Baby Party!

I have to preface this post by saying that I have the most amazing girlfriends/sisters in the world! I am still in amazement at the incredible shower they threw for me today! Early in my pregnancy, when my one of best friends from high school, Beth Anne, and my sister in law Alisa, said they wanted to throw me a shower, I sent them a big email of lots of ideas for them to pick and choose from. I think they used the whole list! We had a blast eating party food, playing "baby" games, opening presents, and giving the baby belly lots of loving rubs.

Spread of delicious party food- the girls carried the brown and pink polka dot theme throughout Beth Anne's entire house including not one, but two clotheslines of onesies! It was beautiful!

Alisa made an incredible diaper cake gift! I didn't realize until we had to disassemble it to get it in the car that each layer was full of other gifts, like bibs and bottles! Nana (my mom) would have been very proud of Alisa's craftiness for this party- she even made me ribbon burp cloths!

The one thing I asked if I could contribute was the party favors. I had a blast making these and filling them with pink and brown m&ms!

We played a game with plastic babies frozen into ice cubes... the first person's to dissolve got to shout "My water broke!" and win. Luckily, the strawberry-smoothie-like punch was so good, everybody pretty much forgot and the littler girls (my niece and friend that I claim as a niece) won the prizes.

We were incredibly blessed to receive a load of baby bounty- including a brand new winnie the pooh swing and a diaper genie! I'm so thankful that Alisa and Beth Anne love us enough to put in the time and effort that I know a party like this must have taken!

The belly overtaking my sweet sister in law Alisa (wearing the dress she wore as a bridesmaid in my wedding! Yay!)

My two amazing hostesses showing the belly some love in Beth Anne's gorgeous house!

Another highlight was getting to catch up with my two high school best friends at the same time- I'm so glad Mary was able to make it, it was so good to see her!

I can't wait until it's my turn to throw a baby shower for one of these lovely ladies that have made me feel so special and important (yes, Alisa, I believe in showering the second babies as well)... and hopefully I will do as amazing job as they did! I had to laugh when I found that Beth Anne, Mrs. C, and Alisa have already written about the party- I'm lagging behind in 'blogland' this week.

(PS- only 8 weeks, hopefully, to go until K makes her appearance!)

29 Weeks in 8 Bullet Points

29 weeks- How I look:

29 weeks- How I feel:

• I passed my glucola test! No gestational diabetes here. At our last visit, the baby's heartbeat was 143, and they estimated her weight at about 2 pounds.
  


• I haven't had an ultrasound in awhile so I don't know for sure, but I think she may have turned a little... I'm suddenly feeling pain in my right ribs that I think are probably from little kicks! I also can feel the difference now between a kick and a somersault.
  


• Matt finally felt her kick! I was laying on my back and could literally see her moving around in my stomach, so I called Matt over and he finally felt it! He talked to her a little, and she kicked some more.
  


• I think she could tell I was sick this week, since her movements on the day I felt the worst had been barely noticable, which is odd. Or maybe it was just because I completely had no energy and had slept 12 hours a day.
  


• Bending over, getting in and out of the car, and sitting/standing are becoming more difficult! It's still hard to believe that I will get even bigger than this. (This feels big enough). Also, I'm starting to get the serious back pain going on, especially if I lay flat on my back in bed.
  


• My ravenous hunger has been replaced with ravenous thirst. I haven't really had much of an appetite at all, surprisingly (but again that could be from being under the weather), but I've been drinking water, juice, and even milk like it's going out of style!
  


• The indigestion has still been really bad, but luckily the OB said I can take Zantac. So I stopped and got some on the way home from that appointment and I've been eating it like candy ever since.
  


• I've re-read (aka practically memorized) my What to Expect When You're Expecting book, and I usually feel equal parts totally prepared and really nervous that something crazy will happen during delivery. I think I've been having Braxton-Hicks contractions all day, but I'm not sure since I can't really feel them, and only suspect them since I read (in the same book) that a sign is your belly tightening up all over.
  

It's so hard to believe I'm already almost done with 29 weeks, which means we're almost on the 10 week countdown! Almost to single digits. I thought the first few weeks went fast, but now like a time speed warp or something... Just for fun, here's one of the view from up here these days (the toes are almost gone!):

Matt's Ordination

This past week was a really busy week for us, culminating in Matt's ordination service at FPBC. Matt had to prepare his usual Sunday school lesson and youth group lesson, plus prayerfully deciding on a topic to preach about on Sunday for his first time preaching before the church, so it was a busier week than usual for him. He felt led to preach about how believers should be setting a Godly example for each other as well as those who don't know Christ, and I thought he did a wonderful job! I love how passionate Matt is when he preaches... I got to hear two versions of it since I offered to let him rehearse in front of me.

Our Brogli, Dean, and Garris family members at church after the ordination service.

Meanwhile, I planned a lunch at our house for after the service for about 15 family members, friends, and their kiddos... we also cleaned the whole house the week of and added some finishing touches like hanging pictures. My Dad and Grannie stayed with us for the weekend, and the whole family really pitched in to help so that I wasn't the crazy pregnant woman trying to do it all. My Uncle and Aunt who live in South Carolina even made the drive to be with us, which was such a special addition! It was definitely all worth it to be able to have so many loved ones all together to celebrate a milestone in Matt's ministry.Relaxing at our house after the service... my brother, uncle, dad, and husband all apparently got the blue shirt memo!

