I wanted to also mention really quickly that Natalie is now singing more of her Twinkle Twinkle song. She's added the second line, so now she sings: "winkle, winkle, lil tar, how I wa wa wa wa are. Up a bu-the wur wur high, mumble, mumble, mumble, mumble [but she does stay in cadence], winkle, winkle, lil tar, how I wa wa wa wa are." Heehee, speaking of how cute my little girl is (I did say that, right?) right now she's sitting here beside me taking a round toy lid, pressing it into the carpet, and then lifting it up and saying "CIRCLE!" while pointing at the indentation the lid made in the carpet. I took a picture of course, so it's posted below. (The instant gratification of my digital camera is so nice.)

By the way, my next appointment is on Monday morning. I think I may have gained a little more than one pound this time, because I'm feeling hungry ALL the time. That nausea I had is gone, it must have just been a passing thing, but chicken still sounds yucky.

February 23, 2004
Today was Natalie's due date, two years ago. Of course she was in a hurry to get here, but this date is still in my head as something I notice. When people ask me when I'm due with this baby, I generally just say "August", since the baby could come anytime in the month if he or she follows Natalie's example. Either that or this one will hold out until into September, so that I can truly experience as much of the heat of the summer as possible. I've been so cold lately; pregnancy hasn't heated me up yet. I just can't get warm. Last night, while I was shivering and trying to get warm in bed, I told Phil that a few months from now, I'm going to look back on this time with longing. 

We did have a quick warm up last week. On Thursday, I took Natalie to the zoo. Warm enough to get out of the house anyway! Most of the animals were outside, because it was in the low 50's. She liked seeing the lions a lot (the male one even roared!) but after everything else, she still spends the most time at the aquarium. Every time we go to the zoo, she probably spends at least 15 minutes standing in front of the tank. (At least it's cozy in there, with benches to sit on, so I don't mind.) She loves watching fish. And she misses our fish too; whenever we are in the basement, she points out the empty fish tank on the storage shelf and says "fish!" Last week's warm up was nice but short-lived. On Friday it got cold again. I am so looking forward to winter going away for good! This time every year I start really looking forward to spring, but with a 2 year old, I'm looking forward to it even more.

Yesterday morning, Phil was installed as a pastor at our church! We both went forward to the front of the church and we were prayed for by the pastor, staff and board, and church. This is something I haven't written about yet, but Phil (and I, since I'm with him!) are going into full time ministry. For now, he is working on a part-time basis with the church as the Ministry Development pastor (an associate position) while he still is active in his law practice. Sometime in the future, as God provides and Phil finishes up his current caseload, we'll be moving into ministry full time. We're really excited about this; it's been something that God has been working in us since around last June and in some ways even before that. Phil is working on his one remaining class he needs (he was able to take it online - all the other required classes he took when he was at Evangel). Besides the class, we're getting all the other paperwork put together right now, and then in June he'll be a licensed minister!

My Grandma Hedrick told me today that she thinks this baby is going to be a boy. She told me she's never thought any baby in our family was going to be a boy (and she's been right, of course) until this one. I just don't know. I have had no feelings either way, except that one dream I had where it was a boy. And my mom had a dream that it was a boy too. Maybe I'm just forcing myself to not think about it either way this time, because both Phil and I really thought Natalie was going to be a boy; every thought and feeling I had was "boy" and every thought and feeling was obviously wrong, so I'm just not thinking about it this time. It would definitely be different to have a boy in this family, but I'll be really happy either way. I want Natalie to have a sister (because that's all I know!) but a boy would be a unique experience, and I know Phil would like to have a boy at least eventually. Natalie, on the other hand, doesn't want a brother or a sister. She just wants a baby. Hopefully we'll find out in the next couple months, then we'll also be inclined to start thinking about names!

