Reflections on being a mother...

I know I have only been a mother for ten weeks (almost a year if you count from conception) but there already a few things I feel as though I have come to realize.  Most of these things I had been told, but until being a mother and holding my baby, I couldn't fully understand them.

First of all, it really is different when it is your own child.  What is "it" you ask?  It is EVERYTHING.  I have been a nanny now for five years.  I have taken care of small babies before.  I really thought I'd be ready for most simple things that came along.  Boy, was I wrong...  This little girl has me wrapped around her finger in a way that no other child has ever been able to do.  For example, as we have been discussing how to get her to sleep and nap better, I almost melt down at the thought of letter her cry it out, yet I have had to go through the crying it out phase with two other kids.  It was hard, and I always felt like the worst nanny ever when those babies would cry, but now that it's my baby, I can't even stand the idea of letting her cry like that.  At this age, we have decided it's too early, but I know that eventually we'll get to the point where we will have to allow her to cry, and something tells me there will be as many tears on my side as on hers.

There is a good side to what's different with her as well!  I have far more patience with her at this point (and I'm hoping that continues) than I normally would with a baby of this age!  I'm not going to sit here and try to tell you I've never become frustrated with her crying and refusal to sleep at times.  I have!  But, I feel like it takes far longer than before to get me to that point.  She's my baby girl!  I am more concerned about comforting her and loving her than making her do what I want at that time.  I pray to God that he will continue to provide that same patience when it isn't simply a little crying or fighting naps, but actual disobedience that I am dealing with!

This brings me to the second thing I have learned in the past few weeks.  A couple of years ago I was reading a friend's blog she was writing after her son's birth.  She said that MOST (not all) of her selfishness went away when he was born.  I always prayed that when I would have a child, the same thing would happen to me!  We are all selfish people, and I don't know that having a child is going to take all of that away, but I know God can really use our children to cleans us and mold us into being more of what he calls us to be than we were before they were in our lives.  I prayed that he would do that for me, as I continue to do so now that she is here.

Before Em was here, I felt that when it came to my time, I was a very selfish person.  When Danny and I would sit down at the end of a long day, I didn't want to listen to him go on about the latest video game he was playing or some movie he really liked.  I wanted some "me" time.  We quickly became those people who would sit next to each other on the couch and he would do one thing while I did another.  Danny never wanted that to be the case.  He always managed to keep up on the shows I was watching, the books I was reading, and the things I was interested in.  I, on the other hand, had a very hard time remembering simple things he'd tell me about, such as the fact that Ron Perlman was Hellboy.  I would ask him who the same actors were many times, because I didn't make it a point to pay attention to all of those little details.  I didn't watch him play many video games, no matter how many times he asked me to, because I felt that we had so little down time, I deserved to use that time to catch up on my interests.

Once I found out Emma was on her way here, something in me changed.  I realized that I didn't want to raise a child in a house where her parents were spending every evening doing things in separate rooms (or might as well have been, for as much interaction we were having).  It became more important to me to keep up with what Danny was doing than to always use that time for me.  And, that has run over into how I deal with Emma.  When I look over the side of my bed early in the morning at a smiley little girl who is awake for the day, I want to get her up and play with her rather than ignore her for more sleep.  Throughout the day, I would much rather be playing with and spending time with her than reading books, watching movies, etc.  I look forward to taking extra spending money and getting her new clothes and books, rather than always wanting to get things for myself.  So, I feel that I can say that some of my selfish nature has been helped by having a child.  There are still many times that I struggle with this concept and I know that I will always do so.  We are all born with very selfish natures.  The only way we can ever get rid of them is to daily, no make that minute by minute hand over our selfish desires to the Lord and pray that he will replace them with his own desires.  So, please know that I am not trying to say that I am now a selfless woman who always puts everyone else before herself.  I am just saying that Emma has made it easier to think of someone else besides me.  At times she helps me put my families needs where they should go... above my own!  I just love her so much more than myself, and desire to love, protect, and serve her in any way possible.  My prayer now is that God will continue to remove my selfish desires when they creep back up, and replace them with his desires, which will always be to serve him by serving my family well!

