More Details!

I decided to wait for a while before I wrote in here. Its taking a while to get into the 3 hourly routine of nappy, eating and sleeping.... and that's just me!!!
We can't believe that we have this little person with us. He's so perfect! I can't believe that he's a little bit of me and little bit of J and that together we've created this new life!!!

So you wanted to know what happened!

As you know from my last blog, my mum and sister came out to visit and were due to go home on the 30th May (the day before the due date). We had thought about what we would do if it all happened while they were here, but I never really thought it was possible. I was expecting the birth to be at least a week late. We all decided (after praying about it!) that if my labour started before they got on the train back to the airport, that they would extend their stay here but that if something happened after they got on the train that they would carry on going home. So at 7pm on the 30th we said good bye to mum and Nic at the train station - nothing had happened!!

It's a 10 minute walk back to our house from the station and as soon as J opened the door to our flat my waters broke!!!! Hows that for timing. The midwife came over and said that everything was fine but that because my contractions hadn't started I shouldn't have a shower or bath.. bummer! Apparently only about 10% of labour actually start with the waters breaking...... take no notice of the movies!!! We had called mum and Nic by this time but all decided that it was meant to be and that they should carry on with their journey home.

J and I tried to sleep for a bit. We knew that things would happen soon so had an early night. At about 11.30pm I was woken up with a definite contraction. J timed them and we decided at about 2.30am to call the midwife because my contractions were about 3 - 4 mins apart. The midwife came out and said that I was 2cm dilated - I remembered from one of the courses that we took that if you call out the midwife and she says 'you're 1 or 2 cm dilated', that you should be sad about it because your body has already had to do a lot of work to get to that point; so I wasn't too fazed by it. She said that it was now ok for me to bath and shower and that J should now set up the bath. She also said that she was off duty at 9am that morning and that I would most probably see the next midwife on call.

My contractions got pretty intense at that point. I took a shower and a bath while J set up the pool. For all those people that one day may consider using a birthing pool here is a little advise.... Set it up before hand - even if it's a few weeks before (except for the plastic lining). As my contractions got more intense poor J was running between setting up the pool and me screaming the place down! I was getting contractions in my back and so couldn't find any relieving position at all. At about 4.00am I got into the bath. dangling my arms over the side with J rubbing my back was the best position for me. A little later I started getting the feeling that I needed to push but that was only after about an hour and a half. I didn't believe that that could be a real feeling so I tried to ignore it!! Until a really intense one came and I 'instructed' J to call the midwife. She got to us at about 5.30am and said that believe it or not, if I needed to push then I should. She got me into the right position and after 3 pushes his head was half way out................ ohh that hurt!! 1 more push and his head and all his body flew out!! MY BABY!!!!

I'd spent 9 months pregnant but something in me can't have expected it to actually be a baby in there - when she put him on me all I could say was "it's a baby!". We didn't even think of asking what sex he was!! It was the midwife that reminded us to look!!!

So In all, from the start of my contractions to his birth it was about 6 and a half hours!!!!!!!!! I have nothing to complain about!! 2 stitches & a beautiful baby boy!!! Apparently only about 2% of babies are born on their due date - our boy is special!!

There are more details but I figure not everyone will want to know them...... I'm happy to talk about them though if you really want to know anything else!!!

More soon i hope!! got to bath a baby!!

Exactly on time!!!

Welcome to the world

Josiah Benjamin Dennis Sweeting

Thursday 31st May 2007

at 6.02 am

7lb 1oz (3220g)

50 cm

Born in a birthing pool at home in The Netherlands
Our very own Dutch waterbaby!

3 months

39 weeks

baby Josiah!!!

I will write in more detail soon!! Bit tired right now!

39 weeks!

Mum and Nic are coming tonight so I can't write too much but I just wanted to add the latest bump picture and a photo of the pool. The pool isn't completely set up - as you can see from thte picture it over lapping and not a full circle, but this gives you an idea of what it looks like. It's waiting for the 'right time'!!

38 Weeks!! Nothing yet!!

Well hello again! Not much time left now!! This pic was taken at 37 weeks. I seem always to be a week behind myself!

We've had a pretty good few weeks. There has been a few bank holidays here so J has had some extra days off which has been fab!! His Spring cleaning and preparations haven't stopped. we've now pretty much finished the entire clean of the whole apartment and it's looking loverly!!

At one point this is what the lounge looked like!We had everything from the bedroom in the lounge, so you could hardly see the floor!

