38 1/2 weeks!

I thought ladies were exaggerating when they said the last few weeks of pregnancy was the most difficult. I had a very easy pregnancy, so I figured it would be easy the entire way through. Holy crap, was I wrong. It felt like the second 37 weeks hit everything got drastically harder! I slowed down a lot with my serving at Sizzler, I'm feeling more pain from walking too much, sitting too long, or lying on one side for a long period of time. I don't sleep anymore. My sleep schedule looks like this:

11:30pm Shane is asleep and I'm lying in bed, wide awake.
12:00am I get up and waddle to the bathroom.
1:00am Still can't sleep, so I play on youtube and have at least one bathroom break.
2:00am Force myself to put the phone away and try harder to go to sleep. I also go to the bathroom again.
3:00am Usually by this time I'm finally asleep.
4:00am Bathroom time.
6:00am Shane's alarm wakes us both up and I get some breakfast and watch TV because I can't go back to sleep.
8:30am I'm able to drift off again.
10:00am I wake up and very slowly find the motivation to get ready for the day.

So in total, I usually sleep about 5-6 hours, which was more than enough time before I was pregnant, but I just don't feel well rested anymore, ever. Oh well though. . .I guess it's preparing me for motherhood?

I'm just so ready to have little Valarie in my arms. I stress so much with her in my belly, it will be so much easier to check on her and make sure she's breathing when I can actually see her.

I'm almost there, I'm almost done! Less than two weeks! I can do this, I hope I can do this, I better be able to do this!

So Ready for Valarie!

We are so ready for Valarie to be here. The apartment is clean, the nursery is finished, (except for the bow holder,) our jobs are ready for us to take time off, and we're registered at the hospital. I'm going crazy waiting for this little girl to get here!

Her due date is so close, but too far away! Waiting for her to get here is testing my patience more than anything else ever has! If you know me, you know I don't like to wait for things. (Just for example, Shane and I only dated for one month before deciding to get married. We'd planned to be married 4 months from when we got engaged, but that was too far away, so we pushed it up a month.) Waiting 9 months for something is just ridiculously long and I am going crazy!

To prepare for baby Val's arrival, we decided it was time to buy a new camera. We got a very affordable one, so the pictures aren't amazing, but they're much better quality than my old camera's pictures!!

 Testing out the new camera.

 Trying to get baby girl to drop, (or my water to break.)

It didn't work.

Oh just us on a random Sunday morning.

And now on to baby things. . . 

 Looking into Valarie's nursery from the doorway.

 (Don't mind the flowers on top of the changing table, they're waiting to be put onto the bow holder. . .)

 Just one of the shelves.

(The dog is a bank!)

 Real simple crib. We don't feel the need to go all out making it super frilly and crazy.

 The mobile Shane and I made.

 A rocking moose!

 I love Eric Carle so when I found this I just HAD to buy it!

 Sometimes we walk our stroller around the apartment. . .

Also, notice the hospital bags are ready to go!

 This is the bassinet by our bed. It's HUGE and super old fashioned because it's the one my parents used with me! 

 This will be a bow holder eventually. . . 

Awww, love the little bath tub!

Dear Valarie, you can come anytime now because we are as ready as we're gonna be! 

Loving My Job

I've had many jobs that some would say are better than being "just" a server. People tend to look down on servers, like they're serving because they can't find a better job anywhere else. I just want to clarify that I am a server because I love serving, not because I have to serve. Before becoming a server I had a job that had pretty good hours and amazing pay that easily could have supported Shane and I without him working at all, but it wasn't a job I enjoyed, and it actually did more harm to me than good. I made the decision to leave that job to do something I love. 

I really do love serving. I am not usually a social person, so serving is a great way for me to socialize with others, get to know people, and have fun while doing it. Not to mention my coworkers are awesome and I get to eat awesome food all the time. And the customers, I love the customers! 85% of the people who come in are just wonderful people and I love getting to know them!

I had a table last night that I had been talking with for a while, and before they left, the man handed me a very generous tip and wished me good luck with my baby. I was so grateful (and hormonal because I'm pregnant,) that I almost started to cry. It's the people like that who seriously make my job worth it. Servers are not worthless, they're no better than anyone else, and most serve because they really do enjoy it.

And besides, someone has to serve, right?