Boxes, boxes, boxes...

The movers came. The stuff was loaded. Then it was unloaded....in the rain. It hasn't rained in weeks in Texas but of course it poured on our moving day. No harm done though.

Now begins the task of unpacking all the boxes. Of course the unpacking has to happen on Noah's schedule....which means that it happens in short bursts between feedings, changings and play time.

My mom is of course super helpful. Thanks to her help our 150+ boxes are now down to about 60 or so left to be unpacked. Next on the to-do list...pick some paint colors and get some paint on these new walls.

Our last night on Wren....

Well, I'm sitting in a house full of boxes. Everything is packed and ready to go except for a few last minute baby items we need to throw in the car and the clothes we'll wear tomorrow. The movers arrive at 8am.


We've been in here for 6+ years and we're definitely tearing out some deep roots to move our lives to a new place. We've had so much fun and we're sad to go. We'll miss Fort Worth and our friends here so much. We love y'all. Thanks for everything.

July 5, 2003

Five years ago I married my best friend.
It was a great day and a wonderful beginning to our life together.

Guess what we did for the 4th?!?!?

Most people watch fireworks and picnic on the 4th. Some people watch baseball games. Josh and I decided to do something a little different this year. But first a little back story....

So, during my pregnancy I would sometimes get intense pains in the middle of my upper back (between my shoulder blades) and/or across the top of my rib cage mainly on the right side. Now when I say intense I mean that it hurt to sit, stand or lay down and it hurt to breathe. The pain would last anywhere from 30 minutes to several hours and made it impossible to function. These "episodes" sometimes occurred at work but usually hit later at night once I was home. One episode started while I was driving to my grad school class final. I finished the test in record time (do they keep records like that?) due to the fact that I couldn't focus and it hurt to sit there. Josh and I often debated whether or not I should go to the emergency room during these bouts of pain. Josh represented the "let's go" side and I camped out on the "I can get through this without the emergency room" side of the fence. I was resistant to going to the emergency room because I thought the pain was caused by gas and it is embarrassing to go to the ER because you have gas.

Eventually I described these pains to my doctor and she thought that I might have stones in my gall bladder. She told me that she could run some blood tests and that if I needed to that I could have surgery to remove my gall bladder. She assurred me that gall bladder surgery while pregnant was totally safe. I explained to her that between work, grad school, job and house hunting that I didn't have time to have surgery whether I was pregnant or not.

I'm sure by now you are starting to wonder what this has to do with Independence Day.
Wednesday my mom came over to help me pack some boxes. Wednesday at 3am after I fed Noah I noticed that my back was starting to hurt again. An "episode" was coming on so I took some advil and went back to sleep. The pain persisted when I woke up. And persisted. And persisted. My mom finally convinced me that maybe I should go to the ER around 4pm because I was hurting so badly that I couldn't function which included being totally unable to take care of Noah. I would describe the pain of these episodes as worse then my labor experience. So, I gave in and up to the ER we went.

At the ER they did some blood work and a sonogram of my gall bladder. I not only had gall stones but some of the stones were stuck in the ducts connecting my liver and some other organs. This was causing all sorts of havoc on my system. The ER doc asked if I'd had pains like this in the past. I explained that I had them throughout my pregnancy as well as 3 other "episodes" in the past week. She then admitted me to the hospital for a procedure to remove the stones in the ducts and a surgery to remove my gall bladder. I asked if they could do both at once but I was told that wasn't possible.

So, we spent Wednesday night at the hospital. Thursday was spent in misery because my procedure was at 3:30 and I couldn't have anything to eat or drink after 7am. Due to the fact that the stones were causing blockages my bilirubin count had gone pretty high and I was totally jaundiced. We should've taken a picture to commemorate how yellow I was.... Anyway, I got to have full anestesia and go to sleep while they removed the stones from my ducts. Afterwards I was starving but was on a "clear liquid diet" due to the surgery I was having the next day. At this point it has been about 36 hours since I had eaten anything solid.

Friday morning at 6:30am another anestesiologist woke me up to have me sign consent forms for my surgery. They rolled me down at 7am and I had surgery to remove my gall bladder. Happy Birthday America!! I have four small incisions in my abdomen that they actually put back together with glue instead of stitches. I was ready for a chipotle burrito, pepperoni pizza and a cheeseburger at this point but they insisted I start slowly with more clear liquids and eventually a turkey sandwich. They sent me home Friday night around 7pm. My mom made chicken, rice and salad and I promptly ate everything in sight. We just watched fireworks on TV since I wasn't in much of a mood to get out and about at that point.

