I'm baaaaaaa-aaaaack!!!! "Weekend" Update

Linking up with the lovely Sami's Shenanigans for a long over due weekend update...

and then some!

Hello all!!

I know, I know...it's about time right?!

I'm saying the same thing right about now, but I had no idea how many new and different things I'd be doing with a newborn at home.

And yes, you read that correct, Emily is home with us!!!

On her 40th day in NICU her amazing doctors discharged our little girl,

letting her come home 2 days before Thanksgiving.

Believe me, Laz and I and our family were more than thankful to have our healthy girl with us for the holiday.

And now that she's been home for almost 20 days now, things are somewhat becoming second-nature to us.

We moved in with my parents over Thanksgiving weekend, which was easier than expected,

and has overall been a big help for us new parents.

We also found a larger house for us all to move into next month, 

so we'll each have our separate spaces but still be together helping each other out.

I'm still technically on maternity leave, and will continue that until the new year.

Since most of my maternity leave was spent in the hospital, I felt like I needed this extra few weeks for some true bonding time with Emily.

And she really is a crazy little girl, just like we all thought she'd come out like.

She's alert, wiggly, and loves to snuggle.

Everyday she's changing and growing, 

one day looking like me and the other looking like Laz.

But she's got these huge blue eyes from someone else...maybe my mom...or the mailman...?

Here are some pictures since she's been home:

She makes some of the silliest faces I've ever seen.

I might like playing dress-up a bit more than she does right now, but that'll change soon I'm sure.

The holidays are just so much fun with a baby to share them with. <3

She snores. It's adorable.

Those eyelashes still amaze me every time I look at her!

So there's my update...I really do wish I got to this way faster than I did, but I'm so glad y'all decided to stick it out and wait for me to finally make my return to the blog world.

Now, I'm not making any promises that I'll be around as much as I used to be,

I can promise to make a better effort at it.

Especially when I get back to work and have baby-less free time,

just don't tell my boss. 

I really did miss you all.

And if you guys really want more of me,

(cause who doesn't?!)

I use Instagram a whole lot these days.

So add me: leeeasha 

***Christmas cards!!!***

I'd love to send out some Christmas cards to my bloggy friends,

so if you'd like to receive our adorable card from my family

message me your address!!!

A little introduction...

Emily Marie

6.14oz

18 1/2 inches

born on Wednesday 10/10/12 at 12:25pm 

She was off her oxygen on her 3rd day.

 

 Day 2 - Day 6

Getting nice and chunky already!

Her crazy little mohawk!

 I'm already playing dress-up, even if it's just with hats and socks for now!

As you can see, she's already posing in most of her pictures!

Laz's beautiful tattoo he snuck out of the hospital to get to surprise me, that's Emily's first footprint!

   October 10th was an interesting day. Laz and I both woke up after only a few hours of sleep to rush over to the hospital at 6:30am for my pre-op before my schedules c-section at 8:30am. And then of course we get informed that I was put on the B list, also known as the "bumpable" list, and my c-section was pushed back 4 times, and I didn't get wheeled into the OR until noon. Then at 12:25pm our little girl finally came into our lives,  Emily Marie was finally born and we were both so excited to meet her! Her belly was a little different than we were expecting. Her stomach, along with her intestines, were outside of her body, and there was also a gap found in her intestines. We were notified of this and she was brought to NICU with Laz to start her treatment. Everyday the amazing staff worked on her and pushed her organs back into her tiny tummy. Emily responded so well that her surgery to fix the gap and close everything up was scheduled for 7:30am Tuesday morning, when she was just 6 days old. That morning we arrived super early to be with our daughter every step of the way, and  just 90 minutes after the surgery started we got the call that Emily was being wheeled back up to her little room in NICU. She did amazingly well and for the first time ever, our baby had a real belly. Since her surgery, Emily has been recuperating so well that they lowered her pain medication so she could wake up and play with us. We wash her little face, change her diapers, and her daddy gives her kisses and nosies for hours! Laz is already wrapped around her little fingers. It's so crazy how just 9 days ago she was still in my tummy, and now I count down the hours until I can get back to the hospital to visit her. We love her so much already, our little princess!  

Whoaaaaaaaa...

Only 10 more hours until I become a Mommy!!!

Laz and I, and our entire family, are super excited for out little girl finally making her entrance into the world!

So let's see if I get any sleep at all tonight.

I'll be back as soon as I can to introduce y'all to our little bundle of joy!!

Friday Letters!

