Nursery Ideas...?

Now that I finally have the old office all cleared out I want to start on the nursery but I have no inspiration! I want it to be cute but I don't want to go all out. I want it to be thrifty and crafty and look complete.

This is one I found online that I kind of like. It is the closest I have gotten to something I want/like but I don't really like these colors, just the modern, simple decor in here...

I really love how simple the decor is in here and I love the shelves with the bins for storage. I think I might want to do a vintage look or an urban look with the colors that can sort of be changed into a "big boy" room later, but not sure yet because we may be putting the boys in a room together once #2 is old enough.

So, what do you think? Send me any ideas you have because I am really lacking!

Nursery from http://www.babylifestyles.com/2011/05/real-nursery-a-modern-baby-boy-room-for-sawyer/

Make Room for Baby

The third bedroom in our house has been an office for the past 2.5 years since we moved in. That room was LOADED with stuff too because that is also where I did most of my indoor photography and where I worked on all of my crafts and things. So, we recently started clearing out things to make room for that to become the nursery. I am wishing I took a before and after picture because once we finish the nursery it will be such a huge transformation.

Anyway, we still needed an office because I work there a lot and the huge desk we were using held things that I use regularly. So, we found a much smaller desk and some shelves and made a mini-office in the master bedroom. We have just finished the shelves and everything...check out the new work space.

We had a chair there but I replaced it with the ball to sit on for the rest of this pregnancy. I love how it rolls right under the desk, it is the perfect size! We also traded in our gigantic computer monitor for this much smaller one we got from a friend.

I put the pictures of baby boy #2 on the wall for now because I just like looking at them :)

I love these shelves! There were inexpensive and they don't take up much room at all, plus they hold everything I need!

Today's Appointment

We went back to the cardiologist this morning to do another fetal echo and see if anything has changed...

The doctor isn't really concerned at all about hypoplastic left heart syndrome anymore. He is really thinking he will be normal or possibly coarctation of the aorta. This is great news! But, we really won't be able to tell for sure if there is anything going on unil after he is born. What they can see is limited in the womb and they will be able to do an echo once he is born to determine if there is anything going on or not. We will go back in 8 weeks and do another fetal echo to see if things change in that time. The doctor said everything is looking great and he is very optimistic that everything is going to be normal.

So...it looks like most likely I will deliver at UAB. We won't decide anything until the next appointment when I am 36 weeks, but the baby will need to be checked out either way once he is born and if surgery is required they would end up sending him to UAB anyway so I am thinking it would be best to go ahead and deliver there and let the doctor we have been seeing there be the one to look at him once he is born. That is getting a little ahead, we have 8 more weeks to decide for sure.

I am so excited that things haven't gotten worse with his heart! I am so grateful for all of our friends who have been praying and I am so grateful that God has been taking care of our sweet little boy for us!

End of the year program

Last night we went to Caleb's end of the year program. It was super cute. The kids were "super heroes for Jesus" and they were all adorable. A friend was so sweet and made Caleb a shirt with the superman diamond on it and a 'C' and I made him a cape. He loved it! He was running around all night "flying". Too stinkin cute!

Caleb and Carter

He was chewing gum, you can see it in every picture. Haha

Family shot...Ignore how ridiculous I look

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day everyone!

26 Weeks! :)

24 Week Appointment and Fetal Echo

To me, this has been the biggest appointment. I was so scared of what we might hear but somehow I felt at peace during the hour we spent in the waiting room before seeing the doctor (apparantly they were really backed up that day).

When we went back to see the doctor, we talked for a few minutes and we told him all of our concerns and asked  lot of questions. He was so patient and listened to everything we had to say, it was a great experience. He started the ultrasound and studied our baby's heart for about 45 minutes.

When he finished, he left the room to get a "mirror-image" diagram of a heart so that he could show us how everything was working and how everything looked in our baby's heart. He showed us which area was smaller and showed us how everything was working. Typically one side is 10-20% smaller where our baby's is more like 40-50% smaller. The mitral valve is the one that goes through that side and he said blood was flowing through and everything was functioning properly (He said a lot of the time when he sees this in babies or children, the valve will be completely blocked) so that was great news!

