The Latest and Greatest, Including the 36 Week Update

The latest and greatest in the Grant Household...

Party Time: Matthew went to Collin's Bachelor Party in North Carolina this weekend. Collin, a college friend of Matthew's, was an usher in our wedding and his beautiful bride Karen has been friends with Matthew for years. They will tie the knot on March 13 and we are so sad we will be unable to attend to the wedding--its only 9 days from D-Day! So, we were thrilled when he was able to meet up with all his guy friends for the bachelor party! All the wives decided the next trip will probably be a fun filled family trip because by this summer we will have three babies and one small child (Noah is a big kid now) in the group.....and who knows what other surprises might bring :)

Greatest Mama Mia Award: My mom (aka Mama Mia to Blessing) won the Greatest Mama Mia award when she surprised me with a diaper bag I have been eying for a while now! She was supposed to be helping me scout out a good deal on it and she did...only she bought it for me instead! I cannot wait until it comes in the mail!! My mom is the greatest in so many ways but this was one of those I wanted to share!

THE baby bag :)

Baby Classes: We have taken a few classes to prepare us for parenthood and to say they are interesting is an understatement. The first was an abbreviated version of a childbirth class; boy am I glad it was abbreviated I would have hyperventilated after 4 weeks of practicing breathing. Can breathing really be that hard? Seems pretty basic. Our classmates ranged from the stereotypical nervous neurotic dad to the scared mommy to the gigglers (we were the gigglers). We also took an infant CPR class; funny how we only managed to actually practice CPR /choking topics for a total of an hour of the four hour class. The teacher was an amazing lady---a survivor. I vowed to try to remember her anytime I am tempted to complain about not sleeping or my back hurting or my random contractions. She survived a stroke, heart attack (she has a pacemaker now), breast cancer and divorce and still finds joy in her life as a P.E. teacher. Matthew and I stayed after class to talk to her---it was so sweet!

What is the next class on the agenda you ask? Breastfeeding. This one had to be rescheduled due to all the snow; it will be about 2 weeks from d-day, so we may skip it. I cannot see myself practicing THAT with a doll like we did in the CPR class---EEK!!! If we went, it would mostly be to be entertained.

Alice in Wonderland: I just had to say how excited Matthew and I are that Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland with Johnny Depp is coming to theaters on March 5!!!! We both love Tim Burton movies and really enjoy Johnny Depp, so we will be there as soon as it opens!!

Just a few characters from the movie...Johnny Depp is on the left.

All About Blessing: We are at 36 weeks!! This time next week Blessing will be considered full term---so BRING ON THE ARRIVAL!!!!! All the websites I read say the baby is, on average, about 6 pounds by this point....no wonder my back is hurting so bad. Even though we cannot be certain, I think our Blessing has packed on a little more weight than that, but only time will tell if that is true :)

36 weeks and busting out of my shirt!

The doctor's appointment yesterday was as non-eventful as the rest, which is good. Measurements were right on target and the heart beat was 144...perfect! My blood pressure remains humorously low for a pregnant lady, one less thing to worry about. The baby is head down and there is not much room to roll back the other way, so hopefully Blessing will stay put. There were also a few other signs that we were getting close to arrival, but I will spare you :) We also did the GBS screening (see my last post for information about what this test is---especially all my pregnant friends). Even if it came back positive, its not a big deal. If positive, we cannot labor at home and I have to be on antibiotics the entire birth---no big deal at all. Only unique element for US is since penicillin is the drug of choice and I am allergic to it, they will have to run some reactive tests to find an alternative antibiotic for me :) So, all in all---no matter the outcome its all good!! Right now the toughest thing is getting comfortable at night, my back has really been bothering me. The rest of the symptoms are just plain funny.

We have everything pretty much ready to go now! Last thing to do is adjust the baby bed height and put all the hospital bag contents IN the bag. So like I said before----BRING IT ON.

Special thank you to Aunt Becky for the Bumbo and carrier cover--it will get lots of use. And Grandma Grant for the cute hats she knitted. I espeically like the red one with the little balls on top :)

Thanks for reading and love to you all!