Linking up with Adventures of Newlyweds!!

Dear 1st Week of Maternity Leave, you're amazingggggggg!!! Seriously, I haven't been this relaxed, tan, and not swollen since before I was pregnant. GRACIAS!

Dear Mommy, thanks for making my last week of pregnancy so fun and enjoyable, even if we just crisped up by the pool for the few days, it was fun and I love you.

Dear Little One, 5 more daysss! And Daddy and I finally get to see your face! Your kicks have been getting harder, so I know you're just as anxious to see us too, just be careful not to break a rib in there!

 Dear Panera Bread, I can't wait to visit you for lunch today. You finally opened up in my town and now I get to enjoy a bread bowl filled with cheddar broccoli soup goodness before I have to get the baby weight off...great timing!!

Dear Hubby, it's almost time to be real adults/parents finally, no more talking to a big belly...I just know you're going to be amazing with our daughter and I can't wait to see your first interactions with her. I'll most likely be blubbering like a fool, but that's ok because I know it will be beautiful. I love you!

Dear Instagram, way to be so addicting. Get everyone here to follow me: Leeeasha

Dear All My Sweeet Followers, as you can read I'm still alive around here, just trying to take it easy, and hopefully get a schedule down with the baby girl where I can blog a bit a day for all of you to read!
You're all the bestest!

M&M cookiesss!

Nesting is fun when you have the time to enjoy it. 

Being at work and wanting to craft all day nearly killed me, I kept coming up with Christmas gifts I wanted to make, or sweets I wanted to bake, but was stuck at my desk for 9 hours.

Then by time I could do anything I'd pass out on the couch.

Not very productive.

But nowwww that I have 8 days til the babe comes, I can nest all I want!!!

So today I bring you some yummy M&M sugar cookies...enjoy!

Ok, the real reason behind my baking adventures was this half devoured bag of M&M's.

I didn't want them still lurking around after the baby was born, tempting me to keep this yucky figure.

So I turned them into a few delicious cookies that me and the hubby can enjoy before I go on my post-baby-body regimen!

 Ingredients:

2 1/2 cups of all purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon of salt

1/2 teaspoon of baking powder

1 1/2 cup of sugar

1 1/4 sticks of unsalted butter  (I use margarine and convert to tablespoons)

2 teaspoons of vanilla

2 large eggs

a bunch of M&M's

How to:

First, preheat you oven to 350 degrees.

Then, mix up all the dry ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.

Next, cream the butter and sugar together, then add the vanilla and eggs.

Then, add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients slowly, til well combined.

I took my sheet pan and covered it with aluminum foil and sprayed it with baking spray so no cookies stuck.

I took a tablespoon size of the batter for each cookie and made sure I left room for spreading.

Then, I took a bunch of M&M's for each cookie and pressed them into each of them.

The batter is too sticky to roll in the candies.

Bake for 10-12 minutes until lightly golden.

Let 'em cool for as long as you can stand it, and then munch away.

OMNOMNOM  YUMMY!

Weekend Update!

Updating with Sami's Shenanigans!!!

I can finallyyy say I had a nice, quiet, relaxing weekend!!

Aren't y'all proud of me?!

Laz and I literally spent the entire weekend at my parent's house,

our soon-to-be-home when we move out of our apartment in November.

I had no problem with spending all that time my parents because we all get along so well, 

and I'm so grateful for that, we're really a family when we're together.

So I got to put my feet up, play with my puppy, chat with my mommy, lay out in the sun...

it was amazing!

My feet never got too swollen, and they only hurt Friday night, but only because I worked that day.

I even saw my right ankle bone yesterday!!!!

Yes, I'm excited for that since it's been weeks, or longer, since that's been visible on my body.

And it also feels so great to have an obvious tan line again. 

I've been so busy, or the weather has been so yucky, that I haven't laid in the sun for months.

So Saturday and Sunday I relaxed by the pool, catching some sun, and even doing some light stretches and exercises in the water, which also felt great.

I even had my country radio station playing on my belly for the baby girl,

and she was kicking to the music while her Mommy toasted in the sun.

I already feel so much better than I did last week, and I know the resting and relaxing is helping for sure.

And also having my family help me out during this last leg of the race.

9 more days!!!

Today is yucky and raining out, so I'm going to do some light chores and wedding scrapbooking (finally).

Then hopefully tomorrow I'll get out in the sun a bit while Laz is working during the day.

I hope all my sweeet followers had a nice weekend, just like me!