It was definitely a 4th of July that I won't forget for quite a while.

I'm a little sore still today. I would describe the pain as kind of like having a stitch in your side after you've been running. I have great pain meds though! :) And of course I now get to play the "I had surgery" card in order to avoid all things move related!!

Hope your 4th was hospital free!!!

Noah loves to sleep. He sleeps so much that I had to call and check with the doctor about waking him up to eat. He is usually wide awake between the hours of 4-6am though...so if you're in the neighborhood and want to hang out please stop by....we're up and ready for fun....well, at least Noah is.

Noah's been busy...

They say that newborns eat, sleep, poop and repeat. Noah is eating well. He sleeps like a champ. And well, let's just say the child has no problems pooping either. But he does tons of other stuff too....

He's been to the doctor for weight checks. Today he weighed in at 8 lbs 2 oz. Like I said the kid eats well. You can probably guess from the expression on his face that laying on the scale is not his favorite thing to do.

He loves hanging out with visitors. He spent Father's Day with Daddy, Poppy and Uncle Mark. Daddy and Uncle Mark were both celebrating their first Father's Day. It was Poppy's 30th Father's Day but his first time to celebrate Father's Day with his grandkids. Here's a picture of the new dads and the Poppy.

Noah has also enjoyed tons of snuggles and kisses from his Nanny and GiGi.

Noah has also been on two outings to Target (he slept the entire trip both times) and over to Plano to look for a preschool.

Of course most days we hang out at the house and feel totally busy just eating and hanging out....after all this is my summer break and it wouldn't be summer without some lazy days of doing nothing.

Another big check...

No, not the kind of check you cash. But another big check off our to-do list. I found a daycare for Noah yesterday!! Woohoo! Actually, it isn't a "daycare" but a "school." Whatever. It is clean, cute and the ladies were so so so nice. It is also in our price range and has an opening in the infant room in August. Double Woohoo!! It is also located nicely between work and home.
I know that come August it will tear me up to leave Noah there but of all the places we looked it
seemed like the place that will tear me up the least....or at least I think so.

Now all I need to do is find some spare time between Noah's meals to pack up some boxes. 20 days until the moving truck comes. Speaking of moving truck I need to find movers!! One more thing to add to the to-do list.

I know it is totally disappointing that there are no pictures of Noah in this post. I'll try to take care of that tomorrow during one of Noah's naps....uploading pictures sounds way more fun then packing!!

Obviously Noah was the coolest kid in the nursery. Sic Em Bears!

Labor Day...

Thursday, June 5th was my last day of work. I finished up at Kerr and came home around 3:30pm. I felt sick to my stomach so I laid down and took a 3 hour nap. I woke up around around 8pm and Josh and I were just hanging out watching the Celtics.
Around 10:30pm I went to the bathroom and my water broke. We gathered our stuff together and called Josh's parents in Houston so they could start driving. We also called my parents and our siblings.
Then we headed to the hospital....knowing that our lives were about to totally change.


We arrived at the hospital around 11:30pm and had to hang out in the L&D hallway for about 20 minutes because there weren't any laboring rooms available. We finally got settled in a room and my sister arrived. My parents, Jason and Hailey quickly followed.
And I was in labor.....
Long story short, my in laws arrived around 4am. I got my epidural around 5am. I felt instant pain relief and never felt uncomfortable again.
I started pushing around 10:30am. Noah's heartrate kept dipping down and we were close to having an emergency c-section but all that was avoided and Noah came into the world at 11:55am!!
It was one of the greatest moments to hear him cry and hear the doctor announce that our IVF miracle baby was a boy!! They put him on my chest and Josh cut the cord. We spent some time together as a family and then Josh went to announce Noah's arrival to our waiting family!!




Noah has a head full of thick dark hair and looks just like Josh.
Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift. 2 Corinthians 9:15

The baby's here....

...and it's a boy!!!

We're proud to annouce the arrival of

NOAH GREGORY

June 6 at 11:55am

Weight: 7 lbs 7 1/2 ounces

Length: 20 inches

He's perfect and we're so in love with him!!

I'll post pics later.

Big week...

It's a big week for us. Here's part of our to-do list:

1) Sign a contract on the house we're planning on buying.
2) Finish up work at KMS. I've been there 6 years and I can't believe that I'll be done on Thursday.
3) Have a baby.

