the countdown.

Eating: PB&J

Drinking: Watered down apple juice

Listening to: Devendra Banhart

Feeling: A little impatient.

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I'm 39 weeks now and I'm more than ready to get this show on the road.

The baby is sitting even lower and my lower back and pelvic area feel like I've been riding a very large horse for a very long time on a very bad road.

I have a bra strap showing in almost every darn photo I take!! I'm going to start wearing a freakin' shawl.
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Our bags have been packed and ready for a couple of weeks now and I made this list for my husband...

I hope I haven't left anything out.

I realized that I really needed to rewash and sort out the baby's clothes. They've just been sitting in trash bags and boxes for months. (We don't know the baby's gender so we've been accepting hand-me-downs for a boy and girl.) I washed the baby's clothes in baby mild Dr. Bronner's liquid soap and sorted them out by gender. Then I went through our bags again... and again to make sure we have everything and decided to pack the baby a different "going home" outfit.

Then I checked the bags again.

My husband has been soooooo helpful and loving this entire pregnancy. Well I mean that's just his nature (that's why I married him) but I wanted to marry him all over again when I jokingly asked him to paint my toes because I can't reach my feet and he totally said yes.

He's never painted nails before and his technique was awful but he got the job done.

To me, my toes have never been prettier.

a loverly night with loverly people

Tonight just might have been my last public appearance before I have the baby and I wouldn't have spent it any where else. The pastor of a small home church I used to go to is moving to Alabama to follow a new path God has set for him. He and his wife are some of the most honest, generous and genuine people I have ever met. 

We met up at Wing Stop this evening, stuffed our faces with delicious greasy chicken wings and laughed at great stories.

That's them pictured below. Charity's face is amazingly hilarious in this photo. I hope she doesn't mind me posting this!

 That's Josh! Everyone loves Josh!

 I devoured that entire basket of celery and carrot sticks before I even got to my wings. I'm not even a fan of raw carrots and celery... being pregnant has really changed my taste.

That's my hungry gorilla face... I think.

Munching down and being wonderfully silly. 

I love those two so much and they will be greatly missed.

Winter Maternity Fashion Inspiration #10

wild blue maternity by hollie-black-ramsey featuring sheer black stockings

Old navy maternity
$28 - oldnavy.gap.com

Topshop sheer black stocking
$16 - topshop.com

Shoulder messenger bag
$50 - udobuy.com

River Island stud earrings
$6.41 - riverisland.com

Lucky Brand floral scarve
$50 - luckybrand.com

China glaze nail polish
$4.49 - discountbeautycenter.com

the night.

Right now at 12am:
I'm listening to Michael Jackson's greatest hits.
I'm so ready to have this baby.
I'm even more ready to be over these... er... hemorrhoids.
My husband is away unclogging someone's toilet.
I just devoured two ice cream cones.
 I am very restless right now.
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Annie, are you ok?

38 weeks

At 38 weeks I'm craving soda pop and beer.
Yes, beer (doesn't mean I'm drinking it though).

My appetite has calmed down a lot but if I stay up late I turn into a PB&J munching maniac- consuming at least 2 sandwiches in the matter of minutes with room for more.

Down to the nitty gritty.

Let's face it: I'm focusing on blogging about my pregnancy right now and pregnancy ain't always pretty so here goes...

I have hemorrhoids for the first time in my life.

I keep hearing that this is a good sign because it means that labor is close but I can't bear the thought of trying to push a baby out myself while my bum is in such a terrible state.

I went to the ER just a few minutes after ringing in the new year but everything is fine I guess. 

I had a yucky heavy headache for almost a week straight and was having a couple of other signs of pre-eclampsia. My tests have all come back clean and my blood pressure is perfect... just a headache.

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Oh my.

Hemorrhoids. Why?

my first New Year's resolutions like, ever....

 I've never made New Year's resolutions before so welcome to my first list of some things that would be nice to do this year.

Stretch my ears to 1/2" 

(two sizes up from 0ga)

Eh, I think that's as far as I'll go aaaaand I'll finally be able to wear pretty plugs like this!

Be more adventurous in the kitchen

Every year my cooking gets better and bolder but I'm ready to kick things up a notch and stop being so afraid of recipes that require ingredients I've never heard of.

Get a henna inspired tattoo

mmm... I'm not sue if you can get a tattoo while breastfeeding. I'll have to look into that.

Go to sleep before sunrise
My sleeping schedule is awful! It's been that way for over a year now and it's only gotten worse since I got pregnant. I go to sleep between 6am-7am and get up anywhere from 1pm-5pm.
Something's got to change!!

Grow my hair out

I love having my hair short but now that it's grown out a few inches since being pregnant, it's making me realize how much easier it is to manage.

Try some color

I think we can all agree that the outfit on the left is pretty amazing- but would I wear it? Probably not. Just the thought of wearing something so colorful kind of sends me into a panic. I've neeeeeever been a fan of wearing bright colors- I'm a dark and muted tones kinda gal (like on the right).

But I would like to try my hand at wearing something just absolutely color drenched at least once.