And I'll leave y'all with my favorite wedding photo.

We had no professional pictures taken, just us and our family, unfortunately the date was set wrong on our camera. :/

I still absolutely love it, and most of our pictures!  

I should be a doctor!

Well, after another pointless doctor's appointment, I decided to become my own doctor for the day and admit myself to the world of "bed rest" starting Monday. Once I heard the word "normal" come out of that man's mouth I almost punched him in the face. Sure, bloating and swelling can be normal for pregnancy, but it's not comfortable, so stop making it seem like it's no big deal.  JERKFACE. My little group at work is amazing and knew it was my time to relax before becoming a mommy in 11 days!!!! Luckily my listing skills have yet again come to my rescue, and I finished up every last thing I needed to do in order to leave my job completely organized and easy for everyone to keep it up while I'm gone. Can't wait to see the piles of paperwork left at my desk for me to return to in December. Oh well people, it's almost baby time! So for the next week I'll be relaxing as much as I can through the back pains and swelling. My feet already looked horrible by 8:00am today, so I know this was the best decision for my body. I'm hoping to get by the pool, for some color and napping time, and maybe even a little kicking around the water would do my circulation some good. Then Wednesday I have an ultrasound in the hospital to check on the babe's weight and measurements for my c-section, and then my last doctors appointment right after that. Fun Fun Fun! Can't wait to be done with all these doctors soon. But not soon enough. Oh well, I just hope to get back to some normal schedule of blogging since I'll be home now. Cross your fingers! Have a great weekend y'all!!

This is who I'm turning into...

Fred Flintstone

and his huge, scary, FEEEEEET!!!

They don't even blow up by the end of the day anymore. It's like once I get ready for my day, we drive over to work, I get to my desk and look down, I already made my transformation into the cartoon neanderthal!

And then my calves, arms, and hands join in on the fun too, and soon I turn into a

human sized blowfish!

6 more working days sounds like an eternity to me.

Let's just see what the doctor has to say about all this uncomfortable bloating at my appointment today..."It's normal" better not slip from his lips or else IMMABEPISSED!!

13 daysss!!!

Overloadddd

  I feel like I should apologize to all my sweeet readers. I have absolutely no drive right now to blog about anything. I just feel like I'm on overload with everything going on in my life, all at once of course, and that I'm just not able to write about anything.   Yet, I do feel like I can make a list for y'all to see what I have on my plate right now:

• getting everything prepared at work for my maternity leave in 7 working days
• giving birth in exactly 2 weeks from today
• my newborn daughter's surgery
• my own recovery
• her recovery (length of which we have no clue about, which is a huge concern)
• getting her insured and on my Aflac as soon as she arrives
• finding a pediatrician
• becoming a full-fledged Mommy once she can come home
• preparing and moving out of our apartment by November 30th
• moving into my parent's house (basically us 3 in 1 bedroom)
• finding a house suitable for my family and my parents by the end of December
• moving into our new place by the beginning of January
• leaving my baby girl with my Mom and going back to work
• Laz's birthday, family visits, and Holidays in between this all
• possibly doing something fun for my birthday (December 29th)
• getting back my pre-baby body

It might not all be happening in 1 week, but I'm a worry-er, and since this is all happening in 3-4 months, it's got me a little scrambled in the brain. So please bear with me over the next few days while I try to just relax, and figure out what the hell to write about. You guys are all great and I hate to let you down with lack-luster posts! <3  

Weekend Recap!

 Sorry everyone! I know you all worry when I'm not around for a day, or 3...but I promise the little one is still baking in my slowly-falling oven. She really gave me a show this weekend, I couldn't even walk at one point from all the pain. But even with that, we still managed to go out and actually do something this weekend! Shocked right?!   Friday night, after a much needed pedicure, I had a few contractions, but we still managed to get me out the door for dinner with a friend from work and his wife. I don't know how we managed to order so much food, and eat it all, but it slowed down my contractions and we enjoyed the night out.   Laz didn't work this weekend, so we got to sleep in until it was time for some iced pumpkin coffees! The girls on the morning weekend shifts at Dunkin Donuts now know us and our orders by heart, which is sad and awesome all at the same time. We needed screws to fix up our bed frame, so we headed over to Home Depot for them, only for me to start having horrible pains as I tried to waddle around. Two steps was all I could talk at a time, before I had to stop to clench at my belly. I somehow made it into the car and Laz practically had to carry me up the stairs to our apartment, where I laid on the couch for a good 5 hours. At least it was a good time to eat some pizza and watch a couple of movies together. As I started to feel better, we decided to visit Laz's Mom and Step-Dad, eat some empanadas, then take his younger Step-Brother and Sister to Dave and Busters for some fun. I pretty much agreed to it because I know there are plenty of stools around where I could sit as they played games...all 3 kids were happy, of course I included my husband as one of the kids. Example below:  

We all had a good time. They're such sweet kids, and definitely deserve to have a little fun every now and then!

