The countdown has begun....and I am nostalgic. Part of me is uber ready to have this baby. The other part of me will miss being pregnant! Despite the aches, pains, mood swings and rising scale count, I really do love so many things about being pregnant. My skin is radiant when I'm pregnant, and boy, do I love that! My hair is thicker, my nails stronger, I just feel healthy and alive. Very maternal and organic, if that makes any sense. I love the smiles people throw your way when they see you waddling by. And I've been really fortunate not to encounter the random hands that I hear can afflict you - strangers touching your belly without warning or permission. So far, it's just family members and I'm cool with that.

I can sympathize with a mommy kangaroo these days, as little one is just getting too constricted for its liking. Still seems to be sleeping for large parts of the day, but the moment I stop moving, IT starts. Especially when I lay down at night - boy, do the wiggles begin! I think the baby has learned some of the dance moves I've learned recently in my Zumba class and is trying them out! I did have a lady tell me in one of our classes the other day that she did dance classes all throughout her pregnancy, and the child that she delivered later grew up to become a dancer! COOL!

I am officially at the point where you go to the doc every 2 weeks. And I think I'm also at the point where I begin retaining water. I remember that when I hit that point with my pregnancy with Brooklyn, I realized it cause I tried to zip up my favorite black knee high boots and it just wouldn't work. I cried! I loved wearing those boots! And suddenly, it just wasn't happening. I stood up yesterday after sitting for a few moments at this very desk and chair and had a little chair crease etched into my thigh. Over an hour later, it was still there. Yep, there's some fluid hanging on!

So far, I'm doing ok on the weight gain. Still working out every day and I think that makes a difference. I feel strong, anyway! I'm the only pregnant woman lifting weights in the weight room and that makes me feel pretty tough! :) Except when I lay down to do a bench press and have to creatively get up without looking like an overturned beetle or turtle.

Anyway, this post is to update you with pictures as well, so here you go. Some official ones - just belly, and some with Brooklyn hugging her little sibling in utero.

A few little anecdotes:

Just to point out that kids are always watching us, always listening to us and filing away our words and ideas, I share with you two little incidents.

At a family meal about a week or so ago, Brooklyn was eating her food with all the rest of us - I think it was actually a Bible study group/family meal at DD's house. Anyway, there sat Brooklyn with me, Kyle, and a handful of her aunts and uncles and other friends who've become like family. Kyle made the mistake of commenting on something with some food still remaining in his mouth. Out of the blue, Brooklyn piped up with a warning tone - "Don't talk with your mouth full!" Kyle was so surprised he almost spewed his food across the table. She has gotten the message I've been sending her.

Another quick little story. Just today, I was cuddling with her for her nap time and she had been generally a little toot all morning. We hung out with some friends of ours and she was pushing her boundaries constantly. Well, I pulled her close to me as we snuggled on her bed, kissed her forehead and said, when you wake up from your nap, will you please be sweet and not a toot? She nodded mutely, her orange pacie clenched in her teeth. Then, after giving it some thought, she pulled out her pacie and said, "Mommy, I wasn't being a toot, I was being a little pill." I somehow managed not to burst out laughing and said, Yes, my dear, you were. Can you not be a pill when you wake up? She said, ok. Again, she does pay attention...and apparently draws a distinction between being a toot and a pill.

I just finished doing my quiet time today, as Brooklyn naps. And I was struck by a little bit of insight that I feel like sharing. So, the following is an entry into my prayer/quiet time journal...

I have just been lying down with Brooklyn who was reluctant to take her nap without snuggling with me. And I relished the snuggle and forced stillness. I take those moments with her to read - lately out of a John Ortberg book. God has really been using this book in my life - to give me little bits of clarity on certain points. As I crept away from B's room to pee, I glanced over at the bathroom wall and saw yet another blasted ant making himself right at home in my home.

And it struck me. Living among ants is like living with sin. When we first spot the return of the ants (every spring), we're outraged, repulsed and immediately on the phone to Terminix to eradicate them from our sanctified homes! Out comes the Terminix guy - perhaps for multiple visits - doing his best to stop the entry of the ants. And maybe the bulk of the ants seems to be deterred. But there are still the stragglers, the seekers of tidbits, the scouts. Looking for bits of evidence worth returning to their homes and calling out the troops in full force. And against those stragglers the battle is waged. Finger combat. Smushing them one at a time. Assuring yourself of their death as the peppermint aroma of them wafts upward.

Yet, despite the constant parade of scouts, I have not called Terminix back. I wonder if I should.

It occurs to me that sin is like these ants. We're so quick to respond with disgust, urgency and condemnation when the sins are prolific, numerous and a threat to our way of life. We call in for back-up. We pull out the big guns. But when it's just the one or two, we go at it much more casually. Should we be any less repulsed by the one than we are by the 50? I think not! For the one tiny ant represents the 50 or 50,000, more likely!

If we let sin find a hint of a crumb in our lives, will not the full force of the devil, Satan and his minions, bear down on us to claim us as their lunch?! Yes! Jus as the scout ants work tirelessly to find the one crumb of catfood left behind, so they may alert their army of troops to come forth, so Satan's scouts seek equally vigilantly for our chinks, our weaknesses, our lapses in cleanliness.

May I give Satan no crumbs just as I seek to leave nothing behind for the blasted, heinous ants. Lord, help me be as vigilant in the house cleaning of my soul and spirit as I am of my physical dwelling.