Shake the baby weight- plus some

When I got married two years ago I got lazy and happy and gained a whopping 40 pounds. Yeah, it happens. As soon as I started to diet and exercise I got pregnant... 

Hello 40 MORE pounds.

I'm not a weight obsessed kinda gal but an 80 pound weight gain in two years is a little much.

I'm due in just a couple of weeks so that'll be a nice 15 pound head start.

Buy a juicer

Juicing is a very, very good thing to do and I think me and my husband would benefit from it immensely.

We've been looking for a juicer for a few months now but we're having a little difficulty finding one that is affordable and reliable.
I can't wait to get my hands on one so that when I get super old I'll still be healthy... and sexy.

Paint my nails more
(or stop buying nail polish)
I'm a compulsive nail polish buyer but I rarely paint my nails. I don't know why. It's time to either stop wasting money or put that stuff to use.


Tap and shimmy
I love to dance and my two favorite forms of dance are tap and belly dance. Strange combo I know.
Last year I got lazy, started making excuses, then I got pregnant and tired and just stopped dancing.
But you know what? Since I love to tap and belly dance so much, maybe the next step is to put them both together and try flamenco???
With the baby?


Make my Faire bigger and better

Last year's faire was pretty darn good for a first try. But this October I'm going to try harder to get more food vendors and merchants. We had plenty last year, but a lot had to drop out at the last minute which left some serious open gaps on the map.
The 2013 Faire WILL be spectacular.


Buy a new gown (or two or three)
I love my gown but I can't see myself wearing it again this year.
My dress really took a beating last year and I'm ready to give it a rest.
I want something more eye catching and regal like the gown pictured below but gowns like this can get pretty darn costly... so I guess it's time to start saving now.

So what are your resolutions? Feel free to share a link to your "New Year's Resolutions" blog posts below!

merry Christmas and enjoy your... crackers...

This is an email I just got from my sister-in-law in Little Rock thanking us for their Christmas gift we sent:

Hey guys,Thank you so much for the Christmas gifts.  What was up with the half way eaten sleeve of saltines?  It definitely made me laugh.Love,Dori

Oh my gosh. The week before Christmas while I was putting presents together I was mad craving saltine crackers and eating them like a wild animal. I misplaced my crackers and couldn't find them anywhere. I shrugged it off thinking maybe I ate them all...
Guess not.
Call it pregnancy brain, call it whatever you want but I'm gonna call this just plain hilarious.

bringing in the new year at the ER

So through some late night emails, my midwife expressed to me how concerned she was about me not taking my preeclampsia symptoms more seriously. 

All my life I've never had to worry about anything like that. I was raised to think that if you just wait it out, it'll go away- and it always does for me. We don't go to the hospital unless something is seriously wrong. I've felt much worse than this- so I've just been dealing with the discomforts and moving on. 

To me, headaches, swelling, dizziness and shortness of breath just sounded like pregnancy. 

 My midwife sent me a link with a detailed list of  preeclampsia symptoms and I went into a panic after reading it. I didn't realize how many of those symptoms I had been experiencing for quite some time now. 

On the site I kept seeing the words "life threatening" and "fatal"... then a serious headache set in and I went bonkers.

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When we got to the ER at about 1am they came to pick me up in a wheelchair within just a couple of minutes of waiting to send me to labor and delivery. I was super embarrassed about riding in a wheelchair and kept my head down the whole time just in case someone was there that knew me. I could walk- the only problem was that my maternity jeans were too tight in the thigh area and that gave me a much exaggerated waddle.

And when I heard they were whisking me away to labor and delivery I was terrified. 

All this over a headache?!?!?

I started to feel like a big silly sissy and I immediately started to regret going to the ER. I wanted to turn back and go home but my husband kept reminding me that we just can't take the risk of not having all this checked out.

After filling out a bunch of paperwork, they sent to a dim room. There I stripped down and put on a dingy, ratty open-back robe and gave urine. They asked me some questions about how I've been feeling and hooked me up to all sorts machines that I didn't understand.

I was tired, uncomfortable and my head was still pounding.

They asked me if I wanted some Tylenol and I said YES- desperately.

*************************

While waiting, I really started to feel frustrated and confused. I kept shaking my head saying out loud, "I don't understand."

I don't understand how I've felt like pure doodoo during this whole pregnancy and now all of a sudden a headache and a little dizziness can mean the beginning of something that can kill you.

**************************

After about an hour the nurse came in to tell me that everything looks great:The baby, my blood pressure, my urine- all great. Just a bad headache.

I was super grateful to hear this news but I still wanted to stomp and scream "All this for nothing?!?!?"

*************************

No.

At 38 weeks pregnant I'm just now learning the meaning of "better safe than sorry" when it comes to my health and the the health and safety of my baby. 

Yes, I had forgotten that when I feel bad, it's not just ME who could be in trouble. There's a human being growing inside of me that needs me to be as healthy as possible.

I don't feel silly about going to the ER anymore. 

Should my symptoms continue, I will go back to the hospital every day if need to ensure the safety of me and my baby.

***************************

Going to the hospital because you're concerned for yourself and your baby is nothing to be ashamed of.

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Better safe than sorry.

First lesson of 2013: learned.