Tim McGraw & Faith Hill - or should I say Tim & Faith? We're practically that close now...

On Saturday night Tammy took me to the Tim McGraw & Faith Hill concert, which she bought us tickets for for my birthday last year, aaaah!!! :) MORE AAAAAHHHH because we had FRONT ROW SEATS!!!!! Awesome!!! and... AAAAAAHHH!!! :)

We went and saw Tim McGraw last time he was here a year and a half ago, and we did not have front row seats. I had morning sickness, and Tammy was wasted, and there were 2 preshows, who were kind of boring, and went until 9:30, and we'd had some very bad venue food for dinner (like, an onion roll or something?)and by the time Tim came on we were both exhausted. Which was pretty tragic! Tim was very scripted also, and kind of stiff audience-wise. He was amazingly fit though, and jumped up and down while singing, and... it's just a shame we were so tired!! lol :)

Anyway, Tammy bought me these tickets last year, and we have been very excited. I thought I might have morning sickness again and was a bit worried about that, but I remain alone here in my body, and am well and good and fit was feeling extremely excited and up for a fabulous concert Saturday night :)

When we got to our front row seats we giggled a little, because they were front row on our far right of the stage (Tim & Faith's left), and were like, past the stage. As in the stage ended about 2m to our left :) We looked at the people just to our left and Tammy sighed that they were just half a mouse click faster than her in ordering their tickets! :)

As the concert progressed, however, it became apparent that our tickets, ROCKED!!! :) Only people on the front row were allowed to go closer to the stage, so we weren't crowed, but were able to stand and go over to where the stage started :) Then there was the whole - both Tim and Faith totally seemed to favour our side of the stage (no complaints!) and spent a great deal of time singing to us! I mean us. Us us. As in, Abby and Tammy.

As Tammy put it, "Tim totally sung his flirt line" to me!!! He came over, and shook my hand (okay, and everyone else's in our section... :)), and I took a picture as he sang to us, and then he started walking away, but then he came over and knelt in front of me, and sung a whole line, just to me, and Tammy said he had a twinkle in his eye! lol - she actually got a little indignant, and said she was thinking 'Hey! - She's married with 2 children!' and then she thought 'Hey! So are you!' - but we're both pretty sure he was just excited to have a 16 year old in the audience, as we're pretty sure that's how old he thought I was. I was laughing - it was pretty funny and awesome!! Faith also came and shook hands our way, and when she saw me taking her picture right in front of her, she came and sung right to my camera!! Sadly it made for a slightly scary shot, as her mouth was wide open in robust song! :) Awesome :)

At the start Tammy didn't want to shake their hands, but I was totally into the concert experience this time - who knows when I'll attend another not pregnant after all - and was not going to let her pass up a front row experience so I practically pushed her forward to shake Tim's hand. I shook his hand about 18 times lol. Oh - and he came into the audience right next to our seats, so I dashed over there again (seeing as we had shifted to actually be in front of the stage, and this was TOTALLY a part of embracing a concert experience fully!), except so did everyone else, and I got totally crushed up right next to him. It's pretty funny how he just shakes everyone's hand over and over - I'm pretty sure this is where he shook my hand 15 of the 18 times, and then it was funny, I was right next to him so I kid of patted him on the shoulder lol. But after a moment the crowd was pushing on me, really hard! If it had gone on a moment longer I was about to ask the security guards to help me out because I felt like I was going to faint! But suddenly Tim went back onstage and everyone moved away, thank goodness! I went back to Tammy (who had totally not embraced this part of the concert experience - crazy! :)) and kept dancing, but had to go back and sit for a moment because I still felt like I was going to faint. Lol - Concert loser :)

The only other scary moment of the concert came when I was fiddling with my rings and I dropped my engagement ring somewhere on the floor!!! It was dark, and there were so many feet in the way!!! Frantically praying Tammy and I searched and found the ring pretty quickly, phew!! As I stood up, the women next to me were looking at me questioningly and so I popped out my finger and explained 'I dropped my wedding ring!!!!' - they were appropriately sympathetically shocked and relieved that I'd found it - bless concert goers :)

About them - we were discussing the funny demographic of people who buy front row tickets to concerts! - The die hard fans, and the really rich people. The ones with no shame, the ones with too much alcohol, and the ones who quietly enjoy their front row position without shaking hands with the stars whose hands are probably at this point let's face it, filthy! :) (like Tammy tried to be..).

OH but before I move to photos, for everyone who's still reading, 2 funny moments of the show:

1) There was a really, crazy drunk guy, really really enjoying the concert with his wife and another guy and his wife next to us. Crazy drunk guy was singing his heart out, and trying to sing with every woman in the place. His wife was too busy watching the concert to appear to care or notice what he was doing, and she's probably used to the way he is when he drinks. Anyway he was pretty funny, but we were mostly avoiding singing along with him, because he kept giving his number to every lady there and making them pose in pictures with him. An older lady behind us was party to this treatment, and she seemed quite flattered, while her husband yawned and scratched his back behind her. Anyway, he yelled out to Faith a few times how much he loved her, and she laughed and said 'thanks!' and 'I love you too!' (she was very fan friendly), and then near the end she came over our way again, and he turned and pointed his iphone at her with his face there to get a photo 'with Faith', and she tooootally bend right down with her face next to him and pulled a funny cute almost Zoolander-ish but more of a smile... face for the photo. When I saw the picture he got I almost gave him Tammy's number so he could text it to her and I could post it, because it is the perfect picture of him and Faith Hill!!! It was awesome - he's not going to remember how he got it, but he's going to LOVE it when the hangover wears off!!! It was pretty cool, and pretty funny.

