37 Week Check-Up

GREAT NEWS!!

When they checked me today, I am already 2 cm dilated and 70% effaced. She said that if my body and Riley continue to naturally progress and everything seems to be going well and his heart rate is good she could induce as soon as next week. So, at next week's appointment she will check me again, see how we are progressing and then we can discuss inducing!! He is already head down and moving down (as he was last week), the only thing is he is facing my back; she said that is very common because it is more comfortable for them to lay, and Andrew was the same way right up until a couple hours before; it is very easy to move them around by doing the "Polar Pose" on all 4's. Anything at this point to make the process move along!!!

But, it will still be ideal if he decided to come on his own, so I will still work on the walking after Saturday at the baby shower!!

Adam

Adam was able to call again this afternoon. This time he was able to talk for 10 minutes and he sounded even better than he did before. Unfortanately Andrew was napping when he called (we are having bad luck with that) but I put the phone up to his ear so he could at least hear Daddy talk. Adam said they came in 1st place in a marching competition and that was why he was able to call and he said he is still able to only read one letter per day, and he has the rest in a huge stack in his security box. But, he also mentioned that he was able to write us another letter last night, so within a couple days, we should have that as well. He said it IS getting easier as each week goes on (or even some day by day I'm sure), the only thing he felt himself being challenged by is the sit-ups. Apparently they were a little different format than he practiced before he left, so he wasn't prepared for that. He has his sit-up portion PT test that he has to pass on the Wednesday of week 4 (75 sit ups in a minute) and if he does not pass that, he will be recycled. But, he said he is working on those in every PT session they have and hopefully he can struggle through and pop those babies out. Please keep him in your thoughts since we do not want him having to repeat anything, but to continue moving on!! He also said he has lost 17 pounds from working out constantly, but I am sure he will gain some weight back with some muscle as he progresses. He got to pick his choices of bases yesterday, he has to choose 5 in the United States and 2 overseas. He chose one in Arizona, one in Nevada, one in northern California and two in Florida. For the overseas I know he said one was in Italy, but I don't remember the other one. It is rare to go overseas the first time, but it could be any of those bases and then I am assuming as they open they would choose from that same list to transfer you, but of course I am not sure of that! He also said that they have the big PT competition coming up this week as well, where the top 4 out of 8 units get the special Town Pass on the Sunday after graduation, which means he would get the whole day (9am-6pm) off base with us to do something, so we are really hoping that his unit will do well. I'm pretty positive, and he said he was too, because his unit has ranked #1 in everything since they got there (hence his two personal phone calls so far). Also, EXCITING NEWS: tomorrow will be 19 days since he has left and 38 until we fly out, so we are 1/3 of the way through tomorrow!!!

36 Week Check Up

I had my 36 week check up today, it was with the covering doctor since Dr. Marotto is not back until next week, but I did discuss with her the dates for the trip and the age requirements for Riley. After examining me, she said that he is already in position, so she doesn't think he will be more than 4 weeks anyway, but only time will tell. She said they can induce at 40 weeks if he hasn't come by himself, and depending on how far down he is they may be able to even induce at 38 or 39 weeks as long as his lungs are developed. But, she said that this should not interfere with the trip, so my talking to him must have helped!! She also said to walk alot (of course I am going to wait until after the baby shower) and massage my belly several times a day because I guess that helps as well. I mentioned to her that I read on a website that you can also eat pineapple and spicy foods, and she said that wouldn't hurt but it is not known to induce labor. And, my stomach still measures 6 days ahead, so we will just have to wait and see, I will keep everyone updated!!

Update

Adam was able to call again tonight; I felt bad because right off the bat he said he would really like to speak to Andrew because he only had a few minutes, but Andrew was already asleep. Hopefully next time he is able to call Andrew is still awake, I could tell he really missed him!! I asked him if it was as bad as he thought and he said it was tough, but he had a good flight and they were doing a good job on their assignments so that was why he was able to call, so as long as everyone keeps up the good work he should be able to call home on a regular basis. He said that he has received our mail, which is great since it took a whole week for his postcard to get here, but he said that he has only been allowed to open one letter so far. That must be torture to have a bunch of letters and only be able to open one!! But, I guess it gives him something to look forward to for the next time they give him the okay! I told him I have a tendency to ramble and apologized if the letters were too long, but he said keep them coming, so the one must have cheered him up a little! I had read that everything has to be thrown away after reading it and he did say that he had to throw the letter away but he was able to keep the picture, so we will have to see, but I told him not to worry if they make him throw it away, the important part is that he got to see it in the first place!! But, he sounded good, just a little bummed out that Andrew was already asleep, I tried cheering him up and told him that I was making the arrangements for the trip down there and that we would be there for 5 whole days and on the itinerary there are a lot of free time for him to spend with us, so hopefully that will do the trick to keep his head held high!!

Uncle Mikey's Birthday at Joker's

Thursday Andrew went with Grammy, Grampy and Uncle Mikey to Joker's to celebrate Uncle Mikey's 24th birthday! It looks like they had an awesome time!!

Surprise Work Baby Shower

Friday the girls at work surprised me with a baby shower; they even had Mom in on it so she picked Andrew up from daycare and brought him as well!! He got some nice presents too, so it worked out well all the way around!!

Shrine Circus

Andrew and I went to the Shrine Circus yesterday with Grammy and Uncle Mikey, it was a lot of fun and Andrew really enjoyed it!!

Playing in the dirt

Andrew decided this afternoon he wanted to play in the dirt; he got his trucks right out of the shed at Grammy's and started digging in. He had so much fun and got wicked dirty!!

Updated Countdown

Andrew and I made a new countdown tonight; the other one we had made counted down to June 6th which is when we thought the graduation would have been, but since we are flying out on June 3rd, we fixed the countdown to end with that date instead!! Only 48 days, that is really not that long considering...

