9 weeks and counting.......

I had a check up tuesday with my Ob/Gyn and everything was great. I have lost weight, but she did not seemed concerned. I contribute the loss to anxiety. The medicine I am on for contractions apparently can cause this to occur and it is driving me crazy! I can not sleep well either because of it. However, she told me that I could take the medicine as needed and not around the clock anymore! In fact, if I was not having contractions to not take it at all. Well, I still have contractions, but they seem to be more Braxton Hicks than anything else! No worries to all you family members reading this....I am being cautious!

I was also informed that my doctor will not schedule my c-section before 39 weeks! Seriously, I do not know if I can wait that long.....that seems like an eternity away! That being said, she should make her arrival anywhere between October 1-6th? The 6th is on a Monday and Brian wants me to schedule it in the middle of the week because it would be easier to come home on a weekend than middle of the week. So....if I am lucky she will let me schedule it on the 1st or 2nd to do that! We will see what she tells me in a few weeks. We will not schedule that until two more appointments! Other than that everything is great and I am trying to get organized and get her room together. I have bought her bedding and waiting for it to come in so I can accessorize the walls and stuff! I have bought some clothes for her, but I am having a hard time finding things that are not PINK!!!!!!! I guess at some point I will have to decide to like pink because that is all there seems to be in the world of girls?????? I will post some pictures soon when everything starts to come together!

Avalon 2008

I know that I am not the best at posting blogs regularly, but I have been out of town for two weeks and just had a lot going on. Recently our family traveled to Avalon, NJ for a family vacation with my husband's side of the family. This is an annual event and we have a lot of fun each year seeing everyone and watching our family's grow! This will be the last year that traveling will seem easy because next year there will be two children and double the stuff to take with us! Thank goodness for the Hovans ( Brian's cousins) because they have three young children that are 100% entertainment for Christian! Jenna, Kurt Jr. and Grace are great babysitters and Christian absolutely adored all of them! I do not know who he annoyed more....Gracie as she tried to sunbathe on her towel and he kept crawling on her; Jenna when she was trying to dig in the sand and he was literally under her feet; or of course Kurt Jr. who so patiently moved from place to place trying to get away from Christian's antics. Thanks you three for being absolutely the sweetest cousins we could have wished for! Lisa you probably might disagree, but I thought they were fantastic the whole week!

Brian's parents rent a house every year down from the Forrey's house (more cousins) where we all gather every night for drinks (except the preggers), dinner and great company! Debbie and John are always fabulous hosts and cook great meals every year. We all pitched in this year and everyone was assigned an appetizer, drink, dessert each night. This was great because we all could contribute and Debbie did not have to do all the work! The Forrey's have three boys whom we all got to spend time with each as they came and went. Alex was there for a couple days before he was off to Martha's Vineyard and then to run with the bulls in Spain.....pretty cool. Jimmy came later after all his Lacrosse games and of course Rob was there the whole time. Brian's Aunt Sue and Uncle Jim were there and of course it is always great to see them. They were off to London and then Greece after leaving Avalon and I can not wait to see pictures. I know they had a wonderful time and I hope the weather was great for them.

I think that Nene and Poppy had the best time of all getting to spend time with their two grandchildren Christian and Bennett! They are both so much fun right now. Christian is talking and Bennett is walking so it is a blast to watch the interaction between them. Anybody who has a child knows that stage where they do not believe in sharing! Well, both kids are in that stage and is hilarious to watch them fight over toys and stuff. We are trying to curb that habit since Christian will have a sister soon, but we will see what happens.

We were in Avalon for the 4th of July and Christian got to watch fireworks for the first time and loved them! He kept saying, Wow.....Wow every time one shot off into the air. It is adorable to see reactions to new things he has never experienced. His expressions are priceless! All and all we had a fabulous time and we thank the Banta's, Forrey's, Hovans, Blairs and the Mizerany's for a wonderful vacation. I posted all the pictures for the family on snapfish and sent them out to all family members! If you did not get them, let me know!

Baby Update!!!!!

I went for a check up last week and was curious to talk to my OB about all the contractions and the Breathine I had been put on to control them. I had not seen her in the hospital the times I had gone in to be monitored. She did not seem worried about them especially since the medicine seemed to be doing its job. I was warned however if I had four or more real strong contractions in an hour to call immediately. I was also told to take it easy and drink lots of fluids to keep hydrated, but other than that things are back to normal. I try to rest when I can, but running after Christian is a chore! I was surprised to find that I had not gained any weight this past four weeks which is wonderful considering I was on vacation for two weeks straight at the beach. My belly is measuring perfectly and her heartbeat sounds wonderful. I like every other pregnant women prefers to count down the closer you get to your due date..... it sounds better!!!! That being said, I have around ten weeks to go. I am 28 weeks, but they took Christian by c-section at 38 weeks. I am hoping for the same scenario with this little angel unless she decides to grace us with her presence earlier. We switched hospitals from Brookwood to St. Vincents and I heard their policies are a little different on inducing because it is a Catholic hospital? I will find out soon enough because when I get to 35 weeks my doctor said we would pick a date for the c-section. Which will be in a couple more visits now that I get to start going every two weeks to the doctor. Brian wants to do a 4-D with her too, but I would like to wait. If we decide to do this ultrasound I will post the pictures. It is best done between 29 and 32 weeks.

Brian and I also had some pictures taken of our growing family and if you would like to view them go to heatherswannerphotography.com/banta
Stay tuned for more updates!