2) After Faith and Tim finished singing their 'last' song, people started leaving, and drunk guy yelled at everyone not to leave, because "they're singing an encore and they're going to KISS at the end of THIS song!!!!!" (we're thinking drunk guy had a friend who attended the night before... or it may have been his second appearance...). Faith and Tim came out for their encore, and there were 2 chairs put at the front centre of the stage, with one of those old school radio-type mikes between them, with 2 microphones. They sat close to each other and held each other's knees (Tim totally then grabbed up Faith's legs and like, lay on her while she sung her bits, Tammy and I were constructing her thoughts "Tim - I let you sing your part, please stop laying on me and let me sing mine!!") and sung their duet 'I need you', in which the lyrics get a tiny bit repetitive near the end:
Tim: I need you I need you I need you I need you
Faith: I need you I need you I need you I need you
(dramatic pause before the final joint 'I need you', followed by a big kiss for the fans)
- except that during the "dramatic pause before the final joint 'I need you', someone further back in the audience screamed out "I NEED BOTH OF YOU!!!!" at the top of his lungs, and the entire audience burst out laughing. Faith seemed to have a bit of a giggle and grinned really bit during the last line and kiss, but Tim didn't seem impressed. So the whole big finale and kiss was tooootally ruined, because everyone was too busy laughing to enjoy the romantic moment they were having for us. Classic. I don't know that Tim McGraw will come back, but it was pretty funny :)

Anyway, you're probably sick of me TELLING you about the concert so I guess we'll get to the pictures!!!

Don't jump to any conclusions, that's not Faith - it's just me, with Tammy, at the beginning of the concert (after the pre-show, Eli Young, which was better than last year's preshow, but before Tim and Faith came out.)


Totally jump to conclusions now - this one's Tim, singing to me, before I put away the camera and he got down on his knee and really sang to me. An important part of the full concert experience, I feel.


Again, conclusions welcome - this is Faith belting it out into my camera. A little scary I know, but still cool. That woman is absolutely beautiful, and had a lovely personality and an incredible voice. I really and truly believe, and have for quite some time now, that we could be best friends!!!! (haha not really, but - movie?? :))


This one is Tim, about to shake Tammy's hand - that's Tammy's hand, waving in front of the photo, just after I literally pushed her forward to wave her hand in front of his face and get a good handshake in there - seriously, front row and not interested?? :) When we went to Keith Urban when I was 8 months pregnant with Ana and we were so close to the stage, I was too fat and uncomfortable to get up and walk up to the stage (was sooo tempted to say 'Will you sign my baby??' - but it would've been slightly inappropriate lol. I think he totally would have done it!! Anyway, it was dumb, and I hated that I couldn't even dance for more than half a song without sitting down and giving my kankles a rest! Ah how I love a good Keith Urban concert, and how this Tim McGraw/Faith Hill concert ROCKED!! :)) Okay right about that picture I was about to post...


And here are a bunch of them together. Faith Hill actually did a set at the beginning, then Tim came out and they sung 'Like We Never Loved at All' - my favourite duet of theirs, and Faith went off and Tim did a set, then they did a few songs together, then of course their cool encore. Let's start with that:


Romantic, huh? Now imagine someone screaming "I NEED BOTH OF YOU!!" and ruining their moment... :) Sad, but pretty hard not to laugh! :)



Aren't they cute?? :)





Ahhh it was a very awesome night, especially because we embraced it - I'm pretty sure shaking Tim's hand that time doubled the awesomeness of the whole front row seats at a concert that time, right Tammy?? And speaking of you, THANKYOU SO MUCH for taking me Tammy - this concert ROCKED!!! :) And next time we attend a country concert we are buying cute cowgirl boots WITH the tickets!!! :) Awesome :) xo

Gripped with Excitement

I'm bouncing off the walls with excitement.

I don't know if my reasons would justify this state of being for everyone, but they seem to be working for me. Here are some of them:

• Christmas. In 6 weeks and 5 days. YAY!!!!!!! This is more exciting because I am on top of the Christmas shopping, YAY!!! :) And we are going to NSW to spend Christmas with all James' family down there for the first time, so I get to have pre-Christmas with my family up here, yay!! :) (I'm totally going to pretend it's Christmas Day! And then I get 2 of them! :))
• I also get to visit Beth & Robbie in Sydney for a few days at the end of the trip, YAY!! :)
• And we are going to James' mission reunion in Sydney, yay!! (more for him, but, happy husband happy ... life? And wife... It'll be fun for both of us, anyway :))
• Elders Boliver in Japan are doing GREAT :)
• Maggie and Ana are soooooo cool :) I seem to have been out of the house so much lately, yesterday and today at home with these girls have been so wonderful!
  