Sunday was better for me in the pain category, I guess the baby decided to give her Mommy at least 1 a day of rest! We spent the day at my Parent's house watching football and eating, of course. I grabbed more baby stuff from my baby shower stock pile, and brought it back to our place. So now her changing table is all equiped for cleaning up messes, and my diaper bag is ready to go!

15 more daysss!!!

Friday Letters!

  Linking up again with Ashley over at Adventures of Newlyweds!   Dear Monday and Tuesday, boo you whores! You guys flew by way too fast and disrupted the rest of the week that just dragggggged by. Or should I be saying... Dear Wednesday, and Thursday, hate chu! Seriously, you guys crept by and were the most painful days of the week, not cool! Thursday, you only slightly catch a break because we got to see our little one during our last sonogram appointment, lucky you. Dear Friday, thanks for showing up, finally. Dear Weekend, I have no idea what you have in store for Laz and I. I don't even know if the hubby is working or not. But I'm sure some baby stuff will be thrown in the mix. And of course iced pumpkin coffeeeeeees!!! Dear Baby Girl, holy moly, someone looks like their Mommy! Lucky for Daddy, now he'll have two of us to love! Only 19 more days until we meet you face to face, and we can't wait to see those big cheeks and pouty lips! <3 Dear Hubby, thank youuuuuuuu! You've been putting up with a lot of moans and groans this past week, and you've been handling it greatly! Washing dishes, getting me random things when I can't get off the couch, and waking up in the middle of the night to rub my back to get me to fall asleep, you're the bestest ever!! <3 Dear Brother, only 18 more days until you arrive for your week long visit! We've all missed you tons, and can't wait to see your bearded face. And you become an uncle while you're here, how awesome is that?! Dear Moving Date, well thanks for the surprise of being pushed up a whole month early! Here we were thinking our lease was up at the end of December, but in fact it's up at the end of November. Which measn we'll be squishing into my parents 2 bedroom during Thanskgiving time, and then all moving into a bigger house at Christmas time. FUN FUN FUN! Dear Maternity Leave, I'm thinking 8 weeks (unpaid-bummer!) won't be enough at all!!!!! OY VEY! Dear Nesting, can't wait to take this weeks trip to Michaels for some more supplies and get to crafting! Afterall, Christmas is only 15 weeks away peoples!!   Have a great weekend everyone!!! :)  

 

OH, how Pinteresting?!

Before I get started with my favorite linkup, I'd just like to thank everyone who read and/or commented on yesterday's post. I literally had it written and saved as a draft for about a week and a half before I decided it was time to post it. And after receiving all of y'alls love and support, I'm very glad I shared it finally. You're all amazing people, and friends, so thank you again. <3   Alrighty, pinning time again, with the lovely Michelle at The Vintage Apple!     This week shall be random pins of mine because I'm in a random state of mind, and because I'm too lazy to come up with an overall topic to pin about. So yea, enjoy!    

AMEN.

The perfect back for a sweeet little white dress.

I'd like this as a print for the little girl's nursery.

Oscar de la Renta Spring 2013...WOW!

skinny pizzas! zucchini with roma tomatoes, basil, and mozzarella....yum!

 

 Good quote.

Light and comfy sweater.

The perfect date night at home...use a blow up kiddie pool and fill with pillows and blankets to cuddle under the stars!!!

Personal time...

