Ham and 37 Week Check-Up

There is one person who has been trying to figure out the closely guarded secret of Baby Pohl's true name: Tom's mom. She frequently asks Patrick, hoping that the little one will be able to relay anything he may have overheard. This past time, Patrick happened to be eating a ham sandwhich when she asked, and the nearly-two-year-old's reponse was: "Ham". Now, when anyone asks P what the baby's name is, he replies "Ham". It seems to be sticking. My 37 week check-up was today, although my back was bothering me so much we couldn't get a good measurement because my doctor did not make lay down. He is sending me off for some physical therapy to try and get me back into shape before I happen to go into labor. I figure it can't hurt at this point, so Thursday I head off to meet with a woman at the nearby PT office who specializes in PT during pregnancy. Thursday seems so far off, but I know it will get here. I seem to be up to 198 for my weight (eek), but I am not concerned at this point-only three weeks left and my BP is great.

Downhill

Since my last post, my health has headed, well, down. I kicked the cough with the help of my inhaler, so my stomach quit aching, then my body decided to reward me me by developing a sinus infection. I literally blew my nose so much that I strained muscles in my back and along the sides of my ribs. As a result, I can't pick anything up, including P. Thank goodness it happened on the weekend you might be thinking, so Tom could be around. Wrong. This has probably been Tom's craziest work weekend to date since he started at the firm. He literally worked ALL weekend with the exception of going to the pharmacy to pick up my prescription. I am not sure which of us had it worse the past two days. I had some tears this morning as I laid on the couch with the dull ache in my back. I feel like I have been housebound ever since my friend departed town and I am ready to heal up so I can have this baby and not be in pain before I even begin to labor. Meanwhile, Baby Pohl has more access to drugs than the Jersey Shore cast. I feel horrible putting any of that in my body, but it is supposed to be "safe" at this point. Thank you, God, for blessing us with family so willing to step in to help out. Tom's mom helped Saturday and will be here tomorrow, my mom and dad were both here at various times today, and my sister was willing to take P today if only I had a car seat that I could have gotten out of my car without hassle. Thanks to my mom, the three days of dishes and laundry that were cluttering up my home are now history. I am heading off to bed (in our guest room so my poor husband can finally get some shut-eye. I hit the bathroom three times last night and with my sore back, I sense another restless night) and am praying for an improved back tomorrow. I have my weekly doctor's check-up tomorrow and it would be nice to drive myself. P.S. Still doing surprisingly well on the swelling and the occasional numbness in my hands at night has not gotten worse at all. I am considering myself fairly lucky still with this little guy.

A Little PG-13

Warning, the following photo has been rated PG-13 by Mommy. Parental guidance is suggested due to obscenities.
During my friend Elizabeth's visit to Pittsburgh a week and a half ago (at 36 weeks pregnant!), she snapped some much needed photos of Patrick, including this one. Even if we had been trying, we never could have gotten this pose, but we had a good laugh when we looked over the photos after-the-fact.

Elizabeth could have gone into labor anytime while she was here, so all parties involved (particularly her husband and mine) were happy this visit was contraction free. It had been almost a year since Patrick was able to see his godmother, so I was glad to have her here, due date looming or not.

This outside photo was one of my favorites-it was taken in the backyard. It is very senior-year-portrait, but I don't care.

Battle of the bellies :) I am so jealous of Elizabeth's shape!

On the Mend

Yes, we are still sick here in the Pohl household. Just when I thought I was feeling better, I felt completely wiped out and stuffy yesterday. Patrick seems to be managing to develop a second ear infection while still on antibiotics, but finally slept through the night after a consult with our "on-call" pediatrician who informed us the E.R. had prescribed P too low a dose. I on the other hand had to get up THREE times last night to use the restroom. Is there no other place to sit, Baby Pohl, than on my bladder?

So what does a primarily housebound mom in her 36th week do? Scrapbook! I started my task of putting all my photos I printed from Jan 2010 to present into albums. I am not a true scrapbooker. Occasionally I'll throw something here or there, but I mostly like to write a quick note about the date/event. I have now completed Jan-March and will try to tackle some of April later today.

Did I mention I'll be getting my new camera soon? A REAL camera! I can hardly wait.

Two Spoonfuls of Sugar

Yep, now I have the dreaded cold. As if being 36 weeks pregnant wasn't uncomfortable enough, I can't breath and Baby Pohl is not very happy about all the coughing. I confined myself to the guest room last night so both Tom and I could get the most out of a night's sleep, but I can't say I feel any better. The men are off to Lowes to pick up the ceiling fan for the nursery while I wait for the morning grogginess to wear off.

