38 wks...come on now

I really thought Frankie would be here by now, but maybe he will make his arrival on Halloween :)

Doctor (and I) can feel the Frankie's hard head right in there, but my cervix is only 3 cm. Need to take more night walks!

I had my 38 wk appt yesterday and was only 3 cm. Which could mean anything is still possible, but I expected to be in 'active labor' (which starts at 4 cm) since I was with L & O for about a week before suddenly popping them out. I was having a lot of braxton hicks (irregular contractions/cramping/tightening) with some twinges of sharp pains a few nights ago, but it stopped. I know his head is very low and putting lots of pressure on my bladder. When the dr measured my belly, he said 'baby is growing' but yet I haven't gained in 3 weeks, in fact I lost a pound this week. (Small victory I can celebrate lol--I was a little bigger and more swollen with L & O). I also found out they hadn't officially scheduled/confirmed my induction date at the hospital, which I guess is busy lately and their soonest availability to induce me will be next thursday NOv 7th, which is my bro James' bday. I am hoping to go into labor naturally before then though....mainly because of my impatience, but also because I am kinda wierded out by pitocin starting contractions...
Here's a diagram of stations and dilation etc...

Anyway, I've been distracting myself from all that by doing my puzzle projects. Lucas and I have quiet puzzle time while we listen to music...while Olivia continues to talk about whatever forever, and try to get credit and applause for every action she does. Or annoy Lucas is heavily focused on his puzzle. He was doing so well, we decided to buy him a big puzzle...550 pieces! And he sorted the outer pieces and began putting it together all by himself...he is adamant that he wants to do it alone :)

The house next door is being built pretty quickly, but we are so tired of hearing all the banging and mexican music blasting all day..and we have no light on that side of the house now coming through the windows since the lots are so close to each other :( I hope they finish soon so the construction debris is cleaned up etc...and because my dogs never shut up when they are out now...I am secretly hoping the construction guys get tired of hearing is and shoot their nail guns at my dogs...just kidding...but yeah Tyrone never stops.

View from my balcony.

I also forgot to blog about the bench we had made. I liked the company and the prices and stuff...but John and I were pretty perturbed that the guy that hauled it up the stairs and onto our balcony left a trail of scrapes in our walls, and black freaking paint in our brand new carpet that I couldn't quite get out...we are just now getting over it...try not to think about it and just enjoy the bench, since the company didn't offer to pay for repairs/cleaning...and just apologized. Anyway, I enjoy sitting here with the kids :)

  I finished my 2000 piece puzzle, and then got another 2000 piece and finished it--they are so big--the pictures don't show how large they really are. I like the landscape ones with water etc...I don't want a pic of times square or anything necessarily recognizable. Stores are actually pretty limited so I will start looking online soon. Not that I will have time for puzzle after Frankie comes lol. I was excited to glue and frame them for the wall, but didn't know exactly how to go about it. I read online about different cheap methods and picked up some mod podge at target. I had never used it before but followed the directions and it came out very pretty and glossy. Then I read a cheap way to frame them is to go to Home Depot and have them cut a piece of MDF board and miter some moulding for the frame..it was such a good idea! This guy Norman was awesome--cutting was free of course.

 I got boards and frame for both my 2000 puzzles, and then took the leftover board for Lucas to work on :) I used a spray adhesive to glue the mod-podged puzzle to the board, and have yet to get the wood glue to apply the frame, but this is what is will look like:

(it's very large, the puzzle dimensions are 38.5"x 26.5")

Well, I hope i'm blogging about my third birth story very soon...I'm sure everyone wants to read my long-winded detailed accounts haha.