October 13th is Finally Here!

Wow, back in February I never thought this day would come! Baby still hasn't arrived, but there's definitely some progress since last night. Since about 8 pm last night I started having contractions that were pretty painful and about 20-25 minutes apart. Chris and I went to bed at 10pm and I woke up 1 am because the contractions are too painful to sleep through. Now they are about every 15 minutes. Not as exciting as I would like it to be, but it's definitely something! I just hope that I'm rested enough to get through it all.

Two More Days... maybe....

It's Monday. Wednesday is the due date. I almost can't believe that I've made it this far! I definitely thought that I would have the baby by now. I'm not sure how I got that in my head, but needless to say, I'm fighting disappointment and discouragement at this point. Sometimes I think, "He's really not coming." But, Chris reminds me that this is impossible. The Lord is teaching me to be patient and to make the most of every moment while I'm home and not working and not tending to an infant. Honestly, I have been really lonely all day when Chris is at work. This past week I tried to be more diligent about inviting people over and spending time reading. Today my friend Tiffany is coming over and we're going to watch the movie "Babies" and bake ginger snaps. Tomorrow I'm going to each Natalie how to crochet. It's a glamorous life...

Over the past weekend three of my friends from California had their babies! I really am excited for them, but it makes the anticipation that much more difficult. I think I should lay off of Facebook so I don't get too discouraged. This verse in Psalm 119 has really convicted me this past week as I have had so much time and my thoughts have been racing about when this guy is going to come, "Turn away my eyes from looking at vanity, and revive me in your ways. Establish your word to your servant, as that which produces reverence for you." As I struggle with a complaining spirit it is a great reminder that I need to grow in reverence for my great God and I need to be disciplined to turn away from what distracts me from worship.

Since I don't do much, I don't have a whole lot to write about! I have really been enjoying my Bible reading plan. One interesting thing about it is that it has me in 1 Kings, Ecclesiastes, and Proverbs all at once right now and I'm getting a really cool picture of who Solomon was. I have been in Jeremiah for about 30 chapters now and it has been such an encouragement to me to persevere in ministry. What an amazing man of God he was! Over and over again he is faithful to God's Word and he is faithful to serve the Israelites and as a result of the hard things he is saying on behalf of God, he is almost put to death continually! I can shy away from saying hard things because I fear man and not God. He is really teaching me about compassionate boldness in ministry... and about the wickedness of my own heart! How often I can ask for help (especially from Chris) and then when I get it, I am tempted to revile because I don't want my sin pointed out. This is just what the Jews did to Jeremiah. Among other books this reading plan has me in, I am reading through Acts as well. Yesterday I started listening to MacArthur's series Paul's trials before Felix in the end of Acts. It's so great!

I hope the next time I blog is because baby Noah has arrived! I'm praying for patience and for contentment in these last few days of pregnancy.

Two More Weeks!

I can't believe that we will be a family of three in a matter of days! Chris and I are sooo excited for Noah to get here. Our hospital bags are packed, we have been meeting with our doula, and we are prepared to pass off any ministry that we are committed to. Chris and I have been thinking and praying a lot about how to make labor and delivery an act of worship to God where we are leaning on His strength to get through it. I have been so encouraged by His Word and by the truths found there that I think will be great motivation to get through labor. I want to look back and be thankful for the grace God gave me to do it naturally and to do it with grace. I know that things may not go the way we planned, but I am preparing my heart to give God praise and glory no matter how the labor and delivery goes.

This past weekend we had our first Cornerstone Church Women's Conference. It was such a great success. Pam Hardy came and spoke on joy. It was such a blessing. I was encouraged and convicted that I need to be depending on the Lord and humbly recognize that I need his Word SO bad. It is my greatest struggle as a Christian to be in His Word faithfully and I want that to change.

Chris and the rest of the steering committee at church spent their weekend in Cora, WY on the Green River planning and praying for our church. It was a really profitable time as well.

Yesterday I thought I was starting early labor because I was having contractions 10 minutes apart that were more uncomfortable than normal and lasted all day. But, sadly, they stopped. I'm hoping that it really is any day now!


I'm very large!

Leslie and Charlotte are coaxing Noah to come out

More Baby Showers!

We had two more baby showers for Noah when I got home from California. My work friends have been planning a "White Trash Baby Shower" for us for several weeks. What fun! You can see in the photos that Chris and I got all dolled up for the event. They decorated the yard with beer cans, a mattress and a pick up truck. Tennille made a DELICIOUS white trash cake and they showered us with lots of money to spend at Babies R Us. We are so thankful for them! I felt really blessed that they would put the energy and money into a party for us. One friend at work has been SO excited about Noah coming. It's awesome to see how my relationships at work have grown after two years at Sidewinders. They are such a fun bunch and it was really a great blessing to celebrate with them.

Of course the amazing women at Cornerstone Church threw me a wonderful shower as well. They are so thoughtful in how they put these types of events together. We had a beautiful brunch at Melissa's house. The main gift that I got there was a bunch of cloth diapers! They were able to get me 25 diapers... mostly fuzzibuns and bumgenius. I'm so excited about them! I also got an ErgoCarrier and a Kelty backpack to carry him in. I can't wait to use all of that stuff! They spent time praying for our little family and encouraging me with Scripture as we embark on this journey. They put together a beautiful little book for me full of Scripture and quotes to remind me of where my focus needs to be in the coming years.

