Last Week of Break

Just like that, break is over! This break went pretty fast. The second week was better than I thought it would be. It helped that Corbin was here. He was gone a lot but just having a little company was nice! I had to dog sit all week and that got old fast. I've had to go over and check on them 3-4 times a day and set an alarm to get up and go let them out. It's not been my favorite but it hasn't been that big of a deal either. New Year's was pretty uneventful. I went to a movie on New Year's Eve with my aunt and cousin and then went with them to my other cousin's house and played a game with them for a few minutes after the movie. I went to bed before midnight.  

I had a doctor's appointment last week with an ultrasound since I'm old they wanted to check in on things. My amniotic fluid is great and baby looks to be about 6 pounds so things are looking great. The parents arrived in Boise on a snowy New Year's Day. It was the first and only snow we've gotten this year. It was very pretty. I decided to keep up a January emotional support tree and I'm so glad I did. I would have been bummed to not have any twinkle lights on the one day it snowed.  

I met the Israeli baby family yesterday. We met at a coffee shop, it felt a little like an awkward first date but it was great. They are really great. They will come over for some pizza this week so the kids can meet them. 

I have been working like crazy the last few days. I tend to procrastinate and cram and it's go time! I need 5 weeks of lessons figured out so that I'm covered for whenever the baby decides to come. I have 2 of my 3 classes pretty well figured out. Tomorrow teachers return to work for a work day so I hope to finish it all up tonight and tomorrow. Wish me luck!

January décor with lights.

A skiff of snow! We got a bit more than that, it only lasted 2 days.

My January happy lights.

Ori (2), Roy (to the left of me), Ran (to the right of me).

It's Christmas!

We had a great Christmas week. I had my kids which was the best Christmas gift ever. It was technically not my year to have them and I asked Scott if he would be willing to let me have them and he agreed. I was super duper grateful especially being giant pregnant I wouldn't have been able to go anywhere else otherwise. Getting them half the time makes me appreciate my time with them that much more. For the most part we just hung out at home. We watched tons of movies and played a lot of games. I made rolls and cinnamon rolls to help contribute to Christmas Eve dinner. We crashed Hart and Jory's as I was not up for cooking a full turkey dinner. Their dinner was delicious and we played a game and had a little nativity program. After that my kids wanted to go home and we watched Klaus which is our new Christmas Eve movie.  I ended up getting a last minute dog sitting gig and that helped to entertain the kids. Ryan was super happy to have extra dogs to play with. We brought them over everyday for several hours. For Corbin's birthday we went to Kyoto's for dinner. It is really expensive but really delicious, I figured we would just go for it especially since we didn't really do anything else during the week. 

Today I did some cleaning and organizing, it felt really good to purge some stuff and clean up some spaces that have gotten out of control. I love clean, organized spaces! I hope to do some more cleaning this week as well. I really need to put my head down and get to work figuring out a lot of lesson plans for the coming weeks. It's going to be really hard. UGH! The baby's parents are flying in from Israel this week. I'm nervous about that. I don't know how much hosting or hanging out will be happening. I hope it flows well and it's not terribly awkward (I'm AWKWARD, it's me, I'm the problem it's me). So that's going down...wish me luck!

Corbin didn't want to be gone to Utah for half of the break so he is staying with me. I'm super excited about that of course. I don't know how much time I will get with him. I think he will be with his friends and girlfriend a lot. Hopefully we will have some hang out time. It will be nice to not be totally alone this week.

Pregnancy is going okay. I am very uncomfortable and over it and I really don't like to stand or walk much at all. I'm happy I'm still pregnant though. I have a baby appointment tomorrow. It's really getting close!     

Ryan made a lot of forts!

Ryan loves dogs.

Crumble is a cuddler and he doesn't shed, two things I like in a dog.

9 months!

Cutest!

Charly got a new toy for Christmas and she loves it!

Christmas morning!

Christmas Eve dinner.

Games!

Corbin is 17! What!

Kyoto's dinner. Yum, and really bad lighting! 

Christmas Break!

Wahoo! I made it! I've had some hard semesters so it's hard to know if this was the biggest relief I've felt at break but I've never been so taxed physically trying to get to break. My body shifted at Thanksgiving break. I really overworked myself the week before and I don't know if that's what did it but I haven't recovered. The week before Thanksgiving break I painted the wall in my room and I helped with Toys for Toys and Rake up Boise and my body shut me down after that. I was basically on the couch all of Thanksgiving break and have tried to limit my movement since then. I stopped exercising and I sat as much as possible at school. My body feels weird when I walk and it doesn't feel worth the stress of not knowing if movement could complicate things for me. I will start exercising again after the baby is born...I hope! The baby for sure needs to cook for 2 more weeks and after that she could probably safely come. I will continue to take it easy for the rest of the pregnancy. 

Before my body shut down I definitely channeled my nesting into my room. This room is giant but it was filled with SO MUCH STUFF. I had my TA's and students load carloads of stuff for me to donate and had them take tons of stuff to the trash. I feel like I can breathe in my room now. It's SO NICE! The room feels clean, light, and fresh now. 

I'm really happy to have made it through my first semester at Borah. It really is hard to teach something new everyday but I did it. I am dreading next semester as I will continue to have to teach all new and figure out a lot of stuff especially for culinary. Ugh. One day at a time. For now, it's time for a break!

 

Before

After

Before

After

Gabby is to the left of the tree.

Gabby moved to the right of the teacher.

Gabby and Piper are in the same dance class. They just had a closed recital for the parents at the studio.