More Easter Baskets

Uncle Mikey came over to visit us tonight so we could celebrate his birthday a little before the big dayt tomorrow and he brought along an Easter Basket for Andrew and an Easter Basket from Mimi and Papa for Andrew!! Andrew got very excited and decided to dig right in!!

Phone Call

I JUST heard from Adam, it was so great to hear his voice, he was only able to talk for 2 minutes but it was wonderful being able to hear him and he sounded like he was doing fine. But, it just made me more anxious to DEFINITELY go and see him at his graduation, I have watched so many YouTube videos and I received an itinerary from Lackland AFB for graduation weekend, where there is also a lot of free time that he is able to spend with us before going to tech school for 6 weeks. It is going to be quite expensive, but just keep me in your prayers that all of this will work out because I think we will regret it if we don't do this for the family!! I will keep everyone updated as I hear from him. He had called originally to ask me to mail a copy of my Driver's License to be added to the DEERS system and he said he only wanted letters and pictures, no cards, because I guess they frown upon that. What is already in the mail cannot be helped, but please from here on out!!!

Haircut

Grammy took Andrew to get his hair cut today. Doesn't he look so handsome?

We went out to dinner with Bumpa & Nani tonight, Andrew ended up sleeping through most of dinner, but it was nice to have a meal with them and be able to chat with others who miss Adam as well!!

HAPPY EASTER

This is a video of Andrew doing his Easter Egg Hunt!! He had tons of fun!!!

Adam's address

Adam was finally able to call home with his address. I wasn't able to speak with him because apparently he forgot my cell phone number since he had it on Speed Dial in his cell phone so he left a message at his parent's house with his address and told them to have me mail my number to him. I stopped in at their house to get it so Andrew and I could mail our card we made him and I re-opened it, added my cell phone number in big letters at the top and re-sealed it to send out tomorrow. For anyone that wishes to send him mail you can do so at the following address:

AB Brockman, Adam W

PFC #3 331 TRS FLT 405 Dorm A8

1320 Truemper St Unit 369567

Lackland AFB, TX 78236-5549

It is probably a good thing he left in a message actually, I had to play the message a few times to make sure it was correct!! This is the picture of the card Andrew and I made for him, I had forgotten to upload a picture Friday. We have decided we will write him a letter Monday & Wednesday and include pictures in the letter, Andrew will include a drawing with one and a coloring book page colored with the other and then Fridays we will do our card like this!!

It was hard to tell in his voice how he was doing, it was definitely a script he was reading from and I am sure that none of those words were his (except of course about forgetting my number and having me mail it ASAP) so I can't wait to hear from him and be able to have a few normal words of conversation!!

Easter from Lindi

Lindi gave everyone at daycare some Easter goodies inside a cowboy hat!! Andrew got some bubble bath, bath paints, an apron and some candy!!!

My Little Guitar Player

Andrew was playing his guitar for a little while tonight, and since he was cute while he was doing it, I thought we would use this picture for Daddy's first weekly card!!

Daddy/Andrew frame & Countdown

Grammy helped Andrew make a frame with some cute pictures of him and Daddy today. We put it on the entertainment center in the Living Room and he keeps looking and pointing at it.

We then took some of Andrew's easel pad paper and made the countdown to when we would be able to go to his boot camp graduation. It will be June 6th if everything stays on schedule, but if something changes we will have to make a new one. We hung it right beside Riley's countdown on the Living Room wall.

Affirmation/Flying Out

I was able to be with Adam right up until he boarded the plane at 2:55 today. It was hard to see him go as I knew it would be, but I was thankful that I was able to go through the airport with him and now we just have to count down until we see each other again.

Processing

So, Andrew and I dropped off Adam at the hotel today for his processing; he was able to check back out and we went out to supper at McDonald's so Andrew could play in the Playplace when he was done eating, and unfortanately the one in Portland does not have a Playplace, but we still had a nice meal together and we played with Andrew's monster toy together at the table. The goodbye with Andrew was a little hard on Adam since he won't see him tomorrow, but Andrew made him laugh by saying "You otay Daddy??" and rubbing his face and giving him a big kiss. On the way home Andrew asked me "Daddy comin back?" about a million times and I kept telling him he we would go see him in 9 weeks, but eventually he fell asleep watching Thomas on his portable DVD player. I am sure that we will have a daily conversation about it, but I will make sure to keep reminding him of his Daddy and have pictures always handy. We also plan on writing Adam once or twice a week to tell him all about what we did that week and hopefully all of that will help as well.

At work today I printed off a blank US map so I could show Andrew which state we are in and where Daddy is, I thought it might help him to have a visual but only time will tell!! But, I want everyone to know how thankful we are for all of your thoughts and prayers, we know in the long run this will be much better for the family, but two months ago when we got this date it didn't seem like it would creep up on us this fast or what saying Goodbye was really going to feel like. But, I have to applaud Adam immensely because I know without a doubt that if I had to say goodbye to Andrew I would be more of a basket case than he was and that shows a lot of inner strength to be able to sacrifice your own feelings in order to better provide for your family. Adam, Andrew and I love you more than anything and I hope you know how proud we are of you!!

I am going down to MEPS tomorrow to see him swear in and fly out and I will try to take a small video or a few pictures so that anyone that is not there can see him once he is officially "AIRMAN BROCKMAN"

Backyard

We put all of Andrew's backyard toys back together again this afternoon, we all played outside, got really dirty and had tons of fun!! Now we just need to rake I would say...

GOOBER

On the way home from Lindi's, Andrew decided he needed to change Elmo's diaper and he stuck it on his head, haha!! Good thing it really ISN'T a dirty diaper...