As promised, here's some of the shots from my shower that took place on the 25th. (Thanks to my Aunt Terri who took so many shots it was tough to decide what should be up here!)

My sister and mom did a fantastic job of welcoming Baby K. We had friends and family that traveled from as far as Toledo Ohio and Detroit to be there. It meant so much to look around and see people who have touched my life from as far back as when I was two. These women have provided me with so many examples of motherhood...they say it takes a village and mine certainly showed up at the shower.

Thanks to all of you reading this that were in attendance and to my family for the blessing of the day they gave Max and me. It was a lovely afternoon!

Talk about blessings...this table is only a small representation of the gifts friends and families have bestowed upon us since learning we were pregnant. Since Max's family is all across the country, none of them were able to physically be at the shower, but all have sent their love and prayers on quilt squares that are being transformed into a receiving blanket, as well as much needed items for Baby K's arrival!


Watch out Martha Stewart. Greeting us at the gift table was this homemade bouquet made from various baby care items. We counted over 35 things, from burp cloths to rattles, hidden as flowers in the arrangement! Amazing!

The room, holding about 45 guests, was decorated with centerpieces of balloons, a stuffed animal, a book and a toy. Each table had a theme. My table was "Mother Goose" and featured a stuffed goose whose back opened and revealed small animals with plush books that matched each critter (three little pigs, attached to a piggie, etc.) Tables ranged from puppies to monkeys and everything in between. So far our nursery looks like a jungle thanks to the table centerpieces alone!

Max (and my dad) attended the lunch portion of the shower, as well as re-entered the room of mommies at the end of the shower to open a special daddy gift.... a diaper changing survival kit. Max entertained the crowd by trying it on. It included a mask, tongs, deoderizer, gloves, and face mask.

We got our diaper bag!!! I was so excited since this thing is super high tech. Is this what motherhood is all about? Before I was pregnant, this type of excitement was reserved for concert tickets or an amusement park!


I was assisted by this lovely crew. Mary and Josie ran gifts, while little Alia was my ribbon collector. And of course, my sister Kirstyn was on hand to write down gifts and keep the narative flowing.

My dad, Tom, Max, and myself. They helped balance the estrogen in the room!


More gift opening!

The mother goose table arrangement.

The prize for shower gift creativity goes to my Aunt Terri and Grandparents. They gave us a rocking horse that "Nays" and has a mechanical head. Cali is questioning if she's been replaced since it is very entertaining. She officially will not enter the front room since it has appeared!


Max's Birthday was a few days after the shower. His dad and step-mom Patti sent him a great gift, along with this very funny one! Max may already be using the ear plugs since I use the bathroom 6 times a night and he wakes up very early!

30 Weeks

Hey all! Here's the news from GR:
- Max's team won an amazing game Friday night. Not only did they beat a rival team, but they did so with a team nearly twice their size! It was fantastic to watch. Final score, 20 / 14. Best of all, we had lost 3 kinds in the last few weeks (all starters and 2 of which were captains) due to some bad behavior and we've won both the weeks without them. It proves that heart wins every time.

- Work has again been nuts but is starting to slow down to a normal pace (I hope). I am having a hard time working at a fire pace all day and then coming home and not sleeping for 12 hours. A website that I've been working really hard on launched Friday, www.Faithgirlz.com. That's a relief.

- We are starting to receive gifts galore. As you can see below, we received our travel system from Grandma Nora (Max's Mom) this weekend, as well as our glider from my parents. Stuff is starting to come together.

- Sunday I volunteered at the Grand Rapids Marathon with the non-profit I help with, CASA. We had a team of runners complete both the the 26 mile race and the half marathon, while raiseing money for our charity. I got to see the sunrise over the Grand Rapids skyline, hang with my CASA buddies and spend a day outside!

- This week's check up went great. I start going every 2 weeks until December. Then every week after that. Heartrate was high 140s. Weight gain on track.

- We met with my yoga instructor last night at our house last night. Kriste is also a Doula. We learned some great strategies for natural child birth (no drugs and no medical interventions like drug inducing, breaking water, etc) including relaxaation techniques, yoag stretches and more to help prep us. It's makeing us more confident that we can do this on our own if given the time and space at the hospital.

Max's team taking the field.

