34 Weeks, a slight scare, and upcoming events

This week, Baby Drew is about 4 3/4 pounds...roughly the weight of a large cantaloupe. He is close to 18 inches long and continues to lay down baby fat. His central nervous system is almost completely developed and his lungs are right behind. Most babies born at this stage in the game are no longer considered pre-mature, but pre-term. And the good news is, that other than a few minor possible health concerns at these early stages, most children born at this time live the same healthy successful lives that full term babies live.

All of this is VERY reassuring after a long night with contractions last night. I was laying on the couch watching some TV...comedy mostly...and counting contractions. They were very irregular. Some would come about 10 minutes apart, then they were 20, then they were 40 and then they were back to 20. Either way, nothing was rhythmic and I knew it was nothing to be concerned about. At 10:45, I went up to bed and did my best to get comfortable, small feat these days. And after a few minutes of tossing, turning, and pillow adjustments, I finally got there. But, I wasn't there for 5 minutes when some sharp pains started in on me. So sharp it felt like a needle going in and out of me and it made me jump every time the baby would move. At one point I had to get up because it just felt a little better to stand and move around. But, with the pain came some contractions. And they were coming every 5 minutes. I dealt with it for the first half hour and tried not to stress about it. Thoughts of Ally's labor came flooding back and all I could think about was how hard and fast Ally's contractions came after so much irregularity through the night. By 11:45 I had to ask Bo to come downstairs and sit with me because they weren't going away and I needed something to take my mind off of them. I thought they might go away if I could just stop stressing about them and fall asleep. So...we watched a little more comedy and they had pretty well subsided by 1:30. But, I spent the rest of the night out on the couch...I didn't want to move or be woken up. This morning I woke up and still had some tightness in my stomach, but it decreased as the day went on. Until late this afternoon...some of the tightness has returned, but I'm not worried yet. I did, however, finish packing the bags for the hospital, put the car seat in the car, and got the girls ready for a night away from home should we go anytime soon. I didn't want to be caught rushing to the hospital with nothing ready...just not the way we roll here!!

We have a Dr. appointment on Friday this week and a super fun baby shower on Saturday to look forward to. After all of that fun, we are doing pregnancy pictures with Darby (www.darbyrosephotography.com) on Sunday afternoon. I'll be sure to post lots of pictures and fun stories after all the fun next weekend.