I'm going to start off by explaining that this is an emotional topic for me. So much so that only the closest people in mine and my husband's world know about it. But this blog is about expressing my feelings as much as anything else, and now I feel like it's time to open up and get comfortable enough to share this with all of you. You've been amazing supporters up until now about anything and everything I write about, and I believe you'll only help me through this even more.    Now, remember back a few posts, when I was complaining or blabbering on about something that had to do with my pregnancy, and I said that this hasn't been the easiest pregnancy to go through... well I decided today is the day I share with you why that is.    At the end of April, we had one of our regularly scheduled checkups, which included a blood collection to test if the baby could possibly carry the genes for Down's Syndrome. I was weighed, my blood pressure was taken, and we heard the little one's heartbeat, which was strong as usual, after chatting a bit with my doctor, we went on our merry way. I wasn't too worried about the results of that test because there are so many false positives for it, so it flew out of my mind until our next appointment in May.   The day of our appointment finally rolled around, and that morning I began to feel a bit nervous, which I'm sure is normal for first time mommys. I cried into Laz's shoulder asking all the "what-ifs" that came to my mind, and he just reassured me that no matter what everything would be ok, and we'd handle it together. Waiting for the doctor to come into my room that day felt like an enternity instead of just 10 minutes. And then when he finally opened the door, I saw his face. No one with good news has ever made the face he had on, ever. So he came over and gave me a hug to tell me my test result came back positive. I just felt numb. I still wasn't sure how to feel with all the false positives that occur. He told me my next appointment would be the gender scan ultrasound, so during that they would measure my baby for signs of Down's Syndrome, and then we'd really know what the future would hold.   Now, thinking back from now, I think we both took that information about our baby extremely well, and even explained the news to our family pretty greatly too. The timing wasn't so great being just 2 weeks before our wedding, but instead of everyone being all nervous, we were all excited about the wedding and super busy, that we didn't have the time to dwell on it. And of course we were naive and thought, "Nothing will be wrong with our baby!"   So 2 more weeks flew by, and it's 2 days before our wedding, the day of our gender scan ultrasound. To be honest, we were still up in the clouds and just wanted to know the sex of our baby. We decided to have a big reveal at our wedding for everyone to learn what little bundle of joy would be delievered in October. I was nervous, but I hid it. So went into the ultrasound room and got ready for our own private reveal. The ultrasound tech was a very quiet guy, hardly told us anything he was doing as he measured every centimeter of our baby's body. Many, many pictures and measurements later, he gets up and says he needed to speak to my doctor and would be right back. Laz and I looked at each others and both thought the same thing. We didn't think he needed the doctor's approval to tell us whether it was a boy or girl. And why didn't he just point it out on the screen? A few minutes later he said to follow him into the examination room and to wait for the doctor to come in.   As I sat through another set of the longest 10 minutes of my life, I kept telling Laz "this isn't normal" over and over again. And then the door opened, and I saw my doctor's face again. That same sad face. The same face that comes with bad news. And then he just hugged me. Tighter this time. And ended it with a kiss on my cheek. I remember feeling very heavy, like I was sinking into the table. And the tears welled up fast in my eyes, like they do now as I type this. When my doctor finally he spoke, he told us it wasn't Down's Syndrome, but something else.   Our baby was diagnosed with a birth defect, called Gastroschsis. It's when there is a hole in the abdominal wall to the right of her belly button, where intestines are protruding out of her belly. I just looked at Laz, as my lips began to quiver, which is always the beginning stages of a crying meltdown for me. He looked like he was on the verge of tears as well, but he sucked them up and started asking questions because he knew I couldn't. My doctor reassured us that this defect is completely cureable, but rare, and needed immediate surgery after she'd be born by c-section. And then it really hit me. My baby would be taken from me, as soon as she gasped her first real breath of air, to already go under for a surgery. My doctor also told us it was neither one of our genes that caused this defect, it happened when she first began to grow inside of me, and it wouldn't likely happen to any future children of ours. He also informed me that I'd be transferring doctors to a friend of his who is more prepared for this birth, and so was his attending hospital, which has a highly recommended NeoNatal section that would be equipped for her stay.   So much changed in just a few minutes, that I was dumbfounded. I couldn't think of a thing to say except, "Do you at least know the baby's sex?" But unfortunately he said her intestines were in the way and we wouldn't know until she grew a bit more. We didn't even have the glimmer of good news to share with our families in just 2 days at our wedding. That broke my heart. Once we left I broke down into Laz's shoulder as he held me in the hallway. He kept repeating "It's fixable, it's cureable babe, the baby will be fine after the surgery, it won't have to live with this their whole life, just for a little while." It made me feel better because he was right, it could've always been worse, and it wasn't. But I still kept that evil question burning in the back of my head, screaming "Why MY baby?!"   Tomorrow I will be 36 weeks pregnant, with this strong baby girl growing amazingly well inside of me. It's been a journey, kind of a rough journey, but we're getting through it. It took us 3 more ultrasounds before they could tell us our baby was 100% a girl, and to actually see her girly parts around her intestines. And as far as her defect does go, it's not as large as other cases have been seen, the intestines are also not swollen or irritated due to the amniotic fluid, and no other organs are protuding which is very good news.   One thing every doctor that has examined her through an ultrasound has said is that she has a beautiful heart. It's strong and has amazing detail for such a young baby. Every valve, every chamber, every pump it makes looks perfect. That never gets old to hear for this mommy.   That evil question pops back into my mind sometimes, but not as often as it did in the beginning, when we found out about our baby's news. I like to believe that this is just the path our little family was supposed to take. And luckily... it's cureable, it's fixable, we'll be ok.  

