The Big Day

Well folks, it looks like the big day will be April 11th, at 12:30pm. They've scheduled me for a C-section (known simply as a "section" in the cool, medical type circles). When I went to the Dr. Wednesday, we did an ultrasound to confirm that Emily was still head up and to see exactly what type of position she was in, how much room was in there for her to turn, etc. It appears that her bottom is firmly planted in my pelvis and that it is very unlikely that she will be turning on her own. They once again discussed the option of EVC, the external manipulation of the baby to get them to turn, but I remained against the idea. I just feel the success rate is too low considering the risks and possible complications. The Dr I saw this week told me that he, personally, had done it successfully 50 times, and only one out of those ended in an emergency C-section because the cord got wrapped around the baby in some dangerous fashion. I'm sorry, but given the fact that you see pregnant women every day I am bothered that this has only worked for you 50 times- and one of those times ended in emergency procedures. Anyway. My point is, I said for them to go ahead and schedule me for a C-section. If Emily turns, then it gets cancelled. If Emily doesn't turn and I go into labor, I have to have an "emergency" C-section. She's coming out one way or another and it will probably be on or before April 11th. We'll keep you posted as events occur.

The Park

Today we went to the park. I got a lot of great pictures- I wish I could share them all with you on here. We were trying to take advantage of the good weather and the limited number of days that we have before the arrival of number three. As Brad has told the Ben and Anna, when Emily comes, she is going to say "Wahh" a lot...

Turning

Wow. It's been a whole week since I've posted anything. Amazing how such a busy week can also be so uneventful. One of the highlights of the week was my Dr.s appointment. I will be going every week from now on since we are at the beginning of the end. There is never much exciting news- no ultrasounds, no blood work, nothin'. They always just weigh me (gained a pound), test for protein (none found), take my blood pressure (usually something low like 90/60), and listen for a heart beat (158- i think that's good). The big news was that Emily is still hanging out head up. At this point she should have decided to flip over and present head down. I was told that when I go in next week, if she is still head up, they will have to discuss trying to manually turn her or they would schedule me for a C-section. After much thought and a little research on the subject, I have decided that I am not going to let them try to turn her. The success rate doesn't seem impressive, with factors such as low fluid, carrying low in the pelvis, and just plain old not having enough room in there, contributing heavily to lack of success. To turn the baby, you have to be hooked to an IV, they give you muscle relaxing drugs, and then they shove the baby around, hoping it will flip. I think I am going to just tell them that we can plan a C-section, and if I go in and she has turned on her own, then we will cancel it. Turning a baby can also irritate your uterus and carries the small chance of starting early labor. So, for now we will just wait and see. We will have an update on this situation by Wednesday.

Living Intentionally

I have recently decided that this is a good phrase to describe the way I would like to live. As a spouse, parent, family member, teacher, and part of my church congregation, I have decided that life goes by too fast to live without a plan. I'm not talking about a schedule- I think we have too many of those already. I mean a plan. An intention. This can apply to all areas: parenting, food choices, TV viewing... the list goes on and on. Living with intention means that in all areas of life we act instead of REact. Today, specifically, I am reflecting on parenting intentionally.

I would say most parents love their children. Most parents believe that they are parenting or disciplining or providing for their child the best way they know how. And they probably are. Anyone who comes from a family that truly loves them should be grateful for that blessing. However, as a parent, it is very easy to parent through our reactions instead of our actions. And what is so tricky about this is that we can't just consider "parenting" the direct interaction we have with our children. We may have the most effective, sensitive parenting techniques up our sleeve that we could write a book. It is easy to be intentional in situations for which you have a plan. Little Johnny wants Suzie's book. He yells and screams. You get down on Johnny's level, look him in the eye and say, "I understand that you want to play with the book. Suzie is playing with it now. You need to use your words and tell her "me next". Johnny tells Suzie, "me next" and you tell Suzie that she has two more minutes to look at the book and then it is Johnny's turn. Good for you. Now how did you react when you were behind the red light at Wal-Mart today? Did you wait your turn patiently? Did you smile and say, "It will be my turn to go soon, so for now I will be happy sitting here looking at the flowers planted in the median." Guess who was in the back seat watching your reaction to that red light. Johnny and Suzie. You have to live your life intentionally every minute.