This brings me to my third revelation.  A wise woman told me a couple of weeks before Emma was born that she couldn't wait to see how God revealed himself to Danny and I through our beautiful daughter.  At the time, I of course believed that I understood what she meant by that.  Then, I looked in the eyes of my beautiful daughter, and was so overcome with love for her, even more than when she was in my womb, and I came to grasp a little bit of what she was talking about.  The Bible tells us that we love, only because God first loved us.  The only reason we have the ability to love is because we are made in his likeness.  So, when I look at my daughter, and realize just how much I love her, I think about how much more Christ loves us.  I want so many good things for her in this life.  I want to protect her from all harm, love her, spend time with her.  These are all things God desires for us.  I know that being a parent will reveal God to me in many more ways, as I have to deal with things such as forgiveness, discipline, watching her make her own choices, etc.  But for now, I have a little more of an idea about God's love for me as I my love for Emma grows everyday!

So, these may seem like simple and small revelations, but for me, these are the things occupying my mind lately, so I thought I'd share.  I love my baby Emma more than I would have ever thought possible.  I so look forward to watching her grow up, become her own little person, and I pray that I get to watch her come to know and love God as well.  For those of you who are tired of listening to me babble on about my thoughts, I will give you a couple of cute videos of the bean for making it this far!  Enjoy!

She is becoming quite chatty isn't she! :-)

One more for all the grandparents/great grand parents who love to see the little one excited and chatty!

Emma's dedication/Danny's first Father's Day!

Today was Danny's first father's day!  While we aren't big on doing presents, we did decide to celebrate with a BBQ with all of our friends and Nancy!  It was a lot of fun, and I think Danny enjoyed himself.  Here is a picture of papa with his bean at the cookout.

As for the babe, we had Emma dedicated this morning.  For those of you reading this who don't know what that means exactly, let me explain.  Let me say that we did not baptize Emma today.  Our church does not believe in infant baptism.  We believe baptism is to be done when the individual is old enough to make the decision and know what they are doing and why.

Therefore, dedication is a time when we promise to do our best to raise Emma in a house that is serving the Lord in every way.  That is a very hard promise to make, and one that we can only live up to by the grace of God!  We have already talked about ways we can do this.  Right now, Danny reads the bible to Emma every night, and we pray afterwards as a family.  Right now, she is usually either nursing or sleeping through it, but we figure that one day she will be old enough to stay awake and participate.  I would love if we can continue this tradition over dinner when she is a little older, and it can be a family discussion time!  Until then, we will just read it over her and pray together.

Also, throughout the day, I try my best to talk about the Bible with her.  I will tell her who different people in the Bible are, most importantly Jesus!  I also try to pray with her throughout the day.  We also sing praise songs while she nurses, the most consistent one being Amazing Grace.  She seems to enjoy getting sung to.

It will be harder to raise her to know Jesus when she is older and we have to deal with things such as discipline and teaching behaviors.  We were given the book "Shepherding a Child's Heart" as a baby gift, and look forward to reading that.  It is important to me that she learn not just to "behave" at times or for people, but that she learn why we choose to act in specific ways.  I want to teach her not to try and please her father and I, but to try and please Jesus first, and realize that if she does that, she will please us more than she could ever know!  I don't have answers about how to do that, but I can only have faith that with lots of prayer throughout her life, God will guide us in how to do that.

I know that first and foremost, it starts with a family that follows God, and has a real love for the Gospel, rather than one that just goes through the motions because that is what we're "supposed" to do.  Danny and I need to live out the gospel in the best ways we can, and allow Jesus to work through us and our faith, to reveal himself to Emma.  We have to go to church, read the Bible, pray, and participate in other Christian activities, not because that's what we've always done and because it's routine, but because we have hearts that long for Jesus and to grow closer to him all the time.  That is something much easier said than done sometimes.  It is easy to fall into the routine of things, and forget the heart aspect of doing them.