Speaking of Natalie not quite getting a concept, lately we've been telling her that she's such a big girl (for all the big girl things she's doing, like going potty, feeding the cats every morning, and so on). She looks at us with frustration and says "no!" We say "you're not a big girl?" She repeats, "no!" Then we ask, "are you a baby?" She says "No. Naddie." We ask "You're just Natalie?" She says "uh-huh".  So she's not a baby or a big girl, she's just a Natalie.

February 16, 2004
Here we are, in that time of by some counting, the first week of my second trimester, and by other versions the last week of my first trimester. Whatever the case may be, you wouldn't think that I would just now be getting my first STRONG food aversion and really awful nausea. You would have thought, as I did, that any of these things would have struck at about six weeks along, not now. But you'd think wrong. Up until the last couple days, I had little to no nausea left at all, and even when I did have it earlier, it mostly came around bedtime. For the past couple days, I've been feeling so nauseous from mid-afternoon on, not even wanting to get up from lying down. I've had nausea both pregnancies, but it never came to anything. The past couple days, I have thought that streak was about to come to an end. So far, it hasn't yet, although tonight at dinner I could almost count what happened. It's a very sad thing. This entire pregnancy so far, I have had several foods that I've craved, like dairy, broccoli, and popcorn, but I haven't had anything I've abhorred, except for things I don't ordinarily like anyway, like fish or onions. And while I still don't eat peas, that food aversion became permanent after last pregnancy, so it has nothing to do with pregnancy this time. I've even eaten and enjoyed chicken this time, which I couldn't handle at all last time. I was feeling pretty smug that I'd gotten through the first trimester and not had to make any changes to my cooking and eating habits (except eating more, of course). Then tonight, I was feeling nauseous as I had the past couple evenings, but once Phil came home from work we decided what we'd make for dinner and I said I'd go and cook it. (I really like cooking these days, and for that matter, cleaning the kitchen up too. It's a time when, after the whole day of being "on duty" with Natalie, Phil takes over and I can be, somewhat anyway, in my own thoughts for awhile.) We decided to have grilled chicken and rice. I got out the chicken bags, picked out a couple pieces, and defrosted them in the microwave. When I was getting them ready to go on the grill, putting salt and pepper on them, suddenly the smell was just horrible. I commented to Phil that it must just be the raw meat but it was just really getting to me. After cooking for a while though, it smelled fine. [Sorry about the graphic nature of the next bit; I just wanted to write it as it happened and there just isn't a better way to say it.] When we sat down to eat, I took a few bites, and it didn't taste very good but Phil and Natalie were enjoying theirs (Natalie even dug into the pieces I was cutting up for her on my plate, before I had transferred them to her plate) so I figured it just must be my taste was off tonight. Then, about four bites into my chicken, I almost lost it; I started gagging. I tried to chew it up quickly and swallow it, but that wasn't going to happen. I ran over to the sink and spit out the piece I was eating, because I couldn't hold onto it any longer. I came back to the table and sat there for about a minute, pretty shaken up and still feeling really bad, and shocked too - I wasn't expecting to feel this way about any food already 1/3 into this pregnancy - this was something I was keeping my senses prepared for two months ago! So, now sitting here a few hours later, even thinking about chicken is making my stomach turn. I can still "smell" it. Again. Like the last pregnancy. It took me completely by surprise; I feel like my body has suddenly turned on me. I had this whole pregnancy thing figured out, right? I was so wrong. This pregnancy has been different in a lot of ways from my first, but in a lot of ways it has not been a surprise either. When I started feeling some round ligament stretching, I didn't call my doctor wondering what these pains in my side were. I expected to lose my waist sooner since my abs have "been there done that" already. I expected the nausea would be going away now, which it had up until the last couple days. And I expected food aversions to start at least a month ago. Surprise! It looks like we'll be heading to the store tomorrow to pick up The Other White Meat again, and if Natalie wants chicken it will just be coming in the form of breaded nuggets.

In much happier news, I think I'm definitely feeling small baby movements -- bubbling. I've felt it here and there for the last week, but I wasn't sure, even though I knew what it felt like this time. You still forget how slight those first movements are, once the kicks and jabs of later pregnancy are implanted in your memory. Tonight, after the dinner I so enjoyed, I was sitting on the couch and felt what I am almost certain was the baby; who, according to books, is about the size of a peach now! Amazing!