No weekend recap because I'm boring...

  Seriously, I'm not going to keep updating y'all on all the chores I've done, or all the baby clothes I got pre-washed. Ok, I will, but real quick! The apartment was cleaned with my husband's help, and all the little girl's 3-6 month old clothes are freshly cleaned with my Mama's help. I finally got to see The Five Year Engagment, and of course Laz complained it was boring, but I enjoy my Jason Segel (writing & staring in it, yay!) oh-so-much and I loved it. There were a couple of iced pumpkin coffees sipped (more like gulped for Laz) and some yummy snacks ate during football. I also started some Christmas crafts that will be some family members gifts this year. They're too cute, I'll share them when I finsih them up! And that concludes my weekend. Slightly productive, but highly boring...welcome to my current life!     And now to switch it up a bit, I'm going to share a little story from my adventures at work today: SOMEONE EXPLODED IN THE BATHROOM! That didn't need to be in all caps or in a larger sized font, because that will grabs anyone's attention. But for real though, someone did. And then decided not to clean up/plunge/let anyone know what happened, and left the mess for the FedEx guy to find. EMBARASSING. Luckily that wasn't a client but a delivery guy that bugs me everyday, so I didn't feel too bad for him to find that. OK, yes I did, it's not nice, he just wanted to pee. He even said his next stop was the jail down the road and he rather use their bathroom. That's saying something. I finally tracked down our janitorial woman, and explained how I refuse to look since I'm pregnant and somehow feel that looking at the mess could harm myself and my unborn baby. She takes a peek, tries to flush, and proceeds to run out of the building and into the bushes to get sick. This girl is very happy she didn't look. So anyways, the mess got cleaned, bleached, mopped, and taken care of. An email is also being written by our HR department to inform people that this type of behavior is rude and just plain disgusting. Even more sad is that everyone who uses that bathroom either is old enough to know how to use a toilet and clean up after themselves, or even have Ph.D.'s.   And the moral of the story peoples is never think I'll have a normal blog entry, I could just end up talking about poop! Just wait until the little one arrives! ;)   KIDDING.  

What a waste of makeup!

  I'd like to update you ladies on my exciting waste of makeup kinda day I had yesterday.   My alarm went off as usual at 5:45am and I started my daily routine, but noticed these progressing stab-like pains in my lower stomach. I thought, ok if this keeps up I'll try to breathe through it and get all my work done by lunch at 11:00am, and then just stay home to rest. A half day without pay is better than a full day without pay. So I'm huffing and puffing as I shower, put on my makeup, eat breakfast, get dressed, and wake up Laz. I'm finally all done, go to grab my chapstick and Laz sees the painful express plastered all over my face. He goes, "What are you doing?! You're in too much pain for work, get in bed and call in to say you're staying home!" He's such a bully. So I do what I'm told, and lay down in the most comfortable position I could find while I'm still having these horrid pains. Laz leaves for work, and once he gets there he calls me to tell me he can't work while I'm laying there like that in bed, so he was going to leave once he finished his job. Luckily I passed out for a few hours, and woke up to him coming home at 9:30am. We called the doctor and he said to go into the maternity ward if the pains aren't going away. So I call my mom to get her ready to be picked up, take a quick shower, and pack up the rest of my last minute items for my hospital bag just in case I get admitted. And as I finish up with all of that, the pains subsided, of course.   We all decided to still see my doctor to get checked out, and they said it's normal to have these contractions now during my pregnancy since it's the beginning of the end. Lovely. I hope these happen more on the weekends or at night so I don't miss too much work over them, since I have until October 5th for my maternity leave to start.   I'm not techincally on bed rest, but I'm forcing myself to start taking it easy as much as possible. I'm asking for more help at work when I need it, and having Laz take over chores as I supervise him. My body is obviously done with this pregnancy, but the little one isn't quit ready to come out, so I have to take over now and make sure there's no surprise appearance by her over the next few weeks.   I hope y'all have a great weekend, have some fun for me ladies!! :)