A Blessing from the IRS

I went to get the mail today and almost fell over when I saw a think letter from the Department of Treasury in our mailbox. My heart dropped and my first thought was, "crap, what do we have to pay now?! did we not pay enough in taxes this year?". As I opened latter and pulled out all of the information, I could not believe my eyes, it was a notice letting us know that we had overpaid and we were getting a refund. Let me say that one more time, WE'RE GETTING A REFUND!!!!!

Derek and I have been a little stressed out lately trying to figure out our finances in preparation for our baby and trying to be responsible and get out of debt as soon as possible. This little bit helps and was completely unexpected. I would be lieing if I said I wasn't tempted to beg Derek for a kitchen table and chairs with the money, but I won't ask (even though he will read this) and have already let him know what I think we should put the money towards. He agreed and told me he had the same idea in mind. We're really thanking God for this, because this to me just God's way of showing us that when we trust in Him all things are possible and He will guide us. This is not me saying that I expect God to send us refund letters from the IRS every month, but I know that this is God's hand and not ours. I will be interested to hear what our CPA has to say about getting a refund :)

3 Week Comparison

Just for fun, here is a 3 week comparison of my belly growth...I think Derek needs to start standing in the same spot, it's hard to track the growth like this haha!

Belly Picture and correction

I need to make a slight correction about how far along I am. I get confused because of these weekly pregnancy newsletters that I receive. I am 23 weeks and 3 days pregnant, so this is my true 23 week picture.

The heat was on today

at work, and it was set at 78 F. SERIOUSLY, not even joking. I couldn't figure out why I was dieing of heat, dizzy, and having trouble breathing. Then I found out that I wasn't the only one suffering, so I knew it wasn't just me being pregnant. We did some investigating, located the thermostat and quickly discovered someone must have been super cold. We put an end to that, by turning the AC on and bumping it down to 72F. My argument is that if you're cold you can easily add layers. However if it's hot in here, I can't remove any more clothing without getting fired. It's now cooler and I am much more happy.

Feet

I can't see mine anymore when I look down. I have to lean over past my belly to see my feet. I broke down in tears about this the other night, and my wonderful husband tried desperately to make me feel better by telling me this "Arwen you can't see your feet because they're so tiny. If you had size 8 or 9 feet, you would still be able to see them." To which I responded "I don't want bigger feet". I have a wonderful husband, who always attempts to cheer me up when I'm down about something :)

Switching Practices

After a lot of thought, and time spent talking to friends and another doctor I have decided to leave Alliance and go elsewhere. I found a great nurse mid-wife thanks to some friends, and will be going to see her. The great part is that she delivers at Ingham Hospital, so in the event that I needed a doctor one would be just down the hall. It was shocking to me to call their practice today to set up an appointment and actually be treated nicely! I feel very relieved and good about my decision, and I am sure this will help me not be as stressed out with each appointment. This also means, my bi-weekly appointments are over :) :) :) , it is so nice to not have to go to the doctor every other week!

Belly Picture 23 Weeks

This is my 23 week belly picture, and yes pee-wee is growing!! I knew I wasn't imaging things when I looked in the mirror on Thursday night and realized that I had grown since Saturday! I hope you all enjoy the updated belly picture, I'm going to try and take these weekly and then I can do a little flip book and see the belly expand and/or see the baby grow!

Happy Father's Day!

My dad is one of the most important people in my life, and I wanted to take a short moment to write what I love most about my dad!

My dad is the best listener I know. He has this great way of being able to give me advice from not only his perspective as my father, but can also remove himself personally and give me unbiased wisdom.

No matter how much time has passed since I last have seen my dad, he gets so excited to see me and his smile lights up. I can always expect a huge hug and "Arwen it's so good to see you!" from him regardless of if I saw him just the other day.

My dad is a man of faith and can always point me in the right direction and give me sound spiritual advice.

Most of all, my dad has proven time and time again that his love for me is unconditional. I was a brat for many years, and regardless of what I did, he may have been disappointed, worried, scared, hurt, angry, etc, but the one thing that I never had to question was his love for me. I could always count on him to continue to love and support me regardless of the decisions I made.

As Derek approaches fatherhood sometime in October, I know that he will love our little candy corn more than life. I see the way that Derek interacts with other kids and know that he will be the best dad he can be. My hope is that our little man will look up to his daddy one day and love him as much as he was and is loved. I know that as long as Derek follows our true dad (God), that he will be able to show that to our son too.

Happy Father's Day to my dad and my husband who is going to be a dad!

one last thing

I forgot to mention that I think my belly has grown about 5 inches outward this week, no joke. I cannot believe how big it has grown this week, I will post a new photo on Saturday or Sunday. Let's hope that birth weights are in no way shape or form hereditary, otherwise I'll be popping out a 10lb baby.

Lopsided

My left ankle is the size of a grapefruit and my right one is regular sized. In addition to only one leg/ankle being swollen I feel like a drumstick ready to be fried. I just finished my nightly slathering of oil and lotion in a quest to prevent stretch-marks, this always leaves me feeling like something that needs to be put into frying pan and then eaten. This leads me to another thing, I have trees of veins that were nicely hidden pre-pregnancy that are now appearing and they kinda gross me out. I remind myself of one of the bodies in the bodies exhibit where it was all veins in blue. Seeing veins reminds me of blood, which reminds me of needles, and reminds me that at 28 weeks I have to drink the nasty syrup stuff, wait an hour and then get stabbed by a HUGE needle and blood sucked out for a stupid test. Women have been getting pregnant and delivering healthy babies for centuries, and never had to give blood 3 different times while being pregnant. One last gripe, when the baby kicks it has a very similar feel to gas in my tummy. I feel like an 85 year old lady : (

One of the foods I miss...