The post game speech.

Some assembly required.

To all Max's Ithaca boys, this must look pretty strange to see Max with a stroller!

Me at 30 weeks.

Accidental Tourists: Our First Trip to the Hospital!

Hi all,

Eventful week. Let me preference this post by noting that both me and baby are just fine....

Thursday evening after work, our neighbor's 110 lb lab (actually Cali's cousin) was especially happy to see Cali and I. Zack is the clumsiest, goofiest dog ever and very uncoordinated. Pair that with his excitement and you'll see how he very easily mowed me down in our driveway! Zach ran after Cali full force from 2 frontyards away and ended up running directly into my legs, causing me to land on my stomach and then hit my face on the cement. (To those who know my propensity for falling, I can honestly claim I had nothing to do with this one.)

Once I collected myself and got inside, a different neighbor called. She had seen the fall and wanted to take me to the hospital. Thanks to her encouragement, I called Max and he came home from coaching the JV football game to take me in. (it is 6 minutes from school to our house and 3 minutes from our house to hospital.) I have to say that Spectrum Butterworth Hospital was amazing. Within 10 minutes of Max dropping me at the emergency doors,  I was wisked up to a special triage unit in the Labor and Delivery section of the hospital, had my own birthing suite (the same kind I will have come Christmas) and was hooked to both fetal heart-rate and contraction monitors. The ER had a 3 hour wait that night, but apparently having a teary pregnant woman in your waiting rooms is bad for business!

The normal chain of events is that the docs watch you for 4 hours and then you're released if you've had no contractions. Come 11pm Thursday night, we thought we were out of the woods and headed home, but the nurses said I had been having contractions and needed to stay a full 23 hours for observation to be sure that the the placenta did not separate from the uterus. Apparently contractions can feel a lot like a baby kicking, so much so I did not even realize I was having them. We did get a first-hand tour of the birthing suite...It's pretty amazing all the hidden gadgets and how comfortable the room actually is.

Throughout the night the contractions lessened and then stopped. My doctor even came in to see me Friday morning and check me out...she was not even on rounds or on call! Max stayed with me all day Friday until I forced him to leave at 3pm to go coach his game. My parents then came to pick me up and by 7pm Friday night I was back home and very grateful that everything was ok. I feel like I got hit by a truck, but other than that I am no worse for the wear. I have no restrictions, but was just told to take it easy and rest this weekend, which I fully did (I am still in my PJ's as I type at 5pm).

Max and I did take an excursion on Saturday to our favorite cider mill near our house, Robinette's, for some pumpkin spice donuts and cider. (See below).  And I should mention that Max's team beat Greenville Friday night, the first time in school history that any football team at any level has beat Greenville. (They're huge farm kids). And to anyone reading these posts and following West Michigan football: The team Max played 2 weeks ago was ranked by ESPN as #71 in the top 100 standing for the country. And last weeks' team, East Grand Rapids....#52. We can claim that Northview also made the ESPN list....they were mentioned as the most recent blow out for team #52.

That's all from Grand Rapids for now. We're going to try and have a less eventful week on this end of the country and produce another win this Friday against rival Creston High. Over and out.

Court, Max & Baby K

Max and I at 29 weeks. Thankfully I am not quite as big as the huge pumpkin...but close.

Bedding

Oops, sorry, but some of you wanted us to post our bedding that we got for the nursery, so here is a picture. If you cannot tell, its a paisley on one side and blue chenille on the other. And our bed skirt is straight so it will not look as feminine.

28 Weeks

It's that time again...the weekly post. I'm tired, so this week's post will be in bulleted form.

- We're doing well and I am growing larger everyday. Baby K increases movement...right when I try to go to sleep! I wasn't feeling well yesterday and headed to the doctor's but everything is fine. I just over did it the week before due to a 55-hour work week and volunteering. Nothing some rest won't cure. Also did my standard glucose test to check for gestational diabetes. (read: chug gross sugar drink and then they test your blood an hour later).  I should hear back next week Friday at my normally scheduled check up. We scheduled our birthing classes and tour today, as well as a consult with another doula (birth coach) we are considering. 

