{Seventeen for Sunday-Baby Edition}

Yes, I am still pregnant. I am thinking/hoping that this will be the last Sunday before I can actually breathe/see my feet/bend over/walk up my stairs/sleep at night/…have a beautiful little baby in my arms. In celebration of that little fact, I decided to compile all the funny or notable things that the kids have said in regards to this little guy and me being pregnant. I had forgotten about some of them-SO glad I wrote them down when they happened because some of them made me laugh out loud when I read them again, and some are just fun to remember what the kids thought of all of this baby stuff.

1. Ryan is obsessed with seeing my belly-the big naked belly. It doesn’t count to feel the baby kick through my shirt, he wants me to lift up my shirt and show him my belly. His thing he says is, “Open it up!” Really cute, except when we are in the middle of church or some other public place and he thinks that everyone in the world would like to see that big white belly hanging out.
2. Sometimes I will say something to Scott and then say,”Do you think that the baby can hear that?” He’ll always say back to me, “Duh, your mouth is open!”
3. Erika is CRAZY obsessed with me being pregnant and along with the other girls can really barely contain themselves until this kid is born. After sacrament today, she says on her way to Primary,” If you start having contractions during Relief Society, come get me!” The whole labor process is pretty much lost on a 9 year old, but man does she sure want to not miss a bit of it. She feels to need to be constantly updated on any contraction activity happening at any time.
4. Austin likes to remind me as of late that I look like I am going to pop.
5. I went back to read up on when Ryan was born (really glad I wrote that down too, I felt like a pretty bad mom when I was reading it and couldn’t remember half of it) and had Ryan next to me playing. He got excited to look through pictures of himself when he was little. I said to him as we looked at one picture, “That was when you were one and a half.” He looked at me and said, “I was one at a time? Then two at a time, and now I’m three at a time”.
6. The kids were asking how big the baby would be. We were taking guesses, and they were coming up with some great ways to tell how big he would be. Austin looked over then with this stroke of genius on his face, and with that great math brain of his said, “Wait, how about we just weigh you at the beginning and then weigh you now and subtract it!” It was a great idea in theory, but I am pretty sure that I am not having a 35 pound baby. Wouldn’t that be great if the actual baby was all the weight you gained? In a perfect world…He suddenly realized the error of his ways, and agreed that yes, that may not be the best way to calculate it. I’m glad because a 35 pound baby is sounding like a bit of a struggle to push out. I am amazing..but superwoman I am not.
7. The kids (mostly Erika, Abby, and Scott) think it’s so funny that the baby is naked right now. We are pretty immature I know, but it just gives them the giggles every single time.
8. Scott thinks that I am always sick and that I am always contagious too. He likes to remind me of that so I won’t even think of sharing a cup or sometimes kissing him on the lips. “Why won’t you kiss me?” I’ll ask. “Um, you’re sick-you have a baby in your tummy!”
9. Not funny.Not even cute. Just a reminder to me of what life was like just a few days before Ethan was born. Ryan and Scott get sick last Wednesday night throwing up every 30 minutes. I wish I was kidding about that fact. But every 30 minutes! That was rough. They were sick Thursday and Friday. Friday night Erika threw up. We slept with three kids on our floors, and everyone else was sent to bed with bowls and towels lining their floors making a little path to the bathroom. Saturday the boys feel better. Sunday morning Ryan throws up again. I feel like my body just aches and can’t sleep at night because my legs have restless leg syndrome and I am having contractions from 10:30pm-3am for the last three nights. Tuesday we pick Austin up from school-that night he throws up. Brooke says she is sick-goes to bed with a bowl. Aaron throws up during the night-repeatedly, while he happens to be on call that night. Lucky for him there weren’t any calls after he threw up-serious tender mercy. Wednesday Abby has to be picked up from school because she is sick and ends up throwing up that night. Brooke sleeps all day Wednesday. That night both me and her finally break our fevers, and by Friday everyone is back at school and work. Brianna is the only one that walks away whole. Lucky girl.
10. The kids love to watch my belly bubble up as the baby wiggles and moves all around. He puts on a seriously good show for us most Sunday nights. Ryan loves to rub lotion on my belly for me. LOTS of lotion. I have a very well moisturized tummy.
11. Little baby diapers are seriously so cute. Weird I know. But seriously they are SO little. We look at them and we all break out in the high pitched squeal of cuteness voices. We are way excited around this place for this baby.
12. I finally got around to washing up all the boy baby clothes. I forgot how little babies are. Those little clothes seem just so tiny! Our little tiny cuteness obsession clearly crosses over from the diapers to the clothes as well.
13. Brianna is in love with driving with her permit. She loves to drive more often that I love to have her drive-it’s nothing personal, just a little stressful at times. She assures me it will be easier for me to just sit back and relax while she does all the driving. If it’s not, she is sure that it may just send me into labor-either way I win. That’s her rational at least. It worked in part after church because I gave in and let her drive home. We made it-and no contractions.
14. When are you going to have this baby?! You need to have this baby tonight! When is he coming?! Are you having a contraction right now?-all key phrases at our house right now. Most mentioned by those age 15 and younger. Multiple times a day. Every day. Multiple times a day-did I mention that one?
15. Brooke, Erika, and Abby like to constantly remind me how fat my stomach is. Like ALL the time. I can’t wait until all these daughters of mine grow up and have babies of their own. I will sometimes walk out with a new outfit on-one that doesn’t camouflage the fact that I am nine months pregnant as much, and I hear, “Wo, that is one big belly!” Love the honestly around this place.
16. At preschool the boys talked about goals, and Ryan wanted his goal to be to go potty in the toilet. He is trying really hard, and is wearing pull ups. We used up our last diapers-besides the few straggler's hanging out in random diapers bags and the back pockets of the vehicle car seats. He does okay some days, and others he just feels a little lazy-kind of like me. He is really trying to reach his goal before this baby is born. I am pretty sure that we aren’t going to be breaking that 15 year straight streak of having someone in diapers though. 15 years. Wow, that’s a lot of diapers. I am super proud of him for trying so hard though. I think after the baby is born, and with a few incentives he will be potty trained all the way in no time.
17. Brooke is really concerned about what the rules are about who gets to stand up and walk around holding the baby. She asks me very often in hopes that she will make the cut, and be on the stand up, and hopefully walk around list. Lucky for her, things are looking pretty good in her favor.