We made it through the weekend...almost!

Hello everyone!
  I'm happy to report that the weekend is almost done, and we are still pregnant ;-)  It has been a busy/stressful weekend for our family with Tom busy hosting a bachelor party from thursday until today - but everything went well, and we are looking forward to our doctor's appointment tomorrow morning!
  Mom and Dad Grivna got a little dose of excitement last night with a quick (and luckily uneventful!) trip to the hospital!  I had been feeling like there was a possibility I was leaking fluid, and after calling my doctor, we decided it would be best to go into the hospital to get checked and make sure that my membranes hadn't ruptured.  Thankfully, the nurses at the hospital were wonderful, and were able to do a very quick and easy test to ensure that the fluid was NOT amniotic fluid!  Thank goodness!!  We spent about 40 minutes at the hospital all together, and then happily headed home to bed - glad that it had just been a false alarm.  As much as I thought everything was ok, I knew it was better to be safe than sorry - and with everything that we have been going through, I'm just not willing to take any risks!
   Tom was informed of everything as it was going on - and he was very concerned.  I was so happy when I could call him with the good news so that he could continue his evening and not worry anymore!
    We are really looking forward to our doctor's appointment tomorrow.  We have an ultrasound scheduled before our appointment to do some measurements of the baby as she has been measuring a little on the small side the past couple of weeks.  It will be fun to see her on the screen and see how big she really is!  It's hard to know if the measurements that the doctor takes in the office are very accurate (they really just measure the size of my belly!) because it all depends on the baby's position at the time of measurement....and a number of other things that I don't even know about.
   I will be sure to update the blog with our appointment information so that you can all stay up to date!  Thank you everyone for your continued love and support!  We are feeling very optimistic and happy about the way things are going!  This little girl has managed to stay put for a long time, and we feel so thankful for every day that she decides to stay where she belongs!

Photos of our journey!

Just the beginning!

Baxter is all set to welcome a new little sister!

The baby's room after Tom and my Mom painted all weekend!  The crib tent is not to prevent bugs, in case you were wondering...it is to keep the cats out!  They want to be in that crib so badly!

A Happy Milestone! (3 weeks of bedrest down!)

My wonderful baby shower at 26 weeks!

Happy 33 weeks today!!  We missed a few pictures in the last few weeks I guess ;-)

The crib has clean sheets (thanks to Mom!) and the closet is getting more organized!  At least now we have a bookshelf for all of the great books we have received!  I am starting to feel a little more prepared!

Enjoying the wonderful rocker and foot rest from Mimi and Boompa!  This chair has become a regular favorite of mine for my "reclining" moments in bed rest duty!

Happy 33 Weeks!!

Well, we made it to 33 weeks!!  It is quite a good benchmark considering this all started almost 12 weeks ago.  It's amazing how fast time has passed and how lucky we have been to have many weeks go by with a very stable course - I feel so incredibly lucky to have made it this far!!
   This week has continued to go well.  After all of our excitement on Monday and Tuesday, it seemed as though things were settling back down.  I continued to take the medication to slow contractions and had been doing nothing more than laying down all day and night.  Thursday morning brought some more excitement!  My parents returned from their big yellowstone trip (they came home earlier than planned due to my change in condition!) and about an hour before they arrived, I started to have more contractions - about 3-5 minutes apart, and feeling quite painful!  So, I called my doctor, and we decided to increase the medicine (Nifedipine) frequency to see if that would help slow things back down.  During my conversation with the doctor, she mentioned that if the increase in medication didn't make a big difference, that they wouldn't do much more to attempt to stop labor.  Because we were able to get the steroid injections to help the baby's lungs mature on tuesday and weds (24 hours apart), I guess the protocol is to let a baby at this gestation deliver if labor occurs.
    So - now we wait!!  Luckily the contractions did slow down with the increased dose of Nifedipine, and they seem to have remained pretty quiet through today.  My mom has spent the day with me helping get the baby room prepared for this unpredictable little lady, and we have had a wonderful day!  Tom is busy this weekend hosting a bachelor party for our good friend Greg, so he has been calling hourly to check in on me and make sure that nothing has changed!  Hopefully we can continue to keep things quiet through this weekend so that we can try to get this little lady growing for at least a few more days, if not a few more weeks!  At this point, when she will arrive seems to be anybody's guess ;-)  We are just excited and hopeful that when she does decide to arrive that she will be healthy and strong!
    I am going to try to post some pictures of my growing bump, and also a few of the progress in the baby room - but I'm still new at this whole blogging adventure, so forgive me if it doesn't work out perfectly!  Love to all of you!

Let the excitement begin!

Well, things have been relatively quiet for the last 11 weeks (thank goodness!) and I guess this little lady just couldn't wait to get things going!!  On sunday night I started having some pretty regular contractions (every 3 minutes) that were strong enough to keep me up from about 1am until 4am.  Things gradually slowed down and since we already had a doctor's appointment on monday, I didn't end up calling the emergency on-call line.  At our appointment monday, I mentioned to the doctor my little "night-time excitement" and she checked my cervix to find that I was about 1cm dilated.  This is the first time that I have had any cervical changes during this whole experience, so that definitely got my attention.  We discussed that this could be a sign that things are starting to move towards real labor and put me on a monitor to see how many contractions I was having.  The contractions were pretty quiet, and not terribly regular, so she decided to start me on a medication called Nifedipine (it's actually a blood pressure medicine that relaxes the uterus as a side effect) to help keep the contractions under control.  She also stressed that if I started to have more regular contractions again, that I will have to be more proactive about calling right away instead of trying to wait things out.
    So, of course my lovely uterus decided to act up not terribly long after that!  Tuesday evening I started having contractions about every 5 minutes, so I called our doctor and she sent me to the Maternal Assessment Center at the hospital to have the contractions monitored and also to get a medication called Betamethasone (a steroid that helps the baby's lungs mature faster).  So, around 9pm Tom and I headed to the hospital with bags packed just in case!  As soon as we arrived the nurses hooked me up to the monitors and I was contracting every 3 minutes, so she gave me the betamethasone (steroid) and called my doctor.  My doctor had ordered some tests along with another injection to slow contractions (called Terbutiline).  So....another needle poke and the contractions slowed down almost to a complete stop!  we then had a fetal fibronectin test done to determine whether there was a good chance that the baby will be born in the next two weeks.  Thank goodness the test came back NEGATIVE!!!  This means that there is a 99% chance that she will wait at least two weeks before she arrives!!  I was so happy!!
    We were released from the hospital around 11pm and happily went home to get some sleep!  Now our plan is to maintain strict bedrest (versus the semi-modified bedrest I was allowed before) and to keep a very close eye on the contraction count.  So far, so good today!!  I will return to the hospital tonight for the second steroid injection (they always give two doses if they can) and then it's back home to keep laying around.
    Thank you to everyone for all of your support!!!  We could not have made it this far without all of your love and assistance with everything!  We are so incredibly blessed to have such amazing friends and family.  We are hoping to have at least a few more weeks of good reports for you ;-)  I will definitely keep this blog going after our little lady arrives to keep you updated on her life outside of the womb!