So here is my prayer for Emma... That Jesus will reveal Himself to her at a young age, so that she can live a long life devoted to and serving the Lord.  I pray that she can learn to be content in her life, with whatever God provides for her.  I pray that she will grow to have a humble and generous heart, who knows her strengths and gifts and uses them well to serve Jesus.  Danny and I are already praying for her future husband (if she chooses to get married), and we pray that through me and other women who have influence over her, she can learn how to be a loving and submissive wife, who serves her family humbly and lovingly!  We also pray that her husband will be raised in a family where he will learn how to love his wife as Christ loves the church, and will learn how to lead his family well, being a strong and secure man!  We both look forward to our lives with Emma, teaching her who Jesus is and watching her grow in knowledge and love of the Lord.  My greatest desire right now is to see the day that Emma accepts the Lord as her savior!!

I'll leave you with the scripture Danny read at her dedication.

2 Corinthians 5:20, 21: Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.  For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Here is Emma and I on stage as papa is reading scripture.  Notice how she is watching him. :-)  He was in the dark, so he couldn't be seen in the pic.

Here's the fam on our first Father's Day!

Weddings, Nashville Style

This past weekend, Emma and I traveled to Nashville for Wendi Anderson's wedding.  There are few people for whom I'd get on a plane with a 6 week old baby and travel to watch them get married.  Wendi is one of the few!  So, Emma and I boarded the plane on Friday and made the 4 hour flight to Nashville.  I was very surprised at how well Emma did!  The only problem we had was shortly after take off, right after I had just allowed the thought of, "take off did not seem to bother her at all" to enter my head, when she decided to spit up a TON!  Luckily for me, I just happened to have the burp cloth in the right place to catch most of it, preventing it from going on any unsuspecting travelers.  Other than that small problem, she made it there without any real fussiness or problems.

What I think neither of us were prepared for when we arrived was the extreme heat/humidity that is the midwest.  Apparently after a few years of being away from the midwest summers, I had forgotten all about what they were like.  Boy, was it a rough few days.  That heat can just zap the already limited energy right from my body!

Emma was very excited on Friday to meet "aunt" Summer and "cousin" Kyla!  We had a wonderful dinner together, and headed back to the hotel to relax and enjoy the rest of the evening.  I was a little worried about how Emma would do sleeping in a new place, and I feared she would keep Kyla up all night.  She actually slept very well in her car seat, and didn't cry once while they were sleeping.

Saturday Emma got to enjoy the day with me, doing pre-wedding day activities with the other bridesmaids and I.  We enjoyed a bridesmaids' luncheon with the ladies where she was passed around the room and oohed and ahhed over by everyone!  She even got to wear her cute summer dress!

Sadly, this dress which is 0-3 months, is already a little short for her!

After a fun luncheon with the ladies, we went to get our nails done.  Emma slept quite soundly in her seat while I got a nice pedi!  Unfortunately, right at the end the man doing Wendi's nails bumped the seat slightly, causing her to scream like a banshee!  The poor guy didn't know what to do... She calmed down quickly once she was out of her seat.  That night, she got to stay with Pawpaw and Riri alone for the first time while I went to the very swanky rehearsal dinner.  It was the first time leaving her alone with anyone other than Danny, but I was proud of myself for only checking in once! :-)

Sunday, which was wedding day, was another warm one.  We enjoyed a nice brunch with Pawpaw and Riri, before pawpaw headed home and riri and I headed to the wedding.  For the fact that it was incredibly hot that day, and the wedding was located at a place requiring us to walk about 5 minutes back and forth between where the wedding was being held and where the girls dressed at multiple times, Emma did great!  She only got fussy a few times.

Here she is in the bridal suite watching the beautiful bride get ready, and dreaming of her own wedding someday FAR in the future!

