peace

My new favorite picture of Liam. Unfortunately it was taken with the camera on my phone so it is not very good quality. I did not make his fingers do this for the picture, he was doing it on his own :). I just thought it was cute.


Also...here are the links to a couple of photo albums of pictures Jeremy and I have taken since Liam was born.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=52956&l=cb0e5&id=510530691
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=52978&l=ed412&id=510530691

First Baths

Here is a picture and videos of Liam's first bath in the hospital and at home. He actually enjoyed his bath at home pretty well!

liam jeremy

He is here! And he is a HE (much to his mother's surprise :). Liam Jeremy Fredin came into the world on Tuesday May 20 at 8:38 am. He was 7 pounds 15.4 ounces, and 21 inches long...keep in mind he was three weeks early! He would have easily been 10 pounds if I had gone to my due date. My water broke Monday evening, and we were in labor all night that night. Started pushing at 6am, and he was born two and a half hours later...he was worth all the work! He is quite amazing...we cannot imagine our lives without him. Just thought I should put up an update :).

itching=no sleep

I am officially done. This pregnancy can go ahead and be over at any point in time. I slept horrible last night. Between waking up every 2 hours to pee and then waking up at 4 am and not going back to sleep because my belly itches so bad...I don't think I have been very much fun to live with. Jeremy told me the other day he is ready for me to be done being pregnant...gee, I wonder why. I have been doing everything in my power to put myself into labor. I know, I know, it is still going to come when it wants to, but I think it might need a little help :). Yesterday I went up to the hospital and had my friend Tara strip my membranes to try and move things along. Well that led to a day of cramping and being horribly uncomfortable, and still no labor. I know I need to be patient, but that is not happening very easily. The baby is now so low in my pelvis (zero station...if you know what that means), I have entered a whole nother degree of waddling, and some serious pressure. On top of all of that my emotions decided to take control of me last night, and Jeremy got to endure an approximate 2 hour crying session for no apparent reason at all. So, like I said, I am done. Anytime now baby...you can just come on out of me...we would love to meet you.

Maternity Leave...

This is what I am supposed to be doing:

Now that is not going to happen exactly all the time, but I am going to try to be better about just laying around and not doing too much. I am definitely nesting now, and everything in me just wants to get everything around here clean and ready for the baby.
The doctors appointment yesterday went well. He just said I cannot work anymore, so I am officially on maternity leave! It would have been nice to get a few more hours in, but I am not too torn up about not working anymore ;). I am just keeping a close eye on my symptoms and if they start to get worse then we will probably run all the tests again. My doctor and I want to keep me pregnant until at least 37 weeks (full term), which is this Saturday. He was afraid if I kept working that I might not be able to stay pregnant. So hopefully we won't have the baby until this weekend at the earliest! Who knows, it could still be another two weeks!

1st visit to the hospital...

Well we had our first visit to the hospital yesterday evening...well I was already there, because I was working, but Jeremy came and met me up there. It all started when I went to take my blood pressure to prove to my mother that it is fine and there is nothing to worry about :). Well needless to say it wasn't so great when we took it. It keeps fluctuating between decent numbers and high numbers. My friend Jessica and I kept taking it throughout our shift, hoping that it was just a fluke, and we kept coming up with high numbers. So I paged my doctor and talked with him for a while, and he decided he wanted me to check in and run some labs. Most of the labs came back normal, and I am now collecting a 24 hour urine to measure the amount of protein in my urine (which is a sign of pre-ecclampsia). So we will get those results back tomorrow probably. This is probably the beginning of pregnancy induced hypertension (or pre-ecclampsia), with my blood pressures fluctuating the way that they are, but we will see! I am probably done working now. My doctor was going to talk to me about that today at my appointment, but I am thinking I probably won't be going back. We will see what he has to say today. Most likely if my 24 hour urine comes back showing severe levels of protein in my urine (which I seriously doubt it will), then they will induce me right away. If it comes back showing mild amounts of protein, they will probably induce me in the near future (like within the next week). And hopefully it comes back showing there is no protein! I will keep everyone updated. Yesterday evening while I was there they checked my cervix. I am now 3 centimeters and 70% effaced! I was contracting quite a bit last night, but they have faded away some today. I am thinking it probably will not be too much longer! That means we have a lot of work to do around here before this baby comes!

