davejenbarnes

I guess I shouldn’t say anything at all because it’s all complaining at this point anyhow.

• I’ve gained 14 pounds so far this pregnancy with a goal of 40, so I still have 30-something to go.  I don’t know if I’ll make it.  40 pounds seems like a LOT of weight they want me to put on.  I gained 16 pounds with James and 26 pounds with Lowell.  I’m gaining weight!  I’m achieving the impossible!  14 pounds at 27 weeks is great!
• The back pain is intense.  I feel like I need a walker to get up out of a chair.  The midwife said “It doesn’t get any better.”  Lovely.  At least I can still get out of a chair!  Heck, it might take me 3 minutes to stand up but that’s better than not being able to stand up at all.
• James and Lowell are really pushing my buttons these days with the hitting and the biting each other.  James and Lowell are so cute when they [have to] tell each other “sorry” and kiss the other one for whatever offense was just committed.
• Lowell has something wrong with his little boy parts and he complains when he pees.  “Owww!  Oww!  Owww!”  I know exactly when Lowell pees, so I can change his cloth asap and hopefully the rash will go away.
• I just discovered that the insurance we have the boys on won’t pay a single cent for anything until we’ve paid $2500/kid out of pocket per year (and the year ends in 3 months!!!)  We have insurance to cover the above-and-beyond expenses in case we have an accident that incurs over $8000 of expenses on the males in the family.  That’s gotta be better than nothing, right???  right???
• I have a very large feeling that the doctor will say, “put diaper rash cream on it and call me back if it doesn’t improve in 5 days” just like he’s said for everything else I’ve taken either boy in for in the last two years, then charge me $300 for 5 minutes of his time which we now have to pay for out of pocket, so I’m not taking Lowell to the doctor.  I’m just praying that Lowell’s pee-pee pain is a rash and not an infection.  I will “keep an eye on it” for 5 more days before we decide to pay the full cost of a doctors’ visit.
• My blood pressure was 108/68 so still low.   I have blood pressure… I must still be alive.
• Baby’s heart rate was in the 150’s this time.  Maybe we’re growing a boy afterall.  I almost want to find out somehow just to make everybody else happy.
• Did I mention my back hurts?  This back pain is not in vain.  I will have a beautiful new human to show for it in 3 months.
• Oh, and James is giving up his naptimes so there go my peaceful afternoon breaks.  James is growing up so quickly.  Now we will have time for “school” in the afternoons!

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and baby, too.  I am really starting to feel some movement, but still not nearly as strong as some pregnant women I know about the same far-along-ness.  If you’re patient, and I mean really really rediculously patient, you can see it from the outside. My back has started hurting by the end of the day and I can no longer squeeze through normal “Jen-sized” spaces as I am the same width no matter which way I turn. (I am used to being able to get through crowds of people without hollering “EXCUSE ME!” but no longer.)  I get to see the midwives on Friday for my 24 week checkup.  Next month is the glucose test.  Last time I took it, I had borderline bad results, but the opposite of having gestational diabetes… My blood sugar levels were too low instead of too high — or something.  I’m sure there is a label for that but I am hoping for perfectly acceptable levels this time around.

James has turned into a copy cat.  It annoys me to no end, but sometimes it can be cute and usually makes me smile, at least once or twice.  Maybe I will insert educational things into my conversations for him to mimick.  He’s started finding an interest in spelling 3-letter words, but more as a game of sorts than to be able to spell the words.  It started with R-E-D and H-E-B (our grocery store, which he LOVES, crazy kid) but this weekend was C-U-T and C-U-P because we were sitting at the kitchen table and he was drinking from his cup and I was cutting fabric.  I’ve tried others such as C-A-T and C-A-R, B-E-D and R-E-D, and some others but those words weren’t relevant to what we were doing, so maybe that will work later.

Lowell is jumping on the word bandwagon as well and has added several funny words to his vocabulary.  Most recently it’s been “gas” and “baby” which both make James giggle every time.  “Applejuice” is becoming quite clear and he’s starting to copy anything you say in his consonant-deprived pronunciation.  Lowell does say his name but it sounds more like “Wooooaah-awl” with the emphasis that Wall-E has when saying Wall-E.  Lowell is the cutest little guy though and I’m finding myself wanting to soak up his 17 month cuteness so I can remember it when he’s handsome and tall at 17 years old, like, 15.5 years from now.  How special it is to get to be his mommy!

I kiss them both all day long, every chance I get.  Someday I either won’t be “cool” to kiss them, or they’ll be stinky and hairy (ew).  I know the day is coming when they say, “Mo-oom” and give me that roll of the eyes and shrink away from the momma-kisses.  Gotta get my smooches in while I still can!

Today is the third day of David being back at work.  (Granted, he is taking tomorrow off so I can drive to Dallas with James for a cousin’s birthday party up in Grandma Barnes’ neck of the woods and he can watch Lowell)… BUT, back to the working bit.

I have never had the boys on such a solid schedule.  Yes, I used the evil S word: s-c-h-e-d-u-l-e.  I would have never used that word with a baby.  [Nursing] babies need routines, not schedules, and I’m defining the difference in those two as the lack or presence of hour-of-the-day events.  For example, this is the boys’ schedule:

• 8 am - breakfast
• 10 am - snacktime
• 12 pm - lunch
• 1:30 pm - naptime
• 4 pm - snacktime
• 6 pm - dinner
• 8 pm - bedtime

But I would never have had a baby on a schedule like this.  I did have them on routines, which would vary per time of day depending on a lot of things… mainly when they got hungry.  So I’m thinking the baby will be on a routine of Eat, and Eat again within 3 hours, Eat again within 3 hours… naps inbetween, waking time too, depending on age. But I won’t nurse the baby only at specific times, so I call it a routine.  (I was and will be again a nursing on demand mommy.)