The wedding was a lot of fun to be a part of.  Wendi looked beautiful, and all 10 other bridesmaids besides me looked amazing as well.  It was so much fun to be a part of it and to spend some time with the other lovely ladies.  As for the service, Jeff Lash, the husband of Wendi's matron-of-honor did an amazing job!  It was one of the most Christ centered "sermons" I've heard at a wedding in a long time.  It was also very personal to the couple, which was awesome.  His wife Annie, and the maid-of-honor Rachel, sang a few songs throughout the ceremony, bringing many of us to tears.  I don't know that there was a dry eye in the house!  I don't know that I have ever cried that much at a wedding.  I was just so overwhelmed with happiness for Wendi finding a man as great for her as Daniel!

One very cool thing happened during the wedding.  Mom, who was in charge of Emma, said that she was getting a little fussy.  Then, the ladies starting singing Amazing Grace, and she got very happy, smiley, and talkative.  What's cool about this is that I sing this song to her every time I nurse her when we are alone.  I do this, because Danny and I have been trying to find as many ways as possible to bring the gospel into our house and to surround her with it.  We have read a chapter of the bible every night since she was born and while papa is at work, I try to talk to her about who Jesus is.  Another way I thought we could share the gospel with her was to sing hymns/praise songs to her as she nurses.  So, I don't know if she really recognized that song when she heard it or not, but I would like to think she did! :-)

This is three generations of Harvey/Brown women!  You can see she was a little unhappy at this point!

A few more pics from the weekend...

Me and the beautiful bride!

Kicking it on the dance floor!

This is her attitude pose!

Look at those chubby little cheeks! :-)

She is learning to mimic us when we make funny faces!

At the airport saying goodbye to Riri!

This is after we got home.  I literally gave her a bath and put her down for a second to do something and came back to find her out cold!  She was one tuckered out little lady!

The weekend was an overall success!  The wedding was beautiful and my little bean did an excellent job of allowing me to enjoy the festivities and enjoy them herself!  Hopefully all of our travels will go that well.  :-)

Emma's Here...

Hey all!  So, as you can see, I am a bit behind in keeping up with my blog.  There wasn't a lot of exciting things happening before Emma was born, so I took a small break from typing, and since then I haven't had a lot of hands free time!  Nonetheless, I thought I'd go ahead now and catch everyone up, and then I promise I'll try to be better at keeping this blog up to date!

Before Emma was born, our time was spent moving into our new home, and trying to fix it up as much as possible before she got here.  That has involved a lot of painting, some gardening (we're still trying to figure that one out) and acquiring some new furniture (thanks to my mom!).  We were luck to get most of the big stuff done before Emma made her appearance (it helped that she was soooo late) and now we're just trying to figure out what we want to do next.

As for Emma, she made her appearance on May 2, 2011 somewhat reluctantly.  I was 10 days past my due date, and we finally went into the hospital to be induced.  This isn't the way I wanted to do it, but I was very fearful of her being a large baby already, and I was trying for the best chance at a vaginal birth, so we went with that idea.

We showed up at the hospital on a Saturday night around 8.  They weren't planning to start the pitocin until the next morning, but they had me come in to start me on another drug (don't remember the name) to help me get ready for the pitocin in the morning.  Once the meds were in, I had to lay on my side for 2 hours straight, which I didn't like.  I decided to finally give in to having lunch meat, and Danny ordered me a Jimmy John's Turkey Tom, which I was forced to eat laying down on my side.  It was hard, but I pushed through because I had be REALLY looking forward to that sandwich.

Not much happened throughout the night, except for my lack of sleep due to their constant monitoring, so at 6am the next morning, I got up and showered and they started the pitocin.  I really thought things would start going then.  By 11am I was having regular contractions, but no real movement.  I was at 5 cm, so they decided to break my water.  The next contraction after that was like night and day compared to the rest.  I was then in full blown labor.  I tried for hours to use all of the relaxation techniques they taught me in my birthing classes, but not much helped.  My contractions were coming every 20-30 seconds most of the time, and some lasted upwards of 2 minutes.  The bath helped some, because I was able to push on one side of the tub with my feet and press my back against the other side during my contractions.  I was having strong back labor, so that helped those contractions some.  Once out of the tub, I tried moving around, but when a contraction would hit I would almost hit the floor, because I was having so much trouble standing.  So, we decided that an epidural was the way to go.  I had them check me one more time, deciding that if I'd made a lot of progress, I could forgo it, but I was still only at a 5.  Once the epidural was in, I was great!