This was all prompted by an event today that was a possible learning event for my children. We went to lunch with Daddy at Chick-Fil-A (since he is still working on Saturdays), and upon arriving home, I realized I had left my pocket book at the restaurant. This was bad for many reasons. I didn't have my keys. I didn't have my cell phone. Our neighbor wasn't home, so I wasn't able to use her phone to call Brad or Chick-Fil-A. I was going to have to drive back to the greenhouse to work this all out, and we were already LATE FOR NAP. That's a biggie around here. Nap time is crucial, but especially on days like today when we have a church event in the evening and we can't afford for the children to be tired and grouchy. There was also the consideration that once I was able to get house keys from Brad, I would have to make the decision to go pick up the pocket book now (further ruining nap time) or go pick it up later (furthering the chance that someone was copying down my credit card number and 3 digit code on the back). I also still had food to prepare for the church supper tonight, a grocery list to be compiled, laundry to be folded, and a dishwasher to unload/load- all waiting to be done during those precious moments of the aforementioned nap. At this point of realization I could have very well have been tense, grouchy, stressed- all sorts of things. I could have been very upset with myself for leaving the pocket book and being so "irresponsible". Better yet, I could have pulled the pregnant wife card and tried to find some way to make this Brad's fault for not seeing the purse or reminding me to get it when we left. Those would have been some great natural reactions. However, I had two little people boring holes in my back with their sleepy eyes, waiting to see why we were not getting out of the car. I had to live intentionally. I used my most pleasant voice and told them that we were going to have to drive back to the greenhouse and get a key from Daddy because I had left my pocket book at Chick-Fil-A. Sometimes we forget things. I told them I knew they were tired, but that we would have a nap soon. I chose to use positive words, a positive tone of voice, and positive body language. I didn't smack the steering wheel in frustration, say Arrgh, or verbalize any worse case scenarios to myself. Because, truth be told, at that point I didn't know if my purse was still there or if it was already dumped out and thrown in a ditch, but either way, I didn't have any control over the situation. None what so ever. The only thing I did have control over was how I reacted to the situation. Even if you don't say a word, children can feel stress and negativity.

To shorten this already long story, it turned out that some honest soul had put my purse behind the counter and I was able to retrieve it. When I arrived at the greenhouse to get my house key and call Chick-Fil-A, Brad's mom offered to go ahead and take the children back to the house to put them down for their nap while I went straight to the restaurant. They were a little late getting down, but not within disaster range. My next step in this learning situation is to address the issue again with them when they get up from their nap and see that I have my pocket book back. I am going to tell them that there are important things inside my purse that I didn't want to lose. I am going to tell them that God made sure a nice person found it for me and kept it safe until I was able to come and get it again. I am going to tell them that I am thankful and that we should tell God "thank you" for helping us today.

On a side note, I would recommend the book How to Really Love Your Child by Ross Campbell M. D. If you are familiar with the love languages books, you should recognize the name. It is an excellent, excellent book for any parent and is a very quick read. He doesn't use the term "living intentionally", but I think his views on parenting imply that philosophy. Anyway- got to run. I still have to do all that stuff around the house that I mentioned before....

