38 weeks and counting...

Here I sit in all my 38 weeks pregnant glory, i.e. Steve's sweats. Haha. We're just waiting for little Wildcat to make his appearance any day now. He keeps teasing me, I've been having contractions pretty often, but so far nothing has turned into real labor. In fact, I had like 24 hours of contractions yesterday (started Sunday night and continued until I was asleep last night), averaging 3 an hour, but by the evening, they were up to 6 or more an hour, about 10 minutes apart. I even had a few that were right on top of each other. I'd been wondering all day if I was going into labor. But I was able to fall asleep deeply and got some good sleep all night, so obviously it wasn't. ;-) But sleeping deeply was soooooo nice. So today I am relaxed.

I saw the midwife yesterday and at first she told me it was likely that I would go to the full 40 weeks, since I did with Jilly. Then when she did the exam, she was surprised at my cervix and said I could go at anytime. I am 3cm, short (1cm long, so pretty effaced), -1 station still and "very soft". When the weather changed last week, it threw a bunch of her patients into labor (the barometric pressure can do that), she had a birth Saturday, Sunday and Monday morning! So basically, it could be any day for me. We'll just wait and see. I really don't want to go all the way until my due date, but I can't control it too much. :-) The weather got nice again today, and is forecasted to stay that way until like Friday I think, so I don't think I can count on that to push me over the edge, for a few days at least. But who really knows?

By the way- this week's vegetable- a leek. Apparently Wildcat is as long as a leek this week. Hehehe.

Obviously, our lives most often revolve around this baby and when he's going to come. My mom has everything ready at her house for the birth, I've got my bag somewhat packed (the necessary clothes and such), and I finally got someone else trained on how to do Gift Shop orders at work. So we're all good. I still need to wash baby's clothes and hang them back up, not to mention go through this huge tub of clothes my wonderful friend Amanda is lending us and sort out all the sizes. I suppose I could be doing that instead of blogging, but really? Do I want to? Naw...

But other than the baby's imminent arrival, we got to celebrate Father's Day this past Sunday! It was a very nice day, if you ask me. It could have been better, if both Steve and I weren't sick with colds, but oh well. I tried to make it as nice a day as he made Mother's Day for me. Sometimes I'm not as good at reciprocating, but I think I actually pulled it off this time. We started out the morning, both tired and wishing we could stay home from church, but pushed through and got ourselves there anyway (so what if we were 25 minutes late?). Before church, I had Jilly take Steve his Father's Day present. It was a T-Shirt that says "LOST: The others made me do it". Hahaha. I loved it. I think he liked it too. Church was pretty enjoyable. In Primary we made fishing poles with gummy worms and a card at the end of the wire that read "Dad, you're a GREAT catch!" Adorable. I made one for Jilly to give to Granpda, because I knew she was making something in Nursery as well. She made some fishy card/necklace thing with foam stickers on it, but ripped it apart as soon as we got home (she did the same thing to my Mother's Day card too). Twerp. After church, we had lunch, then all laid down for a short nap. Some of us (i.e. Steve and me) actually slept, while others played in their cribs. Hahaha. When Steve got up, he took Jilly with him to do some home teaching. I had toyed with the idea of staying in bed, but I dragged my butt out and was a good wife and worked at cleaning up the house (specifically the kitchen) while they were gone. I got just about everything done too!

Once they were home, we did a little bit more work to get the house cleaned up and then Steve called his dad while I got dinner going. (Side note: Jilly said "Hi!" and "I Love You!" to Granpda Mike on the phone, pretty cute!) It was requested that I make chicken pillows, so that's what I did. They turned out super delicious!!! It was even more amazing, because I'd told Steve that I wanted to have dinner ready by 6:30pm. Lo and behold, our plates were dished and Jilly in her high chair, right at 6:30pm!! That NEVER happens! I am always late! Woot!! We had our scrumptious dinner and I cleaned it up too. Then my mom and step-dad came over to have dessert with us. I had gotten an ice cream cake for Steve, because I know he loves them, and wanted to celebrate with Paul too. Before we ate, I had Jilly give Paul his fishing pole and card. She doesn't really get the whole "I'm giving this to you, so it's not mine to play with" thing. Which means, she pulled off the bag of gummy worms, opened them and ate most of them herself! Twerpypants. Then when he opened his card, she kept playing with it, and even tried to throw it away at one point. It was pretty fun to play with, so I don't blame her too much on that one. It was a recordable card with music, and we got her to say "I love you" on it. We gave Steve his card too and then ate our cake. Very tasty. It was a nice little evening.

All day long, I kept thinking about how blessed I am to have Steve as my husband and father of my children. I wrote some of how I felt in a card to him, but I don't think I did it justice. I'll try again here. Steve is an amazing father. He finds such joy in serving his family. He loves hanging out with Jilly, and always has. He plays with her and is goofy and silly with her in a way I never could be. There is a specific giggle that only he can get her to make. He is much more patient with her than I am, and always can tell when I'm at my breaking point and whisks her away to let me chill out. He is quick to use the Priesthood to bless us and shows us how important it is to fulfill our callings at Church. He is usually the leader in family prayer and scripture study. He also likes to teach Jilly little bits of Croatian and speaks to her often. He'll sit down and read books with her, or let her climb all over him while he sleeps. He lets her hold a controller while he's playing Xbox and lets her help him cook dinner sometimes. He takes his role as a provider so seriously and makes so many sacrifices to give Jilly and me what we need and want, often going without things he needs, unbeknownst to us. We couldn't ask for a better father and husband!! We love you Steve! You're the best!!!