Diapers

Diapers, adorable shoes, cute burp cloths...

Thank you Maranatha Baptist Church Ladies!

With Anna, my plan was to do "infant potty training." With Lydia I wanted to use cloth diapers but wasn't able to get them here. Maybe this time I will do both. (As I have never used or even seen someone use cloth diapers, I welcome any advice or tips...Eric says step by step instructions with pictures would be nice.)

Not too much longer left.

(Excuse the outfit...especially the garden slippers.)

Me....Plus Three

Let me start by saying that I have really enjoyed all of your emails. They always seem to come just when I need some encouragment. Thank you so much for your prayers. I have not been half as exhausted as I was and have been able to accomplish a lot more lately...which is good because LESS THEN 6 WEEKS before our little man gets here! (Hopefully, anyways. I start contractions at about 5 months and they have been a little stronger this time so not too excited about going past the due date.)

Many of you have asked how my doctor's visit went. It was probably the best visit I've had yet....probably because the doctor wasn't there so I saw the midwife. She is much sweeter...except for the fact that she told me I was getting too fat. Usually I can just smile and go on because I know that there are pregnant women much bigger than me (I've gained about 22 lbs so far - their scale said 26 but it's an old scale), but I'm starting to get a complex. I even considered putting down the sunflower seeds. I go back on Monday to have some more blood drawn and see the doctor. After that I'm not sure when I will see her again because the hospital is closed the whole month of June. (This is a yearly thing that every hospital - at least maternity- hopistal does.) If a woman has a baby during that time she will go to a hospital in Kharkov. I'm not sure what they do about visits, but I'm sure they will tell me.

We found a dentist office in Kharkov which seemed very nice and up-to-date. Each dentist chair had its own room. The last one I went to was just one big room with all the dentists working in the same room. We were hoping that I could finally get my 3 year old toothache resolved, but they can't do anything until after pregnancy. At least we met the dentist and saw the office. The only thing that would make it better is if I didn't have to go with a translator. It's so frustrating to not be able to understand on your own what is going on and always have a whole crew with you. (For my first doctor's visit I came with 3 other people - Eric, Lina and Yuri (taxi). Talk about drawing attention to yourself.)

Eric made everything better by taking me out for McDonald's afterwards. Then he bought me two climbing rose plants, a cute blankie for the baby and an adorable little hat for him...the baby, thought I might need to clarify. I have the sweetest man in the world! I am so thankful that he can put up with this pregnant woman even though he is never lacking in work.

Poor Missionary Kids

Eric took this video on the train ride home and it was SO cute that I had to share it with you.

With no baby doll around, Anna was pretty creative. (Let me say before you start feeling bad for the poor missionary kids without baby dolls, they have probably more dolls than they need at home.)

Sorry that it's sideways. Can't figure out how to rotate it.

Just Like Mama

Found a fruit candle last week. I set the lid on the coffee table and when I came back this is what I found the girls doing. Guess they like candles too.

River Baptisms

On Wednesday night Yuri, Vladamir and Christina were baptized. Anna had run a high fever all day so I wasn't able to go. I prayed though, especially for Christina who had called about an hour before to say she wasn't going to be baptized that evening and also for the weather (it had been raining off and on all day and started raining right when Eric was heading over). What a praise it was when Eric called to say she had gotten baptized and that it was sunny when they were all baptized. Click here to see pictures and read more.

Ramblings of A Pregnant Woman

....whose brain has a Russian overload.

Because of that, I probably should not be typing, but I thought that maybe if I type out my overloads I'll be able to think clearly before Eric gets home. (He's been giving a Bible lesson to Oksana today, then had to come pick up Natalia and bring her back to the city.)

A Little from TODAY:
Natalia called me Saturday night and said that she would like to stop by for a visit. For those who don't know, she is my Russian teacher...though I'm not sure if I have had even one lesson this year. I should have known that it would be impossible for a teacher to stop by her students house without having a lesson, but I was hoping. We met her at the train station around 3 and she left around 7:30. First off, I AVOID at ALL cost being out at that time of day. Not only do I have a very hard time with the heat, but the heat also seems to change my sweet little Anna-bell...besides the fact that she had to walk about 30 minutes to get there. After talking for a while, she pulled out the books. So between cooking supper, setting up different activities for the girls, bathtime, etc., we had our Russian lesson. I enjoy the fact that I can speak more correctly after the lessons but it's SO hard to balance lessons and being a mommy.