• James is finishing a big prac, tomorow, his final exam on Thursday, and 1 more assignment next Wednesday. Then he is OURS again!!! He'll go back to work, but he won't have any school homework until FEBRUARY, YAY!!! :) It feels like Ana hasn't bonded with him at this age as much as Maggie was able to cause he's been so busy, so I'm excited for them to be able to spend more time together especially :)
• Ana's new Bumbo arrived this morning, yay! Maggie has been sitting in it all morning. She loves it. It's a little odd that she's still fitting into it easily at almost 2, and Ana will probably get to fat for it before she does!
• Ana is deliciously chubby - she's just so healthy and beautiful! :) And such a sweetheart, we love her. Cooking up a pot of potatoes to mash and freeze for her today, bring on SOLIDS!!!! :)
• Netball tonight - I love playing.
• Mum and Dad getting there with their house to put it on the market! This one's mixed excitement and 'you can't sell our house!!!!' :p
• We get our two absent sisters back early next year!!! - Beth's coming up from Sydney (with Robbie, and her baby belly), and Tammy will be DONE with EFY!!! After 2 years I never thought it would happen! Pray for not floods in January, yeah?! :)
• JACEY was born on Friday, and she's so sweet and beautiful!! - Yay for gorgeous nieces and nephew! Jessima does SUCH a good job :)
• Bethany finds out whether her little soon-to-be firstborn is a boy or a girl in 3 weeks! YAY!!! :) (think female thoughts! :))
• I'm making roast for dinner tonight - that means I won't have to cook for at least one night after tonight. Bless leftovers!!! :)
• Maggie's talking all day long. SHe's so sweet and fun, we LOVE her!!! :)
• I have been playing with my early Christmas present from James :) It's a Franklin/Covey planner. I have big goals and plans for next year to be a super efficient Mum/Housewife/Person, and this is part of my master plan. James has let me have it now cause the earlier I start the better the lead-in to my year of efficiency. I am LOVING it. I am so pumped! And the binder I got? Totally cute :) You'll hear more about this later.
• Next year James and I have tickets to all the Harvest Rain Shows - I won them, YAY!!! :)
• For my birthday, Tammy gave me tickets to go and see Tim McGraw & Faith Hill in concert with her next year, and Jessima is taking me to the Power of Mums retreat that's coming to Australia in March!! WOW!! 2 HUGE presents, and both happening in March! SO exciting to look forward too!!! :)
• For HER birthday, I'm taking Tammy to go and see 'Annie' in April!! By July I'm going to have been to like 7 or 8 shows/concerts!! So many fun outings!!! :)
• In January, Jessima's parents are going away and we're able to go up and house-sit for them if we'd like to. They live in Caloundra - one of my favourite places in the whole world!!! I hope we can sort it around James' work - it's a happy year that includes a good Caloundra visit!! :)
• I was thinking about houseboats the other day. I love them. I want to go on another houseboat holiday with our extended family, if we can find a fabulous big one. I can't wait! :)
• I just sent off 4 birthday cards - 3 belated :S But at least now I'm up to date! Hopefully we can stay this way!
• I just got the pictures from my fabulous surprise party and Tammy's fabulous Halloween party off her camera, yay!
• I have been to some sales recently. I LOVE sales.
• I made a new slow cooker recipe the other day, a chicken and potato curry. It was aMAZing, and gave us days of leftovers!! The best bit? I don't like curry at all!!! I just made it cause James likes it and I've never made it before... But I loved this one!!
• It's our Anniversary in 2 weeks and 1 day. I LOVE James! :) And we've nearly been married 4 years! SUCH old timers :) Every other year we've gone away for our Anniversary, but this year we managed to go to Aunty Leah's fabulous wedding in Adelaide instead. Maybe we'll go out to dinner or something. When the tax return came in I bought a few cheap nice meals at restaurants with Spreets, so maybe we'll use one of those :)
• Today I checked the mail, and we got the Bumbo, some little nappy covers I ordered for Ana a week or two ago, an engagement party invite, and a camera cord (I lost mum's :S But found a replacement well priced online thank goodness). End of mail. NO BILLS!!!! :) And nothing awful or unexpected. Lately I'm kind of nervous to check the mail, so that was exciting.
• James helped me run a weekly grocery shop last night. I don't have to run out to the shops anymore this week, yay!
• Maggie and I got up early this morning (definitely her idea!) and made pancakes for James! Yay :)
• Yesterday morning I woke up at 4:30am and realised Ana hadn't fed! So in my haste to make sure she was alive I woke her up and fed her. This morning I didn't feed her till Maggie and I got up just before 6. Awesome :)
• I borrowed some of Mum and Dad's CD's and talk tapes. I LOVE listening to them around the house.
• I am getting a tiny bit more up to date with my housework now that I'm home and focused on being efficient :) BIG yay!! :)
• I am not humongously pregnant!! I don't know how long it will take me to stop being excited about that one..
• Maggie's cold is finally clearing up, and none of the rest of us caught it, YAY!!! :)
• Mums & Bubs Christmas BBQ here Saturday - we have been so much less regular this year with all being pregnant and sick and having second babies, so it's nice to get together, and with our husbands too! Last week at Amy's house the toddlers were playing on Elijah's awesome new outdoor equipment. These ex-bubs are so big and wonderful! And we sat on the back veranda with the second babies :) It was nice. These girls have been such a wonderful and unexpected support base and friendship group since we started meeting. I'm so grateful for them! And Maggie loves them too :)
• I've been completely useless helping my parents with getting their house ready to sell (this isn't one of the things that's exciting.). We go over and I seem to make more mess with the girls than I'm cleaning up, and spend all my time worrying about them making mess and feeding them, etc. But I married James, who has been a MUCH bigger help. I'm so glad I married someone so willing to help and hard working!!! :) And who can' TOTALLY lift a fridge by himself (only single door though, right, Tammy?) lol.
• I am teaching a lesson at church on Sunday. I'm teaching Relief Society. I've never taught adults in my life, so it's kind of scary. But it's EXCITING because I have not taught for a loooong time outside the girls, and being a teacher, I've kind of been craving it. So it'll be fun to prepare a lesson. There'll be visual aids. - I don't think I'll ever let go of some of those primary school teaching bits inside of me.
• I have a treadmill. I know, I've had it for a long time, but I love it. I love using it. I love the results. I love my treadmill!
• Maggie's currently putting Elmo in the Bumbo. I keep walking in on her sitting at her little 4 seater table and chairs talking to the bears who she's placed on the 3 other chairs. I LOVE that she's becoming creative and imaginative and having so much fun playing alone as well as with other children.
• Speaking of which, Maggie and Jordan are AWESOME friends. They LOVE getting together. I don't know about Jordan, but for Maggie, I never see her play the way she plays with him, with anyone else. They just seem to 'work'. Like they read each other's little minds and know exactly what they're both going to do, and then they're off! They run around screaming, jump on and over things, into things, under things, with things, they run into each other, and they giggle the whole time. I love it :)

See wouldn't you TOTALLY be excited too?! So many reasons... :)

I'm off to clean up the traces of pancake evidence, put the roast on, and bounce off the walls a little more. Maggie'll probably participate. She loves to get excited just for the sake of it too. We'll probably have a dancing marathon while we work - we're good like that :)

Just turned around to see she's already started on the folding. What a helpful soul :)

xo

Up and Back Again!!! And a new Personal Best :)

I did it! I gave birth, again. Last time I gave birth I wrote about how I felt like I'd conquered Mt. Everest, because childbirth has terrified me my whole life - sooo not keen on pain! :P Now I feel like I've done it twice. It's the most incredible thing to go through, but the view from the top totally rocks!! (as in, the baby you give birth to..).