Pastor Jon and Matt at the end of the service.
Matt with his two proud Dads (his and mine)!

Matt will get the chance to preach again in a few weeks since our pastor's family is going on vacation. It was so nice to get to introduce our church family to our family family, and get the chance to share our new home with them! Congratulations Matt, I am so proud of you!

Growing Families!

We went to Greensboro first thing yesterday morning for our 28 week check-up, aka the glucose test. After drinking a ridiculously sugary, nasty, flat orange soda tasting drink (a whole bottle in less than 5 minutes at 9 am) I had my blood drawn to test for gestational diabetes. It wouldn't have been that bad to drink if I didn't have to chug it down so quickly (by the last gulp I was worried I might see it again!). If I don't hear anything today, then all is probably well.. if not, I most likely will have to cut back on the fries and soda, which I should be doing anyways, so that's not the end of the world. I just pretty much refuse to take my own blood everyday and keep a chart. I think OBs are a little trigger-happy with how much they diagnose gestational diabetes these days.

After the appointment, we headed straight into Raleigh to Rex Hospital to see our new nephew!!! Beckley William Edwards was born on Sept. 10th at about 9pm, weighing exactly 8 pounds and 21 inches long!
We are so happy this little guy made it here safe and sound! Uncle Matt and Aunt Lindsey were on hand for lots of pictures, and Grandgraddy and Nanna brought Ansley over after school. The whole family is excited at how fast our family is growing! Baby K will have a cousin only about 11 weeks older than her, and Ansley is obviously thrilled to have a baby brother.
Sandy and Leanne say now their family is complete... they are done with the baby-having! I think they are thrilled to have one of each, especially after not finding out Beckley's gender throughout the whole pregnancy. What a great surprise!
Congratulations to the Edwards! We love you guys and are so excited for you!

Taking all these pictures of a sweet healthy boy reminds me a lot of when Evan was born, and makes me even more excited for when our baby is born! I must be a big fan of this type of picture (or maybe it is just 'my style') because there were two very familiar ones of Uncle Matt with Beckley and Evan!
Beckley:
Evan:
And I can't wait to take one of our baby just like this! Who can resist all these sweet babies?! It's so great to see both families growing!

Letting God Work

Lindsey has been doing such a great job writing in the blog, that I haven't posted in a while, but I thought of something I wanted to share and thought I would. Today I had the opportunity to go and visit one of our church members who is currently residing in our local jail while he awaits his trial. I was really looking forward to this visit, because he is a young man in his early 20's who was very active in the church throughout his youth. This is the generation that many are saying have "graduated God" when they graduate high school. I met him for the first time just 2 weeks ago at church and today I got to spend some time with him. I got to hear this young man talk about praising God he was in jail so that he could be taken away from the negative influences and given time to focus on God. He was placed in jail and the very first night he overheard a group of men having a Bible study. He asked to join in and now he starts every day with prayer and a Bible study. He is thankful to be in jail so that he could be able to worship, be encouraged, and learn more about God while in jail. Just days before he was arrested, this young man was crying at the altar for the first time that he had darkened the door of a church in over a year and a half. Fortunately, God heard his cries and had him arrested for things done prior to Sunday removed him from the bad situations in his life and put him where he could be ministered to.
When leaving the jail, I was excited about what God was doing in this young man's life and then my phone rang. I am not an entirely naive man. I believe that God has gifted me with certain abilities that help me to discern others intentions and their heart. So when I answered my phone, I heard the voice on the other end say, "We'll see how long his joy lasts once they let him out. Jailhouse religion is never lasting religion." I understand what this person was saying. Often though, I think we forget how mighty our God is, how much He loves His children, and just how much He loves His own holiness. Our God writes in Hebrews 12:6-11 that he disciplines those that he loves and even though we may not always want it, "afterwords it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness." If we give our lives to Him, he will let us stray and sin for a time, but his righteous discipline is coming. Our sin is an affront to His holiness. I sometimes think that we look at the frailty and fallenness of man and we only see what a believer was, not the one who stands in their place now. I think that we take the view that God can't work in their lives and we may even secretly hope that they fall again because we wonder what would happen if God really did do something miraculous in their lives. If God changed their hearts and we saw it happen, we might be confronted to change our hearts too. We might be forced to look in the mirror and that might be a faith a bit more personal than we really want. I thank God we do have a personal faith though. That Jesus experienced the awkward teenage years, the betrayal of a friend, the sadness of the death of a loved one, the joy of seing someone come to freedom from the death through sin, the joy of knowing God, the feeling of talking to an eternal being more powerful than you can ever comprehend and so much more. When I get to talk to this same man every time I lift my petitions and praises, I know He not only cares, but understands how I feel. While it is possible that this young man could stumble, revert back to old, sinful ways, possibly foolishly battle God more...I know my God loves him and will discipline him again. What's more? I can appreciate someone who talks about their brokeness over their sin, who weeps over their mistakes, and sees joy in God's discipline. I believe that man is doing what Paul speaks of in Philippians 2:12-15 when he reminds us to, "...work out your salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. 14 Do all things without grumbling or disputing; 15 so that you will prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world." It is possible that he may fall, but I say let's encourage our brother and step back to watch God work.