Jude is in the House!

Hello fine readers out there. My name is Jude and I'll be your host from here on out. Technically, I've been writing the posts already, but now I'm officially here. Jude is in the house! Allow me to introduce myself. I am Jude Louis Darrow Churchill. Louis is said like Louie, and that's named after my father's grandpa. Darrow is said like Dare-Oh, and that's named after my mother's grandpa.

I was born on Tuesday, July 29th at 7:51am. I weighed 7 pounds and 4 ounces and was 20 inches long. And don't worry, tons of photos will be coming, but Blogspot is having problems right now and I cannot add any photos...

And yes, I have red hair, too.

Final Flings...

On Tuesday morning, bright and early I will be born! The countdown on the blackboard in the kitchen is getting marked off each day (mostly by Gramps, he tends to get to it before my mother). And sometimes I wonder if my parents are ready... Why you ask? Well, first of all they STILL don't have a name for me. They had it narrowed down to three first names and about five middle names. And then they decided to use one middle name and moved two of the other middle names to first names... So now they have FIVE first names and one middle name.

Eventually they better decide!

The other reason I am not sure if they are ready, is that they keep doing final flings! Last Thursday, mother and father got a babysitter for Daphne and went out to eat and then saw the newest Batman movie, "Dark Knight". And then yesterday, mother went out with some of her girlfriends for a "Girls Night Out", but a boy went too! Little Mcalister had to come too, because he is only five weeks old and is breastfeeding from Miss Alison.

The girls met up and all got their nails done...some did their toes and some did their hands. What is it with women and painting their nails??? My mother did blue polish since she is having a boy here in a few days. She wanted a footprint or a pacifier or something, but the artist didn't know how to do that, so he did a flower instead.
And my mother's friend Rachel makes and sells diaper cakes! So she made this one as a gift for me! How cute, thank you Rachel!!! So now that all the flings are out of their system, maybe mother and father are ready for my big arrival on Tuesday!

Pregnancy Photos...

My mother realized she has very few photos of her in this pregnancy... She claims it's because she is embarrased of her 40 pound weight gain (ten more pounds than when she had my big sister!). But I keep trying to tell her that it's stinking hot outside since it's the middle of July and her feet are so swollen she had to go buy new shoes - two sizes bigger than her normal size! And a certain body part that will feed me after I will be born have grown so much, she's incredibly self conscious of herself right now. But I told her she needed to take some photos, and she better hurry since I'm going to be born in SEVEN DAYS!!!!!!

As you can see in these photos, her stomach is actually not that big. At the final doctor's appointment, her belly was 4 centimeters smaller than it should be! But everything is still a "go" for my birth via C-Section on July 29th!!!!

Getting Ready...

In exactly 7 days I will be born! Wow the time has flown by... Just seems like the other day I was discovering my hands. And soon I'll have to discover how to use my lungs.... My parents are trying to prepare for my birth as much as possible. Grandma bought a bassinet that my big sister and my big cousin William both used, but my Mom wanted to get one that could rock for me. And Grammy remembered that the one she used for my mom was in the attic. So Gramps and Dad climbed up to the attic the other night and found it. They got it all cleaned up and it looks great! Grammy and Mom went and bought a new pad for it and a couple new covers. Now the strange thing about this bassinet, it was bought in the 1970's in Germany for my Uncle Eric when he was born!!! When Grammy and Gramps moved back to the States, they brought it with them and then when my mom was born, she used this bassinet, too! But since it's so old and from Europe, none of the standard size bassinet pads fit. So Mom is improvising and rolled up a cute blanket on the end. I think it will work just perfect!

Now we just have to wait seven days for me to be born....

My first Quilt!

My Grammy is preparing for my birth - in fact she already made me a twin sized John Deere Quilt! She must love me...

Baby Shower!!!

There is this strange event called a Baby Shower... I'm not sure why they call it that. There is no baby there and no one takes a shower. Hmmm, this English language is a strange thing I will soon have to master (in 14 days after I arrive!)

When my big sister was born, she have five baby showers. My mother had to add pages to her baby book to make room to detail all the showers. But she was getting sad as my baby book would not have a single shower to document...

UNTIL...

Yesterday at work, my parents (who work together in the same department) were surprised with a shower! I got lots of new clothes, some diapers, a scrumpulicious cake and a huge gift card to Target that my parents can't wait to go spend! Thank you so much everyone!

Countdown!

On the blackboard in the kitchen, a countdown has begun for my birth..... Only 17 more days!!!!

(guess the parents better hurry up and pick out a name for me!!!)

2nd Sonogram

Everything is perfect!! Of course, what did you all expect? They did a sonogram to take some photos and measurements of me today, which proved to the doctors I am a healthy growing boy! Here's my junk to prove I'm a boy... And here is my profile. Who do I look like - Mom or Dad?
And here's my foot on the left and my hand on the right. The tech said I am giving a perfect thumbs up (which I was!) but my mom can't see it. Can you?
According to the measurments, I am weighing in about six pounds and five ounces. So in 20 days I should be making my big entrance into this world as scheduled!!!!

3 cm Small

My mother had a doctor's appointment yesterday and I am still measuring 3 cm small. In case someone doesn't know - each doctor visit the doctor measures the length of the pregnant belly. The number of centimeters the belly should measure should equal the number of weeks pregnant. Since I was about 20 weeks along, I have been consistantly measuring 2 to 3 cm smaller than I should. The doctor never was worried about it, but now that we are approaching the scheduled c/s (28 days away!!) the doctor is showing some signs of concern. So next Wednesday they have scheduled a sonogram to look at me. There's nothing to worry about as far as I know, but I'll post an update after we know a little more. Especially if it means the date of my arrival to be changed...