February 13 (&14), 2004
My baby isn't really a baby anymore! She's two! (She says "due!" and holds up the first finger on both hands.) I've been meaning to get on here to journal all week, but I just haven't gotten to it; we've kept pretty busy. I'll start with today and work backwards.

This week is the end of my first trimester! (New belly picture added for month 3. It's hard to tell, but I really am bigger than last month...this time we didn't do a belly-only close up since it's all becoming more obvious now, but the camera doesn't necessarily capture that.) I'm now 12 weeks, and beginning my 13th week, so that means I'm in month 4. Nausea is pretty much gone these days, which is wonderful, but tiredness has not yet let up. I could sleep 10 hours a night and I still wake up feeling like I barely slept. Clothing is really becoming an issue now. I can't even wear my non-maternity pants with the button fastened with a safety pin (I tried that in desperation today), but except for a couple things that I never wore last time because they were too small (medium/large instead of XL or up) I'm just wearing clothes that are so big on me that I feel really huge. And they look ridiculous on me too, because I'm not quite big enough to fill anything out, so most things look like big pajamas; big through the tummy, and arms and around my body, where I lost a lot of weight. I've mostly been wearing a few things (over and over again) that I borrowed from my friends April and Allie, because they fit me. I'm at the point now that I still COULD wear most of my non-maternity shirts, if they were long enough to fit over maternity pants (which have the ugly panel). But since I now have to wear maternity pants, the oversized shirts are compelled to come with them. I tried on a pair of non-paneled maternity jeans at Motherhood the other day (the only ones they had less than $20) but it just dug into my tummy all wrong, especially when I attempted to sit. I need the ugly panel.

I'm going to have to write later about Natalie and her birthday, her party, and her two year checkup with the doctor. I planned to write this all tonight but it's now very late and I've been feeling like I could have gone to sleep around 7:30 anyway. I'll write more tomorrow.

February 14 - Happy Valentine's Day! I was really surprised to have gotten a valentine card from Phil - a CARD, and on a day that it's "expected", nonetheless! (Shocking!) He also included a very nice piece of jewelry with the card - a candy necklace. It was really sweet, and no pun intended. He also got Natalie a valentine. My card was written to "Darlin" and Natalie's to "Little Darlin". I wanted to make sure I wrote that down because Natalie has already completely torn up both envelopes, so those won't be kept. Natalie's card is a pop-up (birds, hearts, and flowers), and included a little package of Nerds, which she gobbled up. I think she really liked her valentine from Daddy too.

Anyway, about Natalie's two year checkup. She has become tall and skinny these days. She used to regularly check in at 90% or above on both height and weight.  Now she is half an inch under 3 feet (still 90th percentile - she's going to be like her Aunt Sarah!) but she only gained about a pound since her 18 month checkup, to 27 pounds, which places her right at the 50th percentile on weight. Tall and skinny, just like her daddy and I were growing up! (Though I don't think she has my long legs - we have to roll the cuffs on most of her pants.) I think she's slowed down her weight gain just because she's not breastfeeding anymore - she eats really well all the time, and isn't even half as picky about what she eats as I am, so it isn't lack of food. Dr. Kern was very impressed that she is already learning her colors, shapes, and letters, and wasn't concerned that she isn't forming sentences yet. He thought it was funny that she's not saying sentences but singing "twinkle twinkle little star" though. (This is something I haven't mentioned. She loves to sing that song when she thinks no one is listening. If we ask her to sing, she says "no!" It's so cute; this is how she sings it: "winkle, winkle, ra-ra tar, how-a-ra-ra-ra-ra-are. Winkle, winkle, ra-ra tar... (repeats)" That's as much as she sings, just the first line, over and over.) That's another indication that she's my kid - she isn't strong in speaking but she sings!

