Birth Announcement

The Bathroom - Unveiled!

After hours upon days upon weeks of hard work, my dad (and his still-aching-back) completed the none-too-easy task of remodeling our bathroom to make it friendly for the wheelchair and me! Ricky just loves it, as it makes caring for me a lot easier. It also helps me care for myself.

The overall view, revealing the smooth tile floor

The drop-arm commode contraption aids my lateral transfers and secures me from tipping over to the side. You can get a close-up view of my cut-under sink, which I LOVE!

This is my side of the tile, walk-in shower with seat, bar, and hand-held wand.

Ricky's side of the shower (yes, he greatly enjoys the large rain-shower head)

Aesthetics: new hardware, lights, fan, bars, brown walls and palm tree theme

Palm Trees Don't Like Snow

Yep, there was even snow in "What is snow?" Wilmington. We woke up Saturday morning to 4 inches of the white stuff! I moved here in 1993, and this was the most snow there has been here in my 18 years of sunny days.

The golf course from the deck

Backyard from the kitchen window

Ravaging the BIRD feeder is our greedy "pet" squirrel, affectionately named LeRoy (after Jim Croce's bad, BAD LeRoy Brown).

What a nice day for staying in the pj's!

Aidan: Let's make snow-cream!

Ricky: What's snow-cream?

Aidan: You're from the north where it snows. A lot.

Ricky: Never heard of snow-cream.

Aidan: It's ice-cream but with snow. Take snow and mix in some milk, vanilla and sugar.

Ricky: Yummmmm.....

Aidan: It figures that the Southerners would try to take something like snow, add sugar and make it edible!

Note: Due to our sugar-fast, we used stevia instead, and it tasted just fine :)

God is in the Miracle-Making Business

Our friends Matt & Stacey Ayars are missionaries in Haiti and posted this (short) story on their blog. It is an ABSOLUTE MUST-READ!

Ricky did find the story in the news, with the media's "unbiased" take on it:

• Here is possibly the most detailed story, from The Guardian in England.
• This story from The Times, also in England, mentions fewer details about the miracle, but seems to imply that the survivor could've been "hallucinating." The next day, The Times ran another story, which left out the interesting part of the miracle and said, "The circumstances of Monsigrace's rescue remain mysterious."
• This one from CNN, says that the man "sounded confused."

Note: This week's OB/GYN appointment showed me to be 4 cm dilated and 50-70% effaced already! Also, we got our new computer and I am still struggling to get comfortable with using it. I am growing larger so quickly now (hello stretchmarks-that-were-not-there-yesterday) that we've had to veto leaving the house except for necessary doctor's appointments. I am extremely exhausted all the time, which is rumored to be the body's way of preparing for the hard work of labor :) I've supposedly been in early labor for weeks now, but the contractions have been bearable and inconsistent thus far. I officially weigh more than Ricky (by .7 pounds), and he's rubbing it in. Good husband, isn't he?

Birth Plan

What is natural childbirth?

Simply, giving birth without medical intervention (or as little as possible).

What is a birth plan and why have one?

A birth plan explains how you want your birthing experience to go.

Why have a birth plan?

If the mother desires for any of her labor and delivery to proceed differently than the hospital's routine, she must write it down. If the mother wants the conventional routine birth, she'll get it.

Here is our Birth Plan. We have explicit reasons for each decision, if anyone has any questions! We'd be silly not to mention that, yes, we know that not everything goes according to plan. But if everything is proceeding normally, these are our wishes. We realize that the unexpected could happen, which is why we are giving birth in a hospital and not at home. There are many good websites about it, just Google "natural childbirth."

38 Weeks

This is our favorite ultrasound picture so far. It's of her head (over the bubbles on the bottom half). You can see her cute nose, closed eyelids, pursed lips and chubby cheeks. She officially weighs more than Aidan did when Aidan was born!

Aidan had her final echocardiogram and a routine OB/GYN visit. At the latter appointment, she had her first vaginal exam and found out that she is already 2-3 cm dilated. Woohoo! We attribute that to the evening primrose oil Aidan takes daily. We are hoping she dilates more before labor hits. The doc thinks that Aolani will come on or before her due date :)

*Note: We will post on the blog when Aidan goes into labor. Please keep us in your prayers.