I really dislike reading other people's 'birth stories' because they are not pleasant and they freak me out and are often way too detailed. Maybe I won't mind after I've given birth for the last time, but while I know I've got several ahead of me, they're like horror stories that could quite possibly happen to me, so I'd rather not entertain thinking about them. If you're anything like me in this regard, stop reading now! (Although this was a pretty awesome labour...) I'm probably not going to read back on this too often, but I found with Maggie that when I wrote out my labour experience in my journal, it was like therapy, and then I didn't have to think about it anymore, but typing's faster, and I'm going to write about what happened, here.

***TO SKIP THE BIRTH PART AND JUST GET TO THE BABY BIT, STOP READING NOW, AND FIND ANOTHER BIT LIKE THIS FURTHER DOWN!!***

So at 32 weeks I was sent to get a growth scan because the doctor wasn't sure the baby was as big as she 'should be'. When I got the scan, they said she was in the 3rd percentile for size, and was about 2 weeks behind in growth. At 20 weeks she had been kind of average, so they decided to do weekly scans and make sure baby was still growing. By 36 weeks (going to the hospital twice a week for scans and appointments) she had reached the 19th percentile in size, so they stopped scanning me, although I still had weekly doctors appointments at the hospital. They decided to do a final scan just before my due date, because if she was still small they didn't want me to go too far past my due date without being induced.

I was due on Monday 9th May, and on Friday 6th I went in for my scan. James had been to I think every appointment until that one, but he had a prac lead-in day, so he didn't make it. In the scan I noticed that baby was measuring about 35 weeks, and then when I saw the doctor and he graphed her growth, he looked alarmed, and said she'd barely grown since the previous scans, and that he wanted to induce me as soon as possible. He went to check with 'the bosses' when they could book me in, and I sat there freaking out and thinking how much I wished James had come with me!! When the doctor came back he booked me to come in on the Sunday night, to be induced then/Monday morning. He told me all about being induced and then sent me on my freaking out little way.

It was kind of good in one sense being booked in, because James was starting his big teaching prac on Monday 9th, my due date, so at least he could tell the school for sure which days he needed off, instead of being on call for the first part of his prac, which may have been distracting.

I spend the weekend freaking out, then on Sunday night James gave me a blessing, we dropped our precious Maggie girl at Mum and Dad's for her first ever sleepover (she loved it of course!), and headed up to the hospital.

They began inducing me Sunday night with the gel, which some women go into labour from, but I didn't (I couldn't stop shaking all night I was so scared - my labour with Maggie was a little tiny bit awful and long, and just sitting there waiting for it to 'kick in' was terrifying for me!). Just after 6am they took me into the birthing suite, and broke my waters. By 7:30am I was starting to have some real contractions, and at 7:50 they started me on 'Synto' which is a hormone I think, which makes your body really go into labour. At least it did with me! The midwife started me on a dose of 3ml/hr, then went up to 6ml/hr at 8:20, then turned it off completely at 9:05 because my contractions were going insane. He said though, that he had a lady at 72ml/hr the other day, so those were pretty low doses. Apparently each labour, you need less, because your body makes more, so if I ever get induced again, I'll ask for none!! :)

Anyway, I don't know what time, and I can't remember whether or not I already had the Synto in me, we were sitting there having a nice old chat with the midwife. I had just found out I was 4cm dilated and was ecstatic, because with Maggie it took me 2 days of waaaaaay worse contractions than I was having to get me to 4cm, and I was totally handling it, thinking 'Heck! I won't need any drugs if this keeps up!'.

[Side story: We actually noticed the midwife's surname was Allred, and he had a pretty religious first name too, and he was from America (everyone from America seems like a church member... plus he was clean cut and wearing a wedding ring lol), so we asked him if he was any relation to Sylvia Allred. He leaned back and said 'Noooooo.. but I enjoyed her last talk at General Conference' lol. So we asked what ward he was in, and he's in the next Stake over, and we told him our ward and he mentioned he was the Stake Executive Secretary in his stake, so he had wondered how we were members whose names he didn't know cause he knows most of the names in his Stake, and then James said 'Hey Abby's uncle is Stake President of that stake' and I clicked, and it turns out he works with my uncle a lot, and he said he actually met Dad the other day, and I had a moment of 'Oh no, I could see this guy again one day and I have to give birth in front of him! And it's a him!' but don't worry - by the time I was giving birth I was dying so much I didn't care, plus he was an awesome midwife, so it was great, and just nice to know he knew where we were coming from a bit. And he was totally not weird. Plus he was like a buddy for James - they enjoyed laughing at me together when I got really high on the gas..]

ANYWAY, so there we are having our chat, and he was asking about my previous labour, and he asked at what stage of the labour I had the drugs (I had a lot of everything), and I told him how long I'd been in labour and yadiyada. The contractions were getting worse quickly, and then I went to the bathroom, and I had 4 death to the world contractions, and came out begging for the epidural.

At this point I kind of felt like I'd failed, because I needed it already - it had come on soooo fast!! But the midwife was like 'I'll send for it right away, it's okay Abby we're all about helping you with the pain here!' but I kept apologising but begging for it too lol. They put me on the gas right away while I was waiting. I didn't like the gas at all when I was in labour with Maggie, but the epidural this time seemed to be taking ages, and my contractions were going nuts and I was sitting on the edge of the bed ready for when the epidural came, and I heard Israel say 'Take a deep breath now, Abby... and another... and another', and it was like a little thing I could concentrate on, so I suddenly got super high, and clung to the gas like crazy. Apparently I was saying a lot of pretty crazy things to everyone in the room. The midwife said 'Do you know what planet you're on, Abby?' and I remember thinking 'Is he stupid?' So I told him I was on Earth, duh.