Sushi. I saw this TV show tonight and it was talking about different types of sushi that celebs ordered at this new restaurant in New York. The 2 rolls they mentioned, which happened to be my favorite rolls are: spicy tuna roll and shrimp tempura roll. I am serious when I say that the first thing I want to eat after giving birth is a big honkin spicy tuna roll from Sansu.

Other than my massive desire for sushi, I don't really have set cravings. When I watch TV and see all of the food commercials I start drooling and am ready to order take out from all of the places they show, which have mainly been Olive Garden and Pizza Places. Thankfully they have the commercials rolling so that a nasty Arby's commercial airs right after Olive Garden and they show 5 of their roast nastys and it makes me lose my appetite. This is good news for Derek because it means he doesn't have me asking him at random hours of the night to go get a certain food!

Belly Picture 21/22 Weeks

Here is a belly picture taken yesterday, full 21 weeks pregnant on the verge of 22 weeks (5 1/2 months for non pregnant friends :) )

Videos of the Baby

I finally have most of the videos from my ultrasound uploaded, you can view all of them from this link: http://www.screencast.com/t/yJva71iQz . Each video is 3 seconds long, enjoy!

I win again!

Here's a quick summary of my fight with Alliance. Friday morning I did not go into the office with my appointment paper, because I slept in. I was really sick last week, and I think that worked in my favor with the doctor's office. Normal Arwen would have gone off on the lady at the office on Thursday about my appointment...sick Arwen just wanted it to be over and wanted to go to bed. I did call the office on Friday and spoke to the office manager and shared with her my frustrations and concerns about continuing as a patient, and I did make sure to tell her about Emily's bad attitude. She had me fax her the sheet so she could address the problem with the appropriate person (EMILY), and she apologized profusely and told me that she would speak with the people involved, because this behavior was not acceptable. I felt satisfied with that response.

Yesterday was my rescheduled complete ultrasound, and my mom went with me. I think that my son is going to come running out when he is born. All he does is move, kick, turn, flip, etc all the time. I start to wonder if he ever sleeps !! During the ultrasound, he didn't seem to be too happy that the technician was pushing down on his space, so he decided he would move the entire time!! The benefit of him moving around so much is that the ultrasound tech was able to see all of his parts and make sure that he was healthy and growing. The one surprising thing we learned yesterday is that our little pee wee has huge feet in comparison to the rest of his body. It seems to me that we are going to have a very tall little boy on our hands very soon! Here are some pictures from the ultrasound.

And here is a cool video (3 seconds long) that shows him moving around. If you can figure out what you're looking at on the right-hand side is his head, and the thing that's moving up and down is his hand...he keeps moving it towards his mouth, but didn't seem to get it in!

Latest Doctor Nightmare

I know I should switch practices, but I am honestly torn right now because I really like the doctors at Alliance and they will be delivering my baby - not the nurses, receptionists, schedulers, and every other mean person there. That being said, today was supossed to be my "big" 20 week ultrasound where they measure my little candy corn to make sure he is growing properly and all that fun stuff. Since Derek couldn't go with me, I asked my mother-in-law if she would like to go (they give me weird looks when I go alone), so she made the hour long drive up to join in. I get to the office around 10:15 (my appt was for 10:30), and about 5 minutes after signing in they call me up to the front desk. I was in a good mood and excited to see how our baby was growing so I had a smile on my face. The receptionist looks at me and rudely says, "you're sure in a good mood today", and then proceeds to tell me that my appointment was yesterday. I respond by telling her that all of my paperwork says today, and she asks me if I have any of it on me. Of course I don't - I don't just walk around with all of my appointment cards in my purse on hand at all times. It was on my fridge at home, right where it should be! She then goes off on me about how people NEVER miss their complete ultrasound. I asked her why I was never called, and why they don't leave voicemails with their appointment reminder phone calls. She didn't have an answer and asked me to go sit down and wait so they could "figure out what to do with me". I go sit down and am pretty frustrated, because I know my appointment was scheduled for today and not yesterday!! I may have pregnancy brain, but I don't miss my appointments. She finally calls me back up and says that they can't fit me in for 1.5 weeks, and that this is a huge inconvenience for them, and I will need to bring proof with me next time I come in that shows my appointment card being written for June 4, 2009. Thank you Emily the evil scheduler who gave me the wrong appointment. I think she has a personal vendetta against me. Since I have an appointment scheduled in 2 weeks, I ask her if I can just have that one be changed to be my complete one. She huffs and puffs and tells me that I cannot go 4 weeks without having an ultrasound, because I'm supossed to be getting them every 2 weeks, and this is very bad for my baby (I'm sure he's fine), for me not to have my bi-weekly one performed. If I wasn't sick and feeling so crummy, I know that the usual me would have chewed her out to the bone and demanded to speak to the doctor. However at that point it was all I could do to not cry out of frustration and hatred for every person in that office.

The good news, I WAS RIGHT! Derek got home from work and checked my appointment cards, and guess what date they say: June 4. So what am I going to do tomorrow? I'm going to get up early (this is a big deal), and walk myself into that office and show them the appointment cards I have showing June 4, 2009, and then I'm going to ask to speak to a doctor. I'm going to share with the doctor just what I feel about their practice and let them know that I am seriously considering changes practices if this continues. I know I have given them too many chances, but I do not meet with a doctor each time, I have only met with a doctor 2 times so far, today would have been the third, so I have not had the opportunity to share how terrible their staff make me feel. Stress is the last thing I need right now, and going to see this office every 2 weeks puts me on edge. I could scream right now, but I'll refrain.