Baby #7: 21-26 Weeks

Oh baby #7. While you may be loved and wanted and cherished and thought of every day in the real world, I've been majorly slacking updating the blog on you. I wish I could say it will get better once baby's here, but I know that would be a major lie ha! 

The last six weeks have been filled with fun and even more anticipation of meeting baby. Eric finally felt baby kick a little after 20 weeks. I've also had Brayden and Ashley feel baby kick, and they said they felt it, but I'm not convinced they actually did. 

We had our anatomy scan, and our anatomy scan 2.0 since baby decided to not show a clear picture of his or her heart. We finally got some almost decent photos of baby, so I was excited about that. Baby likes to hide its face out in my placenta or the lining of my uterus, so the adorable face pictures are lacking this pregnancy.

The kids are all still seeming excited about the baby. They were all kissing my stomach the other night, and they talk about baby a lot. Katie will still point to her belly if you ask her where the baby is, but if you ask her where mommy's baby is she will point to my stomach (or my chest, it's a 50/50 shot of her getting it right still haha). 

I'm still pretty exhausted by the end of the day, and I'm realizing that my ability to bend over and give the kids a bath or even give them kisses goodnight if I'm standing will be coming to an end soon. But that all just means we keep getting closer and closer to meeting this last piece to our family, and for that I'm so, so grateful. 

An Eclipse Party for the Books

It was a solar eclipse of the heart(land). A totality awesome thing to witness. Watching the sun get mooned was the best part of my day. {Insert all other corny solar eclipse statements here.}

But seriously, witnessing the total solar eclipse yesterday had to be one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen. 

It’s hard to put into words the magnitude of what happened. You almost didn’t notice it getting slightly darker as the time passed. I’d be reminded by Brayden and Ashley that they wanted their glasses to look at the sun, and then I’d hear their sweet little voices filled with excitement when they would state that there was a piece missing from it.

As it approached totality, the changes definitely became more drastic. It was noticeably cooler, and noticeably darker. There was almost an eerie feeling that came over you as it got closer and closer to totality. And honestly, it felt much more eerie and seemed to get much cooler than when I experienced the eclipse in 2017 with 95% coverage. It’s so amazing what that extra 5% can do!

And all at once it was like a light bulb got turned off as the moon fully covered the sun. Seeing that last bright flash of light before the total ring surrounded the moon was something truly breathtaking.

I didn’t bring my camera, and honestly I am glad I didn’t as I feel like I didn’t get to watch the actual eclipse as long as I would have liked anyway, and we saw it for over three minutes already. But I did find some truly amazing photos that photographers shared on Facebook, with my favorite being one by Ryan Pinkston that I’m sharing below (click on his name to go to his Facebook page for the original). 

In the darkness, the kids played with glow sticks while all the adults marveled at the beauty we were witnessing. There were too many people (and little kids) when we saw it so I didn't notice, but I heard others say that their porch lights came on and they could hear animals and bugs act as if it was nighttime.

Brayden and Ashley loved the "clipse" party. When I asked what their favorite part of the day was, Ashley said it was watching the moon go in front of the sun and it getting dark and playing with glow sticks. Brayden said that his favorite part was playing with his friends. Then he asked me what my favorite part of the day was.

Man that got me thinking- what was my favorite part of the day? Much like Ashley, I had more than just one favorite part.

I loved that I was able to spend the day with some friends we don't get to see very often- talking about you Nick, Jaycen and Katie!

I loved that I was able to experience the eclipse with my family. Seeing the excitement on their faces throughout the whole day was something I never want to forget.

And I loved that this whole thing reminded me just how small I am, and just how mighty our God is. He created the world and all the beauty in it, and being able to witness just a small portion of his miraculous works was something that will stick with me forever.