9 Months and Counting

I thought I would never desire food again after 16 weeks of nausea in my first trimester of pregnancy.  Now, I’m blinking twice at the date and wondering how on earth we got to 40 weeks so quickly and thanking God that I just ate my lunch with an appetite.  Where has time gone?  Perhaps it was moving from one country to the next, reuniting with family and friends after being abroad for 2 yrs, moving back to our Nation’s Capitol and trying to reorient ourselves into American culture.  Maybe that’s where the past few months have gone.  Maybe.

It could also be that life carries on, even when you’re pregnant, and perhaps that’s been the greatest surprise of all.  Now that we are waiting, waiting, waiting, on a job for Danny, on our child’s birth, on the first night I can sleep on my stomach again, I can’t help but look back at these nine months and reflect on this unique and special time.

Month 1:  January 27, 2011 we found out we were pregnant in Durham, England.  We were giddy and surprised to find this out, at least as giddy as we could be on a dark, wintry morning.  We couldn’t stop smiling all day and wanted to tell everyone.  But, we both decided we’d wait until I was farther along to announce the pregnancy.

Month 2:  Sick, sick, sick.  Enough said.

Month 3:  A little less sick and starting to move around.  On March 21st, we saw a heartbeat and were told our baby was one week farther along than expected, due on Sept. 27th and not October 3rd…we’ll see about that!

Lindisfarne, England

Month 4:  Auntie Anna and Uncle Ben came to visit lifting our spirits immensely.  My sister, who just had her baby 3 days ago, was a great comfort to me coming out of 3 sick months.  We had a full, fun-filled 2 weeks with them that we’ll never forget.

Month 5:  We introduced Baby Crouch to our favorite hobby: traveling.  We took our Babymoon to Southern France and Spain for 10 days.  On May 11th, we looked at a healthy baby on the ultrasound and somehow made it out of the doctor’s office without finding out the gender.

Madrid, Spain

Month 6:  June was a month of transition!  I had my first baby shower, one I will never, ever forget.  I don’t think a baby could ever be more internationally celebrated!  Friends from China, Mexico, Canada, France, USA, India, Japan and Columbia came out to bless this little child.  Mimi Crouch came to visit us for a week before we left.  We had a great time showing her around Durham and introducing her to our friends.  On the tail end of this, we said our goodbyes to those people who we still miss a lot.  For the first time in two years, we were bound for the US for a permanent stay.

Durham Baby Shower

Month 7:  Surrounded by friends and family, we felt that joy that you experience when you “come home”.  We celebrated Matt and Daynes Crouch’s wedding in early July, went on the Oster’s annual beach vacation, apartment searched in D.C, and ended the month with a family baby shower in Roanoke that was an extremely sentimental time for me and Baby Crouch.  I loved looking around a room full of women ages 3-78 who are part of this family.  I can only hope and pray that I live to be a great-grandmother and watch my family grow year by year like my Me-Maw.

Roanoke Baby Shower

Month 8:  Moving house in your third trimester of pregnancy is a good idea, right? I think our new motto is, “If it’s not crazy, why do it?”  On August 1st we moved into our new home where we will be a family of 3.  Thanks to the help of D.C. friends, the move was relatively painless and we were able to spend a good month settling in.  We continued to get to know our doctor better and better who we love and Danny logged tons of hours job searching.  The month ended with an earthquake, hurricane and tropical storm–both more hype than actual ‘disasters’.  It didn’t stop a terrific baby shower hosted by old friends in DC.  If rain is lucky on your wedding day, what does it mean on the day of your baby shower?

Month 9:  And here we are.  Still doing much of what we did in Month 8 but feeling ever

DC Baby Shower: These girls made that day so special!

the more expectant.  Any day now we will finally meet this little tyke who has been a trooper through all these months of transition, months of highs and lows.  One thing is for certain, this little life will bring us more joy than we could ever imagine and we can’t wait to introduce the world to it.  In the meantime, I’ll continue to use Danny as my official mirror.  We went on a date last night and I left the house with two different flip-flops on.  The worst part?  One of the flip-flops was Danny’s…you’d think I’d feel the difference.

The left one is green, the right one is blue.

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