We'll keep you posted on how it goes.

No house for us....

We made an offer on a house. It was low. You're suppose to start low, right?
The seller's counter offer was pretty much "the list price is the price of our house." So we went back with a slightly higher offer and again their response was "the list price is the price of our house."
So obviously they aren't interested in selling their house to us....although we're not sure they are all that interested in selling it to anyone.

Back to the search process....

Time to seek shelter....

So, Josh and I are looking for a house. We have a contract on our current one and are scheduled to move out July 14th. The only hitch in our plan is that we currently have no where to move. We've been looking. We've searched a bunch online and been out twice with our realtor and seen about two dozen houses in person.
The main problem I'm running into is that I currently live in a house that I adore. And I haven't adored most (translate to all but 2) of the stuff we've seen.
So last night we went to look at our top two houses back to back to really compare them and see if one of them was the house for us. We met up with our realtor who let us know that house #2 was under contract so we would only be looking at house #1. We were okay with this since house #1 was the front runner anyway.
We looked....
We made an offer....
We're waiting to see what they come back with....

It would certainly be one more major decision checked off the list.

By the way, Baby Weems' arrival date is looming in the near future. We're looking forward to tricking you into visiting us so that you can see our baby and then asking you to help us pack. :)
But don't worry....we're hiring movers so you won't have to help us move because we like you and we want to be still be friends.

And the winner is....

Sorry to keep you waiting in suspense about the job offers. I accepted a job on Monday but there were people I had to tell in real life before I could blog about it. There are just certain things that certain people shouldn't find out via the blog world. Blogs are a wonderful way to keep up with folks but they kind of create a barrier in a way too. That is an entirely different post though.

Anyway, I've decided to become the Campus Intervention Specialist at Boyd Elementary in Allen. I'm excited and nervous at the same time. I'm just nervous in general about starting a new job with new people, a new boss, etc etc. Plus, I've never worked at an elementary school before and I know it will be different then middle school---the children are so small!! Hopefully we can get some good internventions in place with the little ones and teach them to read before they get to middle school. :) Of course, any job is going to be a huge adjustment due to the fact that I've been at my current school for the past 6 years.
Hopefully this job will also give me some insight into what it might be like to be an elementary school assistant principal someday since I'll be finishing my master's next summer (hopefully) and then I'll have to decide what exactly I'm going to do with that.

Anyway, thanks for the encouragement so many of y'all have given me as I went through this whole job search, interview, decision process.

Our next big decision---where should we live?? Where should Peanut go to day care??

Job offers....

Well, I had three interviews last week. It would've been exhausting but I took those days off of work....so three days off was pretty nice. Two of those interviews have turned into job offers. I was really hoping for just one job offer.....because then things would be easy. Now I need to decide. The offers are with different districts but the schools are about 15 minutes apart. Salary is about the same in both districts as well. The main difference is the jobs I've been offered.

Job #1--Campus Intervention Specialist. This is pretty much what I do right now except it would be at an elementary school instead of a middle school. I would be in charge of working with teachers and other staff members to develop interventions for struggling students. I would meet with parents to discuss the intervention plans. I would also be the campus testing coordinator...which is kind of a drag but I've done it before so at least I know what to expect. It is definitely more of an administrator job than a teaching job since it will involve a lot more work with adults than with kids. All the people I've met at this school are really nice.

Job #2--Teaching. I know, crazy, right? I've been offered a teaching job....oh wait, I have an education degree and I'm a teacher. The principal said in the interview that they were interested in hiring me and that he is looking for math and science teachers. Cool. It would be a middle school job at an exemplary middle school. For those of you outside the education bubble, exemplary means that all their kids pass TAKS....and I do mean all....99-100%. It is a great school--excellent reputation, brand new building, very nice principal and assistant principal. I'm not sure about going back in the classroom but this might be a great professional opportunity since it is with one of the top school districts in Texas. Also, my friend Melissa who student taught in the classroom next to me 6 years ago is a 7th grade teacher at this school.

So, now I have decisions to make. What do I want to do next year???
I'm suppose to let the principal from Job #1 know by tomorrow afternoon.....Josh and I have talked circles around this situation all weekend. Where is a flashing neon sign when you need one??? :)

36 weeks....

