"Homeless" Teacher

Yesterday was my last master's class! As my friend Erin put it, "We're teachers now - we're just homeless" (i.e. we don't have jobs). I guess I'll be a homeless teacher for the next year, then!

Last week, I was blessed enough to have 2 baby showers at school - one with teachers and student teachers, and one with my class. My sweet friend Sara organized the first and my class teacher organized the second. They were both wonderful! Here are some pictures from the teacher shower:


The cake was really good!


Russell will be one well-dressed little boy!


Student teachers being goofy - I will miss these girls!

No pictures from the students' shower, but I want to share some priceless cards that they wrote to me. Here are a couple of my favorites (I would scan them but I don't think you'd be able to see all the writing) - I kept all their spelling:

from H:
WHY DO YOU HAVE TO GO
Everyone ♥s you
whith a babby in you house I hope you can sleep at night
Hugs and kisses and kinds of wishes

From T:
Rose are red
Vilit are blue
I know you love me
I love you too.
I love you very much Mrs. R. To the moon and back.

There are so many more, all so sweet. It was a very heartwarming/bittersweet day.

A Great Ultrasound!

We had our scheduled ultrasound this morning to check Russell's growth since I have been measuring small. First though, I had a normal "weigh and measure" appointment, which made me glad that we were having the ultrasound, since I am now measuring 3 cm too small. Everything else from that appointment looked great though.

Next, it was time for our ultrasound - yay! The tech started it off by measuring baby's head, tummy, and thigh. She also checked all of his anatomy again and then measured my amniotic fluid levels. Great news: everything looks perfect! She said he is the perfect size and weight for this stage of pregnancy, and the amniotic fluid levels are normal. It just goes to show that the fundal height measurements don't always mean much. More than that, it shows that God is so good - it is truly miraculous to see him moving around in there.

Here are some other tidbits:

• Russell is officially head-down!, and will not change - he doesn't have enough space now to flip around.
• It was neat how this time, every time I saw him move on the screen, I could feel it too! I could finally see what little parts he was moving.
  
• The tech told us he weighs 3 pounds, 9 ounces

I am relieved and happy that we got to see his sweet little face. Now we can relax and just wait to meet him :)

Week in Review

31 weeks - goodness, it's flying by!


What a crazy week it's been! Wednesday, Jason and I were holed up inside with a horrible stomach virus. I don't think I've ever been that sick in my life - even water wouldn't stay down. Thursday and Friday we were just weak and recovering, although we did start the cleanup process on Friday. We have been Lysol-ing and bleaching everything: doorknobs, lightswitches, etc. No one should ever have this virus again! If you are wondering, Russell should be fine and the virus shouldn't have affected him - in fact, he was still moving around so much that it was making me more nauseous! We are so thankful to be healthy again!

Also, we have been working on the nursery, and even though it's not finished, I decided it was good enough to put some pictures up here.




We're going to add a few more things here so that the wall won't look so plain. But I'm very proud of the way those letters turned out!




Hope you like it - we love it so far!

Baby Guessing Game

I will offer a reward to the person with the highest score!
~Jason

Take a Guess!

Do you feel lucky? :)

Even if you don't, take a guess at Russell's birth day, time, weight, and height in the game below. It will be fun! Don't wait too long (like, until June 15, say) because that's cheating :)



What will you win, you ask? As my professor would say (in a Boston accent), "the warm feeling in your heart." That's enough, right?

University of National Champions

Vince Carter, Julius Peppers, Makhtar N'diaye, and Antawn Jamison ask a rhetorical question at the NCAA basketball championship. Go Heels!

Doctor's Update

So, I realized that I never wrote about our doctor's appointment on Thursday - sorry about that! Several people have asked how he's doing now (thank you!) so I wanted to update you:

The doctor we saw a couple weeks ago (with the smaller measurement) was not our doctor, just another doctor in the practice. So on Thursday we saw our doctor, Dr. Richardson. She is so laid-back and really puts my fears at rest. She said that I am measuring a little small but that it's within the normal range (1ish cm too small), and I have definitely grown since the last appointment.

She also said that they normally do an ultrasound if it gets to 2-3 cm too small. However, she said that by the way I'm carrying, I would probably get to that point eventually, and to put me at ease, she went ahead and scheduled an ultrasound for Apr. 21. But she is convinced that everything is fine and that I'm just someone who carries a baby differently than "normal."

So, Jason and I are excited to be able to see baby Russell again soon :) His heart rate this time was 145-150, and she felt him kicking when she put the doppler on to listen to the heart. All in all, a good appointment!

Our "Babymoon"

For those who don't know, a babymoon is the new name for a vacation that couples have before having a baby. We decided we needed one! It had actually been two and a half years since Jason and I went on vacation just the two of us, which was just crazy. Since we didn't want to pay a lot of money, we were so fortunate to be able to stay at a beach condo that friends own on Emerald Isle. We got there Sunday night and left Wednesday around noon, so we had Monday and Tuesday at the beach. It was a little chilly due to the wind, but the temp was around 65 both days and the sky was beautifully clear. It was almost perfect - almost because I did have a cold the entire time :( But hey, it's better to be sick at the beach than anywhere else, right? I think the sea air can heal a person quicker than just about anything...which is good, since I can't take much of anything (medicine-wise) due to being pregnant!

Here are some pictures from our lovely time:

Not the building we stayed in, but ours looked just like this.

Jason was sick of my pregnancy picture pose, so I gave him a new one :)

JMR squared (well, that's what we were until I took my maiden name as my middle name!)

Even on vacation, Jason had to work a few hours.

Dinner in Morehead City on Tuesday night.