Happy Birthday, Blake!

Happy birthday to the sweetest husband and father on the planet! We are so thankful for you!!

We celebrated with Blake's side of the family last night. The kids and I made his birthday cards this year since I don't get out of the house much. He really liked him, so I think that will probably become a birthday tradition around here. We had steak and taters, and yummy chocolate cake, which the kids thoroughly enjoyed. Many thanks to Nana for providing all of the goodies to make the celebration wonderful!

Too cute

Beautiful blue eyes.

Not quite fully awake, but smiling nonetheless.

Somebody turned 15 months!

Landry turned 15 months old yesterday. She's been learning lots of new things lately. She requently yells out "woof woof buppy" when she hears the dogs barking. There are many other things she's saying pretty well, but my brain isn't capable of thinking properly right now, so I'll need to work on her list of words and document them later. She's getting the hang of running, although it doesn't always end well. We've had several encounters with doors and door jams lately. She loves to torment Camden when he's sitting in Daddy's chair watching one of his movies. She walks up and starts jacking with his feet and the fighting commences. She's not as content to sit back and let him rob her of whatever she's playing with much these days. She's begun to put up a hefty fight if it's something she really wants to play with.

There have been many suggestions that we cut her bangs (Mom!), but the goal is to let them grow out so she doesn't have a full-blown baby mullet. She refuses to keep a clip or ponytail holder in, but we'll keep working with her. I think she likes her hair in her face. Maybe one day we'll get it under control. Regardless, we think she's prettier every day!

32 Weeks

Not the greatest picture, I know. I took a picture of the 3D ultrasound picture with my phone so I could email it to Blake, and it's all I've got to offer you guys since our scanner is in a closet somewhere. We saw some pretty freaky stuff on the 3D ultrasound today. He had the hiccups and kept opening and closing his mouth in all sorts of scary ways, and also kept opening his eyes, which I was not a fan of at all. Still kind of creeps me out just thinking about it. It was neat to watch in real time though.

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Mom took me to see Dr. Pineda this morning, as Blake is spending the week in Florida on business. Actually, it really is business, he'll just get to have a little fun while he's down there. And since fun is something I'm definitely short on these days, I'm a lot jealous and a little bitter about it! But anyway, back to the story. Dr. P checked me and I'm almost 2 cm dilated. I've been a little bit dilated for the past 2 weeks, but today was enough to make it onto the charts. My cervix is still about 25-30% effaced, which is the same that it's been for the past week. He didn't seem very concerned with the dilation. The baby is still very high and my cervix hasn't softened any more. We'll go back on Thursday and see if there's any change at that point. If there is, I'm probably going to start freaking out.

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We saw the techs at the specialist's office after the visit with Dr. P. Things look almost identical to last week with the baby's kidneys (3.5 cm and 8-9 cm) and my amniotic fluid level (22 cm). He performed nicely on for the monitors and we got out of there a good bit quicker than the last several times. Apparently bananas get him moving pretty well.

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That's all I know for now. We've got appointments with painters and flooring folks lined up to get his room (and other parts of the house) completed before he gets here. He has bedding and should have furniture in another week or so. Now if we can just find him a name!

Easter lunch/Libby's birthday

Sunday afternoon my family came over for Easter lunch and to celebrate Libby's birthday. (She turns 13 on the 16th.) It was a nice break in the bed rest. I did stay off my feet, but got to actually get dressed, put make-up on and sit at the table for a while.

Blowing out her candles.

Landry grinning at Pop. This was right before she started wiping off his bald head with a baby wipe.

Camden could not manage to keep his finger out of the icing. Luckily Libby was quite a sport about it.

Libby and Pop surrounded by boys.

The kiddos digging through the huge Easter basket Pop and Dee brought them.

(And the only picture I made it into.)

Easter Morning

Easter morning went over about as well as Christmas did in our house. The kids looked in their baskets, played with the toys, ate a little candy and then moved on to other things. No one would keep the bunny ears on and wouldn't dare actually look at the camera as I yelled their names from the couch. Camden's favorite thing was the Lightning McQueen RC car, but mainly because he used the antenna on the controller as a microphone to sing "Blue Christmas" in. What the heck, right? Landry's favorite thing was by far the paper Easter grass. She had it spread all over the living room and into our bedroom by the time it was all over. They were fun to watch. And if we heard "just one mo' [Hershey's Kiss], pweez" from Camden once, we heard it a hundred times. I can't say I blame him too much though.

