The Great British Crisps!

From the first time we moved here, we noticed the different flavors of crisps (chips). Not to be confused with chips (french fries).  Walkers is a brand of crisps- very close to Lay's Potato Chips in the States. However, the flavors were: (at least the ones I can think of)

1. Ready Salted- just your regular Lay's potato chips, I mean crisps
2. Cheese and Onion (I like these)
3. Salt and Vinegar
4. Steak and Onion
5.Smokey Bacon
6. Roast Chicken
7. Prawn Cocktail
8. Pickled Onion
9.Marmite
10. Tomato Ketchup
11. Cheese and Pickle

You get the idea...

So tonight, we saw an advert (commerical) on the telly for the 6 new flavors that you can vote for. The one with the highest votes will be chosen as the newest flavor. Are you ready for this?

1. Builder's Breakfast (?)
2. Onion Bhaji
3. Chilli and Chocolate
4. Fish and Chips
5.Cajun Squirrel
6. Crispy Duck

HA! How gross is that!!! I don't even want to try any of them! You can go here to check them out!

Gotta love those British Crisps!

No Baby

I have pretty much resigned to the fact that I will be overdue this time! Dern. After all that action at 34 weeks and tons of braxton hicks and real contractions that seem to start and stop before I can even mention anything to Marc- I think she is going to be late.

I've done my Denise Austin Pregnancy DVD and done lots of walking...and still nothing. I've eaten several pineapples and even some spicy food.

Just thought you might want to know. I saw my midwife on Wednesday. And will see her again next Wednesday I'm sure!  I told Marc last night, "I've NEVER gone to my due date!" His response was "As if you've had plenty of opportunities?"  Well, NO... but I was 2 days before my due date with Cerys and induced at 39 weeks with Bailey. SO, technically...I've NEVER gone to my due date. I'm curious how long I would have gone with Bailey.  

I'm not sure if I should ask for prayer for me or for Marc. I tend to be a bit dramatic anyway and it's just a bit exaggerated right now.

SNOW DAY

We woke up to a few inches of snow this morning and it has just now stopped coming down! Cerys' school was cancelled- but only her Nursery class and Year 5- how unfair is that? The teachers that could not come in to school had to cancel their class, the rest of the kids had to stay we were told. Bummer for them! :)

We made a snowman-

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Complete with plastic food for the nose and 2 clementines for the eyes.

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Once the girls got cold, Marc got busy rolling up the snow for his own snowman-

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Us girls came inside for some chocolate milk and a movie!

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Now, if I go into labor I guess I'll get my boots on and tread up the to hospital! :)


It's SNOWING!

FINALLY! Great Britain has been pounded by snow- well I guess snow does not really pound- anyway...from what we hear and see on the news, London is covered and most of south England. They said it would move into Wales this evening and tomorrow and I didn't believe them!  

It's sticking and coming down nice and steady! I'll post a picture in the morning!

The girls will be so excited to see it when they wake up!

39 Weeks...and counting...

Y'all! Still no Baby Girl. I have had several nights of contractions that were either 5 minutes or 10 minutes apart and then after 2 hours or so they completely stop. I am thankful for making it this far, for sure, but I'm so afraid of going overdue for several reasons. If I were in the states I would feel better about not being on time. That's all I will say about that. I've heard too many terrible stories from overdue pregnant ladies in this country.

If you would pray for us this week we would appreciate it. It was a rough week last week in several ways and being a million weeks pregnant on top of it all just was not a good combination. We would also ask for prayer for our visa situation- which allows to stay in this country. I can't go into details here, but we are still waiting for ours to be renewed and it's been 14 weeks since we submitted all our paperwork. Not a good sign. It's not good timing, especially with the baby being due any time. We need our paperwork back in order to apply for a birth certificate, which allows us to get her a passport, etc. Please just pray that the necessary paperwork would be done soon so we can proceed. I know that is kind of vague, but sorry. And pray for us to be patient about all of this right now. There's a bit of stress in our house at the moment.

I was reflecting back on Bailey's birth this weekend and how I was still nervous, but confident in the hospital and my doctor. I had friends and family surrounding us and I just had a peace that everything would work out even though I was nervous. I trusted God to get us through it and He did. And it was a wonderful experience.