A doctor came to tell me risks or whatever and I told him in no uncertain terms that I wanted it, no matter what, now. Then finally (after lots of desperate begging on my part, - they had to call him twice) the anaesthetist came but it seemed to be taking forever for him to get ready. My room was being renovated, and a couple of things he needed were missing and they had to send down to the pharmacy for something, and then it seemed to take forever for him to put it in! So I was sitting on the edge of the bed, trying to hold still, while I was going through awful contractions, and I kept thinking surely it would be the last contraction I'd feel! The epidural with Maggie seemed to take 2 seconds - it was all done between 2 contractions I think, so this was agony!! I was dying. And James said I was very blunt, and kept calling out 'Epi Man! What's the problem?!! Why can I still feel everything! I can still feel everything, please hurry up Epi Man, please hurry up, hurry up!!' Which probably didn't help the poor guy!! :S When he first arrived I told him I loved him though. I also, in my very high state, told one of the midwifes who came while my midwife was on a break and was telling me to 'breathe' to 'Shush!!', I told the other two that I liked them a lot. I told them I loved Maggie and the baby, but 'James the most!', and apparently I got very protective of the gas and wouldn't let anyone touch it even though I kept declaring I hated it and couldn't imagine why people got high because I felt awful and like I was going to be sick. Apparently I also made James hold my feet, and then kept kicking him in the face during contractions and a bunch of other weird stuff.

Anyway, when the guy finally got the epidural in my back (second time lucky apparently - he put it in once and it wasn't right so he did it again, eek! And I was having crazy contractions so I was moving a tiny bit, as hard as I was trying not to, I feel so blessed I had no bad effects!!), they all helped me turn so they could hook it up to the machine, and then the head midwife lady (who James thinks our midwife called because he was worried I was going to get paralysed by the epidural guy) said to our midwife 'She's pushing!!' and then they ran around and threw a couple of things to each other and the head was out, and then they said to push, and I could hear James saying the head was out, and I said 'Are you sure?! Am I dilated?' and they said 'Yes, push!' and then the whole baby was suddenly out!!!! (I gotta say, 3 and a half hours, even without the epidural, TOTALLY rocks compared to 3 days with all the drugs!! Posterior babies are awful to give birth to, I'm going to be a crazy sit forward person every pregnancy from now on)

And then they put her on my chest and I burst into tears and for the next 5 minutes I kept saying "Oh I love her so much! Where's the epidural?! She's so beautiful, but I can still feel everything! Where's the epidural!!" and I think it took a few minutes for the gas to get out of my system and for me to get over the fact that the epidural never got hooked up, and to realise that my wonderful, perfect, beautiful daughter was really there, all born, finished!!! Also, the horrible pain was gone, because I was no longer in labour lol.

***YOU CAN START READING NOW, I'VE HAD THE BABY...***

She was born at 10:52am, and we named her Anamaria Sophia. We named her Anamaria because James wanted a Maori name, and I don't know the language or anything, but most of the names were difficult to pronounce, and I didn't want her to have to repeat it for everyone a million times her whole life, I wanted people to be able to say it. Anyway, the name is used by Maoris, and it's the exotic pronounciation, although already most people call her Anna instead of Ana, which I guess she'll get her whole life after all :P And Sophia is James' Mum's name. Everyone thinks we're into Spanish names lol! :) But there it is.

Ana was 6 pounds 13 (only half an ounce less than Maggie - so not underweight!) and healthy and strong. I remember James crying out to me "She's crying right away! Abby, she's crying!!" which is exciting because Maggie had to be resuscitated, so it was awesome that she was all good :) Her head circumference was 34cm, and she was 49cm long (2 and a half shorter than Maggie). Although Ana's not as startlingly like James, she looks a lot like Maggie, so we think people will definitely be able to tell that they're sisters, lucky because I think they're both beautiful :)

I don't usually put photos on this blog (I can invite you to my private blog for further viewing if you let me know!! I will soon be flooding it with Ana pictures :)), but here's our new little family:

We were so fortunate in our midwife! At the end he even pulled a few strings to let us stay in the birth suite for an extra hour so Mum could bring Maggie up to meet her little sister, because visiting hours in the wards were over. Maggie was wonderful, and she adored Ana from the start. She's uber over-protective, and the first one to make a move if Ana starts crying! The only problem is that Ana needs to be subtlety rescued from being completely smothered quite often, because Maggie just wants to lie with/on her and cuddle and kiss her.

I can't even tell you how happy we are to have little Ana join our family - we really, really love her :) How awesome is having a family?!! :)

I'm worried this entry is jumbled and I may come back and edit it later but I just wanted to finally get it up. We are so happy and we love our little baby girls so much!! :)

Holidays, Birthday & Baby :)

My school holidays were fantastic, and ended two weeks ago. I spent a lot of time doing fun house stuff like spring cleaning and shopping for baby stuff. We finally got a few things done that have been on my 'to-do' list for forever! One exciting one was buying some shelving to go in a little space in our laundry which was spare. I was a bit frustrated at the 'perfect' cupboard being exactly 9cm too wide to fit in, and eventually decided on one without doors, but with plenty of depth, which we had room for and so it would fit a lot in. We've had a lot of trays, dishes, nice glasses etc that we don't use every day stored in different spaces in the house and I wanted it all in the kitchen area (the laundry is right next door). This also made room in the kitchen for more pantry space, which has been very helpful :) I love having everything easily accessible!! :)

I also finally took the blender I've wanted for years that Mum and Dad bought us on the last day of August on its maiden voyage! I went and bought all the nice smoothie stuff I could think of, and blended it up! Our blender was fabulous, but I may need a few tips on good smoothie recipes, because my invention somehow just wasn't quite right. I finally feel like a real housewife though - everybody needs a super blender, and I am sure it will get a LOT of use in the years to come :) (thanks Mum and Dad!!)