Anyone with small children has experienced the never-ending pleas for "again! again!" when you do something they like or something amuses them or they find pleasure in something. As parents, we're usually good for a couple of "agains" and then we try to distract them or move them on to the next "again." Well, I read something today that was so profound I immediately found Kyle to read it to him. It convicted, challenged and inspired me, and I hope it does the same for you:

This is a quote by G.K. Chesterton as quoted in John Ortberg's book, The Life You've Always Wanted -

"Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do it again"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, "Do it again!" to the sun; and every evening, "Do it again!" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite for infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we."

WOW! No wonder Jesus said, "Let the little children come unto me." He GOT them...He understood their endless vitality, their boundless energy, their passion for life, and WE in our haste to "grow up" shed it like an old skin that we can't wait to get rid of. For shame! Why are we in such a hurry to lose the fierce and free spirit? Who cares what fools we appear to those other poor drudges who've forgotten their love, their NEED for life abundant - for joy and exuberance and fun. May God grant to me an endless capacity to appreciate the joy in life, over and over again. May I never tire of saying that same thing to my Creator and the ultimate giver of joy - Again! Again! Do it Again! May I exult in monotony as my God does!

My family has something of a legacy at CAC. We have graduated 7 kids through the school, today marking the final commencement. My youngest sibling and only sister, Rachel, walked across the platform to close one chapter of her life - with no small degree of excitement, I might add. And well I remember that feeling. My whole life felt in front of me - ripe and dripping with possibility. I couldn't wait to get out of high school. As the oldest of 7 kids and having spent a lot of time around older friends and adults, I had no patience for the stupid games played in high school - who's popular, who likes who, who's dating who, who's sleeping with who, who's getting into trouble, who got a new car, who's having a party this weekend, who's parents are giving them way too much freedom, who's gonna do what once they graduate...I felt like a little goldfish in a tiny bowl, swimming in circles, biding my time.

I couldn't wait to graduate. And in a very real sense to me, my life did begin again once I graduated. I met the man of my dreams a few short months after I graduated...seems crazy how young I was at the time, yet how certain I was of my feelings. And still am! I adored college and treasure every second of it. I loved being in a larger pond...swimming in some anonymity for once. But I also have grown to recognize the merits of high school and while sympathizing with the senioritis my sister developed, I bizarrely encouraged her to cherish the fleeting moments of high school. If only because I have learned that while some chapters seem to take forever to finish, the subsequent ones fly by. So, if you savor the ones you wish would zoom by, maybe everything will slow down to some extent.

I am proud to say my brilliant sister was the valedictorian of her graduating class, and I could NOT have been more proud of her. She was poised, eloquent, elegant, graceful and wise. She encouraged her classmates to live in the moments between the beginnings and endings. To define their lives by their actions and work and to take every opportunity to touch the world with God's love and grace. I was very very proud of her. She is my baby sister and one of my most precious friends. I will miss the dickens out of her while she's living the next chapter of her life in college. I envy her, too. I loved college so much, even the painful parts, that I'd do it all over again in a heartbeat.

So, my dear sister, Congratulations! I love you so much!

I have been so blessed with friends in this life. I thank God all the time for the amazing women He's placed in my life. One of my dearest friends is a girl I met while beginning nursing school. She and I share a birthday which I always feel bonds you in some way. From our first meeting, I knew she was going to be a good friend. I just sort of decided it. She is the youngest of a large family and I am the oldest, so our dynamic was immediately hilarious. I was around when she got engaged, then married, then moved nearby and had a baby, then moved away, then we were pregnant together and both gave birth to little girls within 3 days of each other. We have a special bond. We can talk about anything, from her dislike of cooking recipes longer than 5 ingredients, to the nitty gritty details of our spiritual lives and those we care the most about. We are comfortable enough to raid each other's fridges and plop down in our skivvies in front of each other. Breastfeeding side by side on a bench at the mall sort of breaks down barriers. :) I love her kids like they were my own and her husband is counted among my dearest friends, as well. I just love them.

And so I was delighted when they were able to come down this past week for a brief visit. Our kiddos got along fabulously, I was able to try out some new recipes (things with more than 5 ingredients to broaden her palate...), we played at the park, threw our kids in the tub together and just enjoyed being real around each other. For all the times I never tell her how much I love her - I hope she knows how much I do.

I have been busy lately and have put off the picture of my belly which I MEANT to take at 28 weeks, and now I'm almost 31 weeks, so you're missing a few weeks of belly growth. Or should I say, we're jumping ahead to show belly growth. Anyway, I'm officially past the 7.5 month point, and feeling every second of being pregnant.

Don't get me wrong - it's truly fantastic to be pregnant. It's just that it adds a dimension to you that you can't fully anticipate until you're smack dab in the middle of it. Like how you can get so irritated within a fraction of a second at things that normally you'd let roll off your back. Or how you find yourself panting to breathe while simply rolling the vacuum across the floor. Or how you don't want to be around anybody cause it's just too exhausting to expend any more energy.

Sometimes I feel as though I participate in life from behind a screen. Like part of me is continuing on like normal or trying to be normal while there's this huge part of me that has turned completely inward and is just focusing on growing this baby, staying healthy, being a mommy, with no time for small talk or casual conversations or anyone outside my little immediate bubble: Kyle and Brooklyn. I feel that strange sensation so much more intensely this time.

I guess it makes sense that something so powerful and intense should change you, should affect you, should rock your world a little. Not only is there another human being developing in my body, but my own body is expanding its capacity to do everything - support another life, pump twice as much blood through my veins, loosening my joints and bones, things that I remember studying in nursing school with a sense of shock and awe. Pregnancy is simply incredible. That it can be done at all. That we are created to do it, as women. I feel every iota of the privilege of it and treasure every second, even those when I'm gasping for breath or pushing little elbows down from my ribs, or lifting the tiny feet off my bladder. I'm also thinking the whole time, "I can't wait to meet you little one...."