**Quick side note, about having the best mother's day ever...I was kind of panicking about not having a car seat or stroller yet this past weekend, and the baby being so close! I was at work from 11-7 during the day on Sunday and had a very chaotic day. When I left at seven I pretty much just wanted to cry and go home. Well I got out to the car and there is a car seat installed in my back seat, with flower and a card in the car seat. That definitely got the water works going. I got home and Jeremy had bought our car seat/stroller combo and had it all out and put together. He took me out the car and showed me exactly how to use it all, and then took me inside and showed me how to work everything on the stroller. I am so lucky...

baking, baking, swelling, and more baking

Today was a great day off!! Erin and I went out to grandma's house and baked quite a few desserts for my and Elizabeth's showers on Friday! Annette had her last day of high school yesterday, so she was able to help us out the whole morning too. Liz is in town from Indianapolis, so it was a great day with the girls. Meanwhile, my feet and ankles (actually I think in order for it to be called an ankle there has to be some sort of bone visible...that is not the case with mine), have decided to swell to an enormous size. This all started yesterday, and I didn't even work these past two days! I thought that they were swollen before, but that was nothing compared to what they are now. Erin compared them to play-doh...thanks a lot :). I feel like I am walking on stiff stilts...lovely. So we took some comparison pictures today out at Grandma's, the show the difference between me and Erin's feet. And to think mind used to look like that. I am hoping this is a sign that I am very close to the end. A quick update for those who would like to know...I am 2 cm dilated and 50% effaced! I was very excited about this. I will probably get checked again this Friday...hopefully I keep progressing like that! Almost 36 weeks!

latest projects...

I have been putting a few baby things together, and wanted to post pictures...these things might not be very interesting to look at, but mostly I was just proud of myself that I put them together! :) We got an adorable shelf from a friend of mine at work and I put that together, now it just needs to be hung on the wall...that is Jeremy's project. I also put the baby's swing together that I got at my work shower. It is making me really excited to have a baby to put in it!! Jeremy and I also went to Babies R' Us and picked out boy and girl outfits to bring the baby home in, so I had to take pics of those :).

first baby shower...

The girls at work had a baby shower for me at my good friend Jessica's house...right down the road! It was our first shower! We had a great time...we got our high chair, and our swing, and bath set, and lots of other little things. Everyone at work is so generous. The ones who couldn't be there keep giving me gifts at work! We are getting so excited...getting all of these baby things is making it a little more real. This picture to the left is of me and my friend Kelly from work. She is three weeks ahead of me...try not to notice how much BIGGER I am than her! I didn't pick the most flattering shirt for the day. I think I have one big baby growing in there! As far as a baby update there is not too much to update. I keep getting bigger...you would think with as big as I am my growth would plateau a little bit, but no! Actually in the past week the baby has dropped quite a bit. I am carrying it much lower than I was. I thought it had and then mom, grandma and Jessica all noticed how much lower it was...I am hoping that means I might go early! I am now 34 weeks and 2 days. Two more weeks and 5 days till I am full term! Crazy. In the past week I have gotten VERY uncomfortable, big and awkward feeling. My body aches, my back hurts, my hips hurt...you know...the list goes on and on! But it is all going to be worth it in a few weeks!

Really Oprah...Really?

Just wanted to share this video with everyone...my friend Ashley sent it to me. Try to ignore the fact at how super cheesy it is, but it interested me to see the clips of the Oprah show that I had never seen before. It has been quite obvious that Oprah is more "new-agey" all the time, but this just proves it. Her exact words were "God is a feeling experience, not a believing experience." Wow...that is really too bad that she believes that. I think it is really easy to watch her and get wrapped up in what she has to say. I know I have done it. But obviously she is unsure of what she believes, and is leading millions of people in the wrong direction. Wouldn't it be great if such a huge powerful leader in society could lead people in the right direction? I guess that is what I will start praying for...

