22 Weeks!

Hello there again. This is week 22! (nearly 23 as I should have written this before now!)
We've had a great week with J's mum Meryl who came over to visit for a week (or just less because of dear British Airways and the non-existent strike!) It was a really relaxing time for us all and fab to see her again.
As you can see from the pics, the bump is taking good shape and looking more everyday like a huge growth growing in front of me! I'm finding it ever harder to bend over and even cycling on my bike has become quite comical - unless I ride in a certain way I bump my bump with my knees!
The baby is moving around amazingly! It definitely likes Church and the music there, it likes curry's and food in general and seems to be moving more when J talks directly into the bump.
I had my next midwife appointment on Monday, J unfortunately couldn't make it but it was a real pleasure to have Meryl (J's mum) there with me instead. It was fab hearing the strong heartbeat again and fab too for her to hear it as well. I have been very tired over the past few weeks so the midwife checked my iron levels (which are fine) just to make sure. We concluded that I really have to make sure that I eat properly and enough throughout the day and that I rest more. I'm getting at least 8 hours sleep each night but my energy levels have been scarily low. I get horribly emotional, miserable and grouchy. Even going to bed in the afternoon wasn't helping because then I wouldn't sleep that night and the cycle would get worse. I have been trying really hard to make sure that I eat more smaller more regular meals each day and drink enough too.... I have everyone nagging me now so hopefully it should improve (J, the midwife, the people at the gym, friends, family.......)

It's a short one this week. Here is the link to the Baby centre website again. I'll try and write earlier in the week next time!
http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/22weeks/

Happy 29th to Sam & 21st week to pj!

On a blustery ... no windy..... no stormy day in January I celebrated my 29th Birthday. It had a great start by school being closed because of the storm! Yay no lessons! J decided to finish work early so we could spend the afternoon together only to get stuck in the train mania! He managed to get the very last train that was running that day but it took him 4 hours to get home from The Hague! (it usually takes about an hour and a half). We had a really fab evening as J had planned a surprise meal out with some friends at a Chinese restaurant near by. Somehow he managed to keep it a surprise without me guessing! It's a challenge!

We are still trying to figure out all the housing stuff. We have heard from one bank that has said that they will agree to give us a mortgage (a huge answer to prayer). We just now need to find a house then they will finally agree to it. It could all still not happen but we're praying that the doors will open or close firmly.

The baby is fine. Moving around tonnes! J can feel it moving now which is fab and apparently it can hear our conversation now. Here's the new baby centre page: http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/21weeks/

Oh and finally here's a picture I found on the BBC website on the stormy day on Thurs. I thought it was sooooo cute the poor little thing!

20 week scan!

AND ALL IS WELL!!!

Here are the pics (they may be in a slightly different order to what you see)...... we think that the first one (the baby's face) is a little creepy but also amazing at the same time. The pics don't show the skin on the baby only the skeleton so that's why it looks kind of funny. We were watching it drinking in the amniotic fluid - it was amazing! The 3 bright dots in front of it's face are the ends of the fingers (according to the midwife) and the 3 lines just above the chest is the umbilical cord!!
The second picture shows the baby's foot - it's the grayish shape in the middle of the pic with the toes pointing to the right.
The third picture is of the head and the spine! It showed up to clearly it was amazing!
The midwife said that it was very active inside so it was hard to get a fix on it sometimes. It really does seem to be having so much fun in there!.
Everything looks like it is where it should be, the heart is good and there is no evidence of Spina Bifida, clef palette or any other things that they can tell from this scan usually.
Apparently the head is at the top of my bump and the legs (obviously) at the bottom. The placenta is against my back which means that the baby is against the bump; which means that that is why I can feel it moving so much. It's kicking around tonnes; so much so that the other day I was beginning to feel a tad queasy from it! This morning J actually felt a kick which was awesome (although he wasn't quite awake at the time!).
The midwife took loads of measurements of the baby and when everything was tallied up at the end it was the job of the computer to figure out a new due date according to all the measurements. Unbelievably the due date we have (May 31st) was exact! So roll on May 31st! ........because of course it will be born on that specific day!!!????!!!
We found it sooooo amazing to see the baby inside of me. J was a tad spooked by the whole thing but in awe at the same time while I was laying there with tears trickling down my cheeks! ahhhhhhh! It was amazing to see how much the midwife knows. She was pointing things out to up on the pictures that we really couldn't make out. How can she tell that that's the baby's lips?? But the times we could make out the shapes was amazing (or have I used that word way too many times!!)

