two weeks or less, people

i honestly cant believe that my daughter is going to be here (on the outside breathing air) in possibly  matter of days.
DAYS

i have been vacillating between elated and "what the?!" the past few days. today she was wallering around a bunch and making me nauseous . and that makes me feel like... "ok, it's time for you to get out."

speaking of getting out.
here is a most recent shot of our dogs who hear the command "get out" quite a bit....

 i thought they had mastered it, and even were privy to the areas they were not allowed into in the first place. like the garden behind them, for instance. they know not to go in there. but the lush vegetation you see there is the third round of planting for this year. they dug out our first two attempts. they didn't jump over the knee high fence, though they are both more than capable. hazel (on the right) is more polite, she works the latch and goes in through the gate.
oh well. we've wired the gate shut and the plants are doing well. even picked three squash today!
we're practically a nursery.
speaking of nursery.....

we've got lucy's room all set up!
there are some sweet little details that i hope will be special.
like the jar of cotton is from our wedding. i made the bird mobile from hankies i had as a little girl. the crib is the one my sisters and two nephews and a niece have been in as babies. the cradle is the one my husband and most of the nibblings on his side have been in.
the little shoes hanging in the tree are from my time in macedonia. the silver cup and spoon are from my husband's grandmother when she was a baby. my husbands other grandmother made the blanket on the crib. the nesting dolls are from my mom. she brought them to me from a trip she and my dad took to alaska when i was little.
anyhoo....
i am super excited about it all and feel so good to have it all put together as of the day before yesterday.... it was a wreck until then!


i like to just go sit in there are look at it at least a couple times a day. can't believe this is really happening!

4.5 weeks to go. really?

i can not believe we are only a month out from meeting the newest member of the family.
thus far it has been a very smooth and easy pregnancy - for which i am very grateful. seriously.
things have started to feel more along the lines of "normal", though over the past week or so.
sleeplessness. indigestion. waddling instead of walking. grunting any time i have to stand up. you know - all of those things... but i am still having it pretty easy - i would say.

i just know that there is mega change coming around the bend. and i know that most of it can't even be understood or imagined without actually going through it.
like "what to expect when you're expecting" was a funny movie 9 months ago. but today it was funnier and sadder and truer. or like how dilbert is funny, but when you work in a cubicle it all makes sense and is less funny-ha-ha and more like real life....
i know delivery is going to hurt - and i know i don't even know the intensity of the pain without going through it.
i know motherhood will challenge all my selfish tendencies - and i know there is selfishness in me i don't even know i have yet.
i know it will be exhausting, especially the first few months - and i know i don't even know what tired is until i go through this.
i know that my love and joy in this sweet baby will be deep - but i have no idea what depths even exist.
i know i will learn so much about the character of God in this new phase of life - but i can't even begin to imagine what that will mean and how He will reveal Himself and what it will cost me in giving up my little ideas of Him. (though KNOWING Him better is worth any price)
i know this is going to be the hardest and best thing i will ever do - but how could i even guess at how hard and how great it will be?

sometimes i get a little freaked out about being a mom. about bringing a child into this jacked up world. about all the change. about all the things that will be forever left behind. about the expense both financially and emotionally and physically. about how much i don't know and will need to learn. about failing.
but then the sweet tender voice of God comes in (through His Word, my husband, my memory of His faithfulness, my sisters' and mother's experience and wisdom...)and He reminds me that this is His baby and He is entrusting her to me and Jeff and He is faithful.
 He is faithful.
 HE is.
He is faithful in equipping us for whatever the next step may be. He is faithful in our faithlessness and failings. His plan cannot be thwarted. He is good.

and then i breathe deeply and let my tension and anxiety roll off my shoulders.
so thankful.

seriously? february? that was the last time i even had my lap-top out? what the?
any morw questions? or reasons to use a question mark in the first paragraph of this post?
huh?
so here i sit, burning through episodes of last man standing on netflix. i have dedicated the better part of this day to intentionally doing nothing. zilch. i feel like i earned it.
yesterday i subbed junior high. i guess i was due for another reminder, or "booster shot" as my mom would call it, for why i ONLY sub high school. ONLY. EVER.
i could see liking and 8th grader as an individual being. but groups of them? hah! yeah right.
the smallest class size was 30 students. at one point it was so stinky and sweaty-hot i really thought i could pass out. and what a relief that would have been.
there's no real specific incident to site, but it was more just a string of mildly irritating events mounting and building until my crank-o-meter was maxed out. i had little EIGHTH graders cussing and disrespecting all flipping day.

boy: *bloop* (water drop noise that some can make on their cheeks)
me: hey, quit that.
boy: what?
me: please stop making noises
boy: oh.
me: staring him down. blinking. staring.....
me: yes ma'am?
boy: oh. yes ma'am.

