Little Biggs’s Blog

Two weekends ago, we travelled to Fort Worth for a baby shower.  Mary Pat and Lindsey did a great job hosting the shower!  I had a great time with family and old friends.  Lindsey made this cute diaper cake and with a bedtime theme, I got lots of cool books for Little Biggs.

Friday, before the shower, we went to the Texas Rangers vs. Anaheim Angels game at the Ballpark in Arlington.  This was my surprise gift to Jason for his birthday.  Back in April, I gave him tickets to this game and he was excited that we would get to watch a live game this year.

What he didn’t know is that I had arranged for fourteen of his friends to come to the game and sit around us.  He was definitely surprised and it was great to see some of his college buddies that we hadn’t seen in a long time.  Unfortunately, a few people couldn’t make it, but several of my college friends and some guys who were invited by the other guys did come.  We had a great group there to root for Texas and help them win despite a crazy 9th inning.  Jason and I stayed to watch the fireworks after the game as well.

After that wonderful weekend, we took our final pregnancy trip.  We have decided that I will not travel out of Lubbock again during the pregnancy since I am now at 33 weeks.  We went to Oklahoma City to celebrate my cousin’s high school graduation.  It was a great family weekend.  We are really proud of my cousin for being a valedictorian and star athlete of his high school.  We did get to watch him play baseball on Sunday after a day out downtown and to the movies.  My brother rode home with us to Amarillo.  It was a good drive on Memorial Day, but it was obvious that I was pregnant.  The swelling of my ankles and feet were less than comfortable.

This weekend, and future weekends now that I’m in Lubbock will be working on the house and nursery to get everything ready.  I’ve got a lot done so far today and a group of special women will be coming down in two weekends for my Lubbock shower and to paint the nursery.  I am fortunate to have so much help.

We’ve been busy during the week around here with baby classes and such.  Next week, we have more classes and start meeting with the doctor every week.  The last sonogram was good, no new news.  The baby was 4lbs 9oz and in the 69percentile for growth.  So, Little Biggs is growing well and things look good.  We think we have picked a pediatrician so Little Biggs will have a doctor to visit as well.

While getting ready for Little Biggs, we have to give some attention to the first born kid in the Biggs family.  No, not Jason, Sampson.  Sampson loves swimming.  This week we took him to the local park to fetch sticks and chase the ducks.  It was a fun family night.

Tonight we went to a Baby Care class and learned how to have the “happiest baby on the block.”  We are now packing up and getting ready for our trip to FTW tomorrow.  Can’t wait to see the Rangers beat the Angels tomorrow night and see lots of friends at the shower on Saturday.  FTW here we come!!

So, a lot has happened in the last week….here are some highlights with more to come soon.

Last week we had two appointments.  We first went to our best ever sonogram.  It was great to see Little Biggs again.  The sonographer was great and we had a good conversation.  She even took a picture of Little Biggs doing the Texas Tech “Guns Up” hand sign.  We’ll have to work on the Horned Frog after birth.

Then, on Thursday, we had a doctors appointment to do the pre-test for gestational diabetes.  I had to drink orange stuff that tasted just like Sunkist.  Then, we had to sit around for an hour before they could take my blood and find out that I do not have diabetes.  It was a good appointment and we got to talk to our doctor a little more.

That evening after work, we drove to Amarillo to spend the night with Marcus before flying to Denver Friday morning.  Denver was an amazing trip!!  I will have to write at least a whole post just about Denver.  We had a great time with old friends, beautiful scenery, nice weather, cute kids, great conversation and amazing food.

After flying back and driving from Amarillo on Monday night, we started a busy four day work week this week.  My office surprised me with a wonderful baby shower on Wednesday afternoon.  The foyer right in front of my office was decorated and set up with a delicious cake and other snacks right after lunch on Wednesday.  Jason came over from his office.  It was “dead day” at Tech so there were no classes but a lot of people came to tell us congratulations.  It was very nice of the ladies from the Admin Team to put it all together and great that so many people from all our languages came.  We got lots of great gifts.  The department also took donations and put the money in an amazing diaper cake.  The men of the department also enjoyed the shower and it was interesting to see them playing all the games.  For many of the internationals and males it was their first baby shower experience.

The Douala refers to Thursday night’s Breathing class.  But, it’s getting late, so I’ll have to elaborate on that subject later.  We did have our first class at the hospital on breathing, but we have several other classes to attend and more I can write about that later.

There’s a long story to why we were so excited to get this picture taken today.  Maybe sometime after I finish this 10 page paper for my grad class I can tell you about it.  But, regardless of the story, the picture came out cute and Little Biggs is very obvious in this fun picture.  So, here’s the three of us in a Texas-size chair.