Here is the 20 week link to babycentre:
http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/20weeks/

19 weeks & it's Wigglin!!!

Hello!
I decided that I'd written o much about Christmas and New Year that I wouldn't put you through any more and write about PJ. But now seems like a good time.
These 2 pics are from last week (18 weeks). Over Christmas I seemed to explode! I went with all my normal clothes and within 2 days was feeling very uncomfortable and had to borrow some gym trousers from Christianne. We decided to go maternity clothes shopping in Croydon on the Thurs after Christmas but it wasn't particularly successful! But I've now got some clothes so I feel a little less restricted and a little more fat!
I have now started to feel PJ moving!!! It's such an awesome feeling. He(?) really moves around a lot now that I recognise the feeling. So much so that I've felt a little queasy from the feeling at times! I can't explain the feeling in a good enough way as to make someone say 'ahh I understand' so far all my analogies have brought funny looks from people...... it's a bubbly feeling, it feels like the bubblyness before diarea (if you know what I mean), it's the same feeling as if someone was tapping you with their finger - but from the inside!. Not explanation seems to be good enough. I'm sure every mum says the same thing. I can't wait til J can feel it too.
J has decided that the fathers do have an advantage over the mothers. PJ's hearing is improving and J is able to put his face right up to the bump and talk to it in a way that I can't! his low frequencies are easily heard by the baby apparently!!!
We had another midwife appointment on Monday and my blood pressure is still low (which is good). She did have a little trouble finding the heartbeat which made J and I hold our breath for a bit! But it was there and strong as ever! We are having our 20 week scan on Thursday afternoon which I'm so excited about. I really want to see how it's grown.
We are still trying to figure out about the mortgage thing. One bank has asked us for more information on J's previous employment. So we're still no closer to knowing whether we can buy or if we'll have to carry on renting. It's a scary time really, J's contract will officially end at the end of February but he's convinced that there is a lot of work to do still after that point. It's all a leap of faith really. If God wants us here he will sort it out and we'll be in the right place in the right time! It is getting close to try and buy but it's still possible. Please pray that we get answers soon and can start planning.
So here is the next development picture. I missed out the 18th week but you can get to it from this link too.
http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/19weeks/
Til next week!!

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

Helloey! It feels like ages ago that I wrote on here. We've left 2006 & breezed into 2007! Can you believe it!
I thought I'd tell you about our fab Christmas before I tell you all about the growing bump so here goes:

We didn't have too much trouble flying into Gatwick on the 23rd Dec. after the huge palava at Heathrow on the Thurs and Fri before. We were only 2 hours delayed which is fine & I'd prefer a safe flight rather than fighting fog!
We had a really really restful Christmas with J's family. It was fab to be able to get to Oakhall on Christmas Eve and see so many friends there (there were others we missed but it's that time of year I spose). We then went to Meryls church on the Christmas day morning and over to Chris and Marks (J's sis and Bro-in-law) for a very yummy lunch (best sprouts ever!). THEN Father Christmas arrived (he's eaten his mince pie and milk the night before!).... it was so exciting and Josh and Amy were in awe! We were blessed with fab prezzies, lots of laughing and playing games and generally a good time! We had great time playing with Josh's Lego, J's Lego (yes you read that right!) & a mini remote control helicopter Mark had.
Boxing Day was more mellow but still lots of fun. We relaxed so much and ate way too much!
By Wednesday I was beginning to flake - especially after a very unproductive maternity shopping trip to Croydon (don't shop for maternity clothes in January sales!) I was a zombie for the rest of that day and then unfortunately spent the entire day on Thursday throwing up and zoned out! Either something I ate, eating too much or something, but everyone else had a fun afternoon at a kids park near by. On Friday Tim & Beth (J's bro and sis-in-law) came over and we had more relaxing and then a great family meal out in the evening. I was better by then but still tired (as usual!!)