-

boy: after 20 minutes of class: i need a pencil
me: you've been here twenty minutes and still don't even have a pencil?
boy: nothing
10 minutes later
boy: still hasn't make a single mark on his paper and is crumpling up trash and trying to throw it from his chair to the trash can
me: get up and throw it away then get busy on your work
boy: nothing
5 minutes later
me: walking by his desk i point to the pile of trash by his desk: please throw away your trash.
boy: picks up the trash and tosses it under the desk nest to his. the boy in that desk pushes it back over. and boy 1 says "bastard"
me: whip around and say, no you throw away the trash like i asked.
boy: this is pathetic
me: well go tell the principal about it. get out.

-

me: for the SEVENTH time, your instructions are to not talk and finish your assignment.

-

why is it that Hispanic girls LOVE to touch pregnant bellies?

-

my hands sweat a lot lately. and with the body heated class room and my body heated body it was clammy all up on my palms all day.

-


i know i know... life is so hard. but seriously. i earned a do-nothing day.

that and growing a baby can be exhausting.


here we are about 9 weeks out. and getting pumped.
we got the baby room painted and it is going to look so cute!
i was a pretty fun process to work out the plan and execute it with my engineer husband. he is something else.and now we have expertly measured and painted stripes on two of the four walls.

the third trimester has been significantly less traumatic, thus far, than i anticipated. i just hope this trend continues.

a while back when i had gotten worked up over some horror story i'd read online and was certain i'd experience my dear man made a very simple and convicting and good statement.
you should work on having scripture to remember when you fret over something instead of reading up about it.
you need to trust God more than you trust Google.
yowza.
what a good thing to have said. so i have been way more careful about reading anything that can cause needless worry.

so i will leave you with that.
how can you trust God more in the every day stuff every day?

the days just seem to be rolling on through lately. i'll look up and it's almost like i missed a whole week. i just realized that the second trimester is more than half way over... by the end of march i'll be entering into the third one - the last one!
as baby has been been growing so have the emotional and spiritual and physical challenges - but the cool part is KNOWING that all of these challenges are working to prepare me for what is to come. praise God for that. without Him and His purpose behind it - this would be madness.
seriously - i never would have thought that gaining weight - especially weight related to growing a baby - would throw me for such a loop. it turns out that the shape of my body is a bigger deal to me than i've ever really recognized. hm. i don't like that it is such a deal - makes me see my selfishness and yuck.
and then there's the funny(ish) challenges like my abs not working like they used to, so i have already adapted a roll technique for getting out of bed. hah. or the needing to not stray too far from a bathroom for too long. i have to pee all the time. gross, i know, but fact.
just the day before yesterday husband and i took the dogs out to a sporting clay and bird dog ranch to let them "hunt" some birds. i was sure to use the bathroom before we left and about 15 minutes into the 30 minute drive i was ready to go again. so we stopped at a little quick shop on the way there. their restrooms were out of order. i even tried letting my stomach out as far as i could when i asked where the nearest on would be. (in my head i was thinking that all 6 of the employees there must had a secret bathroom they use) but, though they noticed my belly, they did not take take pity.... so then i had to ask husband to drive up to the little clubhouse on the ranch, fortunately it was unlocked. whew!
maybe when i'm bigger i'll get employee only bathroom privileges....


only two weeks to go until we wing our way to beautiful hawaii!!!
it promises to be a fantastic trip. can. not. wait.


now, for those two weeks.... i will sub and who knows what else. i'm sure they will fly by like all the other days have been doing lately.
i hope that i can savor them though. ever so often i have the abrupt realization that things are changing, and they are about to change in a big way forever.
i want to enjoy the time until then. and enjoy the process. and enjoy life.....
i'm always open for insight and suggestions on how to do that...

what the....?

people continually baffle me.
today for instance, i was sitting at a tall table by the window in a starbucks. the window tables in this particular establishment are pretty small and closely positioned. anyhoo. i was minding my own business writing a letter when a man (boy-man) came and sat at the next table... not with his back to me, as would have been the normal person thing to do, but facing me. it felt like we were sitting at the same table. having lived in some larger cities and been in eastern europe for a time - i can usually deal with the occasional intrusion on my personal space, but this was weird. then he proceeded to eat his pungent garlic bagel.... did i say eat? i meant thoroughly masticate with a gaping mouth and audible smacking much like our aging "old man dog" does when he is loving him some canned dog food. seriously. it was loud and gross and all up in my bid-ness.
this act was especially heinous because, a i looked around - avoiding an accidental eye contact situation, i saw that there was at least 5 other table options available.
what the....?
and THEN when he was done smacking in my face he picked up his backpack and moved to a different table.
WHY?

also, under the WHY? category. does anyone know a person (over the age of 8) who says valentiMes day? with a distinct M instead of N at the end? this high school girl in one of my classes yesterday must have said it 20 times.... or would that be 20 tines?


speaking of valentiNNNNNNNNes day, although my husband was gone for work he still made it a sweet day and even sent me a pentatonix album on itunes. and i found a sweet note he'd left hidden for me. what a great man. i am continually surprised and blessed and humbled by his love for me. and it is so cool that i can honestly say i love him more and more as time ticks by.




