Thanksgiving & The After Party

*This blog is kind of my online journal...and this entry contains a lot of barf....since that is what I've been doing recently.  I do apologize.*

Now that the world knows my big and glorious secret (I'm totally knocked up), I can confess that the holidays so far have been kind of a bust for me personally.  But that doesn't mean that I didn't have a good time with my family and friends.

For Thanksgiving, we (the Grant Anderson kids and spouses) were invited to my Uncle Brian's house for festivities.

After personally having a glorious morning of barfing into the bushes in my yard, in front of Aaron, my brother, and some neighbors ("It's 11am....is that lady drunk already?"), we headed off to my uncle's house.

The food was amazing and the company was exquisite.  We got to sit at the "kids' table" with my cousins....all of us were 19 and older...but it felt like the kids table since we were devoid of parents.  We talked and laughed for hours while we ate.  Well...they ate.  I nibbled and tried to take it easy.  But not on the jello....I ate lots of jello.

I took zero pictures since I was spending my time sitting and trying to remain as still as possible.  So you don't get any visuals.  But if I did, you would have gotten pictures of all of us laughing and telling stories with very animated gestures.  It was a wonderful day

The next day was my Thanksgiving After Party.  For the pasted two months I've had this thought in my head, "I'm sure I will be feeling better by next week."  I would keep planning parties...because that is how I celebrate the holidays....and I would have to cancel them since I couldn't get the house clean or activities put together or food prepared....or get out of bed.

I tried to take Friday morning really slow so that I would be able to enjoy the party.  But I still spent it with a bucket.  Most of the time, I was in the middle of having a conversation with my brother.  Finally in exasperation he said, "What are you throwing up!?!  You haven't eaten anything yet!!!"

Because of the constant barfing, Aaron and Markus did EVERYTHING to get ready for the party.  Aaron made the stuffing, got the turkey in the oven, cleaned the house up, and started preparing everything that we would be eating.  Markus helped Aaron with anything he needed.  They even made my mother's eggnog that I love so much.

I got off the couch ONCE to take pictures of the food and the lovely hands that prepared it....so that I at least documented a tiny portion of the day.

I hope you enjoyed.  Those are the only pictures of the day. And they are all excellent quality images also.

My favorite people came over to celebrate.  Michelle, Daniel, and Leo Harnish showed up for the main party which was actually perfect because that was about all the people that I could handle.  At the end of the day Geoff, Clarise, and Kaitlyn came and we celebrated again.

Again, tons of talking and tons of fun.  Michelle was great to talk to about pregnancy.  It is amazing how different my perceptions of pregnancy are now that I've made it a third of the way into a pregnancy.  I can understand pregnant people on a level that I didn't even realize that I was missing out on.

When I tell people who haven't been pregnant that Aaron's breathing makes me gag...they don't get it.  They think his breath is bad.  His breath isn't bad....but the air that is coming out of his lungs....has a smell or something that I can't deal with.  But Michelle, totally gets it.

Leo is still scared of my dogs...which I totally get.  They are small and they move fast and knock into things while they are spazzing out.  I would want to avoid them at his size too.  So the puppies spent the day in their rooms feeling sorry for themselves.

Geoff, Clarise, and Kaitlyn distracted me with Youtube videos and let me relax on the couch.

And Clarise FINALLY got to see me throw up.  I think that she thought that I was making it all up or something.  It also makes her happy to know that my body has got hormones happening.  She laughs at my pain.  But I'm glad that I could give her an early Christmas present.

That was my holiday.  I kept nothing in me the whole two days.  I lost two pounds.  But I got to visit with people and talk about my baby dreams and laugh and have a great time.  So I guess this holiday was a success.

The Big News: Third Times the Charm

*What you are about to read is my excuse for not getting ANYTHING done in the last 2 months.

Well, as you likely know from my Facebook page, I'm pregnant.  I thought that for people who are interested, I would tell you the whole story (well...not the WHOLE story...you might have to use some of your imagination for that...but please don't).

As most of you know, I had my second miscarriage in May.   We decided that we were going to take a break from the medications and the diets.  I was going to focus on school and work and when we were ready again, start trying.

The more I worked with kids at the preschool and the more that I watched this little baby in our ward in the morning...the more I felt that I needed to start trying again.  I tried to get use to that idea because I wasn't eager to risk losing another baby.

About this time, children at church started to realize something....The Reinerts don't have any kids...but they have been in our ward for a long time.  All of a sudden, we had children asking us in their innocence, "Why don't you have any kids?" "Do you want to have kids?" "When are you going to have kids?" "Where are your kids?"

I would tell them, Aaron and I would love to have children but Heavenly Father must not want us to have them right now.  Maybe you could pray and ask Him about it because we won't have kids till Heavenly Father will give us one.

I thought....more prayers couldn't hurt....especially not prayers asked with complete and innocent faith.

Meanwhile, I got a cold at the beginning of September, right after getting back from the wedding in California.  And it kept lingering.  I was so tired and I slept all the time.  And I was getting nauseous in the mornings and my abs felt like they were cramping and stretching.

If I didn't know any better, I would have thought that I was pregnant since this was how I felt earlier in the year when I was pregnant.