Our baby room is coming together - for my birthday Mum and Dad, the twins and Bethany all contributed to my nursery happiness, providing a gorgeous quilt set that I'd been wanting, matching little curtains and window valance, basket covers, etc., and even an adorable teddy bear for little baby girl. James went out and got a great deal on a really really really really nice cot set that I'd loved but that had been very much expensive that he gave me for my Birthday, and it will arrive in about a week! :) We also went and picked up a cot - we went for a Phil & Tedd Sport in the navy blue :) It's very easy to use and lightweight, and James put it up the other night in our early excitement, so now it's sitting in the baby room ready to go :) I loved the big sign on the box that said "Baby not included". I think it was Tammy who said she's a bit worried for the people for whom that sign may be necessary. We also have a bassinet which is a wooden folding leg one with a little canopy - that is a pov explanation, but I loved it when I saw it and James walking into the shop 5 minutes later pointed out the same one and said he loved it, and my little previously anti-bassinet mind turned 180 degrees so we got it, justifying its use as a port-a-cot becuase it folds up :) I've since had dreams where I'm asleep and that little dinosaur cry newborns do starts up and I reach over to the bassinet to get out our little baby girl - I can't wait till it's not a dream! And finally we have a bouncinette - one of the little old school woven ones which I've always wanted :) I'm not taking any pictures though until the nursery is done, and we have a few decisions to make about walls, etc. Apparently baby girl is now about 1.6 pounds and 14 inches from head to toe! Apparently her hearing is pretty good too, and she'll be ready to make her big entrance, ETA 14 weeks :)

Speaking of my birthday - sorry I got a little ahead of myself - I had a lovely brunch, courtesy of James! I went to bed early and got up late, and during those times he got extra chairs and an extra table in, put lovely tablecloths on, decorated with a birthday sign, balloons, even did little name tags for everyone at the table including 'Maggie Girl', and cooked chipolatas, bacon, eggs, toasted turkish bread with egg, tomato and asparagus, juice, coco pops, etc. :) We had my parents, Tammy, Jonny, Jess & Jenna, Beth, Ben and Oliver over - James' parents had to work last minute. It was lovely! Tammy took some pictures which I know she emailed to us, but James in his clean inbox thing has deleted it and I can't find where the pictures are saved! :S It was wonderful though! :) I'll try to add some if I find them soon.. And as well as the quilt set Mum and Dad arrived with a bunch of other little presents, including nice hair products that I love using and try to buy on sales, lovely face creams that I'm afraid to use in case they run out, a little bit of make up, chocolates, etc. James bought me some pretty earrings and a 7 lucky rings necklace as well as the cot set which he rationed out to me over the day, Jonny and Jessima gave me a beautiful home-covered special box which will go nicely in the nursery with something baby inside, Tammy of course took me to Melbourne on the best little trip ever to see 'Wicked'! I got some lovely home-made jewellery from my teaching partner, cards and chocolates from some of my kids (with instructions to 'give at least one piece to Mr E' lol), cute pink PJ's with a stretchy belly bit from James' parents, and overall little baby girl and I got completely spoiled!

I am glad to be 23. It is a much nicer number than 22.

Now I am back at school with only 8 weeks to go before holidays which will last for a looong time, even though they will grow to feel less like holidays and more like 'mum' life before too long :) Our baby girl keeps kicking like crazy, sometimes I worry that maybe she's stressed or something cause she kicks so much, but hopefully she's just really very active and keen to come out and meet us! :) I am getting funny pains in my back and legs, which hurt and make me walk like a weirdo, but which I secretly don't mind, because I'm growing a baby.

My kids at school are so cute and interested in the whole pregnancy business. It's a really nice age they're at (10-11), they're really sweet, and all starting to show their big personalities and growing up. Yesterday I walked to the front of the room to find they'd put a chair out for me to sit on so I wouldn't have to stand and my 'ankles won't get as fat'. They dive to pick things up if I drop them and look horrified if I start bending down on my own. One student drew an uncharacteristic (for him) picture of me with a basketball-looking belly saying "My waters have broken", and 'Mr E' next to me, saying "Oh NO!". I am constantly asked if I have cramps, and if I'm really hot, and I wonder what their parents are telling them at home lol. Yesterday one of my girls said "Mrs E, if it wasn't for your big tummy sticking out, you would look really pretty today!" I said "Thanks R, if it wasn't for your...". They want to know middle names, how I'm going to get to the hospital, how I'll know when I'm in labour ('heck, good thought! - I have no idea! I assume it will hurt?'), if I'll have to get my stomach cut open, whether I'm going to punch Mr E when I'm in pain in labour or not, exactly how dissapointed Mr E is to be having a girl ('Boys - it's not a tragedy for Mr E to be having a girl! He's quite excited!'), whether I'm going to paint the walls to the nursery pink or not, am I craving chocolate, is the baby really eating my brain ('Yes!'), do I feel her kicking now? And now? And now?, etc. These questions are usually blurted out in the middle of calculating compound area or something like that, sigh.

Anyway, James still isn't home so I can't probe him for the location of the pictures of last week's birthday brunch, but I'll post this now and maybe add them if I find them.

Hope everyone is having a great SpRiNg!! :) xo

Catch up pictures...

