Those of you living in suspense....the surprise party went well. He was really overwhelmed by it all but so greatful for the whole thing. He never has really had anything like that for him before. The in law issue resolved itself somewhat. They started to think of ideas for centerpieces the day before and when they were telling me about it I thought great what a great idea, YOU GUYS go for it. So they ended up doing the centerpieces with balloons, toilet paper rolls and hershey kisses. It was cute. Other than that it went pretty well. While the party was going on though my family had a major meltdown and began freaking out. They were fighting everyone was crying it was crazy. Amazingly though, we did it all upstairs and to my knowledge it wasnt really obvious (other than my parents in intense conversation at the table). It was just a bizarre event.

Other stuff...baby is doing okay. I went to the doctor and the little thingamabobber had a heartbeat so the risk of miscarriage at this point goes way down. I am happy about that. They also took literally about 9 tubes of blood for all of the tests they have to run on me because of my previous preeclampsia. In one sense I hate being special and needing higher risk care but on the flip side the more tests they run the more I feel safe that they arent going to "miss" anything.
I have fully decided though that I have figured out what and ideal pregnancy and parenting experience would be for me. I would like to be pregnant starting at around week 20. What a great time in pregnancy! You are through the pits of the first trimester, you havent quite made it to the uncomfortable and tiring third trimester so you are just happy feeling the baby move, showing enough that people dont think you are just getting incredibly fat. I have also decided that although I do not want to birth a 1 year old (yikes!) I definitely am interested in parenting a 1 year old. I really began to truly enjoy parenting at that point. Life became stable again and some independence began right around then. I am a great Aunt to a newborn, holding the baby, changing diapers, I can even take nursing (so okay maybe not an Aunt) it mainly is the lack of sleep and the lack of being able to communicate with your child that makes this definitely not my favorite stage of development. I want baby to tell me what is wrong, what hurts, what it needs. THat is why infant sign language was so helpful at a young age for my little girl. At 6 months she began to express what her needs were making life a bunch easier. That is for another blog though.

Anyways this is the extent of life right now. I am tired and nauseous (though it is beginning to subside a wee bit I think). I am tired of school and doing practicum hours. I am pretty much ready to quit and just do what I really want to do which is just live life on weekends again and not go to school at night and take lunch breaks again at work which I have had to give up because of this practicum. I just am beginning to question what this degree is really worth. I keep thinking when all of my kids are raised and I am ready to enter the "real" work world again I will be happy I have the degree to fall back on but for the moment. Nothing is really enjoyable about it.

I hate to end on a crabby note so just the overall life situation is okay right now. Nothing to pressing or scary going on so I will just take it day by day for the moment.