When I’m losing my control and the city spins around,

You’re the only one who knows and you slow it down. 

                   I’ll Look After You by The Fray

  
I’m not even going to try to summarize 5 years of marriage so this guy, so instead I’m just going to leave it as: I don’t regret a thing. 

Happy 5 year anniversary to us! I plan to spend the next 5 reminding Angel of the deal we made on our honeymoon to return to Bora Bora at 10 years.

Since not everyone is on facebook, allow me a moment to brag about the men in my life who I’ve either picked or made, and who I get to share my life with.  We just got our amazing photos back from when Joshua was just a week old.  Enjoy!

May God bless and keep you always

May your wishes all come true

May you always do for others

And let others do for you

May you build a ladder to the stars

And climb on every rung

May you stay forever young

May you grow up to be righteous

May you grow up to be true

May you always know the truth

And see the lights surrounding you

May you always be courageous

Stand upright and be strong

May you stay forever young
May your hands always be busy

May your feet always be swift

May you have a strong foundation

When the winds of changes shift

May your heart always be joyful

And may your song always be sung

May you stay forever young
   
   

Well, I woke up in the middle of the night Friday morning with contractions. When they started to get close to the 6 minute mark I hopped in the shower and to my surprise my water broke! In what turned out to be a very fast and hectic morning, Joshua Nicolas Rivas joined us just before noon on the 24th at 6 pounds 10 ounces, 20 inches long. Everyone is doing well!

Photo bomber in this week’s picture

Baby is:

• 36 Weeks
• Comfortable with his foot directly into my rib, apparently.

I am:

• Not comfortable with his foot directly in my rib.  In my opinion, he needs to remove it by birth or other means necessary and he needs to do it now.
• Feeling a bit like a prisoner doing time who was just given their parole date and is still hoping for a last minute pardon.

Oh, the memories:

• It was confirmed at the doctor this week that he has, in fact, dropped.  She even commented that she was surprised that he was that low this early.  In my head, I heard “He’s coming early” but her exact words probably included more medical language.

Surprising:

• The paranoia over baby movements.  I never had this with Lucas (though it turned out that I should have), but these last few weeks of pregnancy are being spent a lot like the first few were: Is this normal? Does that mean anything?  Should I call the doctor?  Nature is cruel.

And there I’ve gone and missed another week in my pregnancy updates.  Second baby syndrome is a real thing (poor guy).  Here are some pictures that we had taken at 35 weeks though:

I wasn’t planning on taking maternity photos, but at the 11th hour (almost literally), I suddenly had the urge to document the pregnancy because we may be done after this.  If I knew I was going to want to take photos, I probably would have done it before my face started swelling up like a blow fish, but hey: that’s part of documenting why this is probably it for us. Not that hormonal tears aren’t fun for everyone.

That’s all I have for this update.  I think there was more but the combination of pregnancy brain just was met by stupid neighbors who are lighting off fireworks at 10pm and just woke my son up in sheer panic.

I leave you with these final thoughts this week and I wish you all a happy and safe July 4th holiday:

I can be a lot of things for my sons, but I can never be their dad. 

Currenty going on…

I was home alone this week with a toddler so I took a Mommy Vacation and packed up to head to Chicago for 2 days to hang out with a good friend of mine and her kids. I’ll post on the pregnancy update later, but to wet your pallete, here are some photos of me, my sidekick, and my leech in Chicago

 
This is the bump photo that you get this week. You’ll get another tomorrow at 27 weeks, so don’t be shocked when it looks, well, the same size. It took me a week to be both home and showered at the same time and the thought of 5 extra minutes to write on a chalk board and set up my camera is daunting. So this week lets all just agree to let Baby Boy take a backseat to his brother Lucas since we operate under “no man left behind” in this family. 

 Lucas is on the bounch back. I’ve never been so content with my toddler getting on my nerves.
I’ll post more tomorrow. I just don’t have the energy to tell you about all of the things I’ve been doing when all I can see in the house around me is the evidence of things that have been neglected. 

But we’re all happy and healthy again and hats the important part. 

There’s a quote that being a parent is to forever learn how to let your heart walk around outside of your body. That’s never felt more true than these last few days when Lucas has been sick and we couldn’t do anything but watch him get worse.

This post comes to you via my phone on the pediatric floor of Bronson Methodist Hospital in Kalamazoo. 

  
A stomach bug knocked Lucas down and the resulting dehydration delivered the match-winning blow to the house 2 year old. This morning I threw in the towel and took him to the pediatrician who sent him over for some lab work. When the results came in this afternoon I got the phone call that no Mom wants to hear: “the lab results indicate dehydration and he needs to go to the ER for fluids.” We hoped for a long evening before returning to our own beds for the night, but when we got here and they hooked him up to fluids they reran the tests. The doctor ultimately decided that he was getting worse at a rate that he wasn’t going to catch up from on his own with nighttime approaching and it was best for the little man to get some more serious IV fluids throughout the night. 

The first good feeling came when Lucas became coherent enough to  realize that he had and IV and tags that he didn’t want.

  
The second good feeling came when he didn’t want Mom and Dad to leave his sight. 

  
This week’s maternity post is on hiatus until all members of our family are able to sleep in their own beds. I haven’t slept much the last few days which would probably be a stretch from my daily naps reappearing, but don’t ever underestimate what a Mom can do when it comes to her worry of her children.