Scrapbook mystery boxes for sale!!

Anyone interested? they are flat rate priority boxes, the ones that ship for $9 something, PACKED with cardstock, Patterned paper, partial kits from various kit clubs, embellishements- stickers, rubons, lumpy stuff, etc. If there's a category of stuff you don't use, like you don't want partial kits, or you don't like cardstock, or whatever i can lightly customize, but i can't provide pics or tell you exactly what is in them because that would take forever and i'm not supposed to spend much time on my FEET right now, so the price is reflective of that! i'm asking $25 ppd for each box if you'd like them mailed, or if you live locally to me $16 each. I accept paypal, checks, money orders, etc, and might be willing to barter :-)

I'm trying to declutter my bedroom so its fit to house 2 more small humans :-)
Thanks!
Rebecca

24 week appointment

Was today... and it was nightmarish, but with a good outcome. I'll explain. First, the babies are doing great, and i'm NOT dialating, so that's good.

What is nightmarish? well from the very beginning, it was SOMETHING. First the ultrasound. Baby A was COMPLETELY still. And it took a LONG time to find his heartbeat because he was all wrapped up around himself, kind of wadded up in a ball, and when i THOUGHT i saw his heart, NOT moving, it was really his stomach, the US tech showed me his heart which was a bit obscured but visibly beating. thank GOD! but it was a HORRIBLE few seconds there.

Ok, so NEXT, was the awful icky SPECULUM and while we'd decided to do my pap AFTER the babies were born, he figured why not go ahead and do it since he was doing a vaginal ultrasound anyway :-( :-( Well, my cervix is hard to access, and it was SO SO SOOO uncomfortable, not to mention psychologically with my ISSUES with being around strange men half naked. Well, it didn't work. So no pap, no cervical swab to look for preterm labor but we were able to see that my cervix was still nice and long, meaning i'm not dialating, which is awesome. So the next goal is to get to 28 weeks, then to 32, and then to 35 or so. The babies are really big. He kept marveling over and over about how big they are. Well, big deal, my babies are ALL big. They were still healthy and just fine. Not everyone follows a perfect chart of averageness. So they are in the 94th and 95th percentile and thought to be about 1 lb 12 oz so far :-) Which "I" anyway, think is a good thing!!!!

So then i went to the part of the appt afterword where we go over my blood sugar and all that.. basically, its not great but its not bad enough to warrant insulin so that's awesome. I'm kind of all over the place. But i do have to make pretty serious changes to my diet and be super super deliberate about EVERY little thing i eat. and i'm grumpy and chocolate deprived, and NOT happy about the whole situation, i'm doing it anyway, except that tonight i'm having a peice of Chloe's birthday cake and thats completely non-negotiable, so there.

I can't have my carnation instant breakfast anymore for breakfast which completely SUCKS because its the ONLY thing that appeals to me and i'm SICK of being nauseated all the time and just want to eat what feels good. I know, selfish.

Ok, so then we got into restrictions. No more grocery shopping unless i'm in a motorized cart or wheelchair. That just seems WEIRD to me, and I already feel like a freak on display. Especially when alex points out to EVERYONE that i'm having twins, at which point you can see people mentally counting my children, and making some sort of shocked gesture. Well, get over it people! UGG. ANd i HATE being dependent on others for stuff. Especially Andy. If i want something, i have to rely on HIM to get it, and that just plain SUCKS! i HATE IT, i want to do it myself.

So anyway, the last half a week or so has been trying, really really hard... as you can probably tell by my fabulous mood right now, and today just added to it all. At least my dad is back in MN now. It was a HARD visit, and he's coming again next month, and honestly, i don't know how i'm going to find the emotional where with all to be able to deal with it. He's demanding, and ALWAYS gets his way, and I have to cram all my kids into one small bedroom, and he doesn't have any kind of idea what is realistic for us as a large family. Honestly, i dont' know how i'm going to deal with that. My sister's coming too at least which is awesome. But i just feel like i have SO MUCH stress right now, that i can't take anymore, but he doesn't take no for an answer. I have NO power in this relationship. He gets his way, ALWAYS. I'm SO FRUSTRATED.

Anyway, this is my life right now. Hope i can post more positively next time. PRAYERS PLEASE!!!!
Rebecca

near death experience.