Once again...cheesy video :)

32 Weeks (8 months sounds better)

Emmett and Cayden

Rosann and Cayden (our new nephew) came over today for a little while. It was the first time EVER that Emmett had ever been around a baby. So I took a couple of videos...I think that Jeremy and I are going to have our hands a little more full than we thought with a new baby. Emmett intends good, but he just doesn't realize how little baby's are and how strong he is compared to them. There were a lot of new smells for him to get used to! He just wanted to jump and lick all over him. (Don't worry Jaynann, we didn't let him :). Cayden seemed to really enjoy Emmett though. He was all smiles!



So does anybody have any good website or book suggestions for how to get a dog/puppy ready for a baby?

a couple recipes

I wanted to share a couple of really easy recipes I have made in the past couple of weeks. My new favorite site is kraftfoods.com. Their recipes are so easy, and very very good.
Easy Parmesan-Garlic Chicken, and the Speedy Chicken Stir-Fry are a couple of our favorites.

Easy Parmesan-Garlic Chicken
-5 min prep time
-30 min total time
1/2 cup Grated Parmesan Cheese
1 envelope Good Seasons Italian Salad Dressing and Recipe Mix
1/2 tsp garlic powder
6 boneless skinless chicken breast halves (2 lb)

-Pre-heat oven to 400. Mix cheese, salad dressing mix and garlic powder in a bowl.
-Moisten chicken with water; coat with cheese mixture. Place in shallow baking dish.
-Bake 20-25 minutes or until chicken is cooked through.

Speedy Chicken Stir-Fry
-10 min prep time
-25 min total time
8 oz angel hair pasta (capellini) uncooked
2 cups broccoli florets
1 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into thin strips
1/2 cup Asian Toasted Sesame Dressing
2 Tbsp soy sauce
1/4 tsp each ground ginger, garlic powder, crushed red pepper
1/3 cup chopped dry roasted peanuts (optional)

-Cook pasta as directed on package, adding broccoli to the boiling water for the last 3 minutes of the pasta cooking time.
-Meanwhile, spray large non-stick skillet with cooking spray, heat on medium high heat. Add chicken; cook 6-8 minutes or until cooked through, stirring occasionally. Stir in dressing, soy sauce, ginger, garlic and crushed red pepper; cook 1 minute stirring occasionally.
-Drain pasta mixture; place in large bowl. Add chicken mixture; mix lightly. Makes four servings.

There you have it!! Hope you guys can enjoy these too!

30 weeks

no internet...

...that is my excuse for not blogging in a while. That and we have had just a few things keeping us busy :). Well we are all moved into the new house! Our first night there was Thursday of last week. We LOVE it. Things are slowly getting un-packed and put in their place. The guest room has become the room to put all the crap we don't know what to do with...so that is the next obstacle to tackle in the un-packing process. That and actually making our garage a use-able two car garage, since one side is filled with box's and furniture. I can only say we have gotten as much done as we have because of all of the help we have had. Our family has been wonderful. Thank you so much to everyone who helped us. I will take some pictures of each room and put them up in the next couple days.

The internet guy is coming tomorrow morning. I will not feel so disconnected from the world! I will also take a more recent belly picture to put up. My belly button is about to pop! If only that meant I were done! I know I am only starting to get to the miserable part of the pregnancy...and I know it will only get worse from here (which everyone feels the desire to keep telling me), but here is my list of complaints. I will list them once, and then try not to complain about them again.
...Sleeping at night...not so much happening...or at least not continuous sleep.
...My hips hurt...mostly why I can't sleep.
...My cyatic nerve pain is getting worse, and will continue to as the baby gets bigger.
...New development! Cankles! Yes, that is when your ankles blend into your calves, which mine
do. The past couple of evenings that I have gotten home from work they have been pretty
swollen. Not so bad on my days off...not on my feet near as much.
...Lower back pain...big surprise I know.
...Contractions...usually only when I am at work. They are a bit distracting while I am trying to
work, but once I get home and get off my feet they ease up.