Dr. Kern gave me a suggestion to help with her nail biting - make it part of our routine to file her nails every day. Not that they NEED to be filed because she bites them so short there's nothing left, but maybe if we take the time to get her involved in doing her nails, like we do her toenails, she'll stop chewing them. That, and he said to keep her hands occupied when she's sitting still and has the tendency to start chewing (like when we are snuggling, reading, or watching TV). I haven't started filing yet because I need to find a nail file for her, but I have started trying to distract her with giving her something to hold when she starts reaching for her mouth. That was pretty much it for her doctor's appointment. I forgot to mention that she's started going potty. On that front, I've started to go at training more seriously now, since she's doing so well at it, it seems she is ready. I'm not doing as much as I would like yet; soon I want to get to the point that I'm putting her on the potty every hour, but we are going more frequently. Every time she sits on the potty now, she goes at least a little. We're so proud of her!

Natalie's birthday party was last Sunday afternoon, and her birthday was Monday. On Monday, we just had a fun day, first getting her pictures taken (they'll be back on March 2 - sorry, no proof sheet this time because the price went up too high for it), and then we played around at the mall for a little while before Phil went back to work. We took her to get a soft pretzel, and she also played for awhile at the kids' play area. There was a little boy there who was born on February 9th too! The mom asked me (seeing Natalie all dressed up) if she'd had her picture taken, and I said yes, she's two today. She answered, "so is he! Today's his birthday too!" I asked what time he was born, and she said 2:09 am, then I asked, "you didn't deliver at St. Ann's, did you?" She hadn't, but wouldn't that have been funny? So anyway, after Phil got off work that night, we had dinner then we went to Chuck E. Cheese for a little while, so she could go on some rides. They gave Natalie a "Party Time!" paper crown that she has been wearing pretty much constantly (in the house anyway - that's where it stays) ever since. Yesterday it was worn down so much that it wouldn't stay together anymore, so, since I'm such a good mommy, instead of throwing it in the trash, I taped together the ends so she can wear it for a little longer. It's starting to look pretty ragged though!!!  

Finally, here's all about Natalie's birthday party. This year it was mostly just family, with the exception of a family that goes to our home group, and also Jaime and Ben, who were invited because Natalie personally asked for Jaime to come. (I asked Natalie who she wanted to come to her party, and after she went through family members, I asked her if she wanted any friends here and she said "Addie", who couldn't come that day, and "Jaime". So cute.)  It was much less chaotic, and a lot less crowded, being family only. I figure we will have plenty of parties in the future that will include a dozen kids running around. I made a Nemo cake that I was (still am!) so proud of. Wilton hasn't made a Nemo cake pan yet, so what I did is tape a piece of wax paper on top of a picture of Nemo, then I took a star tip in all the different colors and drew/colored in Nemo with frosting. I froze it for a couple hours, then peeled it off the wax paper and put it on the cake. Here's a picture of it! It turned out so good, and the best part was, it tasted even better. The cake was french vanilla, and I found a really good recipe for a meringue buttercream that is much better than the Wilton one I had been using. I used that all over the cake, and made a strawberry creme filling for between the layers. It was yummy, and it was eaten so fast that we didn't get any leftovers!  Natalie got some good practice at blowing out candles before we ate cake, because we got some cute bubbles (Nemo fish inside of fish bowls) that most of us couldn't get to work, but Grandpa Brett and Natalie did just great with them. She'd never actually blown bubbles before (we always blew them and she chased them) but she learned fast! So by the time it came to blow out her TWO candles, she blew them right out, all by herself.  It was a fun day, and not even exhausting, either, since we kept it so low-stress. For dinner that night, the whole family and Jaime and Ben went out to Mi Mexico to eat. It was a really good day. I think Natalie had a GREAT birthday this year! (By the way, there's a picture of Natalie with her cake down below.)