But I couldn't be.  Because I wasn't on any medication AND I wasn't on my diet.  So....this must be a really bad cold, right?  Those children at the preschool must be coated in germs!  When would I get immune to them?

General Conference came and I was praying hard to know what Heavenly Father wanted me to do with my time while I waited for children to join our family. I wanted to know what I should focus on in school.  And I was praying to know what He thought would be the best path for me.  I'd been praying this all semester and I didn't feel like I was getting an answer.

Saturday morning Elder Shayne M. Bowen spoke about his feelings about losing a child and his sorrow.  His words were so comforting to hear.  "The Lord takes many away, even in infancy, that they may escape the envy of man, and the sorrows and evils of this present world; they were too pure, too lovely, to live on earth; therefore, if rightly considered, instead of mourning we have reason to rejoice as they are delivered from evil, and we shall soon have them again."

"I have not been robbed but rather that there was a great blessing awaiting me if I would prove faithful."

Was this the answer to my prayers?  Or were the words of comfort to keep me holding out hope for kids in the future?

That night, Aaron and I talked about what we wanted to do.  We decided to pray on whether we wanted to try adoption or try more medication.  Either way, I called and made an appointment to see my doctor so that we could see what the next step would be.

Then I took a pregnancy test...because I had to before I start any medication.

It is ALWAYS negative.

Or.........................wait............................WHAT?!?!

Okay...that couldn't be right.  There must be something wrong with the test because it says that I'm pregnant...which makes NO SENSE.  I couldn't be pregnant.

I walked into the bedroom....dazed.  I told Aaron, "Ummmmmm....so...something a bit weird happened.  I'm pregnant...or something."

"Wait....are you being serious right now?"

"I....think so?"

"What do you mean, "you think so"? What did the test say?"

"It says that I'm pregnant but I can't be....so...I don't know."

I decided to take another test the next day....because...obviously something went wrong.

The second and third test were both positive on Sunday morning.  My parents came over to watch conference with us and I said, "Oh...sorry the house isn't that clean.  I've been sick...or, I guess.....I'm pregnant."

Both my parents turned to me, "Wait.....REALLY?"

I told them what happened.  They promised to pray for us but we were all a little reserved since I've been pregnant before and my chance of a miscarriage was about 66%

I called the Clinic Monday morning to change my appointment from an infertility consultation to an ultrasound appointment.

"How far along do you think you are?"

"I have no idea...this was a bit of a surprise."

"When did your last cycle start?"

"I think in July...but I can't be THAT pregnant."

That was an awkward conversation. 

Our first appointment was on October 12th to see what the heck was going on.

Apparently, this little person was going on.  It turns out, I was pregnant.  I didn't believe it till I saw this.

Yeah....what is that?  It is a picture of a 7 week and 1 day embryo.  I saw the heart beating immediately on the screen....it was a living little person.  We got to hear the heartbeat which is always really nice.  An added tender mercy was that I have never been this far along before....and since I didn't know that I was pregnant for so long, I hadn't been worrying about.

Thank goodness!  Because I would have been a WRECK waiting to pass the milestone date of the last one.

But I still wasn't completely sold.  I had heard a heart beat before and it didn't guarantee a baby.  I was still skeptical.

The barfing though...that was a good sign.  SO MUCH BARFING!!!  I nicknamed the baby "Smalls" so that when I was barfing I could say, "You're killin' me, Smalls!" (quote from The Sandlot)

My next appointment was on the 26th of October.  Since I was high risk, they wanted to see me in two weeks to make sure the baby was still there...and I'm not patient so I didn't mind not having to wait a month.

Two weeks late, look how much more like a baby this little one was looking.  That thing in the black blob?  At the top of that thing in the blob? That's a head!  You always want the baby to have a head.  I don't know why it looks like it is wearing an elf hat though.  And you can see the little back and arm nubs.  Everyone needs arm nubs.

I was starting to get excited....this baby had made it 9 whole weeks without dying.  That's really awesome!!

Around this time, the barfing got so bad that I had to stop working.  Some days I couldn't stop throwing up long enough to get to work.  And sometimes I would get to work and keep running to a trash can to throw up.  The kids weren't getting the best me and I couldn't be consistent with anything.  I'm probably going back in January though...when the barfing will hopefully be a thing of the past.

And all of October was ruined of festivity for me since I was spending all of my time in bed...with a bucket.  Luckily Geoff and my brother came to help us put up Halloween decorations.  Our Halloween was really lame this year.  No parties.  No festivities.  Hardly even costumes. We just sat at home and passed out candy to kids....that was the extent of the celebrating.

On November 16th, we had our next appointment.  Only 3 weeks since the last one.  This doctor didn't really want to let me out of her sight...which is good for me.

12 weeks and 1 day....starting to look like a baby!!!  Aaron was amazed at how much like a baby this little one is starting to get!  I've got to say that I am too.  It has gotten so cute in the last 5 weeks.

Here is a picture that I labeled in case it is too hard to tell what things are.

After 12 weeks, my risk of miscarriage has dropped down to 0.5% and I was brave enough to tell people our good news.  And I could finally admit to myself that 

AARON AND I ARE GOING TO HAVE A BABY!!!!

So get ready because I'm about to get OBNOXIOUS up in this blog!!!