Chris and I have been a very tight budget since August and it has been really incredible to see all the ways that the Lord is providing. We will never have to buy a diaper for our baby boy (or the rest of the kids we have for that matter!). We have everything we need and more and we haven't purchased one thing for Noah! Someone at church gave me a Medela Free Style pump which retails at about $370. What!? We are so overwhelmed and thankful for how God is taking sweet care of us. Thank you, thank you, thank you everyone who has blessed us so much!

California Trip

Chris and I have had a very busy week! Last Friday Neill and Natalie got married here in Jackson. Neill moved out here with the crew to plant the church. He heads up our music ministry and many other things. Natalie was our intern last summer and they started dating this past winter. Natalie is a good friend of mine; we usually spend time together at least once a week. When they get back from their honeymoon they are going to stay with us for a few days before they can move into their new home. Anyway, after their wedding we drove through the night to Denver and went to Chris' cousin's wedding Saturday night. It was at a beautiful home and had fantastic food! The next day Chris and Bethany took me to the Denver airport and I flew to LA. Chris and Bethany drove to Kansas from their. Chris dropped Frazier off at hunting school. Sad!! I miss him. He's going to be there until after the baby is born. Our friend John is training him since we don't have access to any birds. Hopefully he will come back an amazing hunting dog! So, Chris had to get a bunch of dental work done and he was able to get it done for VERY cheap if he did it at home in KS. It was another opportunity to see the Lord providing for us! We are super thankful for people's generosity.

In LA I was able to spend lots of time with family. Mom had to go back to work so I spent a good amount of time with Heather and the kids and then Debbie came out for a few days. It was a very relaxing trip. The heat was a little tough for this pregnant woman, but other than that it was great. My first baby shower was Saturday and I felt so very blessed! I got to see friends and family that I haven't seen for a long time and Chris, Noah and I were blessed with lots of baby gifts! I am slightly obsessed with the baby room. Debbie and Mike painted and reupholstered a BEAUTIFUL black and white glider chair. I LOVE it. I'll post pics soon. I have lots of little projects to do... washing baby clothes, cloth diapers, putting together car seat, finishing a mobile I'm working on, etc. I'm trying to hold off on doing too much of it before I stop working. I only have one more week left!

I feel like I learned a lot this past week and I'm thinking through a lot of things in my own heart and for our family. I was thankful for the time to do that! I will post about that sooner or later.

All is well!

We got all our test results back and my blood sugar levels are just fine. She said it may have been something I ate the day I did my first test. And come to think of it, I had very syrupy waffles that morning. Makes sense. Also, the test results came back about the painful contractions and all is well with that too. I'm super thankful because I want to be able to work the rest of this month. It will help out financially quite a bit... even though it is SO tiring. I'm setting aside Mondays now to cook meals for the week and last week it went so well! I only had to cook one other day and we were able to eat leftovers and frozen meals that I prepared ahead of time. I feel very organized and accomplished this way :o) Since we are on a tighter budget we can't rely on being able to grab lunch out or go to dinner if I'm too tired to cook. If I do the work on Monday than we don't need to worry about it all week. I did have to warn Chris that we will probably be eating a lot of the same meals for a while because I'm trying to do easy things that I can freeze (pasta, chili, meatloaf, etc.).

In other news, we officially picked our baby boy name. We are going to call him Noah Andrew. We chose Noah for a couple reasons. For one, we both love it. I like that I can picture a little boy with the name or a manly man cutting down trees in the forest. It seems versatile. Also, Chris has a great love for all things creation and flood-related in history. Noah is obviously a key player in that part of history. I love it also because of what is said of Noah's faith in the book of Hebrews. He really had such incredible faith! He built that boat for years and years and years when everyone else doubted him. Not only that, but IT HAD NEVER RAINED BEFORE! God said it would flood and there was no way for Noah to even reference what that meant, but he just really trusted the Lord. As for the name Andrew, I was listening to John MacArthur's series on The Master's Men on Grace to You and I was so moved by the disciple Andrew. If you haven't listened to these sermons, you must! Andrew was so humble. He was known as the disciple who was always bringing others to Jesus. He put aside his own preferences in a very Christ-like way. Church history tells us that after he shared the Gospel with the governor's wife and she was converted, the governor sentenced him to be crucified on an X shape cross. He preached the Gospel for 2 days as he hung on the cross! This just brings me to tears. What an incredibly gentle and passionate man. I hope our son grows up to have the faith of Noah and the desire to bring people to Jesus like Andrew.

a predicament

so i was laying in bed dreaming about this really big spider in our house, when i heard the door slam and frazier started barking. back story... Chris keeps waking up really hot in the night so he goes into the living room and sleeps on the couch with the front door open. i have "encouraged" him not to do this in the past because bugs come in the house. i can't confirm this is what he did last night (because it's 5:30 am and he won't wake up to answer my investigatory questions), but i think it is. so... i woke up to a loud bang, got out of bed to see what in the heck is happening and then i hear this little sound under the couch. what!? it's like a thumping or chewing or something. it moved from one side of the couch to the other and it stops whenever i move stuff around. so i'm almost certain that there is a creature living in our house now and i'm so very unsettled about this. i don't want to go back to bed because i feel like i need to babysit this creature in case he decides to relocate to another part of the house. what to do... what to do...