In no hurry to make an appearance

Between the last posting and this one, we have moved into our new temporary pad in KL, had 2 Dr. appts...one last Monday and one yesterday, and finally gained Internet access.

We are settled into our new place now and it is going well. The apartment is nice and spacious, so we are quite pleased with the accomodations. It has 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, a nice-sized living area and dining area, and a small kitchen with a stove top and microwave (but no oven!). So we are making do quite nicely. We try to eat in as much as possible, but we are only about a 5 minute walk from KLCC (huge shopping mall with a big food court and tons of restaurants, including our favorite...Chilis! Strange how your preferences change when you have limited Western food options! We never used to go to Chilis back in Houston!), so we eat out every now and then. There is also a large park, with a huge playground area, outside KLCC so we've taken Evan there a couple of times to play when the weather has been nice. I think he has more fun standing around watching all the other kids than he does actually playing on the swings and slides!!

As I mentioned, up until Sunday, we had no internet access (or actually just problems with my computer connecting to the internet), so sorry I've been terrible in keeping this blog updated. Luckily, Andrew was able to get it up and running, so I can now keep everyone posted on how things are progressing. Unfortunately for the grandparents, we are still unable to get Windows Messenger working, so they've not been able to see E on the webcam for the last week and a half like they are used to....sorry guys!! I'm still working on it!
Also, my digital camera broke before we left Melaka, so I probably won't be posting many pics for awhile. Although, I do have my old camera as backup just in case the little one comes before I get my new one back. They said it would be a couple of weeks and we are going on 3+ now, so we'll see!!

As for our Dr. appt....we had our 36 week appt last week, where they did the Group B Strep (I think that is what it was) test, so he went ahead and did the internal exam, but said nothing was happening. The baby still seemed pretty high and didn't seem to want to make a move just yet. We then had our 37 week appointment yesterday and the same thing. He did an ultrasound to see that things still looked good (which they do!), but said it wasn't even necessary to do another internal exam because he could see on the ultrasound as well as feel on my tummy, that he still wasn't moving down. Of course, it was this appt with Evan that Dr. Thayer told me nothing was happening and then 3 days later Evan was born....so who knows!! The Dr. is out beginning tomorrow through the 5th of May, so we won't have another appt until the 7th. Sure hope I don't deliver while he is away....he is one of the main reasons we decided to come to KL to have the baby in the first place. As for the baby, the Dr. said he is weighing about 6 1/2lbs now, so if he is right he'll definitely be bigger than Evan. The pictures we got yesterday showed him with some pretty chubby cheeks, so we may have a little chunk on our hands! We also saw more hair on the ultrasound this time, so looks like we are going to have another full-head of hair on this one too!!

I did seem to have a few real contractions yesterday evening (but nothing last night or today), so maybe he is starting to prepare me! I'll be sure to keep everyone posted.

Baby No-Name Update

***I actually finished this posting on the 20th of April, but left Melaka without getting it posted to the website and have had Internet problems up until now, so I thought I'd go ahead and get it out there. The more current posting (which I hope to get posted soon) will have more up-to-date info on the progress of our newest little one.

As you guessed from the title of the posting...we still don't have a name for #2. Andrew and I have casually thrown out names over the past few weeks, but still haven't seemed to land on one we both agree on! Hmmmm...sounds vaguely familiar to the process we went through with naming Evan. Hopefully, we'll have one soon! As for how the little one is progressing...we have our 36 week appt on Monday so we'll see. I've been having several Braxton Hicks contractions over the last few weeks, but nothing consistent or too painful. I just asked Andrew last night if he thought I complained this much when I was pregnant with Evan, and of course he said "yes"...or was it "ohhhh yeah, you did!", but I just don't remember being this uncomfortable at this stage with him. Oddly enough, I'm about 7 lbs lighter with #2, but I'm about an inch bigger around the belly than I was with Evan at this point. It also seems as though the baby is about a pound heavier than E was at 34 weeks. I have alot more indigestion this time, but I haven't had any swelling, so thankfully no cankles.... yet! We'll be moving up to KL this weekend to stay in a serviced apartment until the baby arrives. I start my weekly appointments on Monday, so we thought it best to go ahead and make the move so that we'd be closer to the hospital. I hate having to leave home for so long, but it is probably for the best. Andrew is planning on coming up on Fridays and leaving on Monday mornings for the time being. I know Evan and I are going to miss him tremendously. I think this will be the longest we've been apart since we've been married! It's funny to think that the next time we come back home to Melaka, I'll have two little ones and not just one!! Once we are settled in our temporary home in KL, I'll try to get more frequent in my updates to keep everyone up-to-date with the latest and greatest about #2's progress for making his appearance.

As for an E update, the little guy surprises me more and more each day with the things that he learns. We made a list the other day of all the words he is saying and he has a vocabulary of about 60+ words now....of course, not all of them distinguishable to anyone other than Andrew, Marte and I who are around him all the time!! Nevertheless, we really have to watch what we are saying these days because he such a little sponge. The other day I spilled something on the floor and said "crap" and what do you know, he picked up on it in a second and he was even at the other end of the kitchen! Another list we made was of all the hotels he had stayed in since he was 5 months old (which is when we made our first househunting trip here to Malaysia) and we came up with 18 (which doesn't even include the times we have stayed in the same hotel more than once!). So this apartment in KL will be his 19th new place to sleep in the last 14 months!! It's amazing how well he adjusts to each new place. He just goes with the flow, which makes it so nice for us!! Hopefully, the same will be true of our upcoming move.

We have had a bit of trouble with sleep times lately. For some reason, he has been requiring a bit more attention in order to get him down for naps and bedtime. We have to read more books and sing until he is almost asleep, otherwise he starts to cry when we try leaving the room. When before, I simply laid him in his bed and walked out of the room. I'm not sure if he senses the new one coming along or is just preparing me for the new one!!! Wow, am I really ready for those sleepless nights again....sure hope I am - I don't have much of a choice now!!! I hope this phase E is going through is only temporary and that he gets back to his old sleep habits soon, especially with the new one arriving any time now. Oh and did I mention....as of about 3 weeks ago, E has been "bink" free!!! We think this could be contributing to his sleep issues....although they started even before we took it away. He was only using it for sleep times the last year or so, but now he doesn't even ask for it. He says they are "gone" and that the neighbor's dog, Nadia, has eaten them! Believe it or not, this was actually something he came up with and not me....all I told him when he woke up (after I cleared them from his bed while he was sleeping) was that they were gone and didn't know what happened to them!! We sure hope he is okay with it when the new one starts using one!! That is why I tried to take it from him several weeks before #2 gets here...hope it works!!

Well, better go now and get finished packing up for our move....I sure am taking a ton of stuff so I hope we don't get there and then have the baby just a week later!

Below are a couple of pictures from a recent birthday party we went to. Evan had a great time and enjoyed every minute of it.....even in the Malaysian heat (as you can tell from his rosy red cheeks!!). The other picture is of the 3 of us...with little brother, that is!! I hestitated in posting this pic since I look huge in it, but I thought everyone might like to see just how big I've gotten....as well as my belly button (that the nurse at my Dr.'s office seems to laugh at everytime I go!!)