I labored like that for hours, and by 10pm, I was still only at an 8, and seemed to be slowing down.  My doctor didn't think Emma was turned properly, but she was still high enough that she couldn't really tell.  At this point, I was having so much pressure put on my bladder, that my urine was straight blood.  The doc gave me one more hour, and said that after that if I hadn't went up any more we'd need to discuss a C-section.  After the next hour I was still only at an 8, and I was less effaced than before.  Therefore, they decided a c-section was the way to go.  I was quickly prepared and we were taken to the OR.

Everything I was told about a CS was true!  Once I was in there, I was shaking so bad, and I couldn't control it.  My anesthesiologist sat by my head and tried to calm me down before Danny was allowed in the room.  I was almost asleep before Danny came in due to my complete exhaustion.  Danny came in and was so concerned with my shaking that it woke me right up again.

It took them about 15 minutes once they started the surgery to get her out.  I really thought she was much bigger than she ended up being because they kept making comments about her being a big baby.  She ended up only being 8lbs, 7oz and 19 inches long.  She does have cute little chubby arms and legs, so that's probably why they thought she was so big.  She went straight under the heating lamp to get cleaned off and then was promptly handed to Danny.  Prior to him getting her, he took a picture with his cell phone and brought it over for me to see, so my first view of her was only a pic.  Finally he brought her over and put her up against my cheek so I could give her a kiss, and then sat down next to me for a bit.  It took quite a long time for them to sew me up, but once they were done, it was right back to the room so that I could finally hold her.

I nursed her and then she went right to sleep, and slept the rest of the night.  We ended up staying in the hospital until Wednesday afternoon, and we were both very ready to be home.  We then spent 2 full weeks doing nothing but sitting on the couch and watching movies.  Emma was a great sleeper from the start as long as she was being held, so we lived in our basement until tonight (almost 6 weeks later) so that I could sit up on the reclining sofa and hold her and Danny slept on our guest mattress that we brought downstairs.

At this point, she is finally sleeping all night without being held, in her Froggy bouncy chair next to me.  We are hoping she'll move into the pack and play tonight.  She has had three nights in a row where she's slept at least 6 hours between feedings, and one of those nights she had another 4 hour stretch after her 6 hour one.  I'm hoping we're getting closer to sleeping through the night, but as we've only had 3 nights of this, I won't get too used to it.  She could still relapse back into sleeping only 1.5-2 hour stretches very easily.

Overall the birth experience was much better than I thought it would be.  I had recently watched "The Business of Being Born" and was very worried about having a hospital birth.  I was really worried that I would feel like the doctors didn't care about my hopes for the birth, but would make decisions that benefited them (as the documentary leads you to believe).  Overall, I was incredibly happy with my experience.  I felt very in control (at least in the sense of making decisions... God was the real and only one in control) and I felt like the doctors and nurses were trying their best to see to my wishes for the birth.  I loved all of my nurses and my doctor!  And, most importantly, we got our amazing little girl from it!!

The first pic I got to see

After her first bath!

From the mammoth...

So, as I sit here looking at the most recent belly picks, I am reminded of just how small that bump used to be and just how large I am becoming.  I am going to be HUGE by the time this baby is here!

So, for updates, we are closing on our house this week and will be completely moved in by Sunday!  We are not looking forward to the moving process, but are looking forward to being in our own house!  We had thought about trying to get the house painted this week before we moved, but we decided that it would be way too much work if we did that.  So, we'll paint in a few weeks, but for now we'll just focus on the house repairs we need to get done early on as well as getting some boxes moved over.  Then, once we have time to be there and decide what we want painted, we'll work on doing all of the rooms at once.  I am hoping to post some pictures next week of our house once we get moved in, even though the furniture will change in the next couple of months.