Slow and Steady Wins the Race

With the help of of a visiting friend (post to come later due to the fact that she took all the photos during the trip!) I finally was able to get some pictures hung on the living room walls-it is almost as of we live here now. The living room furniture is in place, and our grown up room is nearly complete. Now I just need to hang art/pictures in the nursery, P's room, the family room, the upstairs hallway, our bedroom, and the bathroom. Sigh. I suspect all that will have to wait until after baby arrives.

A Spoonful of Sugar

This morning at 6AM, this family headed off to our friendly neighborhood emergency room for a suspected ear infection with P. It was a LONG night of crying and the first time since P's birth that we actually brought him into our bed (which still resulted in no sleep). Although our pediatrician's office opens at 9AM, I had hit my point of exhaustion

We headed home with this assortment of helpful meds...

...but our neighbor provided the real feel-good stuff-a whole box of popsicles.

Happy to report that as of 6:00 tonight, P is acting much more like his usual self. Please pray for a good night sleep for all of us!

The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly

We had our hospital tour tonight (since we delivered Baby 1 in Mississippi), and here is the breakdown:

The good: Best Neo-Natal unit around. Lots of quality doctors and one of the highest VBAC (Vaginal Birth After C-section) rates you can find (a positive since I want to avoid another c-section if at all possible).
Mississippi as a state has one of the highest c-section rates in the whole country.

The bad: In Mississippi, we were STRONGLY encouraged to leave the baby in the nursery during the night with the staff bringing the baby in for feedings so that we could get some good sleep and recover more quickly. At this hospital, that is frowned upon and it sounds like they want the baby with us 24-7. As a first time mom, I thought I would want the baby in our room at night, but after realizing how exhausted we were from the laboring and c-section, we ended up loving the nursery babysitting at night. Also, in Mississippi, a lactation consultant automatically made rounds to all the new patients to offer assistance. Our new hospital is so big and has so many patients that the consultants only come if requested, and even then you are placed on their "schedule", which means I am unclear how soon one would show up if you needed them.

The ugly: The postpartum room we will be staying in for 2 or 3 days is literally half the size of the room we had in Mississippi and nowhere near being updated anytime in the last 15 years. Tom and I couldn't even imagine having more than 1 or two visitors in there without being overwhelmed.

In the end, the good definitely outweighs the bad, so we'll have to see how this experience stacks up against P's birth. Laughed internally at two "new" dads on our tour who were frantically scribbling notes the ENTIRE time.

With a Little Help From Your Friends (and Husband)

So close to finishing up the nursery! The crib will be assembled this weekend, and that leaves just artwork/decorations. One project completed that I I've had my heart set on were narrow book ledges to fill this dead space: there is a mini hallway actually in the nursery.

My inspiration came from these cute ledges on Land Of Nod's website. Two problems-they are only about 20" long and I wanted 3, 4-foot ledges, and I couldn't tell from the online photo whether the light wood color offered would match the room which is more of a pecan/orange.

So I decided Tom could make them. Then I decided I could make them-right? So off to Home Depot where I purchased red oak, pre-cut 4' boards and stain. Now what? Cue the ever helpful DIY neighbors, Debby and Rich who just happen to have an entire woodworking shop in their garage. I mean, they have every wood tool imaginable and basically built these guys for me (I helped glue on the front of the ledge). They even copied the decorative work at the top. I stained them in my garage wearing my pink Darth Vader respirator mask and voila-here they are:

And now enters my handy husband who isn't just a piece of eye candy-he stayed up past 11pm last night installing them so I could show off the progress to my playgroup who were congregating here this afternoon (I love you for meeting my artificial deadline). Needless to say, they are exactly what I was hoping for...

(I would like to clarify that all of the ledges are perfectly, equally spaced (which you would not doubt if you know Tom well), but my camera angle has somehow made the top ledge look like it was spaced too high. )

No More Hibernating

After two days of sunshine and 40 something degree temps, this family crawled out of our den for a quick zoo trip. It turns out that we had the run of the entire zoo (my sister and nephew also came with) except for another couple we passed at the first exhibit-it was awesome! The animals were all active and actually seemed excited to see some humans. I didn't get any video or photos, but in the monkey house, one of the long armed monkeys was going, well, apes and swinging all over the cage-twice he jumped onto the window we leaning on which made for good entertainment.
My favorite moment though: walking into the elephant house and seeing P wrinkle up his nose and make the most offended face. A little payback I suppose.