This time around, we are back here and even though our situation is different in some ways, I feel as if all those "props" are gone. I could easily distract myself with a trip to Target, or get out the house and walk around the mall, etc. This time around I feel totally, completely, utterly in the hands of the Lord...and that's a good thing. Just a very hard thing for me to release all control and trust in Him more than I trust in our situation. I don't have much confidence in the hospital right now. I don't have much confidence in myself right now either. But I do pray daily that the Lord would help me continually place my trust in Him and nothing else.

Nursery

I hesitated putting pictures of the nursery on here just because I've seen some really nice ones out there in the blog world. I didn't really see any point in buying new bedding, although I would have loved to do something new this time around. When we had Cerys we didn't do a nursery since we were living here and we didn't have anything but an old portable crib- plus with renting a house our landlord didn't allow us to paint or hang anything on the walls. So I was really bummed about that the first time around. Then with Bailey, well we had just moved back to Texas and it was all so chaotic that we didn't do a nursery then either, she just slept in the pack-n-play in our room until we moved back here when she was 6 months old.

SO, this time I really wanted to have the chance to actually "do" a nursery, but I would have to use the same bedding my mom had found for us when we had moved back for Cerys' crib. I do like the bedding, but I would have loved to have chosen something newer. But that is just not practical for us right now.
Enough of that- here it is...

Remember our bedrooms are tee-tiny here and no closets- This is the view from the door. I still need to get some ribbon for that dress-me-up mirror (my leftovers from being a SLAH consultant!)

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On our holiday in October, I bought these Beatrix Potter pictures and then got the frames at IKEA. These are the frames I was dead set on getting when I had all that pre-term labor action. Ha. I told Marc I was having some pretty regular contractions but I really would like to get these frames first! They go well with the bedding I thought.


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I ordered some new sheets and changing pad overs from Babies R Us and had my aunt send them to me because the cribs here are smaller and narrower. I chose the sheets by holding up the bedding to the computer screen to see if they would even slightly match and I am very pleased with how well the work.

You can see the floral sheets a bit better in this picture-
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And, thanks to Marc who drew out the shape of the Boppy pillow for me, I finished it this weekend. It's probably a bit smaller than the Boppy, but it will do! Making the pillow was easy, it was the cover that stumped me. Sewing a zipper on a curve was harder than I thought. I had to call my mother -in -law in Africa and get her to explain it to me. Ha.

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And there you go...we just need Baby Girl now! I see my midwife tomorrow- at 38 weeks- the appointment she told me I'd probably not ever make it to. Dern. I'm so happy and relieved though to have made it past 37 weeks so I'm going to enjoy being a family of 4 as much as I can. I'm trying to soak up time with the girls before they become "3"- today we played Nail Salon and painted our toes! :)

My Shelter, Strong Tower, DELIVERER

No pun intended on that "Deliverer" part. Ha.

I came across this video on Kelly's Korner Blog and I had forgotten about this song. I wish I could tell you why I sat here with tears streaming down my cheeks as I listened to it again. There's just a lot on my mind and I really needed to hear this tonight.


I have been thinking a lot about music lately and how much I miss worshipping in a setting like this. I know that is not what it's all about, but I do miss it. I really need to load some songs on the ipod so I can listen to Praise music more.

This song means a lot to me, for many different reasons. I hope you are blessed by it today.

False Alarms

Well goodness me, I can't believe I'm still pregnant. Ha. In my other pregnancies I would never even be thinking about labor at almost 38 weeks just because I've never experienced pre-term labor or this many strong braxton hicks. I had them with the girls, but not this frequent. There have been several days this week that I was sure I would end up giving birth, and then after an hour or so it all stops! Even yesterday morning, I was woken up by strong contractions at 5:45am and laid there till almost 7am timing them. I was just about to tell Marc I that I thought this was it when they all stopped. 

I know I need to be patient and let Baby Girl stay in there as long as she can, but after the pre-term labor at 34 weeks and my midwife telling me every time I see her that she doesn't think I will go much longer- I guess I've got my hopes up that she will arrive sooner rather than later. But now I just don't know!  I'll be 38 weeks on Sunday, so any time now would be good Baby Girl!

Several have asked me about any progress I've made- but the midwife does not check me, so  I have never known anything- effaced or dilated. I know at 34 weeks at the hospital that I was not dilated yet, but they gave me the medicine and steroid shots just in case things progressed quickly. So, I have no idea if anything is even happening!! Based on the contractions I've had and the strength of them I would think that something is surely going on, but I really don't know.

So, that's where we are now...the waiting game. I had forgotten about the waiting part since I was induced with Bailey and just walked right on in to the hospital that warm, sunny June morning.  