On the baby front, I have quite the little wiggle worm in my belly.  While there are days where she's not terribly active, on average I feel her all the time, and not just little kicks here and there.  She's all over the place.  I'm not complaining though.  I love it!  She did manage to keep me awake one night, but that isn't a normal thing yet, so I'm okay with it occasionally. :)  She's just preparing me for the time after she's born! :)  When I went to the doctor this past time, I was told that our baby girl was in the 28th percentile.  Knowing that my brother and I were both bigger babies, I'm okay if I have a petite baby, as long as she's healthy!

For my next doctor's appointment, I have the wonderful glucose test where I get to drink the yucky liquid and have my blood drawn.  I'm not at all looking forward to that at all, but I've been told that I'll also go over signs of labor, and other important information, so I'm excited for that part.  After that, I begin the time of going to the doctor every two weeks.  We will also start our labor and delivery class the second week of February, which will go for 7 weeks.  I'm excited about those, because it will be nice to start to feel prepared for the birth of our baby girl.  Currently, I'm also looking into a doula to help with the birth, because I'm a little nervous about it, especially considering I want to do it all naturally!

Danny and I have finally settled on two important decisions with this baby.  We've come up with the color scheme for the nursery, and are pretty sure we've decided on the name.  For the color scheme we're going to do gray walls, white furniture, and pink accents in the room.  The name we've come up with is Emma Moses Brown!  It's fun to finally call her by a name, rather than Baby Brown!  It still could change, but that's probably what we're going to go with!

I'm going to give the rest of the belly shots I have at this time, and try to do better about keeping it up!

What I call the small belly at 19 Weeks

20 Weeks (1/2 way there)

21 weeks in a pre pregnancy shirt!

22 weeks (Christmas Eve)

24 Weeks (I forgot to take the picture on New Years weekend)

25 Weeks

26 Weeks (It's a point now.......)

House and Baby updates...

Sorry I haven't been keeping up on my pictures/posts.  It's been a pretty busy month.

For Danny and I, things have changed a ton.  We bought a house this past month!!  We don't close until January, so it isn't completely official, but it's a safe bet we will have no problems with it.  The house is in the northern part of Seattle, right at the top of the lake.  It is in a great neighborhood, and had everything we really wanted in a house.  The inspection went great, with only a few minor things that need fixed, and we're hoping to do all of those on our own.  There are a few changes we hope to make over the next year or two in order to make it into our dream home.  We will see what time and money allow! :)

This is the front of our house.  We aren't crazy about the color, but oh well.  That's the least of our concern.

Our Kitchen.  The window looks out over the back yard.

Our dining room, from the living room.  The kitchen is to the right of the light you see.  We want to rip up the carpet here, and put in a wood floor.

The bonus room downstairs.  That is a second fireplace off to the side.  That window looks out to the front yard.

This is our entry way from our living room looking down.  The bonus room is down the second part of the stairs.

Main bathroom upstairs.  Hopefully the glass doors will go away pretty quickly! :)

Master Bathroom.  We only have a shower in ours, but that's all we really need.

Those are a few of the pictures of the new house.  Once we're moved in and decorated a little bit, I'll try to post some new ones.  Everything is white at this point because it was a rental, so we'll be doing some painting right away.  The big investment we're saving for, is that we want to put in a nice theater room in the garage.  Depending on how much it costs we will try doing a little of it ourselves.  The rest will be done by a contractor.  We're hoping to make a room that seats 8-15 people, depending on how we work things.  There is a huge pole in the center of the garage, which is a load bearing pole as it's below the bedrooms.  We are hoping to find an engineer who can maybe put in 6 poles down the sides of the room and take away that one, but we don't know how much that will cost.  Danny wants the theater room within the next year, so the pole may be something we just have to live with.

