My BFF Erin came to visit over the weekend. She’s a fantastic photographer (she took most of the pictures at my nursery rhyme baby shower too) and started doing it as a part-time job last year when she founded Open Shutter Photography. She was kind enough to bring her whole photo set-up with her and we spent a lot of time playing dress up (or dress down) with my new doll baby.

Just ignore the messy bedroom in the background.

Erin thinks I am doing her a huge favor by “letting” her use Caroline as a model, while I think she’s doing ME a huge favor by taking beautiful pictures for free and “letting” me post them here.

Here are 5 8 10 some of the shots from Erin’s photo shoot. The rest are over on her portfolio site here. I thought it was unfair to anyone with baby fever to post them ALL at once.  I would especially avoid the shots where she’s smiling and laughing unless you’re ready for (more) bebehs. But for the record, Suzanne is a lovely name for any girl children born approximately 9 months from today.

(Yeah, I know it’s annoying to talk about how cute my kid is all the time but I can’t help it. Blame all the hormones that make me feel attached so I don’t leave her to be raised by wolves or gorillas or fairies. IT’S SCIENCE.)

Where am I going and why am I in this handbasket!? - Courtesy of the brilliant MKP

I love this face: OMG WHAT IS THAT THING? WHAT'S A HAND??

We call this one "The Angry Elf"

Squished bebeh!! I don't care that she's totally colapsing in this picture - I have NO shots of myself with Little Evan until he was at least 6 months old so I'm just happy to have ONE I really like with Caroline.

I think I'll frame this one.

For the record, this will be one of about a ZILLION posts called “Sweet Caroline”. You don’t name your daughter Caroline without a) liking the song  b) hearing it in your head practically every time you say her name and c) knowing it makes a good title for a blog post.  You have it stuck in your head now too, don’t you?

You’re welcome.

Not right now, but probably before the weekend is over. My blood pressure was still high today, combined with some elevated numbers for my liver function (I should really pay more attention to WHAT exactly those numbers are and/or mean, right? But when the doctor is frowning at me my brain goes blank) means my OB was concerned enough to send me up for a couple of hours of monitoring in L&D. I have absolutely no other symptoms of pre-eclampsia – no swelling, no headaches, no blurred vision, no protein in my urine – and my blood pressure STILL isn’t quite high enough to be official pre-e (at least according to Wikipedia) so I managed to talk them into letting me out of labor & delivery tonight. If there was a record speed for getting your pants on, I totally broke it on my way out the door.

As long as I keep feeling fine, I’m free until 5 pm tomorrow, at which point they’re starting my induction.

That’s right, I said 5 PM TOMORROW. SATURDAY. Which might even be TODAY by the time you read this. SOON. My mind is having some trouble processing this time frame, in the same way my mind would have trouble processing the entire room turning upside down and all the furniture sticking to the ceiling.

The baby, for the record, looks FINE and still doesn’t care that her mama might be sick. Girls, I tell ya, trouble right from the start.

But now I have approximately 22 hours to finish up my Super Important List Of Things To Do Before The Baby Comes, including getting these boxes of Goodwill donations out of my kitchen, organizing baby clothes, finishing the nursery and picking my mom up from the train station. Because I CANNOT have this baby until she gets back, despite the amazing collection of frozen meals now filling our basement freezer thanks to my awesome friends from Stroller Strides and E being on stand down from work. I need my mom here to feel prepared and relaxed and calm and all of the good things one should feel when bringing a new life into the world. I’m already nervous enough just hearing the words “induction” and “pre-eclampsia”, I don’t need to feel overwhelmed by the huge pile of unwashed laundry and the dirty bathrooms and the fact that I STILL haven’t been to the grocery store since I was sick. E is helpful and all but really? His idea of a clean house means you can walk from the front to the back without tripping. Mom understands CLEAN.

So, internets, wish me luck for Saturday night/Sunday. And no more guesses in the birthday pool, since it looks like the weekend is for sure. But the 19th is my mother-in-law’s birthday and also the day E and I got engaged 7 years ago so not a bad day to have a baby overall. If you want to follow along on Twitter I’ll be over there as much as I can & you don’t need to have an account. Just look at my page here and try to focus on the tweets that don’t have an “@” somebody in front of them, since you’ll only see half the conversation. That is, if you’re interested in live birth updates. If not, come back Monday or Tuesday for fresh-baked bebeh pictures.

P.S. I would really appreciate happy, it-wasn’t-so-bad induction comments since the majority of the stories I’ve heard are not so good. Even with the drugs everyone’s labor seems REALLY long and hard – not to mention my mom’s induced labor with me which was long & hard and DIDN’T involve drugs.