- Below are pictures from Max's football game on Friday. They played East Grand Rapids (#1 in division 2 in the state). For a while it looked promising, but did not end so. The only cool part of last week was the field was really small, so I could actually get pics of Max coaching!

- Max has been the best husband ever (again). Last week and the beginning of this week was super stressful for me due to client pitches and presentations. He picked up all the slack around the house and even just baked me muffins! 

- Some of you know, I volunteer (design and marketing consulting) with an organization called CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates...they place volunteers to advocate on behalf of abused kids that have been removed from their homes navigate the family court system). Anyhow, we had a huge mass mailing to promote our upcoming fundraiser house party. Not only did 18 volunteers (including 6 DDMers) show up for the first mass mailing drive, my mom printed labels and Max even helped me stuff the remaining 100 envelopes last night! I am so blessed to have such awesome support all around me.

Other than those tidbits, we're having a normal week. The weather is in the 70's though it rained today...but I know winter is just around the corner. Hope each of you are doing well. Love to you all.

Court, Max and Baby K

Me before a client pitch Monday. 28 weeks...I just realized that NOW I am in my third trimester....not last week.

Scenes of Max coaching his linebackers. Notice the lady in red. Three players on Max's team are hearing impaired, so there are two team translators at every practice, game and camp. It's an amazing program and is one of the coolest parts of Northview High School (it is the county hub for all hearing impaired students, so there are over 100 students in the district's program). 

Just today Max was rubbing his chin while deep in thought and a hearing impaired player jokingly gasped. Apparently Max accidentally made a not-so-kind expression for homosexual....You learn something new everyday.

Max calling the defense.

27 Weeks

Hey all,

Note: If you are getting this text in a boring looking email with no pictures from our google group, click here and see the real deal on our blog. We're still having issues with the group software not bringing you to the blog, so every time you get a notification of a new post, just visit us at the blog. You do not need to sign up for a Google account!

Needless to say, the 27th week has been crazy busy. Max's game against Lowell went badly (as we expected...remember, Lowell's the #1 team in the state.) However, we had the largest "support Max" turn out this season and marked Colin's first football game!

Saturday was spent with rearranging furniture between my parents house, Kirstyn's house and our own to make room for the nursery (former guest room for all our sleepover buddies to reference). We have a rug down and things cleared out in anticipation for the arrival of our furniture.

Saturday night we hung with our friends Carrie and Dan. Carrie and I met on a 22 hour drive to Mississippi as we volunteered after Katrina. Ionically, we had both been trying to get pregnant since then and we ended up with due dates 11 days apart! Talk about a blessing (and a relief since there's nothing worse than getting pregnant when you know your friend is trying and its not going well....as most of my friends will tell you while we were trying and they were pregnant.) They've been a great means of support since we share a lot of what we're learning with each other.

The rest of the weekend was spent with me both Max and I working all day Sunday. Work is insanely busy and I am trying to do my best to find balance. I am not sure if it's pregnancy or stress or both, but the heartburn is starting. 

Yoga kicked my ass this week. Who makes pregnant ladies do PLANK 5 times? We then watched the documentary The Business of Being Born. A very eye opening look into the evolution of OB medicine and how women are being stripped by societal norms of some of the rites of passages of becoming a mother....It's making us rethink a lot of how we're preparing our birth plan. Other than that, Baby K is moving more than ever. The massage therapist today actually saw the blankets moving over my stomach and was laughing. Afterwards, I was blessed to come home to the greatest husband ever, who had grocery shopped, cooked dinner and had it waiting for me! Honestly, I don't know what I did to be so blessed.

That's all for now crew! We hope each of you are doing well!

Love Court, Max & Baby K (and Cali too).

 

Colin's first football game and a chance for Mindy and Kev to get out of the house! 

Josie wearing the jersey that Max scored for her. Josie and Mary are my constant football companion and incidentally make great back rest on bleacher seats. 

Mary eating skittles since this is the snack we ate the last/only time the team won. As she was rubbing my stomach in the concession stand line, I caught her talking to my tummy and introducing herself to the baby as his/hers "kind of cousin". So cute!

Kirstyn and her boyfriend Eric made it the game too. Too bad it was Lowell. 

Max and I doing a comparison of stomach girth after dessert with friends at Bistro Bella Vita. I finally beat him at something (besides Wii boxing)!