names and we were set.  No big deal.  During labor it definitely felt like motivation to FINALLY find out who this little person was, but I have to admit, I thought the moment she was born would be a little more monumental.  I expected it to be all like "What is it??! What did we have??!" but in reality I lifted her up onto my chest and before I even "looked" I knew she was my girl.  Literally, right away. When they announced, "It's a girl!" It just kinda felt like, "Yeah, I know."  I still don't know why/how I knew, but it's kind of a sweet memory.

   The second one came along and Randy really wanted to know, so I caved and we found out.  I was surprised at how much fun it was to know!  I began dreaming of sisters and the bond they would share, I set to organizing all of my girl things for girl #2, and we only had to pick one name.  And if you over-obsess with names like me, that little bonus right there makes it ALL worth it.

   But then the third pregnancy came along, and suddenly I felt a sort of unexplained, primal, desperate urgency to NOT FIND OUT.  I can't even really explain it...when I try to break it down into rational reasons, those reasons fall apart one by one.  The practicality of knowing the gender wins out every time.

  Knowing decreases our name-choosing burdens by 50%, eases in the nesting phase of readying the little outfits and nursery decor, it gives an enhanced sense of bonding to the un-born baby because it now has a gender and a name, and aids in any gift-giving that people may feel so led to do.  Especially if it's a boy, as we have maybe like, 2 boy things in this entire house.  (Case in point, the above pic! I have zero boy's pants.) Over-all, it makes 100% logical sense to find out.

  But like I said, strange, unexplained urge to not know.  I was even at the ultrasound and had the self-discipline to LOOK AWAY from the monitor when they got into the little "gender region" which I then had them write on a little card, (for the sake of my dear husband) which I carried all the way home, and still haven't looked at yet.

   Some would equate the desire with not wanting to know with a desire to do things "all naturally" and "as they once were".  Well, that's not necessarily true, because men weren't even allowed in the delivery room at one point, and obviously, we want no part of that.  Modern medicine back in that time fell just short of American Horror Story, and so I don't think any of us are anxious to actually go running back there.  However.....

The gender dispute remains.

  Personally, I think it was so much easier when we didn't have a choice.  You just sat in your rocker and knitted little, white caps and booties, and no one even dreamt of anything different.  But today, since you do have a choice, people view it as almost a personal offense if you choose not to find out.  You appear stubborn, irrational, and just a little bit crazy that you would willingly choose to not know what you're having until you actually have it.

   But before you think I'm all on-board the mystery train, I have to say something for the other side.  FINDING OUT IS OK.  It's not wrong.  And it's actually pretty fun too!  The encampment over on the "not-finding-out" shores can make almost a semi-religion out of their decision to wait, thus ostracizing anyone who would lack the self-discipline to just WAIT AND SEE.   And it all gets a little bit silly after a while.

   But since I've done both, I feel I have a truly diplomatic, non-biased, scientific opinion.  (ha) And that is...........

   It doesn't really matter.  There are pros/cons either way, either way is a really cool surprise, and either way doesn't affect the gender that your baby already is.  It won't change anything.

But it is STILL hard to decide.;)

So just for fun, enter your guesses below!  Which do you think Smucker baby #3 will be???

  I took these two little munchkins along to my last appointment, and I was a little apprehensive about how things would go, but they did GREAT.  Despite having to park like, 5 miles away (it felt like it) and being a few (more like 10) minutes late, everything went quite smoothly.  Jocelyn was all goofy and giddy until they listened to the heartbeat, and then she got really anxious and covered her face with her hands.  But she secretly loved being able to go with me to see the midwife and talked about it for a long time.

   Charlotte of course doesn't seem to comprehend very much of any of it, but just loves being along for the ride, of course.  And MAN those two are growing up fast.  I remember when I had two (almost) non-walkers and would carry Jocelyn on my hip and a car seat in the crook of my other arm, and entering and exiting buildings felt like powerlifting and cardio rolled into one.  Now they are following me along, even helping carry a bag or backpack now and then.  What a difference a year or two can make!!

   And lastly, just for fun, let's have some discussion on finding out the gender.  In a few weeks I will have my ultrasound and we could find out what we're having if we choose to do so.  So far we have experienced both ways....we didn't know with Jocelyn and we did with Charlotte.  You would think trying both ways would make it easy to decide but my husband likes knowing and I like NOT knowing! So we are still undecided about which we will do.:)

How about you?? Which do you choose, and why?  I would love to hear.:)

   I've been missing seeing these little faces on this blog lately...but the snotty noses and piles of tissues and house of horrors that is our life today isn't exactly a pretty picture, so we'll throw back to these pictures I caught a while back that I couldn't share until now.