Alexander Annual Easter Egg Contest pictures

Blake and the kids went to the AAEC on Saturday at Aunt Beth and Uncle Bill's house. Here are some pictures from their day. Blogger is crazy slow with the uploading today. Otherwise there would have been many, many more pictures posted. They're also out of order, but sometimes Blogger uploads in order and other times it decides backwards is better.

It looks like Landry found a rather large egg that strongly resembles a football.

Landry getting a little lovin' from Uncle Beeeeeel.

Landry and Cousin Brooke.

Landry loves to kiss dogs. I'm not sure exactly how Ella felt about it though.

A funny, funny moment.

Landry trying her hand at decorating.

Landry must have become bored with all the decorating. Not sure what happened to Uncle Bill.

Looks like Camden enjoyed himself.

A lot.

Getting schooled by Aunt Tara and Peyton.

31 weeks prego

I saw Dr. Pineda this morning. My cervix is behaving and the meds are doing a great job of keeping my uterus nice and relaxed. I'm still having Braxton Hicks contractions, but they've slowed way, way down. He said my cervix was a little shorter than last week, but at 31 weeks with my third pregnancy he wasn't surprised by it. He was pleased with the results from the combination of the Brethine, Slow-Mag and bed rest. I'll see him again on Thursday, just because he wants to monitor me a little closer this week because of the meds. If everything looks good after that I'll go back to once a week with him. He did mention 35 weeks again yesterday, so it looks like if my cervix and I can behave until then he'll lighten some of the restrictions at that point.

We saw Dr. Groome's ultrasound tech and nurse after the appointment with Dr. Pineda. Dr. Groome has been out of town for the last 3 or 4 weeks, so it's been quite a while since we've laid eyes on him. The baby's estimated weight is 3.8 pounds, which is right around the average mark. One of his kidneys looked excellent - down to 3.5 mm - but the other was larger than it has been before - 9.1 mm. They said while that obviously wasn't a great finding, that it still wasn't anything to freak out about. The non-stress test went very well. I only had one mild contraction while they had me hooked up, which was a vast improvement over last week. The baby's heart rate was excellent and he was plenty active to make them happy. We go back on Thursday and will see Dr. Groome and hopefully get some more information about the kidney issue.

We got some additional 3D ultrasound pictures of his little face. I would scan them and post them, but I'm trying to behave! He still favors his siblings, but something funky was up with his nose. It looked rather large in most of the pictures. I'm hoping that can be explained by shadowing during the ultrasound, or maybe that he had his face squished against something. Or maybe he just has a big nose. I guess we'll find out soon enough! (And again, as usual, he had his little right hand up by his face just taunting me!)

30.5 weeks pregnant

Last Thursday I got put on what Dr. Pineda called "strict bed rest" (even though his description didn't actually sound all that strict) after having 7 Braxton Hicks contractions in an hour the night before. Today I went for my non-stress test at Dr. Groome's office and had 7 contractions in the 45 minutes that I was hooked up to the monitor. They called Dr. Pineda's office and sent me over after the NST was over. (I had only had 3 contractions when they called - the other 4 came in the 10 minutes or so that it took them to call and come back in the room.) We went to Dr. P's office and he put me on two medications to slow the contractions and relax my uterus. I was also put on the real "strict bed rest" and will go back Monday. There still isn't any change in my cervix, other than that it's soft. Monday he will re-examine me and decide whether he thinks I need to be hospitalized or not. So basically, I'm seriously motivated to behave this time! The meds are supposed to make me feel crappy, so hopefully it'll be a little easier to lay around.

I hope you guys enjoy your Easter weekend! I'll be sitting out on one family gathering and laying about for another. But I hope to have lots of good pictures to post of the kids enjoying their weekend.

A very Rainey day

Pop Steve was in town this weekend so Blake loaded up the kiddos and made a trip to the farm. Here are a few pictures from their day:

Camden and Pop Steve took a few four-wheeler rides.

Landry did a little swinging with Aunt Victoria. (or as Camden calls her "big tortilla". it's funny what little ears hear.)

Loving every minute of it.

Handsome happy boy.

I'd LOVE to know what the inside joke was.

Sweet siblings.