Mia's 2nd birthday!

Well, it's official. Our baby has turned 2. I can't believe that Miss Mia is already another year older. Sometimes when I think about it, it makes me sad, other times, I love that she is growing up. I guess this birthday was a little different because we are so close to meeting Baby Stocking and I realize that soon Mia will no longer be our "baby".
We celebrated her birthday the weekend before, which is good because she has actually not been feeling the greatest.
Here are some pictures from her birthday. She had a blast and was so good the entire time.
We had two birthday cakes for her and she loved both of them. Here is one of them with her adorable picture on it, the other one was a Dora Cupcake cake!

Here is the birthday girl in the adorable tutu I made her!

Sporting her Dora hat and carrying her Dora balloon.

I just love her expression here. This is while we were singing Happy Birthday. She just smiled the whole time, later she kept singing her version...."Ha Day Mimi!"
It is seriously too cute

Mia with her baseball bat, ball and new Sox hat from the Lovelady. This girl may be all tutus and dresses and cute, but I think she is going to make one heck of an athlete. She seems to have a natural ability for sports.

A family picture on Mia's birthday

Me (34 weeks), Mom, and Lindsey (26 weeks)
What a great family picture!!

Mia at home shouting Hooray!!

Riding her new bike. She is a little too short for it but she still loves her "motorcycle".

Here she is on her actual birthday. This is a classic Mia face!

You can tell she wasn't feeling to hot on her birthday, either that or she really didn't like mommy and daddy singing to her.

34 weeks and back to normal

Not only am I 34 weeks and feeling back to normal, but we celebrated Miss Mia's 2nd birthday today (see next blog post).
So this is coming to you very late, as tomorrow I will technically be 35 weeks. I have felt so much better since the kidney stone was removed. YAY!! And the best part is I lost almost ALL the weight I gained in the hospital. So I am actually only up .5 pounds from where I was 2 weeks ago. That makes me VERY happy, as I was pretty freaked out about the 9 pounds I gained in the hospital.
Baby Stocking is moving tons and actually likes to do flip flops in my belly. Josh is always astounded when he can see the baby moving from across the room.
Well this will be a short update since I'm almost to 35 weeks.

Here is a full body shot.

Here is my ever growing baby belly

And the bare belly shot.

10 bags of IV fluids = 9 pound weight gain...

Or at least that's my thought. I gained 9 pounds this week. I can only imagine, laying in bed for 3 days being pumped full of IV fluids caused some major water retention. I am feeling much better, although my upper back and neck are so sore from laying in a hospital bed for 3 days. Up until that incident and since then, I have been feeling pretty good. Today we even did our maternity shoot. I am so excited to see the pictures. I can't believe we are 33 weeks, that means 4 weeks until baby is full term.
Here are the pictures of the week. Big covered belly.

Look at that belly...I am wondering if looks bigger due to the fluid I am retaining

And the full body picture...check out that belly!

Coming to you from L&D (Labor and Delivery)

Wednesday night I started having some serious lower back pain. I assumed maybe it was from exercising the night before, but thought that was weird, since we really didn't do a lot of back. I had Josh rub it before bed, and was in so much pain I could barely crawl into bed that night. Thursday morning Josh left at 4:30am for a school in DesMoines. I got Mia up and ready for the day and then realized I was pretty sure I had a bladder infection, and that's probably why my back had been hurting. So I went to my regularly scheduled OB appointment and they confirmed that my white cells were elevated and there was blood in my urine. I filled my perscription and went back to work.

I decided to skip Stroller Strides that night because my back was not feeling any better. Mia and I ran a few errands, but I would have to stop quite a bit and breathe through the back pain. As the night progressed, the pain kept getting worse. After I put Mia to bed, I called my mom and asked her to come stay with Mia so I could go to the hospital. When I got here, they checked baby who looked great, and started me on fluids and antibiotics. They figured maybe it was a kidney infection. They also gave me some Nubain to help me sleep (it made me feel CRAZY).

On Friday, they were gearing up to send me home, when it happened. I got up to go to the bathroom and on the way back I got stuck between the bathroom and the call button. I was in pain beyond words. I have never felt something like that before. I stood stuck, sobbing in the middle of the room, praying the nurse would walk in...finally I got to the call button and by the time she came in I was in hysterics.

They got me some hot packs for my back and gave me a different pain med. Then they ordered a kidney ultrasound to check for kidney stones (which, I've never had, but do run in the family). When the ultrasound tech came in it happened again; debilitating pain and this time vomiting too. I just couldn't believe the pain. It was HORRIFIC!! They brough ultrasound up to my room and there is was. An 11mm Kidney stone. Now to put this in perspective, the tube that this is supppose to pass through is only 1mm...so my stone was over 10x larger than the area it needed to pass through. So the urologist came in and they scheduled me for surgery to put a stent in.

Immediately friends and family started praying for me and this little baby. At 9:30 this morning they decided to do my surgery, I would have to be put under general anesthesia, so that made me nervous, but it was all worth it when they woke me up from surgery and told me that they got the stone and no stent was needed. I got to see the stone and it was very big and jagged, so they are glad I didn't have to try and pass it.

Now I am just hanging out here listening to sweet baby's heartrate and hoping I can go home soon. They said they are going to keep me for a bit longer since the procedure actually caused me to start having contractions.

Well, Dr. just came in...I am free woman!! YAY!! Contractions have slowed, cervix is closed, about 40% effaced and still at -3 station (all that jargon means baby still has awhile, which is good). YAY!! So I'm headed home!!

Easter Sunday and 32 weeks!

Easter was amazing this year! What a difference a year makes. Last year with Mia was fun but searching for eggs this year was amazing. It was hilarious to hear her talk about the Easter Bunny, or as Mia would say, the Esser Bunny. We went to church Saturday night, which Mia loves and had a great time praising the Risen Lord. We are so much to be thankful for, we have been blessed beyond measure.
Here is a picture of Mia last year.

And here she is this year. Getting pictures of her is getting harder and harder the more active she gets. But I still love everytime I can catch her precious smile.

Here she is at my sister's house after the Easter Egg hunt. She is watching Grandma contently, waiting for more eggs.

Here is our family Easter picture. Mommy, baby, Mia and Daddy

This is what Mia wore while searching for Easter Egg's in the front yard. She had so much fun and couldn't run fast enough to get each egg. After she filled her basket, she wanted to sit and open each one. Then she thought she could eat whatever was in there. We decided we should go inside and play toys and mommy would empty the eggs.

Here we are on Easter Sunday at my sister's for dinner.
The boys are sporting the kid's new bouncy balls.
Josh, Me (32 weeks), Lindsey (24 weeks) and Auggi

Here is my 32 week belly. I gained another pound this week, and I have a feeling every week from here to the end is going to include more weight.

And here is the bare belly shot of the week. I feel like I am carrying this baby really low...but it could just be me. It is definately getting bigger by the day. Not sure where I am going to fit 8 more weeks of baby!!