30 weeks

I've reached the point of no return. :-) I'm hugely pregnant and mentally gearing up for my upcoming labor and delivery. Ten weeks to go... Even though this will be my fourth time doing this, I'm starting to feel the anxiety and excitement of actually giving birth to this basketball size growth that is inside of me. Scary!! I've started doing pregnancy yoga sessions to help me focus and relax and approach this event as a very natural process. I wish that I was seeing a nurse midwife again instead of a hospital doctor. This pregnancy feels so much more like a 9 month medical procedure rather than a holistic, natural experience that I prefer. Earlier this week I had to go in for a 3 hour glucose test because my first blood sugar test was high. That was fun. I was starving by the time it was over (16 hours w/o food) and trust me, spending almost four hours in a hospital waiting room with three kids is not an ideal situation either. After four blood draws (one each hour) we were finally released. Travis checked my medical record and saw that my sugar levels were high on all of them so I guess I'll have to hear back from my doctor to determine how this will affect the remainder of my pregnancy.

A couple months ago, I decided to follow my doctors advice and have an amniocentesis test. This was another new aspect of pregnancy that I hadn't previously dealt with. My blood tests came back with elevated risk for birth defects and with my age and family history, we decided we wanted to know what we were facing. This is when we found out we were have a healthy baby boy! We were anxious about the procedure but relieved to have a healthy report and excited to plan for a baby boy. We still haven't decide on his name yet but we still have time to mull a few names over.

I'm growing out of some of my maternity clothes all ready. Those huge ones hanging in my closet are starting to feel pretty comfortable at this point! We'll soon be pulling out our box of baby gear to determine what will be used for this baby and what we need to add to our nursery. This is the fun part! I got rid of most of our stuff about a year and half ago after we decided we were most probably not going down this road again. But I just couldn't give it all away (just in case) and for that I'm now grateful. We'll be building our nursery from some of the basics and not from square one. Some of the big ticket items we need right away are a crib, a stroller and a baby swing. We also need to get Sloan a new dresser so we can use hers for the baby. Travis made it for Camryn ten years ago and it duals as a dresser and a changing table. I think we need to fix a couple handles but other than that it's in great shape still. Travis' other project will be to fix the hooks on our baby bassinet. It's a family heirloom that we've used for all our babies and most of the Peterson cousins. At this point, it's been passed around and moved quite a bit and we noticed the two swinging hooks got broken during our last move.

Oh and we need to buy a bigger vehicle before baby arrives too! We are still a one car family because we are having a difficult time finding a minivan or equivalent that will seat more than 5 people (that is anywhere affordable). Europe is not the ideal place to have more than 3 kids. First we need a 6 seater and second, it has to have European specs, not American, due to a customs clause that only allows one foreign car per family. Not to mention that everything costs way more than in the U.S. For example, we sold our perfectly good minivan in California for $2500. The same year, make and model has up been for sale here for $8000 or more. It's frustrating.

Hopefully all of these details will work themselves out over the coming weeks. There is a lot to do to prepare for this arrival but I think if I start planning now it won't be too much trouble for any of us. I just hope my body survives all this stretching and aching!