currently i am re-reading Redeeming Love. it is an amazing book. i highly recommend it to any who have not yet read it. the theme is so good. and i feel like i am even learning from it again, new stuff this time. i think it is really neat to read books again that you have loved before - especially when you are in a different phase of life - it can take on a whole new meaning. like reading scripture that speaks directly to your situation and then in a totally different situation it is applicable again - but in a fresh way and deeper understanding.... so good.


some of what i am taking away from RL this time has to do with the fact that we will soon have a sweet little baby in our family. raising a person can be a scary thing. beautiful wonderful exciting and scary. so much responsibility and so much influence on how a person will understand and relate to the world around them... i don't see how anyone could take on that task without the Lord Almighty as their strength. also - i was reading in a dog training book today about how puppies are always learning, good or bad, they are learning.... same thing with kids. in every situation they learn something... isn't that wild. and it's up to us as parents and families to make sure what they are learning is truth. it's no wonder there are so many screwed up people in this world....
sorry. i can easily spin off into "what's wrong with the world" thoughts if i don't look out.


well my belly has officially gone pregnant. the sacker at Albertson's was gawking at it and then asked if i was having a kid. that was my first time to be asked about it. i've been feeling it move for a couple weeks now. it is awesome. there is a lot of change going on with my body and i am just along for the ride and trying not to go all crazy. being more aware that there is a living human inside of me has been helping me finally get some perspective on how i look at and feel about my weight gain/shape shifting experience. what an emotional mine field... haha. poor husband. (btw he is doing amazing at being supportive and understanding and all.)


i have had ten million "blogworthy" thoughts and experiences lately, but for the sake of not making a way too long entry for today - i'll just have to come back to some of them.
i'm going to try to write more and share more in the days to come.


the other day i was reading a friend's blog and it was really inspiring. so thanks, Carlie Linde. keep up the good work.

today is mostly supposed to be about choring. but i happened to get nline to look up some albums i was thinking about and then pinterest had to be looked at and yadda yadda.... here i am.
though it has been a fairly productive morning. vacuumed, swept, mopped... put bathroom cleaning bucket by the bathroom... made lunch, cleaned out the fire place, thought about cleaning the bathroom, disciplined my dog for digging yet another hole, dusted all the wood in the living room... put some puzzle pieces into the puzzle my clever sister gave us for Christmas. progress on that has slowed dramatically now that the only pieces left are white. (cue liz lemon and her recap of her summer activities... mostly which puzzles she did  "that one was really hard. a lot of white")

lately i've been in a schlog. or funk. or lazy cloud of aimlessness. whatever you want to call it. my husbands work schedule has been fairly light over the holidays so that we have had a lot of free time. and since it's not yet spring the chore list is relatively small. i'm sure there is always something that can be done. but we are still in winter hibernation mode i guess. so there's been lots of movie watching (saving mr. banks and the secret lif of walter mitty were both great! thank you hollywood for finally releasing movies that are not filled with degrading and demoralizing trash.)

the secret life of walter mitty has a strange reference to benjamin button and the new puppy we got has a "benjamin button mouth" (all wrinkly) ad so today we wanted to revisit the movie. i have it on a hard drive and spent a significant amount of time this morning trying to figure out how to get it to play on our tv. turns out it can't. but in the process i stumbled across a lot of photos and videos and audio recordings from my time in macedonia (also on hard drive). it was quite a little trip down memory lane. crazy how much time has passed since that venture.

the other day i called my friends there to let them know there is a baby on the way. it was wild how much language came back to me - and even more how much i could still understand of them. though it has digressed a little - i was still blessed by that reminder of how God made sure i learned their language.... and then those photos and things were another reminder of the great things God did there - though there were several little reminders of the sad things and things that did not go well, too.  but all is under his watchful eye - and all things will work together for the good of those who love him and are called to him... and he will complete every good work he begins.... good things to count on.

the bathroom wont clean itself, as it turns out.
so i must.
least favorite chore.

the new

2014 has started off with a tragedy in our family.
Minnie, our beloved little weird dog, has passed on. she lost her mind and jumped our 6 foot fence when our neighborhood was lit up with fireworks.  we were not home at the time, she was already gone by the time we returned. the next morning my sweet husband found her on the highway near our house. she had been hit and from what he said, it was a pretty severe end. thankfully he would not let me see her when he brought her back to put in the grave he dug in our alley. poor dog.
she was quirky and manipulative and flat our mean to hazel at times, but she was also a great hunter, loved being petted and sitting in laps. she barked too much and wiped eye boogers on my pant legs, but also she heeled and followed commands eagerly. she waited to eat just so she could eat slowly while the other dogs looked on and drooled. she would take hazel's toys and guard them, just so hazel couldn't have them. she was creepy at times with her staring and lurking - but she had the sweetest face that i could rarely pass up petting and praising her.
good dog.
she will be missed.

2014 will also hold great joy as we add a new niece or nephew (any day now!!!!!!)
and then June 30 (or there abouts) will bring us a son or daughter!
woweee!
... and then there is the possibility of a new puppy as well to fill the void that minnie left in my dear husband's hunting party.

for now, i must go paint a box.
for later - maybe more bloggin.