Saturday was packing and going home day. It was really sad to say goodbye again I felt pretty emotional about it all.
Our flight home was the most......interesting.....no..... adventurous... no......frightening experience ever. The weather was awful and wind really strong. At landing time it kept dipping all over the place and the pilot even had to go up again just as we were about to land. Lots of worried faces and gasps as the wind caught the plane again but we prayed and believe the angels protected us and brought us in safely eventually.... to big cheers from everyone. Unfortunately pj didn't like it much and i was really sick again that night!

So that was our Christmas week off... hope it wasn't too boring for you to read!

We wanted to be back to experience New Year with friends. So we went over to Leon and Maryka's for a wine and cheese evening (don't worry I didn't have any!) There were lots of people we knew there too and it was great fun (even though I still wasn't all that well) Maryka had told me about New Year in Amersfoort and how amazing it was to watch the fire works from her roof. I was expecting a spectacle but when 12 o'clock arrived it was like standing in a war zone!!! I have never seen so many fireworks in every direction!! I didn't know which direction to look in AND it went on for about 2 hours!!!!!!!!! Constantly! In Holland you can set off fireworks anywhere you want - in the street, your garden, your roof etc..... crackers going off everywhere. I've never seen anything like it! People seal up their letter boxes, postboxes are sealed - people go mad with fireworks! Amazingly enough though not that many people get hurt! Apparently Amsterdam is even more mad with fireworks but there is so many people there it can get quite dangerous! I can't find any photographs of it yet but if I do I'll post them on here as soon as I can.

Well enough from me on this blog.... I have tonnes more to tell you about our growing pj, but I reckon your eyes will have gone funny by now so I'll leave it to another day.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!

17 weeks!

Ok, so after thinking to myself ....'I look hardly different at all' J took this picture last night and I nearly had a fit!!! In 2 weeks I've got a belly!!! Ok it's not huge but I thought that you really couldn't tell but you can! Yesterday at school I was getting some very inquisitive looks from some of the girls in one class. They didn't say anything but I'm sure they were guessing. I'm sure after Christmas they'll have no doubt! I haven't kept it a secret at school but I'm also not shouting it from the rooftops!!

Before I go into any other baby details, I thought that you might like to know that J and I have just taken our level 3 Dutch test! We both felt we did very badly and I especially thought that I'd failed but J got 92%!!!! and I just passed with 72%!! I think I nearly collapsed with shock! I have decided that although Dutch is important to learn, I won't be carrying on with the next level of the course. I found out I was pregnant the first lesson of level 3 and have struggled with tiredness and concentration all the way though. I decided that I want to focus on learning things around the pregnancy and have my mind consumed by that for a while. J will still be studying so I can learn from him. Having the baby here on one hand will be a great experience but on the other hand I'm finding pretty overwhelming too. I have to constantly remind myself (and have others remind me - thanks Wendy!) that God is completely in control. We are convinced that this is His timing so I have to trust that He will organise things around it being the right timing. I panic and fear so quickly but I have to remember to give it to God and trust that the best will happen whatever that might be! The Dutch are very assertive and us English not so. I get easily discouraged and forget my needs are as important as the next persons. Wendy gave me this passage from 2 Timothy 1v7: "For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love and self-discipline". It's something that I'll be reminding myself of a lot over the next few months, I'm sure.