Finally, a doctor’s appointment I was really excited to write about.  Thursday, Jason’s birthday, we finally had an appointment with “our” doctor.  Dr. Phillips was who I picked at the beginning of the pregnancy but we had never been able to schedule an appointment with her.  Our doctor’s office always has each woman go through the rotation of meeting every doctor, but it’s usually towards the end of the pregnancy.  Due to scheduling conflicts, we have already been halfway through the rotation.  I also made sure our next appointment on April 23rd was scheduled with her so we can see her twice in a row.  After that, we do have three more doctors to meet and then we will finish up with appts with Dr. Phillips.

Dr. Phillips did a great job of introducing herself, really trying to get to know us and understand our concerns.  She spent time answering our questions and asking me things I hadn’t really focused on to this point.  She reassured us and we did talk a little about labor.  It was relieving to talk to her about what to expect that day since all three of us will be there.  Knowing who is probably going to deliver our baby is a nice feeling.  Jason agrees that it was comforting to realize we are in good hands.  He’s happy we both like our doctor.

We really like Dr. Yeoman’s who does our sonograms and has done one appointment with us.  We thought about switching to him, but after sitting down with Dr. Phillips, I am happy with my original decision.  Dr. Yeoman’s will still be involved in all of our sonograms and if Dr. Phillips were not around on the day of labor, our first pick would be Dr. Yeoman’s.  Because he is the Head of OBGYN at the hospital, we will definitely see him more.  I like having two doctors that both really know us and seem to care about our baby.

Our next sonogram is April 21 and on the 23rd I get to drink some orange stuff and be pre-tested for diabetes.  We also set up 11 future appointments that go to the due date of July 16th.  Eleven, and that’s without the sonograms we will be doing!  It sounds like a lot, but then you think in 11 appointments or less, Little Biggs will be here…wow!

Two posts so close together, I know.   Little things that I should not worry about at work, now anger me to a point that I am very not used to.  My blood boils when one of the two “crazy” people I work with do anything that “they shouldn’t do” or that I disagree with.  Half of my brain knows not to worry about it and that stress is not good for Little Biggs, but my blood pressure and red cheeks won’t listen to this smart side of the brain.  Thankfully, my receptionist totally understands and calmed me down with some breathing and some biscotti.  She reminded me to focus on the baby so I wouldn’t cause Little Biggs unnecessary stress.  What better way than to write good things on Little Biggs’ blog?

Last Thursday, Little Biggs, Jason and I went to our first ABC Pro rodeo.  We’ve decided that if Little Biggs wants to be a mutton buster, we’d be fine with that.  Sunday we went to the Lubbock Ballet to see Firebird.  It was a nice matinee.  Cindy and I had gone to the Lubbock Symphony Orchestra a few weeks ago.  We are trying to expose Little Biggs to as many auditory arts as possible.  We’ve been to the movies and are celebrating Jason’s 33rd birthday at the Drive-In this weekend.  We’ve been to some contemporary worship services and our more conservative church.  Now that Little Biggs likes music, we should try to go to some concerts.  We’d like to win tickets to the Alan Jackson concert that is next month.  We’ll have to keep up all these cultural activities after Little Biggs is born and then we can all enjoy the visual aspects of them as well.

Well, it’s not really a worthy excuse, but Momma always said if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.  I should have written something before now.  I didn’t post about our last sonogram because really it would have just been a rant and not a post.  I was very frustrated about the visit for many reasons but after time, I can probably write about it without so many complaints.

It wasn’t the worst thing in the world…just annoying to me.  We were in a hurry, which is never a good feeling.  Then we were given a Sr. resident who was wanting to learn how to do sonograms.  I had been looking forward to seeing the same doctor and same wonderful sonographer that had orginally seen Little Biggs.  There were a few pictures the sonographer couldn’t catch last time and I knew it wouldn’t take her long to find them.  I’m not against med students learning, but I think you should practice on someone that doesn’t know how long (or short) an ultrasound really is and someone who needs a picture of every piece of anatomy of there baby.  As anyone has read this blog can see, we have pictures of spines, feet, hands and face…we don’t need a picture of things we know are there, we need someone to make sure other things we haven’t seen yet are there.  If Little Biggs had 10 tens toes a month ago, we are sure they are still there.  So, she had some problems finding things and the doctor that was “teaching” her was in my opinion, rude and unhelpful.  I’m sure she was self conscious of the time it was taking her and him yelling from across the room, “Too many ribs. No, 90 degree angle. No. NO. No.”  probably didn’t help her and it definitely didn’t help my attitude.

I love when the rude doctor asked Jason and me, “Do you know why you are here for this sonogram?” Jason answered, “Because of the bilateral cleft lip.” and the doctor followed with, “Who has it?”  Wow!  Really?  Then he asked, “Why were you here for the previous sonogram?”  Are you quizzing us to see if we know what is going on, or can you really not do the math and know that all pregnant women have their first sonogram around 20 weeks??

