Birth class

Today we took our birthing class. It was from 8:30 - 4:30. We chose to do the all day class instead of breaking it up over multiple days. This is because of John's work schedule. The classes that spanned multiple days started during the week at 5 pm. John cannot make it to downtown by 5 pm, be probably couldn't even make it by 7 pm. So we decided to do the all day class.
The class was good. I had heard we would have to watch a birthing video so I had psyched myself into thinking it would be awful. It actually wasn't as bad as I thought. It wasn't traumatizing at all! Haha! We ate in the cafeteria at the hospital. I wouldn't call it hospital food, but it wasn't that great either. I found out that when I deliver the hospital offers room service for the mom. So I will get good food and John will have to eat the cafeteria food or take out from somewhere near by.
After the class we were pretty tired so we are just hanging out at the house tonight doing nothing. Tomorrow we are going to Abt, a Chicago area electronic store, to pick out our washer and dryer! Yay!

Work Shower

Everyone at my office surprised me with a baby shower today. It was so nice! They threw it during lunch and served pizza, watermelon, and cake. I don't have any pictures since I wasn't expecting it so I didn't take my camera. We got a Dallas Cowboys onesie and blanket! I'm going to John's office on Thursday for a shower at his office. Busy week!

32 Week picture

Here is a picture John took of me today. I'm 32 weeks and 5 days.

32 Weeks

I'm 32 weeks this week. I went to the doctor yesterday and Austin is measuring 36 weeks. He keep growing faster than he should and has since the beginning. The doctor was a little concerned by how big he is but they don't know much until I have a sonogram. My next sonogram is scheduled for August 20, when I'm 36 weeks. They will determine at that time whether we need to schedule him to come early or if we should just wait it out.
We went to our first class at Northwestern today. It was called Newborn Basics. I think it really helped. We learned some things that I never thought about and its also just comforting. We got to practice on a baby doll. John changed his first diaper :). Haha!

Caravan Beads

Yesterday I took a class called "Beadgirl Boot Camp". We made a necklace, bracelet and earrings using different methods. I even put the loops on the wire that attach the bracelet beads together. It was very interesting. I definitely think this is something I'm interested in continuing to do, but will need more classes. At Caravan Beads, where I took the class, they offer free classes on every Saturday. You only have to pay for the supplies.
I found this place on Group On. For those of you that don't know what Group On is, you need to. It is awesome! I get an email everyday about the Group On of the day. It is something different everyday, sometimes its restaurants, clothing stores, golf lessons,... you name it. Each vendor puts what the price of what they are "auctioning" off and it is usually at least 50% off the original price. The Group On is "on" when the threshold has been met. So each vendor will say that once a certain number of whatever they are selling has been bought then it is officially on, this is when I get an email. Alot of times it is something I'm not interested in so I just delete the email. The other Group On's I've done are 50% off a spa pedicure, 70% off a haircut at a hair salon, the bead class, and a Chocolate Tour in the city. Group On is available in most major cities. I recommend it!
Here are some pictures of what I made:

Dreaded Stretch Marks

Up until last week I had zero stretch marks. All the sudden this week they are popping up everywhere!! I've been using cocoa butter the entire pregnancy, I just think he is growing fast right now and my skin can't keep up. Right now they are on my hips and lower abdomen, so most likely won't be visible unless I wear a skimp bikini after I give birth...haha yeah right!
I'm hoping that they don't keep coming, but oh well I guess if you are going to get them there isn't much you can do...still it is frustrating.

No Texas... :(

We found out yesterday that John will not be getting the job in Dallas that he applied for with his company. They said he did a very good job interviewing but they went with someone who had more experience. This just means we will have to wait a little longer to move back. There aren't any other positions open at this time with John's company in Dallas, but we are still hoping there will be another one soon.
Austin will definitely be born in Illinois...I'm having a harder time with this than I thought. It pains me a little that he won't be a "true" Texan, but there are much worse things in life :).