So here's this weeks link, there doesn't seem to be a huge amount of info on it this week but you can at least see a picture!

http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/17weeks/

J & I want to wish you a very Merry Christmas and a healthy and special New Year. May 2007 bring you blessings beyond your wildest dreams and may you have a deep sense of how much you are loved by us but mainly by our Lord God.................. He came as a child for YOU you know! He died on the cross for YOU you know and even now he is rooting for you, loving you and forgiving you daily!

16 weeks!

Just in case you didn't know what it looks like, I thought that I'd put a picture of Amersfoort on here today.

Happy Birthday PJ!!!
It's PJ's 16th week birthday today! http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/16weeks/

15 weeks!

To begin with I should say Happy Sinterklaas to you! On the 5th December it was 'Sinterklaas'. A prezzy day for all the children where they put their shoes next to the chimney or door and Sinterklaas and his helper 'Schwarz Piet' (Black Pete) come and fill them with gifts and sweets it they are good & coal or twiggs if they have been bad! This is their main day here and although Christmas is getting more popular they exchange gifts on the 5th. As soon as Sinterklaas is finished out come all the Christmas decorations! We actually have some this year so we're feeling festive which is fab!

Next I'm going to put the 15 week link up. I always seem to leave this to the end and then forget to put it on until later!http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/15weeks/

We had our next midwife appointment on Monday afternoon. A 10 minute appointment that we made last 30! I have so many questions there's no way that I can fit it in in 10 mins!! (sorry to all the patient families waiting outside when we left!) It was awesome, we got to hear the babies heartbeat! I tried to put all the horse running analogies to one side and think of something else the sound reminded me of. So here goes......... you know when you watch a film and some one throws a Frisbee and they show it in slow motion then put a whooshing sound effect over it, well I think it sounded like that.... whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!!! You with me? If you have no idea what I'm talking about then stick the horse running sound! J and I found it so awesome to think that the little heartbeat was doubly as fast but in perfect time with my heartbeat! Wow I have not only a baby in there but a live one!!!! God is soooo awesome (be nice to invent pregnancy without the morning sickness but we can't have everything!). The midwife also took my blood pressure which is ok but on the low side. So why did that all take half an hour.....because I had to ask about the birth over here. It's more than normal to have the baby at home with no medication! Pray for me, this is a big decision for me where and with what! The midwives are very experienced and trained and thy keep a very close watch, if there is any chance of a complication at all then they will send you to the hospital which is never further than 10 mins away. She reassured me that they will never deny you meds. if you really need them but you can't have them at home. They want to you to do it naturally as long as you can and then they will intervene. I am thinking a lot about this whole area at the mo (maybe a little too much) but all the meds. have side effects that sound horrible. Everyone i have spoken to here says that it's actually amazing how much strength you have without realising it. We have a good friend here that was due yesterday so I'm waiting to hear all her gorey details (of course keeping in mind that every one's different!)
I'm beginning to get bigger. I'm still in my own clothes but I can definitely tell the difference in myself. I can't suck in the bulge there any more! Nauseousness is hanging around - it seems to still come in waves.

Happy 14th week!Birthday PJ!!

I've been asked a few times now if you can see a bump yet! Hmmmmm well, as the pic shows..... no you can't yet. I've been assured a few times that I'll 'pop out' soon! Morning sickness went away for a few days but is still now hanging around. It's definitely not as bad as some people get it but it still pretty much sucks!!!

I have my next Midwife appointment on Monday so I'll probably have more to write about next week. This week just seems to be a week of tonne of information coming through the post from all the places I've registered with. Great, but it's all in Dutch! I've had to book my anti-natal classes already and the 'Kraamzorg'. This is the person that comes to your house for about a week afterward to take care of mother and baby. She's there to help with everything from bathing the baby to breastfeeding, from cooking to cleaning! It's one part of the 'Dutch way' that I'm looking forward to. There's still a lot of things that I think I'm supposed to have arranged by now but haven't. I'll find out on Monday I think.

Here is what the baby looks like now at 14 weeks http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/14weeks/

PJ is 13 weeks old!!