45 minutes after we got in, we did get to see the doctor we like for just a minute.  At that point we really needed to get back to campus for a meeting that we thought Jason was late for at 9am but really didn’t start until 10am.  So, there wasn’t time to chat or ask any questions.  They had a made a CD and were going to review it.  If anything was abnormal the doctor would call.  Never heard anything.  So, this still sounds like a rant, but I think I had every right to be frustrated.  They wasted our time, didn’t tell us anything…I a mean, no new news and no even reassurance like look, there’s the heart and it’s beating well or you are growing well or anything.  I learned nothing from the hour long horrible med school class that wasted my morning and put unneeded stress on me.  But, alas, we survived and apparentely everything was good with Little Biggs.

We have a regular doctor’s appointment this Thursday, Jason’s birthday, with “our” doctor.  It will be our first appointment with Dr. Phillips.  We have thought about switching to the sonogram doctor (the good one) that we have now seen 3 times.  Depending on Thursday, we may request this switch.   Our next sonogram is April 21st and I pray this one is nice.  I’d really like to leave a sonogram with good news and a good attitude!

Many people have asked and our captalistic society has demanded so, we are officially registered!!  One great thing about visiting Babies ‘R Us,  Walmart and Target all in one weekend was getting Jason to talk about baby stuff.  It was nice to really see what was out there and think about what our baby is actually going to need and use.  There’s obviously so much to choose from but thanks to Debbie’s advice to buy the “Baby Bargins” book, I felt more prepared and actually smart about some choices.  Jason and I would try to make an educated choice and then check to see what the book said.  We were right more often than we were wrong. 

It’s crazy how many unnecessary things you can find on baby aisles and how so many people waste money on things they really don’t need (i.e. $1.49 for a small plastic canister of Cheerios).  We tried not to scan many of these items and stick to what we “need,” but anyone who has ever registered for something knows that the scan gun sometimes has a mind of its own.  It’s job is to scan and it can get rather addictive.  We thought three stores might be too many, but it is interesting how they all carried different things.  Each store had a different “big” item that we wanted and none of the stores had all the “big” things we were looking for from the beginning.

While we were out, we had to look for some maternity clothes too.  I was really excited to find a purple dress that looks good and is going to be super comfortable.  I also got a dress shirt that was on sale for $4.  And then, I bought this ridiculous one piece sweats outfit.  It doesn’t look like anything I would buy, but I love it.  It is more than comfortable.  It’s a great around-the-house outfit that will not be seen in public except in this picture on the World Wide Web.

And Sampson loves it too!

Pregnant Golfer

The baby unknowingly got in this picture two weekends ago.  Our friend Melinda thinks the bellly has doubled since then, we’ll have to see in the next picture.  Either way, the belly is coming along.

Also coming along are preparations for the nursery.  Thanks to Grandma Gayle (name not set in stone yet) we have the bedding and some accessories.  The theme is Down Under with the cutest infestation ever, Koala bears, kangaroos, alligators and parrots (reference to Mitch Hedberg).  We think we have a crib and we have a bookcase picked out but not yet ordered from IKEA.  Thanks to Jason, the junk room/office has some clear spots.  He worked diligently on the room while I was in Houston and now that my midterm is over, maybe I can put some time into the throwing of junk.

Tomorrow is our two year anniversary and Jason’s parents are in town to help celebrate.  Then Wednesday we have a doctor’s appointment, so we’ll try to keep you updated.

Mobile with Kangaroos and Koalas

Wall Hanging

I always thought that it was unfair that completely healthy moms with completely healthy babies only got two ultrasounds during 9 months of pregnancy.  Of course, you want to see what’s going on inside there more than two times and most moms are probably like me and love pictures even if they’re as strange and unattractive as ultrasound pictures.  Well, I guess you should be careful what you wish for because we get to have an ultrasound at least once a month from here on out.

That’s what happens when the mom has complications or the baby has a birth defect.  I’m still super healthy, but the word “defect” has come up.  I am not very happy with that word; it sounds so negative.  Jason has decided we will rename it  a birth “uniquity.”  So, Little Biggs has a birth uniquity.

Naturally on our first ultrasound, Monday, we expected a regular, happy visit with good news and photos to share with family and friends.  We never expected the doctor to come in and let us know that he wanted to “jump in feet first” with bad news.  Fortunately, after his intro, the news wasn’t as bad as we anticipated.  Little Biggs has a working heart, organs, all four limbs, etc.  The uniquity is that Little Biggs has a bilateral cleft lip.  They could not tell yet if the palate is also cleft or if there are any other issues.  Therefore, we get regular check ups to see if anything else is abnormal.  The bilateral cleft is found in 2 out of 1,000 babies and easily fixed by surgery around 3 months of age.

Although shocked at first, both Jason and I are upbeat and feel very blessed to be given the gift of a baby.  This is a new interesting aspect of our pregnancy and planning for Little Biggs to come.  Some things will be different but we are very excited about the months to come.  Many people long for an opportunity to have a baby and we are thankful that God blessed us with a healthy pregnancy and a healthy, unique baby.

This weekend I’ll try to post our nursery bedding.  We hope to keep updating post regularly.  With doctor’s appointments and ultrasounds falling every two weeks, we should have something to say about the pregnancy.