Oh my goodness. I've made it to 36 weeks. Honestly this pregnancy has flown by. It seems like just a few weeks ago we got a call from the doctor's office that we were indeed finally pregnant. And last week at the doctor's office I set up all my appointments for the rest of this pregnancy...the crazy part was there were only 4 and one of them is after my due date. I made a joke about not wanting to make it to the June 11th appointment and Josh says, "Heck we might not even make it to the May 29th one." I immediately told him not to say that again.

Grad school is over for the semester! Woohoo!! I'm taking the summer off and planning on taking online classes in the fall so I won't be actually in class again until next January. It will be weird not driving out to Arlington once a week (or more) for a while but I won't miss it too much.

The job search is still in progress. I have three interviews this week so hopefully one of them will work out. The house is still on the market although we've gotten lots of good feedback and there are potential buyers on the horizon. Josh and I have gotten really good at keeping the house picked up at all times in case someone wants to show it. I wonder if that will continue after the baby arrives..... :) I'm leaning toward probably not.

It is crazy to me that I have about 15 work days left at KMS. I've been there for 6 years. I told someone tonight that the end of my time in Burleson seems kind of anticlimatic....but then I realized that really giving birth will be the end of my time in Burleson so probably not so anticlimatic after all....just a little scary. But I can't wait to meet this little one!!!

Hometown shower....

On May 3rd we had my "Hometown Shower" at my sister's house. The hostesses with the mostestes....Chris, Jaimie, Jessica, Sharee, Marcy, Carole and Hailey....threw a great party. It was so fun to have so many friends in one place.

I love this pic with my mom, sister and Ava. It looks like Ava is patting my belly. I can't wait for Baby Weems to be big enough to chase after Ava. They are going to have so much fun together.

Granny, GiGi (Josh's mom), Great Aunt Kim and Josh's cousins, Charlie and Katherine all came into town for the shower. Charlie and Katerine are such cute and sweet girls. They touched my belly too....but very very lightly and I could tell they were totally uncertain about the whole situation. It was pretty hilarious.

If you're a blog reader who went to Baylor then you know it is nearly impossible to find Baylor stuff (not to mention cute Baylor stuff) outside of the Waco bubble...but my mom found this cute cute Baylor quilt. I know we will use it a bunch....and I'm sure Baby Weems will be snuggled up in it at the Homecoming Parade. (Saturday, Nov 1st vs. Missouri....mark your calendars...we'll be in front of the sub as usual.)

Here are some of my sweet Baylor friends...Jaimie, Emily, Hailey, Kristi and Jessica.

My hostesses did a great job. They even added little touches to make the day special....like little petit fors for Baby Weems (or as I like to call them "baby cakes") and M&M favors. These baby food jars were filled with pink and blue M&Ms that said things like "It's a surprise!" and "Find out in June."

Overall it was just a perfect day.

I'm spoiled....

My friend from work, Jennifer, threw my first shower. At KMS we always do a little cake and punch in the teacher's lounge for weddings and babies but she wanted to host a little special get together at her house. I felt so spoiled by my school house girls. They are so excited about Baby Weems....they keep saying they are going to be at the hospital with us....but I think I'm drawing the line about who gets to see the actual birth....

Mom and me at the shower. I was really glad she came out to meet my work friends. I can't believe I won't hang out with these girls everyday next year. They've been such good friends through our entire journey to parenthood.


Hostess Jennifer with crazy Heather.

Jennifer's mom knitted this precious yellow blanket for Baby Weems. It is unbelievably soft and just perfect!!


This cute little outfit is totally girly. All of the work girls insist that Baby Weems is a girl. In fact, they gave me girl's clothing with gift receipts because they refuse to buy anything neutral.

The belly grows....

Both of these pictures were taken during my 32nd week. I thought the patterned shirt just made me look big all over so I made Josh take another picture the next day when I was wearing black. I know it is a big shocker to see me in a black tshirt since I only own about a billion of them. Anyway, this black tshirt is special because it says "Due in June" on it. It is always amazing to me how many people talk to me when I'm out and about wearing it....sales people, random little girls, all sorts of people. Of course their 1st question is "Is it a boy or a girl?" And then they look at me like I'm crazy when I tell them I don't know.

Where have I been???

Well, shortly after I wrote that last post about updating my computer died. And I mean it died. The official word from the tech department was "Critical Hard Drive Malfunction" although the tech actually said, "Girl, your computer is MESSED up."
So it has taken me a little longer to update than anticipated....but here's what we've been doing....