I just found my camera cord :)

A couple of pictures from the birthday afternoon tea we put on for Mum a few weeks ago - I only took a couple, I wish I could show you the deserts :)

Here are a couple of pictures we took of my bump at around 18 weeks for a Father's Day puzzle thing - it's a little bit huge, I know, plenty of old ladies and my doctor have told me so and I'm getting a complex :) I'm 23 weeks now and it's only getting bigger! But baby girl's a perfect size so all good :)

Here's a cute pic of Jenna getting ready to show off her swimming skills at our little BBQ Saturday avo :)

And finally, a 'before' picture of what will be our little nursery for baby girl - at the moment it's covered in storage and mess, and I am currently cleaning it out. This will make an 'after' picture much more impressive :)

Oh I almost forgot - here's a photo of the picture we got from our baby scan - it's terrible quality but hopefully you'll be able to make out her little fist and side profile! :)

xo

Happy Birthday James!!! :)

Sensing a theme?! - Like... I have too many family members with birthdays in the first half of the year! :) Yes today is James' actual birthday, so he's the be 2-3. When I mentioned to James' parents how old it seems they nearly chocked, but from my little naive 22-year-old perspective, it seems like we're progressing life at an alarming rate!

Anyway, here's a picture of James' breakfast in bed:
Yup - those really are chashews you can see in there! The bowl, is oats, with sultanas, cashews and almonds on top, again topped with mango peach yoghurt. James was stoked. If I woke up to that on one of my birthdays, I'd just have to cry. No bacon, eggs, or coco pops. James is a saint - he lives the best way he can in every way, including food. Tonight for a treat he's eating the leftover fruit. When I suggested on the way home that we stop for a treat he said he had just been thinking about what a treat it would be, to finish it off. I was thinking more along the lines of copious amounts of chocolate (sigh). I have a generally healthy menu, and I like to be fit and healthy, but not for a treat, and not on my birthday!!! :) And yup - that's the size of the plates and bowls I have to use for the man!!! - Lol just kidding - that's a platter. The bowl is his regular though.

I love James! He is a wonderful husband to me. Before he was a wonderful husband to me, he was a wonderful missionary. Before that he was a wonderful friend, and son, and nephew and grandson. One day (hopefully in this life!) he will be a wonderful father. I am blessed to have a husband who is my friend, who I love hanging out with, who is good for me, who I can talk about anything with and to whom I get closer every day. I am blessed to have a temple marriage, and to be sealed to a husband who is a worthy Priesthood holder, who teaches me so much, and who has righteous goals and purpose. I am grateful that James is such an active and hard working person, who is always itching to play sport or work hard or help someone out, and that he loves doing fun active things together. James always makes me happy :) We're a great team, I'm unbelievably excited to take that team through the eternities! Happy Birthday James, I love you!!! :) xx

PS: Today we also got good news - James got his uni transfer, so in a month and a bit he'll officially begin studying what he would LOVE to do with his life - highschool PE and SOSE teaching! :) Fun, I'm glad he'll finally be doing something he loves. I just keep reminding him that he might have to get into private school admin to support our 7 children :)

Happy Birthday Micky!!! :)

Okay sorry Mick - in all my posting about our Mexican Fiesta yesterday I neglected to mention Micky, the oldest brother in our family.

Micky is quiet - he rarely speaks in family discussions, partly because he is quiet, and partly because he has sisters and even a brother or two who are so busy speaking loudly over each other that he rarely gets a chance. (In fact, I blame Micky's quiet for me neglecting to post about him yesterday - I would not have not posted on Tammy's birthday, because she is NOT quiet.)

People like being around Micky, because he is cheerful and easy to get along with. Micky accepts everyone - I've rarely heard him say a bad thing about anyone. Lately, Micky has been absent from our family circle a little more often, but when he's there, he's made up for it with the presence of a girl he's been bringing along, who we all like too. She is hard working and blunt and smart and grew up in the country. Micky has been happier than ever lately, so that's good!

Anyway, the reason I really should have been posting about Micky yesterday when I was spilling my life story to you at the same time as I told you about our cool fiesta, is not that he's engaged, but rather that it was his birthday! Happy 26th Birthday Micky! I totally think of you as a menace to society even if that title is rarely used these days for boys your age, but I have faith in your amending that soon ;) Hope you had the best day EVER, and have fun on all those dates we planned, and even the 'Choose Your Own Adventure'! ;)

Love lots, Abby xo

I'm grateful for my family and 2008.

Not only have I been blessed with a wonderful husband, I was blessed to grow up and still have an amazing set of parents and siblings. I am one of 7 children: there's Tammy, Michael, Jonny (and Jessima his wife, and Jenna their baby girl!), me, Bethany, and Ben and Oliver (twins). My family have a lot of fun together, we love celebrating each other through fun birthdays, anniversaries, un-birthdays, etc.; we love Family Home Evening, family dinners, and just spending time together. They are very supportive, loving, accepting and fun.

James' 23rd Birthday is on Tuesday, but it looks like it's going to be one of those week-long celebrations! :) Yesterday morning my Jonny and Jessima (and Jenna!) came to surprise James with his early birthday present - putting on a nice breakfast for us. It was yummy and fun, and they even decorated our place a little bit in a birthday way! :)

Last year for his birthday, Tammy gave James a voucher for a Mexican dinner, because he loves Mexican food, and Tammy used to live in Utah where there are more Mexican places to eat and Mexican food is a lot more common than here, so she learnt how to put on a yummy mexican feed! :) The idea was that she would teach me to cook it in the process, so that I can cook them for James in the future! Because this voucher has not yet been redeemed and it's almost the next birthday, we decided to have it last night. It sort of quickly became this year's birthday dinner, and my whole family along with James' parents (he is an only child!) were invited.

Yesterday morning when Tammy came to pick me up to go shopping for ingredients, we quickly became carried away by each other's ideas and encouragements and ended up at a nearby party shop for Mexican decorations. Tammy blew my budget just as quickly, and we ended up with a good mix of fun decorations, then we bought ingredients, and even a Mexican Fiesta CD to help with the mood. By the time we were heading home we also invited a couple who are friends of James and mine to share in, so it was becomming more of a party than a dinner.