So, another week has passed. I'm not really sure what to write in this one...... my size hasn't changed, my morning sickness although less is still there and I'm still tired a lot of the time. But I guess the biggest thing is that it's not a secret any more! I have even told the head teacher at school, so we're free to talk about it everywhere now...... although that too feels a tad weird, like I'm betraying someone!

We have been overwhelmed by all the messages we've had from people with Congratulations! The email is definitely a wonderful invention. Thanks for all your support and prayers.

I am continuing to go to the gym which we have been going to for the last year. They have been great there and have given me a lot of advice. Today there seemed to be a conspiracy ..... all the employees, at different times said that they were going to speak to me in Dutch from now on! Something tells me they know how hard I find it and have decided it would really help me..... I think it will!
J has also told his work now and had really positive comments back. We praise God that he's put us here amongst such great people. It would be tough with out a support network around us. Our home group from Church has been especially fab! We have some friends that are having a baby sometime in the next few weeks and they have been great with telling us what we need to do and when.

We are still trying to figure out what would be the best plan for living arrangements and are having a chat with someone about mortgages on Monday!

Oh yeah, here is the link from Babycentre.co.uk about the status of little pj...... http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/13weeks/

Week 12!

Well, we've reached week 12! I thought that I'd put a link in here with a picture of what the baby looks like now! http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/12weeks/ I hope it works!
By the way we are calling the baby PJ for now. 'P' has been the name J's called me since we've been married and 'J' is.... well, J! PJ's collection of teddies is slowly growing to a nice size.. Welcome to the family: Fudge, Davey D Duck and Micheal Angelo (ask J!!)
I'm still getting 'morning' sickness and I'm very tired but I'm very much hoping that it'll start subsiding soon - I nearly fell asleep at the dinner table the other day and that's totally not like me! I don't know if anyone else has experienced this but my eyesight is getting worse. It was actually the first thing that I noticed before I knew I was pregnant but I didn't realise that it could be effected. I'm still not showing, but I can safely say that I notice a difference in myself.
There still seems to be a few people that we have to tell too.... we were so excited to do it all at once that I spent too long on the computer and got a migraine - silly me!!
This is such an exciting time and fab to be able to watch and feel the changes little by little. :-)

Echo.....

It's a brand new season in the Sweeting family life!
We are going to be parents!!! I am 11 weeks pregnant so on the 31t May (approx) next year we'll have a new addition to our family!
We're both very excited although a little apprehensive. God is giving us a huge blessing and responsibility and we want to make him proud!
We went for our first 'echo' yesterday (see the picture) and saw the little jelly bean jumping around.... it seems very active! It's only 4.2cm long (an inch and a half!)!Seeing it there was awesome and has reasured both of us that everything is ok and that this is actually happening! I have to say I half expected the midwife to tell me that I'd just had a sickness bug and I wasn't pregnant at all! Silly I know, but I'm not showing at all so I needed the reasurance... as if throwing up isn't enough. As I'm coming to the end of the 3 months I'm very much hoping that the 'allday' sickness is subsiding... not the most glamorous part of being pregnant but at least theres a good reason for spending so much time peering over the toilet and walking around like a zombee!
With having a new baby comes the new questions of where to live and what to do. We're living in Holland right now and we'd really like to be able to stay here for longer. We really enjoy being here and have made some fab friends. Amersfoort is a beatiful town and our Dutch is coming on (slowly but surely!) We can't stay in our current flat unless the baby wants to share a room with the washing machine, have no window and have an access door to the outside corridor! So now comes the decision of whether to rent somewhere else or jump in and invest in a new house. We like the idea of the latter but thats up to God. We will take the steps and he can open or close the doors!
So there is it! A new website and a big bit of news! Hopefully (if I'm as organised as I hope I'll be) I'll keep you posted on all the developments on here so keep checking the site!

Our first blog!

We're the Sweetings!!!!
We're here and we're blogging...... but not tonight