Ok...I think I am done complaining. Overall these are minor things to be dealing with. It could be much worse. I usually take care of people around my due date everyday that are there with way worse conditions than mine! So I will suck it up. The baby is still moving constantly, and now we like to play a little game. It will stick a foot up at the top part of my belly and I will push it back down, and we will do that a few times before it quits playing...sore loser :).

Here is a link to some more pictures of us finishing up the painting and moving everything in!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=45449&l=3e1e4&id=510530691

we love our families...

Jeremy and I decided on the way home tonight that we are so grateful for the families that we have. They are always so willing to jump in and help when we need it. We started painting the new house today! We had Rosann (Jeremy's mom), grandma and grandpa Thiessen, my dad, Hillary, me and Jeremy. Between those of us, we were able to get so much done! My grandma and grandpa Butch brought by lunch for us. Mom also helped with lunch, but she was not able to be there today because she is sick. So we got all three bedrooms completely finished and painted. The living/dining area is primed and painted with the first coat. It just needs the second coat. The bathroom wont take long to finish. The only room we have not started yet is the kitchen. So I think we are making much better progress than we all expected.

So obviously from my last post, things have started going better :). We did get closed on the house and I slowly started to de-stress. Now I think I have finally entered the excitement stage. Once we get done painting, we will start moving in. We are hoping to have most moved in by the end of the weekend. So we will see how that time frame works out for me :). That might be pushing it a little.

Here is a link to some pictures from today and yesterday...
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=44107&l=60907&id=510530691

stressing...

Well I think that there is officially too much stuff going on in one week's time. I am trying really hard to not stress about the minor details of everything. Well this past weekend I packed up pretty much our whole house, and then I worked all day yesterday. Today we had our walk-thru at our new house at 11:30 and that went well. All day today I have been communicating with our lender about finalizations for tomorrow morning at our closing. The bank closes at 6 tonight and we have to have a cashiers check tomorrow morning by 9, and they cannot seem to give us the final number that we need to take. I was going to go and get that check before I went to work today, but now Jeremy is going to have to go and get it because I have to be to work by 3. They say we are waiting on the title company at this point. I just had to e-mail him our savings and checking account statements as of today so that can see all of our money. They need to see exactly where the money that we were putting in savings was coming from (Jeremy's paychecks). It all seems kind of ridiculous to me, but whatever. Now they know exactly what we have where up to the hour! Seriously. I guess that is necessary. So then tomorrow morning we will go and close at 9 am, and I will work from 11am-11pm and then early Thursday morning we had to Sioux City to the girls' national tournament for two days. We will come back from that early Saturday morning so I can make it to work by 3, and then work for the next three days....then the painting and moving will begin. I think this post was supposed to serve as a venting/de-stresser for me. I don't know if it really did that...hopefully it didn't make anyone else stressed in the process! I will be so glad when all of this is over. I definitely felt the effects of working so hard over the weekend while I was at work yesterday, so hopefully work is kind to me today!

27 Weeks

Well I have not put a pregnancy update on here in quite a while, so I figured it was about time! We are now 27 weeks pregnant, and the baby is growing very rapidly. Everyone at work continues to give me a hard time about how much bigger I am than our average 27 week patient, and the twins joke is starting to get a little old :). Things are going very very well. The baby moves constantly now, and that is actually starting to become a little uncomfortable at times... I love that feeling, except when my bladder is full :).
Some new things....
...I have this new found love for Sonic (I am there almost every day)
...The baby does not like it when I use my belly as a shelf for things, and when I do it kicks until I move whatever was there.
...The dog is becoming more and more aware that something is different. The baby kicked him
the other day while he was laying on my belly, and he did not like that so much :)
...I am quickly growing out of my maternity clothes! (what exactly are you supposed to do when
that happens?!)
...The baby seems to like the hour of about 7:30 am when I am still trying to sleep
...Oh, and I definitely cannot bend over anymore...I keep trying and I keep reminding myself
that I must squat down to pick things up now. No more bending at the waist.
...And the thing I think I hate most is putting on my shoes. That is proving to be more and
more difficult as each day passes. It is definitely time for flip-flop weather!
...One of Jeremy and I's favorite things to do now is to just sit and watch my stomach move. It
is quite the active child!