When we got back to my place we sort of
kicked Jonny and James down to the tennis/basketball court so we could surprise them. We only had 2 hours to cook this amazing feast (Tammy was aiming for a CafeRio-style meal) and clean and decorate our little unit, so Tammy cooked and I decorated so I'll have to learn how to cook it next time! We didn't get many good photos, but here's the spread (Black beans, pico de gallo, fake wine and onion black beef, cilantro ranch dressing, cafe rio shredded chicken, cilantro-lime rice, tortillas, cheese, cruch corn chips, lettuce, guacamole, fresh cilantro, tomatillo dressing, etc, etc) and a couple of other shots including the pinata (every Mexican Fiesta party should have one), James getting into character, the boys doing the dishes, and Tammy and my favourite cute little asthetically-pleasing bowl of tomatoes, limes and chillies :)




Overall it was a really fun night. Half of us (including all the boys bar dad who was tired) went down and played some sport and went for a swim, then there was pavlova for dessert and the birthday candles. Thankyou Tammy! You are the most wonderful big sister in the whole world. You are smart and funny and exciting and it turns out you can cook! :) And thankyou mum and dad for coming early to help and always being there!! And James - you are wonderful and I love you sooooooooooo much!!! I hope you enjoyed the fiesta! :) Happy Birthday! xo

When James and I first got married 23rd November 2007, I went through a really tough time. I'd always wanted to be the perfect traditional wife and mother - perfect house, perfect dinner every night, etc., but I'd never bothered learning how to cook, figuring I'd be doing it forever and I'd just 'pick it up'. Unfortunately I wasn't suddenly the perfect wife, and I still (somewhat unsurprisingling in hindsight) didn't yet know how to cook anything at all. We also didn't have children straight away like we'd planned, and I sort of crumbled around the edges. Last year for James' birthday (less than 2 months after our wedding) we decided to have a barbeque with family and a few friends, and I lost it. My mum and two sisters came over that morning to help me out (James was working and I was going to get everything ready so he could walk straight into the BBQ upon arrival), and I just sat there, not having a clue what to do. They didn't want to be pushy, so they were waiting for my cue, but I just crumbled. In the end dad came over and took me shopping for ingredients while my blessed mother and sisters cleaned our unit, and then dad did the BBQ while mum did salads, and I just felt stupid and scared of people coming over. My familiy were shocked! - I'd always been so confident and capable, but I had a really hard time when I first got married. I think it was not living at home for the first time, not being perfect, not being pregnant, and wanting soooo badly to be perfect, like my mother, like I always thought I would be, being so far from it, having a messy house and not having the time to clean it working all the time and studying, etc., whatever - a big mix of things.

I'm telling you this so I can tell you my happy ending :) Last year James worked full-time and did a TAFE diploma in Business - Human Resource Mangement. I studied full time in my last year of primary school teaching (including big pracs and internships), and worked 3 jobs part time. James is the ward Young Mens president and I'm the music leader in primary, but for half the year he was the Ward Mission Leader and I was the 1st Counsellor in the Young Women's Presidency. James played basketball Wednesday nights and I filled in for women's games in the same comp. I've never stressed much before - I could never see the point or be bothered. Last year I made up for it: 22 years of stress in one. I stressed like never before, over seemingly insurmountable tiny little bumps: I stressed about not having kids, I stressed about the relationships between me and my families, I stressed over uni, I stressed over work, I stressed about not being able to cook, not having our little unit clean all the time, not keeping up to scratch on my viola. The year went by in one big ball of stress and feeling like a failure. I don't think I've ever felt like a failure before, but this year it was like I could barely keep my head above water, 24/7, and it seemed like I kept failing at EVERYTHING! In October, I was rejected from my dream job (apart from motherhood!), which I had apparently been a 'shoe-in' for. I didn't know what we'd do next year, with James hopefully going to study full-time and I was terrified.

Fasting, praying, enter November:

My wonderful husband suggested I take a week off all work in the week after I finished uni forever and my full-time 6-week stress-filled internship, and spend some time and some of our savings, 'doing up' our little unit. Enter the happiest week I've had all year, and possibly in my life.

I spent the week cleaning our little home, and shopping for little bits and pieces to make it ours. I got a pretty quilt and put together a non-set of cushions and a throw rug, and bed-side pieces for the spare room, and got it right. I bought white and blue towels for the spare bathroom, then got matching little candles. Mum bought us a little wooden outdoor setting I 've wanted since before we got married to put on our previously depressing little veranda, as well as bed-side tables (finally! - our little 'poofs' went straight to the spare room :)). We even got a new kitchen bin - something that sounds so insignificant but has made such a difference! I cleaned and altered and cooked and fulfilled my divine role by making our home a little closer to the temple - a place of peace and refuge, a place to feel the spirit. A place no longer cluttered and confused and messy. I am so grateful for that week, for my husband for knowing or being inspired to encourage me to do those things that made me so happy, and for caring, and coming with me, and suggesting, but for letting me create, for letting me choose. For my mum for helping us out by buying those things, and coming with me some days.

Enter December:

I graduated from uni after 5 years and on the same day I got a phone call offering me a wonderful job teaching year 6 at what seems like a great school nearby. James graduated from TAFE and got accepted into Uni.

I turned around one day and noticed that the sun was shining. I know that Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ carried me through this year, that they knew every second how I was feeling and was giving me all of those experiences to help me learn and grow. I know that I couldn't have done it without the Holy Ghost comforting me. And suddenly it was a wonderful year. We achieved so much! James has a diploma and can study full time! I have a degree and will work full-time. I've learnt to trust in the Lord, and am no longer crying once a day, or even once a week or fortnight because we don't have children yet! I know that last year wasn't the best time for us, and that it will happen in the Lord's time.

So last year I spent the day of James' birthday celebration sitting on a chair in our little living room, trying to distract my mum and sisters from the fact that I felt helpless and lost, while waiting for them to save me. This year I spent it with one of those sisters in a delightful afternoon of planning and giggling and shopping and decorating and cooking and preparing :)

I'm so grateful for 2008, and I'm grateful for my family.

Enter, 2009... :)