February 2, 2004
This is going to be a longer entry because Natalie had a very big weekend, so I want make sure I get all that written down. But first, we had our doctor's appointment this morning and we had our first ultrasound! We're keeping my due date of August 27, but the baby was measuring at August 25. Close enough, though. It was so amazing to us how different this ultrasound was from our first ultrasound of Natalie. This was definitely no little bean picture! Her first ultrasound was taken at barely 8 weeks along, very early, so she wasn't moving yet and it was just a little upside down bean on the screen with her heart pumping. What a difference a couple weeks makes! It was much bigger and clearer, but my first thought was, oh boy, this one is MUCH more active than Natalie...then I realized how much growth and change there is just in the last few weeks. The baby was moving around so much, doing a little jig with his/her arms and legs and turning around different directions. Everything looks good; I realized later that I forgot to ask about the placement of the placenta, but he said that "everything looks really good" so I'm assuming that means the placenta is in the right place too. We saw the heart, and the fact that the baby was so active was a good sign too. And there's only one! Whew! I've been having dreams as of late that there were twins...which would have been really funny seeing as how this time there were no fertility drugs involved. :-)  I had a full exam this time, which was my first exam with a male OB. He was okay, I wasn't uncomfortable with him. I'm still considering looking into other places though, just mostly because I'm not sure I want to be stuck going to Mt. Carmel East. I want to tour the new facilities at St. Ann's (where I delivered Natalie) and East before I make that decision.  I gained one pound since my last visit, which is right on target. I also found out today that I'm not almost 5' 7" anymore - I'm now not quite 5' 6"! How is it that I shrunk an inch in the last couple years?

This weekend is Natalie's birthday party! We decided (or, actually, Natalie decided) to go with a Finding Nemo theme. We were at the store and she pointed out the Nemo stuff, so we looked at it and found some cute stuff, including little fishbowl bubbles to pass out to the kids. That will be a good game for a bunch of two to three year olds! Now I just have to find a cake pan, which I'm sure won't be hard since it's so popular right now. We're also getting her picture taken next Monday, which is her birthday. I like to always schedule her pictures actually on her birthday or the day after.

Natalie had a VERY big girl weekend! First, on Saturday she went poop in the potty! She's been very good lately at telling us when she has to go pee, so we put her on the potty and usually she goes right away. Sometimes it doesn't come out right away so I tell her to "push out the pee pee's!" She squints her eyes and pushes, which generally gets at least a few drops out but most of the time she pees quite a lot. This time, Phil had taken her, but he usually sits her on the potty seat and then sort of leaves her alone to do her thing. Suddenly, she was all finished and said "uh-oh! uh-oh!" as she was looking into the potty. She had gone poop and she thought this was a problem! We both cheered wildly and said she was such a big girl, and told her that it wasn't an uh-oh, it was a very good thing and we were very proud! Then, on Saturday afternoon, Natalie had her first real hair cut! Yes, finally! Until now we've just been trimming her bangs. We figured almost two was a good time to get her hair all evened out, though it meant cutting off those baby fine ends that she's had since birth. We took her to Snip Buzz Bangs, a hair place just for kids. She sat in a fire truck chair and watched a little Elmo while getting her hair cut. She sat very still the whole time and had a sort of "WHAT is going on?" look about her. But she really loved it that they used spray on her hair and gave her a purple pretty afterwards. She is still talking about the spray they put in her hair. Since it was her first hair cut, they saved the hair lock for me, in a little plastic ziploc. Natalie even had her hair blow-dried and styled, for the first time in her life. It was really cute, with flippy-out ends like Paige Davis. I'm thinking I might try to do her hair like that for her picture next week too. If she'll stay still for me like she did for the stylist! Of course, I took lots of pictures afterwards. One of them is below, but I'll be posting more on its own page in the next couple days.

The last big-girl thing I wanted to mention about last weekend is that on Friday, we were driving in the car and Phil gave her a book to read. It was a book of opposites, and Natalie actually "read" the book! She's often looked at books of animals or things and pointed out and named the objects, but this time she pointed to the pictures and said the correct "opposites" words, like "open" and "closed", "top" and "bottom", "wet" and "dry", and some others. We were so proud!