If anything happens, I'm sure Marc will let you know! Or if you are his "friend" I know he will update Facebook when the times comes. There is no internet at the hospital so there will be no "live blogging" like some of the other blogs I've read lately. In fact, I think that would just be too weird. So, once it all goes down and I'm home I will be on here and let you know! 

In other, non-related news...Cardiff now has a Costco! It's not open to the public but we were able to get a card through our organization. We went out there one night this week and had a blast. I had the camera, but Marc was not happy about me taking pictures inside. What is his deal?!? :)  Anyway, it's mostly British food-of course- you know just in case you need a giant box of 4,000 tea bags! :) But we did find some American goodies that I was excited about....Hershey's syrup, Pace Picante Sauce, Skippy Peanut Butter- this is huge because we usually have people send us PB and it's expensive since it's so heavy- and we also found a large bag of stone ground tortilla chips, brownie mixes and some American candy. The girls thought the store was fun since there were samples of things out for you to taste. I did get quite excited about some of our finds that I gasped out loud and Cerys said "Mommy, why are you getting so excited over food?" Ha! She then thought it was funny to mock me and at every turn down an aisle she would say rather sarcastically, "OH WOW, LOOK AT THIS!"  And then giggle her head off. :)

Ok, so all I really wanted to say was that there is no baby action here!

Until then...probably...unless something exciting happens that I just HAVE to blog about....

Let's Just Be Honest

I've been a cranky mother lately. I could use a number of excuses- I'm not sleeping well at night, therefore I'm exhausted. I'm very pregnant. I'm hormonal. I have a 4 year old. I have a 2 year old. I could go on, but I won't. Tonight I decided I needed what my mother use to call an "attitude adjustment."  

The little tantrum Bailey threw at gymnastics this morning and her screaming the whole way to Cerys' school didn't help much. The way Cerys gets worked up over the hand towel in the bathroom not being hung exactly to her liking after washing her hands-EVERY TIME... did not help either. Today has been "one of those days."

I'm so thankful to have my girls. Most of the time they crack me up and I love spending time with them. Lately though it seems I'm getting upset rather quickly or annoyed way too fast, when I should just chill and laugh a bit more.  I was skimming a book that I've read before called The Mission of Motherhood by Sally Clarkson. I highly recommend it if you have not read it before. One sentence jumped out at me, basically because it said exactly what I have felt yesterday and today-

"They were busy little sinful creatures that demanded all of my body, time, life, emotions and attention."

Let's be honest, have any of you ever felt that way? It's so demanding! And to think we are about to have another one any day, makes me feel even more defeated! 

Clarkson explains how one evening she was desperate to put her children to bed and they were splashing around in the bath making a huge mess (can anyone relate?) and in her moment of anger she realized there were two conflicts in her heart....

"...my commitment to motherhood versus my lurking desire to have life my own way....I began to see my children's care and nurture as God's best will for my life during my season as a mother....I needed to accept days like this - my children's neediness, the myriad of mindless tasks, and even my own occasional discomfort-as part of my partnering with my husband toward our mutual goal of building a godly heritage for Christ."

I guess lately I've been selfish and have that "lurking desire to have life my own way." I keep thinking, my life is about to change again- sleepless nights, nursing a baby, a million nappy changes a day,  and I just want to enjoy the last few days or weeks (hope not!) of not having anymore demands on me. But because of that thinking I have been less patient and quick to snap at the girls just because I'm annoyed.  It's not fair to them that Mommy has been so cranky. 

So, my plan is to wake up with a happy heart (something we use around here when talking about our attitudes) in the morning and relax a bit more...knowing that at this season of my life, this is just part of it.  Knowing that the "smallness" of this stage of my life will not last forever...just like this pregnancy, I hope! :) 

This too shall pass....

Finally!

Hello 37 weeks, it's good to see you!

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(please no comments on the size of my face, I'm one of the lucky ones that gains weight all over, not just the belly!) ;)

Now that I've been saying all along I want to have Baby Girl early, I've chickened out and am scared to death now. I've finally reached the 37the week, which means I can deliver in the midwife led unit - praying that nothing will go wrong or that I won't need a consultant- or I will be transferred upstairs.

We would appreciate your continued prayers. My braxton hicks last night started back again and they were quite strong and border-line painful. I find peace in knowing that God is the only one who knows the day that Baby Girl will make her appearance!

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