WOW. Last night the most incredible, horrendous, scary thing happened! Andy and I had dropped off the older 4 at LOGOS, and were going out on our semi-date night with Leif, and had gone to barnes and Noble, and while there, Leif had gotten a poopy diaper. Well, we stopped at the parking lot outside the restaurant we were going to, and Andy was going to change Leif and i was going to go in ahead and get us seats and order, to reduce the time we'd need to wait and make sure we could pick up the children on time. Anyway, i was walking through the parking lot and approaching the main drag where cars drive, right in front of the restaurant. I saw a guy walking toward his car, he made eye contact, which i thought was kind of odd, had a serious look on is face, got into his car, all the while i'm approaching that main drag. Well in NO time he TORE out of his parking spot and barreled toward me! he missed me by less than 5 feet, i'm not sure exactly how much, but it SCARED the bejeebes out of me! oh my gosh, a couple people in a van saw and looked at me, like "WHOA" and i was just so in shock that i paused for a minute and went into the restaurant. When Andy got in i was like, "did you SEE that guy!? and Andy said, YEAH, he left a trail of burned rubber from his tire! It was CRAZY. We contemplated how if he HAD hit me, the speed would have surely killed me and the babies. And we wondered if at 23 weeks i was far enough along for him to be charged with 3 homicides. It was THAT close. And we thought about what would have happened had Leif NOT been in the car with Andy. we'd have been slower. Would we have been able to get him out of the way? It really reinforced to me how much God is in control, and while things seem to randomly happen, and while it seems like i could be taken out at any second by a rogue crazy person, I know that that's NOT the case. But it still makes you think.

Decluttering sucess!!!

Ok, so the girls room was the WORST in the house.. i WISH i took before pictures, but here's some AFTER pictures! i'm SO pleased at the nearly all day venture Alex and i undertook to make their room look nice!! The rocking chair i got at deseret thrift store, $30 woohoo! and is temporary till we get my living room baby nook carved out, but the girls LOVE it, it will be hard to take away from them!

My appt today

It went pretty well! Not ALL the answers i wanted to get but overall, i'm ok with what's going down. First of all, i meet with the nurse, mostly, and she is about the sweetest person you'll ever meet, and she's so diplomatic, andy was really impressed with how she suggested i not be so confrontational in a really super diplomatic way, LOL! No, but really, she's great, and all the techs are nice and i'm getting more used to the dr. And i am fairly certain i'm staying with them at this point.

Anyway, here's what i found out.

1. vaginal vs. Csec for me will be determined by how baby "A" is positioned. If he's head down, i'm good to go. My biggest (non baby health related) fear is that i'll deliver A naturally, and then have to have a section for B! UGG. so if B is transverse or breech, that will throw a kink into my plans and i may well just opt for a section at that point, well see.

2. If i have the go ahead for a regular birth, then the only real restrictions are that i have to have an IV or an IV port, the babies have to be monitored at all times, ie, no WATER :-( and i THINK thats it... I don't have to deliver in the OR. There WILL be a minimum of 5 people present, which is a bummer but it makes sense. not ideal but i can manage.

3. Babies are looking good, both hearts still beating! one is on my left side, (B) and one is on my right.. they are both currently head down! so if they can stay put another 15 weeks or so i'm good to go :-)


So overall, a very positive experience. I feel a lot of peace about the whole thing... OH one bit of bad news. The office person that told me my 1 hour test blood sugar was fine was wrong. it was slightly elevated, so they sent me home with a blood tester, and so far so good! i just have to track my blood sugars for a couple days and call them in, which itself is a good sign, the dr. isn't making me take a 3hr test yet, so YAY!!

I think that's it! I'd totally appreciate continued prayer.. still have a lot on my mind, and i'll feel MUCH better next week after my 2 ultrasounds, vaginal and regular to see how my cervix is doing. I've been having a fair amount of cramping but its hard to tell what is normal creakyness and what is a real concern.

:-)
rebecca

Family of origin issues.

Why is it that being pregnant, birth, and the like have SUCH an effect of directing one's thought toward family of origin? For me, this is really HARD. My mother basically told me she didn't want anything to do with me, when i refused to have any kind of relationship with my stepfather who has molested me since i was a baby. I had recently told her, and she called me a liar, until he admitted it to her, and that didn't change anything. I got back in contact with her a few years ago... when Anna was a baby. Rather, i got in contact with my Grandma, and my mother called me to yell at me and "how dare you talk to your grandma" me, and despite that, we had a couple of non-heated email conversations until she just ignored me. My grandma's number was changed and i've not yet been able to find her. Not sure if that was intentional, for my benefit, or just kind of in the swing of things. Anyway, my mother, she's never made any attempt whatsoever to even MEET her grandchildren, she just plain doesn't care. And that GETS me. I don't understand that. I'm a mom, and that would absolutely KILL me. The thing is, i KNOW i have absolutely ZERO fault in the whole scenario, and how often can you really say that truthfully? Basically this is me being beaten over the head by her and it doesn't ever seem to go AWAY! Especially now, just about everyone asks if i have family coming up to help with the babies, and how they wouldn't have survived their twins' first few months without help, and i have to say, NOPE, don't have any. And that's not entirely true. Andy's dad is going to come up this summer sometime, for his annual visit, and he's AWESOME, he's just such a positive and NICE guy. We've really loved how our relationship with Danny has blossomed and how we've gotten to know him and he's gotten to know our children! MUCH more than any of our other parents. NOW, that's not to insult andy's OTHER dad, LONG story, LOL but he's only had a few years to get to know us, another long story, and he and his wife are SUPER busy and yet they still make time to come up to visit at least every other year. And we talk to them on the phone and they are SUPPORTIVE. Now, if only the mother situation was that good. Things are spotty with Andy's mom. Not NEARLY as crazy as with my mom, but not great, that's for sure. Especially when i'm pregnant. She doesn't like that at ALL- never has, and that ticks me off in a big way. WHY would it be so hard to just support us????? i'm not talking about paying our bills or watching our kids every week for a date night, or even coming up for a couple of weeks when we have our twins, heck, i'd be happy with just positive words. Just something better than "well, guess you'll have to get back to the real world" when andy mentioned that we'd have to have a hospital birth. I mean, COME ON! That is a BIG deal to me, BIG. how hard would it be to have just a little sensitivity. I mean WHY THE HECK is it SO FREAKING HARD to have a LITTLE bit of support for us in our time of need. And be sure, it IS our time of need! My whole world is practically upturned and i feel like we are ON OUR OWN. Now that's not exactly true. I have a GREAT bunch of friends, my local MOPS group is AWESOME, i mean really, no comparison, I just discovered a twins support group in Tacoma! Things SHOULD be good, but i just can't get past the idea that our MOTHERS should BE there for us!!!! Maybe that's just me, becuase when something is lacking in life, God totally provides some kind of substitute. But it still smarts. And i really wish things could be different.