P. P.S. I thought I had more time to ask for these, but if anyone would be willing to write & share their own birth stories while I take a few days off that would be awesome. You can be a blogger or not a blogger or have it written already and send me a link or write it now or write it in the next two days. Just send me an email at bebehblog@gmail.com so I can post it here. It doesn’t have to be rainbows and butterflies or involve meadows and wheat fields (although if it does PLEASE sent it), I just want to hear your story and take a few days off to, you know, give birth myself. And everybody loves a birth story.

Do I need to remind anyone that this is the point in pregnancy where pretty much every post will contain TMI and if they don’t want to hear words like “mucus plug” they should stop reading? Did I not do enough to scare those people off with the first baby?

Ok then: IF YOU DON’T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT WHERE BABIES COME FROM, COME BACK AFTER JANUARY 1ST. Or never. Because once this baby is born you’re guaranteed about six months of constant boob talk followed by another six months of “OMG I cannot lose this baby weight” talk and then before you know it I’ll be knocked up AGAIN and thus begins the circle of mommy blogging again. *cue Elton John song*

I had my 38-ish week check-up at the OB this afternoon and it was pants-off, complete with one of the most uncomfortable cervical checks EVER including the kind you get when you’re not pregnant than involve things that look like torture devices. But it was fairly pointless as no signs point to imminent baby arrival (sorry early guessers in the baby pool!) so I’m waiting another week before I let them even talk to me about Things That Might Help Induce Labor.

Or at least that was my plan.

Unfortunately, my blood pressure was a little high (130/80-ish)(which is only borderline high for a normal person but extra high for someone like me whose numbers are usually closer to 90/60) and since I had all those issues with my kidneys, high blood pressure can be a Very Bad Thing and unexplained high blood pressure might be any number of things that could potentially lead to more problems. So my midwife sent me down to the lab for bloodwork and orders to come back tomorrow for another blood pressure check at which point we may begin talking about Things That Might Help Induce Labor or even DO one of the Things That Might Help Induce Labor*. Which suddenly makes this “I’m having a second baby” thing WAY WAY too real. Definitely not good for my blood pressure.

In the meantime, I’m going to do a little happy dance over the SEVEN POUNDS I’ve lost since my last check-up (almost certainly just water weight due to the IV fluids I was full of thanks to hospitalization but still pretty good – losing a few pounds is often a sign labor is imminent)(Also, I am 11 lbs lighter than my 39 week pregnant weight with Baby Evan which means 11 lbs less to lose to get back to my pre-pregnancies weight). I think I’ll also try to make it to Stroller Strides tomorrow, since walking and/or stair climbing might be just what my body needs to get things moving and I would MUCH prefer to let this baby come on her own than start down the road to induction.

But like my midwife said, the full moon is on the 23rd 21st anyways. That’s ONE WEEK until I’m pretty much guaranteed a baby.

*My midwife actually offered to strip my membranes today but a) I wasn’t dilated enough for her to do it b) I wasn’t sure I WANTED her to do it and c) my mom doesn’t come back until Saturday so I CAN’T go into labor until then. Does anyone have experience with membrane stripping working/not working? Google assures me it’s harmless unless labor is already close but sometimes I’m not so sure Google is the most reliable medical source. WHY EVER WOULD I THINK THAT?!

At least, probably. Maybe. Don’t go ordering anything monogrammed just yet. Because when E comes home and says “If she’s born on Christmas, isn’t Piper Noel a nice name?” I can’t stop myself from second guessing Caroline Still-No-Middle-Name, especially after Swistle (squee!!) and her readers came up with a whole list of Christmasy themed possibilities. Suggestions still welcome.

I was going to post just a couple of these but I CANNOT PICK which ones I like the best so here’s the most epic, ridiculously long photo post ever. Kade from KBG Photography took over 600 shots on Saturday and gave me a disk with 370 edited photos less than 24 hours after our session. How’s that for amazing turn-around? If you’re here in Eastern Connecticut I HIGHLY recommend using her for family photos – she was fantastic with Little Evan, even when he was being…difficult. Check out her website or like her on Facebook to see all the great shoots she’s done. (And thanks to April for suggesting her!) I’m so glad I was able to get these taken, even if my stupid kidneys forced us to reschedule. Thank you so much Kade!

And Mom/Mom Davis/Other Relatives, I have a release form saying I’m allowed to print as many of these as I want so if you need new family pics for the walls just let me know!

Belly handprints: Fail. But still cute!

He did NOT want to love the belly.

He had no problem loving the belly :)

My super pale belly is...kind of creepy. But the kid is cute!

Little Evan is trying to escape. But we'll call it hugging.

For the record, those are my pre-pregnancy jeans unbuttoned/with a Bella Band. They still totally fit over my butt at 38 weeks pregnant, something I am ridiculously proud of.