Update

Wahoo, I made it through another week of work. I'm still pregnant and I'm still alive! Last week was my last hard week of work. Next week I just need to show up, give the assignments, and continue to sit. It was nice to finish the last cooking labs for the semester. Getting the groceries and helping in labs has been more challenging for sure. I made students help me bring in the groceries from my car and I mostly sat during labs and tried to watch and answer questions. They are done! Hooray. My Child Development classes also hosted a preschool Christmas party and I'm really glad that's over with also. I still feel weird and not normal and try to walk as little as possible. I'm really glad to still be pregnant and still managing life well enough. I did call in sick on Monday. I felt like I needed another day. I can't accomplish what I used to accomplish in the same amount of time so I just took a day! It was really nice. Piper also wasn't feeling well so she stayed home with me and we had some great one on one time together. 

We mostly hung out over the weekend. My aunt hosted a Hart Christmas party for local Hart relatives and only a few of us came. Later Hart and Jory invited us to join them for a movie and ice cream and they treated us. It was really fun! One more week of work and school. We are all ready over here for Christmas break. 5 more days...we can do it!  

Cute snugglers.

Piper made some cute Christmas crafts.

Beautiful Gabby painted ornament.

Preschool Party.

Preschool Party.

Hart family Christmas gathering. 

Update

 I made it through one more work week. My body shut down over Thanksgiving break and it's still broken. I was able to work all week though. I just sat as much as possible and made my students run errands for me and get supplies out for cooking labs. After work I planted myself on the couch for the night. I have basically been on the couch all weekend but I'm still feeling crummy and exhausted so I took the day off tomorrow. I have two more weeks until Christmas break. I am hoping I can just keep making it. I was freaked out that maybe the baby was trying to come early so I went to the hospital on Tuesday and they hooked me up to a machine for a couple of hours and gave me a test to see if the baby was coming and the results came back negative. Everything looked great on the monitor so I don't think the baby is coming early...fingers crossed. I think my body is just too old to be working this hard. It's been kind of a crazy experience. Up until this point the pregnancy was really good and not harder than my previous pregnancies. In my previous pregnancies I was not in my 40's working full time and I think that is just taking its toll. If I have to I can take a medical leave but I don't want to do that so I'm hoping I can just keep sitting at work and resting as much as possible. I'm SO glad that I have holiday breaks at the end of this pregnancy. I don't think I could have done it without it!

Over Thanksgiving break Ryan climbed the BIG wall. Dang! 

Charly helping me work.

Thanksgiving Break!

I can't believe Thanksgiving break is coming to an end. Wipe a tear. It was a much needed break. The week before Thanksgiving break I think I overworked myself and my body revolted on me over the break. I started to feel weird on Sunday. I was contracting a ton and felt kind of nauseous. I was kind of freaked out the baby was going to come way too early. I basically did nothing for days and I started feeling better. I am still struggling physically with this pregnancy now. I'm not sure if it's age or working full time but I'm anticipating the next several weeks to be a struggle. I will need to pace myself and rest whenever possible. The kids were with me this past week and that made me SO happy. I loved hanging with and they were the best sports with dealing with a practically invalid mom. We mostly lived on leftovers and whatever we could forage all week. We were supposed to go to Arco for Thanksgiving but I was too freaked out and exhausted to make the effort to go. Luckily Hart and Jory invited us to join them for Thanksgiving dinner. Yay! It was very yummy and great to spend the holiday with some family. My plan was Chuck O Rama so going there was 1 million times better than that. We went to Moana 2 on Tuesday. We did some Kohl's Christmas shopping on Wednesday (I used the wheel chair, that's where I was at folks) and we went to Idaho Pizza Company for dinner last night. The kids joined family at the climbing gym on Thanksgiving night. The rest of the break has mostly been a Christmas movies marathon. Now it's time to lesson plan and get ready for regular life. Boo. 

 

Christy was dog sitting this most adorable puppy so we went over to visit it. 

Corbin got to ski and hang in McCall for a couple of days.

8 months pregnant. Buckle up.

This was basically me all week. The kids were very helpful heating up my hot packs over and over and getting me water and whatever else I needed.

Piper's Christmas tree. It's hilarious. 

Nacho Baby Shower

This past week kind of flew by. I was crazy tired after work. Being pregnant in my 3rd trimester while working full time is no joke. I pretty much have to sit all night long. Everyday by 6th period I feel like I'm going to go into labor. My job is so physical with cooking labs. I brought a pair of tennis shoes for my classroom. I cannot be in regular shoes, by 6th period I change into my classroom shoes and have no effs to give. Dress and tennis shoes, you betcha. I had one of my friends who is a midwife come and speak to my Child Development class. It was so great to have her come and share her expertise and experiences. She also gave me a live exam which will probably be very memorable for the students. We put up the Christmas decor extra early. I usually like to put it up the weekend before Thanksgiving but I won't have my kids that weekend so I did it this weekend instead. No regrets! Piper is SOOO happy. She seems to love Christmas the very most.

My friend Chelsey wanted to throw me a baby shower but she lives in Texas so she got my talented, amazing sister-in-law Christy involved. They planned the cutest surrogacy shower ever. It was super amazing and generous of them to do that. It was super fun to see my friends and eat yummy food. My sister Kelsey came and it was extra fun to spend some time with her. Now it's time to get ready for work next week. 5 more days to break. WAHOOO! We can make it!

Finished with pictures. It looks good! The kids were very happy.

My friend Katy the midwife.

She gave me a quick exam so the students hear the baby heartbeat.

My 4th period class. Some of them are thrilled to be getting their picture taken. Haha.

The kid ornament tree. Love it! 

Love it!

So cute!

Haha.

Friends!

The talent!

Haha!

Piper added the balloons to her space under the stairs. She is in heaven.

Haha,