A Little about TOMORROW:
Tomorrow I have to go see my doctor again. I say have because I am not at all looking forward to it. I know she's not going to be very happy with me because she told me to come in last week, but I wasn't able to. Also I did not do all of the tests she asked me to because my former doctor advised me again one. (Even though I think this hospital is probably the nicest looking one I've been in, though still just cement walls and floors lined with wooden benches, my previous doctor seems so much more up to date medically.) Eric is going to drive me so I'm kinda hoping he can come in and help pacify some of her wrath. I'm hoping that there are not too many people in line so we can get in and out quickly because if it doesn't take too long Eric said that he would take me to look at kitchen cabinets. YAY! It would be so nice to have the kitchen in order before the baby comes.

Special Finds:
Eric brought me out to buy curtain rods the other day and guess what I found? A glue gun! I was so excited. Now I just need to find something to use it on.

Thing I can't live with out right now:
SUNFLOWER SEEDS. MMMMMM. Can't seem to keep them in the house. It doesn't seem to matter how sick I may be of them at the end of the day, by the time I wake up - before I even get out of bed - I'm craving a nice, big bag of them...shelled, of course. A lady wouldn't eat them with the shells....unless she was pregnant with no other options AND no one was around.

Well, guess that's about it for now. Tired, content and going to go meet my love at the door. (Not just because he's bringing me sunflower seeds either. ;))

Open Fences

(Thankfully wrong season, but still the congregating spot of the neighborhood for both the young and old.)

Only 7 more weeks until our little guy will be here! I can't believe how fast time has flown, though I must admit I am now in the stage where I'm just ready for him to come. Between the extreme exhaustion, major heartburn and the return of nausousness, I don't know if I will be able to make it through this time. (OKAY, maybe a little dramatic-but not much.) The only problem is that I am not prepared, unless I want him wearing pink, frilly dresses. So it's good that I have a few more weeks to go through what I have and what I need. I'm also trying to figure out where we will be placing his cradle. I haven't had a whole lot of time to do anything because since returning from Poland our days have been filled with doctor's visits, church services, Bible studies, getting our registration.............and visiting with the neighbors.

Since my dandelion post, I have already received 3 lilac bouquets which have filled the house with their beautiful scent. In a way, it has been nice to have our yard so open that everyone stops by to talk, but some days I long for the privacy a higher fence would bring so that I could just hide and relax with my girls. We can't go anywhere without kids and people coming over to talk and hang out. At the same time, I like the fact that everyone is slowly opening up and talking with us and if we had that higher fence, I know I would not have met half of the neighbors that I have.

Tonight as we were hanging out in the yard one of the neighbor girls came over and played with Anna and Lydia. While they were playing two boys came over and sat across the street from our house. They started harrassing her, falling around, singing songs....I thought they must be drunk or at least imitating their fathers. This went on for about 20 minutes. I was so tempted the whole time to ask the girl if they had been drinking and finally did after I saw one of them throwing up. She carelessly told me "Yeah, they're drunkards." When I asked her how old they were, she told me 10 years! I almost started crying. She said that there had been a group of them hanging out around our house last night. We had heard them but figured it was just rowdy kids hanging out by the tire swing because the gate was broken and our yard wide open. I don't think that I have ever seen anything so sad as these two little boys so drunk that they are falling all over the place, laying down anywhere and getting sick. I pray that I never become so de-sensitized that the "normal" things we see every day stop breaking my heart.

Beautiful Dandelions

To some, it's just an ugly weed. But to me, the dandelion has always represented simple beauty, childhood innocence and now open doors.

The weather here has been absolutely beautiful and we have spent almost every minute outside enjoying it...and so have our neighbors. Still, between my extreme shyness and poor Russian, I have barely gotten past the neighborly "hi".

It started with one little dandelion bouquet the neighbor girl gave Anna...which led to a FULL jar and then some. Next thing I know, we are in the neighbor's yard and Anna and Nastia (the neighbor's daughter) are calling each other sisters while the mom and I talk. What a blessing it is to have kids! Pray for us as we try to meet and reach our neighbors. Pray especially for me. It takes a lot for me to speak to people even in English, much less in a different language (unless I know the person will be patient with my mistakes).