davejenbarnes

A rare moment - because of the cat, originally uploaded by davejenbarnes.

I was napping in Marty the Recliner when David got home from work one day last week. David found me and as Mambo was walking into the baby’s room to greet him (our cats come running to say hi when we get home) and of course, David reached down and picked up Mambo. Well, Mambo ended up being placed by Dave on my lap, and if you know Mambo very well, you know that he is NOT a lap cat. No way. That is Samba’s job. Not his. He must have either been an exhausted kitty or just found Marty extraordinarily comfortable because he stayed there for about 10 minutes.

Wierd cat.

silly Barneses, uploaded by davejenbarnes.

We spent the weekend travelling since my doctor is limiting my mobility starting on Thursday. We drove up to Plano on Friday and met up with David’s parents and had an awesome dinner at Texas Land and Cattle Co. I don’t remember much of Saturday since I was asleep almost the whole day (you know those pregnant ladies need their rest!) and Sunday we joined David’s parents for church and got to preview their church’s new Youth Center which looks like it will become an awesome place for the teens to hang out. Sunday evening, Kimberly and Co. arrived at the parents’ house and we had fun with the kids. This picture was taken Monday right before we left. Had we stayed, we would have had the opportunity to put one more niece in the photo, but with it being a Monday holiday, there was no telling what the traffic would be like, so we left before the visit of the second niece.

On the way home, we got to stop by my parent’s house and see the new kitchen/laundry room floor, visit for a bit, and have dinner together. It was a great weekend!

David recently recieved gift cards from the CPMS Band to Best Buy. We ended up going to Best Buy tonight for a shopping spree and came home with a CD/MP3 boombox (ya, I know it’s not the prettiest thing in the world) for the nursery (as opposed to the crib-side CD player that I thought was so cool but received many mixed and negative reviews), a digital audio cable for the xbox, and a Monster Cable Home Theater Power Center. He is sure loving those students tonight!

Oh, and my obgyn’s nurse called me this afternoon to tell me that my lab results are negative for a urinary tract infection, praise the Lord!

This afternoon, I practiced folding the cloth diapers (dipes) into the covers. I LOVE the cloth diapers! Yesterday, I ran the unbleached chinese prefolds (UBCP) through their first of several “pre-washes” to “rough up” the fibers and make them more absorbant. Initially they were practically waterproof! They came out of the first wash & dry cycle sooooo soft. I am so excited to be able to put something so soft and natural against my baby’s bottom. In fact, I was telling Dave that I couldn’t even tell you what a “sposie” (disposable diaper) is made out of… most likely some kind of paper product… and the gelling chemicals! Those disposable diapers sure take advantage of today’s chemical developments.

David and I have finished our childbirth classes… which mostly were informative but sometimes were boring (same information as you can read in a book, which we have done) and which ended in a tour of St. David’s Medical Center Round Rock Hospital Whatever You Want To Call It Women’s Center. The labor & delivery rooms were all impressive and spacious… but the postpartum rooms were tiny and cramped and lack windows. I think I will miss not having daylight in the room the day after the baby’s born… we’ll see. It might be nice, like when we were on the cruise, to make the room totally dark in the middle of the afternoon to take a nap.

June 4th is our next and probably last “shower” … a small one thrown by David’s coworkers for couples that we know. It will be nice to have David at this one.

June 5th is the breastfeeding class. I’m not planning on taking David with me because I think he would find it uncomfortable enough to start laughing… and if you know David, you know that when he finds something funny he gets this wheezy laugh going which makes everyone laugh… and that would be… embarassing… in a breastfeeding class!

David and I cannot afford healthcare through his school for the three of us. He’s hearing from the healthcare rep. that is at his school today that it will be illegal for me and the baby to find independent coverage because it is available for us from his school. The problem is that if we go with the health insurance through his school, the premium will be right around $1,000 per month… which is roughly half of what we live off of each month!

Our plan was to have him covered through the school since that will likely only cost us about $5 per month and to find an individual policy through another healthcare provider for me and the baby. That’s what the Humana rep is saying is illegal in the State of Texas.

Please pray that this mess gets cleared up soon and that the three of us will have insurance that we can afford.

UPDATE 5/25/2005
Apparantly the Humana rep was a ditz and didn’t know what in the world she was talking about. David got it all straightened out and we will be able to have 2 different companies cover the three of us starting Septemeber 1, 2005.

I was surfing through my old emails and noticed a link on the cloth diaper order confirmation I recently received so I clicked it. Lo and behold, my cloth dipes are in Austin on a FedEx truck somewhere scheduled to be delivered today! :-)

My appointments are getting farther away from the actual week they’re being labelled, but this still counted as my 33 week appointment. I’ll be 33 weeks along on Thursday, though.

Weight gain: +10 lbs overall
Blood pressure: 112/80
little Barnes’ heartrate: 154
little Barnes’ presentation: head down!! hallelujia! Though that may change, it’s a praise for now!

With all the good comes a little bad… and this little bad is that I may have (they have to send off for a culture to be sure) another UTI, though I have not yet begun to feel any symptoms if I indeed have it.

This is our last weekend to get out of town. No more travelling after June 3, 2005. David and I will talk tonight about driving up to Dallas one last childless time this weekend. We’ll keep you posted, mom and dad Barnes!

32 weeks, originally uploaded by davejenbarnes.

This belly is making things harder than you would think. Like sleeping. How do I sleep? How do I get out of bed? If it didn’t weigh anything, I think life would be easier, but since there is a human and some other stuff in that belly, it weighs more than it looks. This is what makes everything so difficult. I can lay on my left side, but to roll over to my right side, I have to defy gravity for a vew seconds. To get out of bed, I have to roll around and shimmy my rear off the bed then push myself up with my arms!

I guess with 8 weeks left, I will only be getting bigger *sigh* and more off-balance!

My baby shower at Z Tejas is in an hour. I am so nervous. I know it will be very small, but I hope it will be enjoyable for all participating.

UPDATE:
It was very small, but very enjoyable. Brunch was very yummy. Thanks to Lisa who bought my meal. Mmm-mmm good! There were seven other ladies… all good friends …and David’s mom even drove down to Austin just for the event!

Lisa had a camera there and will be getting me the pictures soon. I thought it might be overkill to take my digital rebel to Z Tejas since that camera is almost as big as the whole restaurant (just kidding, but it feels like that sometimes!). You should have seen the diaper cake that Nicole made! Woah! I’m afraid that in my excitement of getting everything home, I disassembled the top layer before I decided I better not take the whole thing apart before my mom could see all of Nicole’s hard work. It is prettier than my wedding cake… and bigger too!

A big thank you go out to Lisa and Nicole!

COLA小青蛙, uploaded by noise.

This almost rivals the Lime-Helmet!