This is my first experience sticking to an hour of the day for everything to happen schedule and so far I really like it.  Lowell is almost 18 months old and it helps him a lot.  James thrives on times for things and doesn’t argue at naptime or bedtime much anymore.  Overall, I’d say it keeps me less lazy as well and our house kitchen has never been cleaner.

David asked to get the boys up this morning (they will be SO EXCITED to see Daddy first thing in the morning after his being away for three mornings in a row all of a sudden) so I decided to type up an entry to keep me from opening their door and inhaling all the sweetness that they are in the morning.  Or at least that they are most mornings.  There are always exceptions!  :-)

Lowell has two more teeth and the next two are wrecking havoc on his mood/runny nose/messy diapers so soon he will have four new shiny pointy teeth.  He has been teething for what seems like the majority of David’s 5 weeks of summer break.  After the bottom ones poke through, it will bring his grand total of teeth to 16.  In the past couple of days, Lowell has added “Ow!” to his vocabulary (which is soooo cute) and has perfected “Please?” which comes out sounding like “Pees?” most of the time.  When David disappeared (really, he just drove to San Antonio for a convention but to the boys, he vanished), Lowell walked to nearly every door, knocked twice (loudly), and said “Da-dee?”  Looking for David.  We didn’t know if Lowell would miss Daddy very much but I’d almost say that Lowell missed him more than James and I did.  Or appeared to at least.

Oh, yeah, I don’t know if I blogged about this but Lowell started walking on June 29th in Plano at Grandma and Grandpa’s house.  He just all of a sudden, like he’d been waiting for someplace special to show off, started walking like he’d been walking for months.  It’s almost like he’d been practicing in his crib while we weren’t watching.  ;-)  I like to think he waited for Grandma Barnes to see him since they’re birthday buddies.

There’s not much new to report on James, developmentally, since there are no big things we’ve been working on lately.  Potty training is done (though I am anxious for him to develop the understanding of actually getting his underwear back on all the way, growing a little bit so I don’t have to lift him on the potty — “No more little potty seat, Mommy.  That’s for babies.” –  and being able to start dressing himself.)  Speaking of dressing — he’s in a 4T shirt and 2T-3T shorts and probably wears a 9 or a 9.5 in shoes.  I do need to take him for more shoes very soon.  (Lowell is in 2T shirts and 12-18 month shorts though I have been putting him in 2T & 3T shorts already, since I know grandparents read this… :-)

There’s one neat thing about James, though.  He’s a chatterbox.  He says the funniest things!  I always forget to write them down so I can share them here.  Every evening at dinner, he makes up a song about something doing something (bunnies jumping, cars driving, light shining - they each get their own special song).  He has started walking around randomly quoting Cars (the movie) so in the course of the day, you’ll randomly hear, “Never need a map again!” then later, “Maaaw, Dang” or “I’ve got DIRT in my rims!” or “You love ‘er, you love ‘er, you love ‘er.”

I’ve started knitting little tiny wool soakers (diaper covers) for the new baby out of scraps from when I made them for Lowell.  They’re to me like baby hats are to some knitters: fast, easy, memorized pattern, fun, and a great stash-buster.  The ones I’m making are not pretty so I don’t know if I will ever post pictures of them but they will be functional!  I figured if need be, I could always use them as dying experiments if and when I ever get the itch to dye some wool.  Worst case, I’ll overdye them black.  :-)  If this baby is a girl, she’s gonna have some very boyish diaper covers on her sweet little bum.  I refuse to invest in girly colors of new wool (at $10-$35 a skein, ouch) not knowing AND I doubt I will have the time to knit up a good girly stash once she arrives.  (Hoping this is a girl, but not counting on it.)

Time to go eat breakfast.  Dave said, “I’m makin’ pancakes!” (to be read in Donkey’s voice).  Yum.

Just for the record, this is the boys’ first night sharing a room at home.  Hope it goes as well as it went on the trip last week!  So far (it’s been 10 minutes) both boys are screaming.

P.S. if you don’t know what a twitter is, well, just google it

10:30 pm update - They both fell asleep. We (Jen) found a great deal on a great-sounding (and looking) minivan (350 miles away of course) so we will be calling about that… if it works out, another trip to Dallas (and beyond) will be required. I’m praying that the seller (private sale) will give us the VIN tomorrow so we can CARFAX the minivan. So if you read this before the end of Monday, please pray for this situation for us.

update:  The minivan is probably a scam.  The dude wants the money sight-unseen and he’s overseas.  His phone number is a Washington DC number and the van is in a random city in Texas, and he hasn’t given us the VIN.  Too many things not lining up point to a four-letter word:  SCAM

Yesterday, at Grandma’s house, Lowell started standing (from nothing, the floor, no support, no help) so we know walking is not far off.  He is officially 16 months old today (Sunday, the 22nd) so we’re hoping he can start walking soon.  The pediatrician said if he’s not walking confidently by the 18 month mark, we will have to consider physical therapy.  I am sure it won’t come to that!