31 Weeks

I'm 31 weeks as of yesterday. Only 9 left!

Baby's now the size of a squash!
Baby's going through major brain and nerve development these days. His irises now react to light, and all five senses are in working order. (He won't pick up anything from his nose until after birth, though -- smell is transferred through air, not amniotic fluid.)

Weeks 29-32 (Month 7): Squash

Average size: 15.2-16.7 inches, 2.5-3.8 lb.

Erin and Ross: Sunday

Today we went to the Field Museum. I had a wheelchair again :). John tried to get me a small wheelchair. When I went to sit down in it my hips barely fit and then we realized that it was a kids wheelchair. The only other size they had was huge, so we had to use it. Then we went to Chinatown and had dim sum. Then we finished off the night with Navy Pier. Here are some pictures.



As you can see, Drue juiced me :).

Erin and Ross

Erin and Ross got here on Thursday. They took the Amtrack from Dallas to Chicago. It was a 23 hour train ride. They brought Drue, their 3 month old. I picked them up at Union Station and we rode the bus home. Then John, Erin and Ross went to see Jack Ingram at Joe's bar down the street. I stayed home with Drue. She is the BEST baby! Never cries. You wouldn't even know she was with us sometimes.
On Friday we went to the Mag Mile, Millennium Park, Willis Tower (Sears Tower), and then came home. We had Giordano's for lunch. You should have seen Erin and Ross's face when they brought out the deep dish pizza! It was great.
Today we went to the Planaterium, Shedd Aquarium, and went to eat Indian food for dinner at this place walking distance to our house. It just opened a couple months ago and we heard it was good. Erin LOVES Indian food so I knew they had to go while they were here. John had never had real Indian food before and really liked it. Everyone liked it but me, which I have tried Indian food about 5 times and I just don't like it. I had Nan, which is the bread for dinner. Its my favorite part! I walked so much yesterday that we got me a wheel chair today at the Aquarium! It was AWESOME!
Here are some pictures:

Erin about to eat her first bite.
Me in the wheelchair. I was giving John some practice.
Drue and I
John, Erin and Ross at the concert
John and I with the skyline behind us.
Erin and I at "The Bean"
All of us at Giordano's.

Update on Interview

John had his third interview yesterday. He said he thought it went really well. The person he interviewed with would be his direct manager in Dallas. He told John that every candidate has been interviewed and they are going to narrow it down to 2 or 3 to continue in the interview process, this will be the last round of interviews. We will know by Wednesday if John is one of those or not.

Crib

Here are the pictures of the crib John carried up the stairs for me. I LOVE it and am very excited about the safari animal theme. We still have more to decorate but this is what we have for now.

Suburbs

Well we went to the suburbs yesterday to buy the rest of the baby essentials we needed. The main thing on our list was a crib. We went to Buy Buy Baby first and they have a great selection, but not much in our price range. We finally decided on one and then the worker at the store said it would take 10-12 weeks to deliver it to our house. I couldn't believe it! I'm due in 10 weeks, so this was no an option. Then we went to Babies R Us. They had a sale on one crib. The problem is at the Babies R Us we went to that can't tell you anything about the products they sale. They can't tell you which wood is harder, why this one is priced higher than this one, ... it is SO frustrating. The Buy Buy Baby workers know TONS of information about the items they carry. Anyway, at Babies R Us we could take a crib home today, but they didn't have one I liked that was a reasonable price. All of the cribs that were of a decent price, if you shook them they seemed so flimsy. So we went back to Buy Buy Baby because we had a 20% off your ENTIRE purchase coupon so we bought whatever wasn't on sale at Babies R Us at Buy Buy Baby.
Well, being 7.5 months pregnant, you can imagine I go to the bathroom ALL the time. So I had to use the rest room and John waited outside for me. When I came out he had picked out a crib that we hadn't seen the first time in the store. I liked it and it was last year's model so they were trying to move it. It was a GREAT price AND we could take it home today!!!! Now comes the problem...we drive a honda civic. Ugggg.... So we told them we would have to come back and get it.
First John wanted to strap it onto the roof of the car and I said no. I thought that was WAY too dangerous. So we rented a U-Haul F-150 today and went out there and picked it up. The box is huge and weighs 80 lbs! In case any of you forgot we live on the 4th floor, NO elevator. We got it home and John was going to strap the box on his back. I said before you try this why don't you see if any other guys are home in the building. He knocked on a couple doors and no one was home, so he moved it all by himself. I was pretty impressed. We are off to a friend's house now for a cook-out. Tomorrow we will be putting the crib and Austin's room together. Erin and Ross will be here on Thursday so I want to make sure we have things organized before they get here.