I'd never been able to tell Randy in a fun way that I was pregnant.
 
   When I found out with Jocelyn he was just in the other room and I just burst through the door and blurted it out in shock and excitement.  Then with Charlotte I made up a note that said, "Shhh, Big Sister sleeping" and taped it to Jocelyn's bedroom door, but the moment he came home from work he knew I was hiding something, so I just ended up telling him then.

So THIS time, I was determined we would at least have a little fun with it.


   
   The girls helped me make cupcakes and we decorated in pink and blue and I made a little card for him and then....we waited.

   Of course, they didn't actually know the reason behind it all.  I hadn't told them and wasn't planning to until it was safe to say, but we all know how that story turns out.




We can hardly wait.

   It's always hard to know how to start up again after a long absence from the keys....lately I have felt so distant, so distracted, and so disconnected from my writing, blog, or even my own thoughts for that matter it has been nearly impossible to think about catching up in this little space. 

But now I feel it is time. 

   Because I have something I really, really, want to share, and it is breaking past all of the writer's blockage erected mainly by my own piles of insecurity, and I'm tired of not writing because of me, because I really, truly, have something worth saying.

   June 2015 is quickly shaping up to be one of the best months of my life................






 
   Indeed, my friend, you counted THREE balloons in those pictures.  Three!  Soon I will be a mama (well I guess I sort of already am) to three precious little souls!  What a privilege!  What a gift! What a treasure.

    If I was surprised by the quickness of the first two, I was surprised by my intense desire to see that positive test with this one.  It didn't happen right away like the others, and I found myself thinking, dreaming, seeing, hearing and feeling BABIES everywhere.  I just so badly wanted another.

   I'll be honest, I have been sort of sicker than normal with this one, which of course is sending all sorts of images of a little boy dancing through my head, when really it could just be that I'm getting...well...older. 

   The yuckiness and fatigue and food aversion, and general crappy-state-of-being has done it's best to diminish my excitement, but let me tell you....I. Can. Not. WAIT.  We are so thrilled to be adding to our family, and we are so grateful to God for blessing us yet another time with this precious, precious gift of life!  Who are we that we should be entrusted to raise yet another soul?  I feel so grateful, so thankful, and so humbled. 

   So.  That explains some of the break.  I have felt the "pregnancy brain" fog roll in like usual and completely crowd my brain until the simplest of decisions loom up tall and impossible and everything in my life seems bigger and harder and crazier and just.....MORE.  The hormones, the estrogen, the emotions, the sickness, all smushing in there alongside the waves of joy, the tears of expectation, and the DESPERATE gratitude.....it all just took me like a tidal wave this time. 



   And those moccasins?  I was shopping with my sis-in-law who spotted them and they were one of those "I'm not even pregnant but they are $8.95 and so I cannot pass these up and I'll just really hope I have a reason to use them someday!" buys, and now my heart does little flips whenever I see them.    
   Oh and then there was the secret-keeping.....quite possibly my LEAST favorite phase of the entire pregnancy.  I mean, first of all, it's just hard, am I right??!  You're bursting at the seams to tell everyone and anyone and you can tell NO one, at first.   And then you have to tell everyone in some kind of certain order, but your family and friends are far away, and you feel like sleeping 15 hours a day, and not making 1,500 phone calls.

   So then you hatch a plan to tell everyone in a special way, because somehow sidling up to them at the next family reunion and saying, "Hey, I'm preggers" just doesn't have a ring to it.

  So you plan outfits, and pray for nice weather, and plan a photo shoot, and decide to hand out pictures (that double as Thanksgiving/Christmas cards of course, we're not superhuman here) but then obviously, you have to tell your photographers.  So you do, which is no problem at all except that then your husband really wants to tell your 3 year-old daughter. 

So you give in.

   And you tell a toddler, who then proceeds to tell her Sunday school teacher, and cousins, and friends, and anyone she can really, before you've had a chance to tell ANYONE YET.  

   So all our well-laid plans worked about.....40% of the time, and I felt like I was just making everyone mad at me some way or another and it was so frustrating because I really was just trying my best to tell in a special way and I just felt like laying in bed ALL DAY EVERY DAY and figured my feeble efforts had to count for something, ya know? 

   ANYWAY.  I am thrilled and tickled and super, super jazzed that it is officially out of the bag, and the secrecy is over.  We are really, really excited about this little one, and I am so glad I can stop secret-guarding and just be happy again.  Just be excited, and thrilled, and giddy while dreaming of June, and holding a brand new little Smucker babe in my arms. 

   And now I have 1,735,462 more reasons to wish summer would hurry up and get here.