What's new

I have to share! I am SO excited. Andy is off work for 11 days, and we are going to be cleaning and organizing! wooohoo! I'm supposed to be taking it easy, so i've been making the kiddos do all the grunt work, but it will be SO nice to have a GROWN UP here to help! So far, i've moved leif's dresser into the boys room, in the one remaining teeny tiny spot for it! and then i set up the new drawers for the babies, in my closet, it fits nicely. we still have lots of cleaning in my room to do, still need to set up the crib, which we probably don't need to do for a while but since he's on vacation this week, its probably not a bad idea, we have a LOT LOT LOT of decluttering to do! and hopefully finding some homeschool stuff to sell in the homeschool sale that i'm doing next month in May. Shouldn't be hard! I'm sick of my house being a mess, and i'm thinking if we can drastically declutter, it will be easier to maintain, ESSENTIAL if i end up on full bedrest. So... we'll see! hoping to post some pics later of my nice clean space!!! off to dinner and church! Hope you all have a blessed Easter!
Rebecca

The last week's insanity

So, Last thursday, i had an alarming visit from my landlord... long story short, i told him that we were having twins, and he was NOT impressed. To say the least. I couldn't quite get out of him whether he was upset enough to kick us out, we are on a month to month lease, which means he COULD legally boot us with 20 days notice, which for us, would be instant homelessness. It sounded BAD though, so that night we went out to Round Table to let the kids play games, have pizza and have grown up discussion time/space. So we came up with a plan and decided to have Andy call our landlord Saturday... sooo... i went through all of Friday, completely freaked out and crying almost all day (can you see a theme here, NO clue what's up with all the crying) So Saturday, he called and was told in no uncertain terms that he would NEVER do that, and he was not the kind of man who would put almost 7 children out on the street (YAY!!!!) it really left me wondering WHY Andy has so much better luck talking to people than i do!! I mean, i'm the oratorically gifted one of us, NO comparison. I wonder if being female is THAT much of a liability. ANYWAY, it seems that hurdle is jumped, and we can at least move on and not worry about being HOMELESS. YAY!

So then saturday we also went to lowes and did our annual no interest, no payments for a year trip, bought some drawers for Leif and the twins, bought an AMAZING CUSHIE rug for our living room and another lamp table for the living room, then i was up till like 1230 cleaning and stuff... but our living room looks nice.

SO... next order of business, on Sunday we got to pick up our crib from Teresa in Renton! (Thanks teresa!!!!) She volunteered to give it to us when i first posted to the HSA list about how wigged out i was about the whole twin thing, and that was a NICE load off, just one less thing to worry about! not only that but its a super NICE crib, and IKEA one! LOOOVE ikea... i could totally buy all our furniture at IKEA, IF i could buy all our furniture at IKEA! LOL so that's awesome. I'm eagerly looking forward to garage sale season to seek out some baby stuff, totally pregnant at the perfect time for that, provided these little guys stay IN!

YESTERDAY was so beautiful out and today too, we actually did our schoolwork on the front lawn. I noticed it was a LOT harder to have my laying down in bed time, (a significant amount each day that i'm supposed to be doing now) So i guess i'll need to have prescribed front yard time for everyone so i can watch them and then just make them stay in the back the rest of the day that they want to be outside....

I'm having REAL issues with keeping the house clean right now.. i need to declutter BADLY, not easy right now... and NO one listens to me! i'm so grateful at the end of the day when ANDY gets home because he commands respect in a way that i don't think i ever could. I really need to work on character training before the baby comes... NOT to mention getting Leif to sleep in his OWN bed... sigh.. he's such a snugglebug...

Over and out-
R