Musical Flooring

To your left we have a (not so good) picture of (someone else's) Harmonics Laminate Flooring. I believe it's in Brazilian Cherry, but I can't really tell because the glare hurts my eyes every time I try to get a closer look. The reason I am posting this picture is because Brad just took a box truck to our friendly neighborhood Costco yesterday and filled it with 200 boxes of said laminate flooring. That is approximately 4,000 square feet of fake wood. We also purchased all the stuff that goes underneath the floor, which is 20 some boxes of floor kit. This all came about because of our last Costco coupon mailing. We noticed they had a coupon for laminate flooring. $5 off each box. Now, being Costco, the flooring was already cheap. $5 off each box made the flooring equal about $1.25 per square foot (including the underneath stuff). Sooooooo. Despite the fact that we don't actually have a HOUSE in which to install this flooring, we are the proud owners of a couple thousand pounds of floor. We ended up going with the Brazillian Cherry because it really looked attractive on the picture on the box, and also because it was the only color left that we could get that many boxes of. Let's guess why. Because we went to use the coupon on the very last day of the sale, of course. They actually had to get it from another store because ours only had half the amount we needed, but that's another story. The customer service desk was thrilled.... Especially when we told them we had to pick it up in a truck the next day because we really didn't have the time to get it that afternoon... And oh, we were paying mostly in cash, but wanted to write a check for some of it.... And what is their return policy exactly...

I'm sure good old Nathan will remember us for a while.

The Plant Haven

The Plant Haven Website should have been up and running by now. If you haven't noticed- it's not. There are a lot of excuses for this, and most of them good ones. The Plant Haven is a retail website that Brad and I are starting that is not *officially* affiliated with North Carolina Farms. I am supposed to be the "webmaster" (yeah right) and maintain the site. That is why I have been trying to learn the basics of HTML. If you go to the page, you will see that we have started working on it, but that you aren't able to actually order any plants. In fact, all we've really done is picked a color scheme. Most people either love it or hate it. Some people say it looks like I'm selling chocolate, not plants. Either way, if you have an opinion on the site, leave a comment and let me know what you think. BUT- Let me just go ahead and say that I refuse to use green. Every other retail website has green as one of their colors. It drives me crazy. (In case you didn't realize we were selling plants, we'll make sure our website is overwhelmingly GREEN so you will associate it with growth and leaves.) Don't even try to change my mind on that one...

Pictures

I have been struggling to get pictures to show up on this site. That is why I haven't sent our link to the public yet. No one wants to read my ramblings, but everyone wants to see pictures. Let's see if this works.

The Equipment Man

Today our equipment man, Todd, came with a few items for us to test. Anna and Ben spent the late part of the morning racing up and down the hall in wheelchairs and walkers. Actually, the walker wasn't so racy. The wheelchairs were a hit, though. Anna did best with a toxic green colored one with light up front wheels. Neither of those attributes had anything to do with why she did well in it, but they were the most noticeable ones. I think the real reason was that the wheels were large and skinny, like on a racing bike. There was another chair that was way too chunky and stable. She wasn't going to flip over in it, but she also wasn't going to beat grandma across the parking lot either. We are going to go ahead with the next step of the ordering process. Maybe we'll be in possession of one of those little chairs in 4 to 6 months.

In this picture, Ben is on his trike and Anna is in her Ready Racer. They love to wear hats and chase each other around the house.

Overview

Here is an overview of our life right now.... or rather a to do list for the next six months:

1. Keep Emily from appearing until all three children's choirs have completed their music and had the chance to sing/play in church (before Easter).

2. Help organize our preacher's going away party- while finding a new pastor for the church, integrating him into the community, and jump starting a new phase in church growth

3. Have a baby

4. Start building the house

5. Recover from childbirth in time to do Vacation Bible School in June

6. Organize our belongings and sell the house we are currently living in

7. Finish learning HTML and get the Plant Haven website up and running

8. Complete the building phase, move in, decorate, and get everything polished up in time to have Thanksgiving in our new home!


Heh heh. Next year may be a little boring compared to this.

We're Ready to Begin!

Well, this spot has been up and running for all of one minute. I really don't have time to do much to it yet, but I wanted to go ahead and type a christening entry. Ben and Anna are wearing hats and playing happily with musical instruments, but it is almost time for lunch. The internal clocks will go off and I'd better have something planned.