3rd Trimester

Today marked yet another huge milestone. The last leg of the journey has begun. I can honestly say I've never in my life felt this pregnant and this full of babies before. After so many previous pregnancies and having already carried twins I find it a bit odd for this pregnancy to be so different. Maybe just due to the fact I'm 5 years older than the last time I carried twins or perhaps due to the fact there's just 5 more children and the responsibilities that go with them than there were the last time around. Babies are both head down....a very reassuring and peaceful thing for me at this point since I never did have 2 vertex babies while pregnant with twins the 1st time....but they are also big enough that there is constantly the feeling of 2 little butts being up under my rib cage which makes for lots of shortness of breath and total loss of appetite. I find it humorous to bend over and only be able to go so far due to now compressing baby parts within...mainly bony little butts. You can only smash them up so much before your body refuses to cooperate. How grateful I am for this and how long I have waited for these days to come. So, I refuse to gripe or be overcome with complaints of discomfort. These are sweet days that will be over all too soon and our daily routine will take on a whole new life as we transition into what our family will become.

So it is that I eat with great purpose and count every gram of protein that goes into my mouth and I sleep knowing I will not be this tired forever. And I watch my body expand knowing it is only a matter of mere weeks before I will be running again. I embrace the feminine curves that exist and the new and temporary roundness my body has grown into because I know, more now than ever, that there is never a guarantee I will ever do this again. It's an amazing thing to have these 2 little boys flourishing within after all we have survived over the last year of life.

27 weeks marks the beginning of the 3rd trimester. It actually is a little daunting to think of these babies coming any earlier than their due date. Having made it all 40 weeks the first time I am quite certain there is no reason I should have a problem doing it a second time. The goal is to have everything completely ready by 37 weeks for the "just in case" but if it goes anything like last time we'll be in for yet another 3 week wait....and honestly, that is fine with me. All the more time to prepare and birth in cooler weather. I'd love to have two 7 lb babies so that has become my new goal. Garrison was a mere 6'4 while Grant did make it over the 7 lb mark by 2 ozs. Although.....little 5 lb babies sound entirely easy to deliver. Based on the fill factor of the uterus right now I am quite sure we're already up to 5 lbs each! Ok...so maybe only 2 lbs but it feels like no less than 5 lbs per baby at the rate I'm going.

On the home front...and I'll elaborate at a later date....the dishwasher motor burned up so everything is being washed by hand by a myriad of living dishwashers, the vacuum cleaner blew up so everything is being swept which triples the amount of time where floors are concerned, the dogs got ahold of a cat..but it lived...maybe, then went on the very next day to get ahold of a kitten...not that we couldn't spare a few. I was a little of the mindset to throw a few more out there since we seem to be a bit prolific in that area of life. And all within a 48 hr time span an 8 ft rat snake got into the coop and ate an entire day's worth of eggs...some 2 1/2 dz. In his generosity he left 4 for us. He was so exceedingly fat by the end of it that he fell off the ledge of the coop, rolled into the floor and took off out the door....no longer fitting through the hole by which he entered. Lovely. Grayson ran to get Brad as Evye was instructed to keep an eye on the snake. She, of course, freaked when it decided to start moving so came running to the house. He got away.

The kitten that was stupid enough to enter the backyard today only succeeded in getting it's back 2 legs broken so with Brad on shift Grayson, armed with his .22, had to finish it off. That was fun and only succeeded in setting the girls off for hours on end. Evye is beginning to develop a much tougher spirit due to our rural living experiences, however, Aubrey is still quite sensitive to the plight of all living creatures and only proceeded to cry for no less than 2 entire hours. Tomorrow all cats, minus 2, are headed for the shelter. I'm done with dogs vs cats, chickens vs snakes, feral cats vs chickens and home vs mice. On the mouse note....we still have yet to catch the little turd. It's amazing how fast you overcome it all and just learn to sleep despite the fact there is a mouse in your house somewhere. And in all of our rural farm living we had our 1st real encounter with a black widow today. I must say I was completely and totally impressed with how much the children know and how well they have been trained. I think we always hope they understand the extreme importance of it all but are always wondering just how far it sunk in....especially with a bunch of little insect loving boys.

Grant went out to find the baseball mitt that has been in the open playhouse for quite some time now. After all of the excitement finally died down I was able to get the entire story. He knew, even at the age of 5, to check it for spiders before sticking his hand into it. When only holding it with a pincher grasp and twirling it around the black widow with her web and egg sack was discovered in the mitt part of the glove. He was inspecting it as he walked so by the time the spider was discovered he was already in the house. He dropped it immediately and the spider went running...across our living room floor no less...and a whole bunch of excited little boys started yelling. I inspected it to verify that it was indeed a black widow...in which it undoubtedly was, we know them well now....and promptly did away with it.

Oh the joys of rural living. All the things that you don't exactly know you're signing up for when you commit to this lifestyle.

So, anyway, onward to the last 12 or so weeks of the pregnancy. If it would ever cool down below 100 I might think of getting baby boy stuff down from the attic and preparing a little. Until then I'm blissfully pregnant without really a thing ready. 12 weeks, though much shorter than 40, is still a long time away.