Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Pt.1 With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility - Uncle Ben

Back to even more positive stuff.
(It's good stuff, you know!?)

We have learned SO MUCH during this pregnancy. 
Everything from "The Butterfly" exercise, 
what your Kegel muscle is, 
under what circumstances should you give your newborn eye drops, 
how to tailor sit,
why people choose to circumcise,
are vaccines worth it?
And a ton more.

Fortunately and unfortunately with some of this new knowledge comes a lot of
 freedom, 
empowerment 
and hardship.

What it comes down to for us, is what we believe is right and wrong...
Now how do we tell family and friends who are going to disagree with us?
It seems simple.
We are the parents of this child.
Not anyone else.
So why is it so complicated?


So here is the bad-ish stuff.
But it's all about good stuff! 

Let me explain?

The Circumcision Decision.
Ooooh. Touchy subject! I know! Because I have been on both sides of the fence. Our entire pregnancy we felt that it would be best to circumcise our son. We based this primarily on what we thought the Bible said. However after digging deeper into God's words regarding circumcision, we found that we don't need to anymore! Why? Because after Jesus, the final sacrifice, God's only looking into what's in your heart, not judging you based off your hoo-ha as well! Yay!!! We found so many verses backing this up and you could ask me if you're interested where in the Bible these verses are. Medically we thought circumcising him would be best as well. Doesn't it help prevent STD's or something? Well, that's what I have always thought but I figured I'd check just in case. As it turns out there is no proof circumcising prevents STD's. Okay then, aren't intact penises just bacteria traps? Aren't they dirty? Firstly, little boys are generally dirty little goobers. (Gotta love 'em though!) We are simply going to focus very hard on teaching our son how to keep himself clean. Just as you would teach a circumcised boy to clean himself right? It's not even a very different "how-to". So if he does try to keep it clean, there should be zero problems. The skin itself doesn't even fully retract for a good long while, sometimes not even until the teen years, so no! It's not a dirt trap, it should stay clean given the proper care. However if an infection did arise the likeliness of it being able to be treated with antibiotics is very likely! I am just saying there is only a tiny tiny tiny chance he would ever even need his skin removed, so there isn't really a reason to do it to start with! I had many ear infections as a child and my ears were hurting me SO BADLY. The thing is, even though I was already having problems with them at that point, they never suggested chopping my ears off. You don't *need* ears to survive, they are just really nice to have! So I am glad we are choosing to keep him intact. This would be really great for him as an adult because when he has a wife there would be so many benefits for them both if he was to keep it natural! I don't want to think too deeply about it, but I guess it's pretty great for the married life! *wink*wink* So there is a little insight to our choice. I could go on for hours, but I'd rather not. So how do we tell people that are going to disagree with us? Most of their reasons are really not even valid for wanting to do it, and most of those those ideas are totally based on assumption. I know that's why we wanted to in the beginning. We assumed, but after I looked at the facts we changed our minds. Plus, this is what WE, HIS PARENTS think is right. If we or he decides it would be best to circ. down the road we/he can always make the choice then, but none of us can undo it. So we are just going to leave it natural, as God intended and go from there taking full responsibility for our choice.


P.S. 
Our bags are packed and ready for Onyx's arrival. (Is it real yet?)
Car seat in the car? Check.
And I have almost all the food I want for labor as well!


Ill check back in soon!
My next post will be about our vaccine choices, 

and then I promise it will be the last of the grim info posts for a long while! 


Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Good Stuff!

Growing, growing, and more growing...!

Many things in my life have really turned around lately. 
Many -if not most- for the better! And for that, I am truly thankful. 
However life has a funny way of balancing itself out.

       I have gained 30 "mama pounds", or at least that is what I am going to call them. (It makes me feel better!) Jared has been so sweet about it. For some reason, he thinks I look beautiful in a whole new way and seems pretty genuine about it! So I'd count that as a plus because mentally, emotionally and physically, I think I am doing pretty well for having this lil boy in my stomach for 34 weeks now. I have not even had a breakdown! Unless you count crying over silly little things like cute pictures on the internet a breakdown, because then I've had many, many breakdowns!

      In the past I brought up that we did not like our midwife. Well ya know what I did? I finally got the courage to change our care provider! With the support of our new Bradley Class friends (Bless our classmates and our teacher for being so wonderful!) Jared and I said enough was enough. We let it go on too long and now I wish I changed sooner! Our new midwife is only 15 minutes farther then our last and she is so comfortable to be around! I even feel a little sad because I will only get to see her for appointments during the next month or so until we have our baby and then *poof* she will be out of our lives! I think I am going to bake her some awesome pastries when this is all over.


Speaking of which, I never posted pictures of the carrot cake I made for my father in law!

Yes, it was amazing...
and yes, I am getting off topic but if you made a carrot cake this good, you too would be proud!

I'll be posting more good stuff soon, but it's but deeper and for now you can just enjoy some belly pics and a close up of cake. Hope you like it!

Sunday, September 16, 2012

Sunday, September 2, 2012

Little Words, Big Pictures

Heart shaped beet from the garden.

Going on walks. (Trying to keep active)

 Garden stir fry

 Quiet mushrooms...

 



Spending time in the garden. We learned so much this year, the goods, and the bads.

+10 Climbing skills


Sunflowers and tomatoes are the mark of a great summer


 We met two new kitten friends.



 It's getting colder but we keep on walkin'. There's a baby arriving next month you know. : )