The doctor was very optimistic that the heart will continue to grow the way it is supposed to be and everything will be normal but we aren't sure yet. That is the best case and what we are hoping and praying for.

We also have two options about things that could be going on that are causing the left side to be smaller than the right side. The "worst case" is something called hypoplastic left heart syndrome. He said if this ended up being the case that it would be a mild case and we would be able to fix it after birth with surgery. It could be more than one surgery, but he said it was not life threatening and it was a great sign that everything is working properly.

The other thing that could be going on is a better situation, but still might require a surgery. It is coarctation of the aorta. He wasn't able to see this completely and won't be able to until after the baby is born, but again, it is not something that is life threatening and that is what we have been praying for.

So, this appointment was filled with lots of information and some news that maybe wasn't the best, but I can only think it was a great appointment because we recieved the news that I wanted to hear: Our baby is going to be ok! Praise God! I do not take any of this for granted. I am so grateful that this isn't something more serious. I am so grateful for God's blessing in our lives!

On May 18th, we will go back to the pediatric cardiologist and do the same thing to see how things have grown and see if things have changed at all. In the meantime, we will continue praying for good news and we ask for everyone to continue praying for our sweet boy as well. I really believe in the power of prayer especially when the people praying believe in that power too!

23 Week Appointment and Target Ultrasound

At 23 weeks, we went in for our target ultrasound to look more closely at the heart and determine if our baby had situs inversus or if there was something else causing the heart to be on the right side. After a few minutes, they determined that it was situs inversus (PTL! that's what we were praying for!) and we also were able to determine that the stomach was also flipped, which is good (it means that most likely everything is flipped on the inside).

While there we also found out that one side of the heart is larger than the other when they should be about equal. Of course, I start freaking out again and go cry in the car. We didn't get any answers about what this could mean or how serious it could be. Just another appointment with another doctor. So in a week we would see a pediatric cardiologist who would look at the heart more closely and do a fetal echo. I did not read anything about what could cause this because I feared that there would be horrible things that I didn't need to read. The one thing that did give me a little relief was that everything was functioning properly and the doctor said it wasn't an emergency or they would have fit us in the same day.

So, we spend another week in prayer for our baby boy. At times, I couldn't think of anything else. At times, I cried and feared the worst. But, over just a few days I felt a sense of peace. So many friends sent me messages and texts letting me know they were praying and I think with that and all the praying I was doing for the baby and for my nerves, God just took care of me. I don't think I would be able to get through things like this without Michael. He isn't emotional like my preggie self and he just shows strength. He always makes me believe that everything is alright and I don't know what I would do without him by my side.

The next post will be about the appointment with the cardiologist.

21 Week Appointment and Unexpected News

I wish I had started this blog awhile back so that all of this could have been posted as it happened, but I remember exactly how I felt during each of these moments that I am going to write about and it is probably better to write about it later when I am not a emotional. As of right now, we are 26 weeks :)

So, we had our big appointment with the ultrasound at 21 weeks. Let me just say that even at 21 weeks I was so nervous to go in to the appointment. For those who do not know, we had two miscarriages last year and it seems impossible not to be at least a little nervous before every appointment. Anyway, we watched our little boy move around on the ultrasound for awhile and then we went into our room to wait to be seen by the doctor.

When he came in the room, he told us that our baby's heart was on the right side of his chest. I heard him say that this was most likely situs inversus and if that was the case that he would have a completely normal life with no complications, just with things flipped on the inside. Despite hearing that, I walked out to our car and cried for awhile. All I really heard was that something could be wrong with our little boy who we had been praying for so much for so long. After I calmed down and read a little about situs inversus, I was still so nervous, but I felt a little better. They scheduled an appointment for a target ultrasound a week later at UAB so we spent the next week in prayer for our baby.

The next post will be about that appointment.

We're bringing up boys!

I have decided to start a new blog about our growing family. I have failed horribly at blogging in the past so this time I am going to try to do better, but no promises. Most of the time I don't have anything to talk about so this this could get boring.


The main reason I wanted to start this is because we have had so much going on the past year or two and I am thinking this will be an easy way to keep people posted and it will also be nice to go back and read later. I wish I had done this awhile back.


Anyway, I will be trying to get some posts up this week about our family and all of the things that have been going on with my pregnancy with our 2nd boy!