29 week belly shots

Well here is my belly at 29 weeks 2 days. Do you think I will make it to 40 weeks? I keep wondering if my belly can possibly stretch anymore :)

Cherry Pie

We bought some cherries at Whole Foods this weekend. John wasn't helping me eat them so we had a TON and I was afraid they would go bad. I didn't know what I could make with cherries so I thought of cherry pie. I have NEVER made cherry pie before nor have I pitted cherries before. It turned out really good! Here are some pictures. My fingers are STILL stained today :)

John and I after eating the pie
Cooked pie
Pie before it went in the oven
My stained hands
Pitting the cherries

We are blessed

John and I knew that having a baby would change our lives, but I'm not sure we realized how much baby stuff cost. We sat down when we first got pregnant and went through everything we thought we would need to buy and put a price range down. In the last week or so we have hit the jackpot! First we found a good pack n play on Craigslist for $20. Then last week a woman at my office reminded me that since we are a subsidiary of Aetna we get discounts on certain products. The only baby related product that we get a discount on is a breast pump. I decided to look into it. I got on the Aetna website and found out that the Madela Pump In Style is the breast pump they offer a discount on. That is the pump I wanted!! It retails for $330 and Aetna will pay everything but $40. So I got a brand new breast pump that I wanted for $40!!!!!! God is really looking out for us :). It is supposed to get delivered today!
Then on Saturday we went to a grand opening at this baby store near by. They were giving away a double stroller at 1 pm. We don't need a double stroller, but it was free so we thought we might as well try. Before we went in the store I said a prayer that we would be the winner of the free stroller. The drawing happened and we didn't win. I didn't think anything of it. Then we went straight from there to Anthony and Ashley's sons birthday party. While at the party Milvi, Anthony's grandma, asked us what we had left to get for Austin. We told her we still needed a stroller, crib,... Milvi then tells us she has a stroller and asked if we would like it. John and I thought it was worth while to at least take a look at it since it was free. Unfortunately Milvi lives really far away in the suburbs, but Ashely and Anthony were driving out to her house on Sunday anyway. So while they were out there they picked up the stroller for us. Ashley and her son's brought it by our house on Monday. It is a top of the line Graco stroller that includes the infant car seat and car seat base! OMG it is neutral colors and VERY gently used. I looked up online to make sure there weren't any recalls on it and I couldn't find anything. The stroller reclines all the way down so a newborn can lay in it or it comes up to a seat so a toddler can sit in it! Also you can fold it up with one hand!
All three of these things came at perfect timing because we were going to the suburbs this weekend to buy all three of these things. Now we only have 3 big ticket items left to buy: a crib, a baby monitor, and a glider and ottoman. Everything else we need are just small things that will help us get ready. We have lots of gift cards from the showers so we should be able to buy most of the other things with those. Everything is falling into place and my goal is to have his room set up by the time I'm 32 weeks because after that we start taking baby classes every weekend and then he will be here. Once we have his room set up I will post some pictures.

Next Interview

John found out today that his next interview will be on Wednesday over the phone. I will update everyone once he has the interview and what the outcome was.