We weren't able to travel home for Thanksgiving, but we had a wonderful time with a group of our friends who were also unable to be with their families.  We had tons of food and then ended up playing a rousing game of munchkin very late into the night!

Danny ran his first half-marathon yesterday.  He finished in under 2 hours and 30 minutes, and did amazing!  He was pretty sore afterwards, probably from the cold temps he wasn't used to running in.  I am so proud of him and I can't wait until we're able to run one together! :)

On the baby front, I can now feel BB kick quite regularly.  Danny is still unable to feel any movement on the outside yet, but hopefully in the next couple of weeks he'll be able to.  I have some days where I can feel him/her kick all day, and others where it's harder to feel the kicks.  Usually if I'm on my feet a lot and very active, I don't notice them.  When the doctor was listening to the heart beat yesterday at my appointment, she said the baby was being very active.  He/she has a strong heartbeat and seems to be quite healthy at this point.

I have my 20 week ultrasound on Saturday, so hopefully BB will not be shy so that we will know what we're having.  I still feel like my belly is HUGE already, and it's amazing to me that I still have months of getting bigger.  That being said, thus far I've only gained 8 lbs.  I feel pretty good about that.  Here are the past few weeks of bump pictures, since I seem to have forgotten those.

Me at 15 weeks pregnant!  

The 15 week belly... 

16 Weeks

16 week belly... It's starting to take up the entire picture.

17 Weeks

18 Weeks

I'm 19 weeks right now, and I'll take those pictures this Friday.  Hopefully I'll also have lots of fun ultrasound pics to post along with the bump pic.  Until then, for Danny's sake, think penis for us until Saturday.  He's hoping with some positive thinking, we can make sure we have a boy! ;-)

Halloween...

So a lot has happened in the past couple of weeks, both baby related and not so baby related.  For Danny and I, we had our last of Brown's House of Horror, watching the original Halloween.  I think I was the only one in the room who jumped multiple times during that movie.  Sunday night, we got together with a lot of our friends to watch The Walking Dead premiere on AMC.  It was an amazing show, and hopefully we'll have a chance to watch more soon.  I was surprised at what they could get away with on television, even if they are pay channels.  The show definitely had more of the feel of a movie than a television show. It was great!

On the baby front, I really thought I was starting to feel better, but Saturday baby Brown proved me wrong.  So, I guess I'm not totally out of the morning sickness zone.  Soon I hope, but if not, I'll survive!  I had my second doctor's appointment on Friday.  I was only supposed to hear the heart beat, but BB decided to give me quite a scare.  The doctor couldn't find the heartbeat for quite awhile.  When she finally looked up at me, she must have seen a very panicked look on my face because she quickly pointed out that if I listened closely I could hear his/her little kicks going nuts in there.  So, I calmed down after that.  After searching for a good 5 minutes, she finally pulled out the ultrasound machine!  That meant I got to see my little baby again!  Last time I had an US, BB was pretty still.  I was so sad because everyone said he/she would seem like a little jumping bean in there, and I got nothing.  I was so excited this time to watch BB kick like crazy in there.  His/her whole body would shake with each kick! It was the most magical and adorable thing I've ever seen!  I have another appointment the Monday after Thanksgiving and hopefully shortly after that I'll be able to find out the sex.  At this point, I'm 15 weeks pregnant and have gained 5 lbs.  We are both healthy and growing!  Also, BB is sitting incredibly low right now, so if you follow those old wives tales, that would make the baby a boy.  We will see!

These pictures aren't really clear because the baby was so low and far back.  I love the foot in the air as he/she was in mid kick!

I feel like he/she has an alien head in this one! :)

And here is the growing belly!  I'm a whale!

I look like less of a whale when the belly is covered...

Okay, that's all for now!  More to come later!

Oh, and it looks like if we have a boy he will be the ODB... Old Dirty Brown is the name that won!  Wonderful...