I couldn't decide which picture was a better representation of my belly so I am posting two. That t-shirt I am wearing in the pictures used to be pretty big on me!
So a couple days ago at work I asked one of the Dr's to sono me so that we could do measurements of the baby and see how it is growing. Basically we found out that it is growing alright...maybe a little ahead of schedule. There are three measurements that you take when measuring a baby and then combine those three into one. They measure the head circumference, the abdomen circumference and the femur length. The day I had the sonogram I was 26 weeks and 5 days pregnant. This baby came out with an overall measurement of 29 weeks and 4 days...yes...three weeks ahead. Each part of the baby was measuring very consistently around that gestation. The sonogram said the baby weighs 3 pounds and 0 ounces. Now that weight is not totally accurate, but if this kid is anywhere around 3 pounds that is quite large. (Hopefully that all made sense to everyone). I am hoping that if the baby is really this big, then it just decides to go ahead and make its appearance a few weeks early! That would be perfectly fine with me. The sonogram put my due date at May 18th (that is not my actual due date, it is just what the computer thought it should be according to the measurements).

I think that is about all! I will try to be better about putting more frequent updates on here. Jeremy and I close on our new house this coming Wednesday, and then we have possession the following Saturday. We are really excited to get into our new place!! A week from this coming week is mom and dad's spring break, so we are going to be doing a lot of painting and moving during that week so that we can take advantage of their help :).

(This picture is the best picture we got out of the sonogram. The picture is from the knees down, and the baby has its ankles crossed)

KCAC CHAMPS!!

Not very often can a team say they clenched their tournament championship and their overall conference championship. Sterling Lady Warriors did it last night, in their match-up again Southwestern. This has only been done four times in Sterling's history. The girls did an amazing job!! They worked so so hard this season, it was great to see them win...they definitely deserved it. I took our video camera and caught some of the highlights...hope you enjoy the videos! (These are the rough videos, not edited. Jeremy is going to edit them and make them nicer, but we have not done that yet. I apologize for some of the shaky shots, I got a little excited! :)

This video is the starting line up for the Lady Warriors...girls to watch for...Erin number 11, and Hillary number 33.


There was less than a minute to play when I took this video. Erin got a steal and then got fouled and went to the line. She missed her two free throws, but got HER OWN rebound (obviously to just up her stats :), and got fouled again. That put her back at the line and she made both of these free throws, and put them four points ahead. The very beginning of this video is Erin scoring her 4th free throw.


This video is the very end of the game, when they won!!


This video is Erin and Ashley Kraft getting recognized for making the all defensive team in the conference. Only 5 girls get picked for this team. Erin was the only player picked unanimously!


This video shows the players picked for First Team All Conference. Hillary was chosen for this team, as well as Ashley Kraft.


This is the girls celebrate by jumping in the pool. And if you watch, I pan over to get the mom's getting in this time also!




This video is the girls receiving their award for the KCAC Title!


This last video is of some of the girls cutting down the net!


Here are a couple articles from the Hutch newspaper, the Wichita Eagle and the Sterling website if anybody is interested. They had some really nice things to say about Erin and Hillary.
http://www.kansas.com/sports/colleges/story/330633.html
http://www.hutchnews.com/Sports/sterling2008-03-03T22-14-35
http://sterling.edu/athletics/release.cfm?ID=808

Birkey time!

We were lucky to get some good quality Birkey time in this past weekend! They had a family wedding on Saturday, and now that Justin lives here, and Jodi is here until Thursday the kids got a chance to spend some time together! Monday evening me, Jeremy, Justin, Jodi and Melisa took a road trip up to Sterling to see Erin, and go out to dinner with her. It was great for ALL of us to be together at the same time!! That has not happened in a very very long time. Now that exactly half of the Birkey family is living in Wichita (including Justin and Amy after they get married), it is our goal to convince Lowell and Dianne and Jodi to move here. Then we can all be together again for good!
Well this is definitely the most exciting this that has gone on around here in the past couple weeks. I have not had much to update about. But I am putting pictures on here of us and the Birkey's, so those should be good pregnancy pictures for those who want them :).