On the day that I was 37 weeks (full term) Thursday, all the baby furniture we were waiting for arrived. Then on the Friday the pool arrived (I forgot to take a pic. when we set it up as a practice, maybe later!). It was a little overwhelming for me and I had a bit of a freak out. Suddenly it was real and was happening! I feel very much like the expectation of a new mother is that you should know everything; know what you should need - sizes, amounts etc, be in control and aware of what you want in the labour and after.... basically that you are sposed to be this strong creature that is expected to deal with all these changes. Well I have to say that I haven't felt that at all. I have no idea what I'm doing. Every question that I have about having a baby takes me into about 10 other questions! Even when others tell me that it'll all come naturally when the baby is born, I'm still able to freak out! Don't get me wrong I'm not falling apart and I am truly excited about this whole process, I just don't like the feeling that crying over not knowing what a baby is sposed to wear to bed, shows that I'm weak. Anyway.. for all you soon to be mums that freak out about all this sometimes I say CRY! and cry as much as you need! God will help us through this whole thing but it's not wrong to cry and to feel overwhelmed sometimes!!

Back on the subject again. As I said all the furniture arrived and we spent ages putting it together. So now we've eventually got the nursery end of our bedroom sorted and everything in the drawers so now there's nothing out at all really! Here's a pic of J building and the new 'nursery'! Unfortunately we can't fit in the Moses basket that we borrowed so we've decided to either use the pram or put the baby straight in the cot.

We also went to the 'Thuiszorg' (Home care) shop on the weekend. This is the place you go to borrow things like crutches or anything that you need to be able to function at home when you're ill. In our case we went there to pick up the stilts for the bed. When the 'Kraamzorg' (after care helper) comes after the birth you have to have the bed 70cm or above so that the nurse isn't always stooping over you over the bed. So you have to hire (free) these stilt things to lift the bed higher. It's like sleeping on a throne! Here's a pic:

So there you go. Nothing happening yet.. Pj is still moving nicely and kicking me in the ribs. My b.p. is still low - no change there. I'm having weekly checks now at the midwife so hopefully I'll get to see a few different ladies. There are 5 there in all. One speaks very good English (I'm praying she's on duty on 'the day', 2 speak pretty good English and 2 speak very little or at least don't communicate very much with me. I can't expect people to speak English (I'm in their country after all) but I find some appointments very frustrating as I seem to get only the answers to my questions - no more info. I'm sure it'll all be fine but I can't help pray that I get one of the good English speakers if only for reassurance!

Here is the link again as usual:

http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/38weeks/

See you at 39 weeks!!???

36 weeks!!! Are we ready????

This is the bump at 35 weeks

Hmmmmm well I can safely say that we're kind of ready but not really! Can you ever be ready! We feel like we're in the midst of the calm before the storm! We now just want to get on with this and learn how to be parents. It feel like we've been waiting for ever.

Here is a pic of the baby's nursery!

As you can see it's not in the least ready! We borrowed a moses basket from a friend just in case pj comes early, so that it actually has somewhere to sleep! Hopefully the furniture should arrive this week. I'll have another picture when that's all finished!

We said before how we were having some issues trying to find a pushchair that we remotely liked here. Well below is a pic of the one that we finally chose.

When the baby finishes with the bed part of the pram we won't need to store a huge great bed thing somewhere which is something I really didn't want. Instead on this one you take the material off the frame and use the same frame for the seat part. All we need to store is the material which takes up soooo much less space. It's good too because the car seat attaches to the main structure of the pram................. very exciting hey! I'm sure you wanted to know all about all that!!!

Here's a pic of J modeling it very nicely! He's also modelling the baby carrier that his Sis (Christianne) gave us. Very fetching don't you think!

Last week we had a really nice visit from J's mum and sis for the day! Yes the day! That's the benefit of living so close to the airport! It was really really nice to see them and to share the experience with them. The down side of being abroad through the pregnancy is that our parents haven't been able to enjoy the feeling of feeling their grandchild moving around and kicking like the karate kid! It makes me sad that they haven't been able to go through this pregnancy with us. But at the same time we have flights booked for after the birth so they'll have an intense baby time then!

Everything is still going well with pj. We seem to have had a pretty good pregnancy - I know though that that isn't an indication that the birth will be too! Thank you to those people that have emailed me with encouraging messages. You hear so much information about the things that can go wrong and, as important as it is to be prepared for any eventuality, it's good to also know that sometimes things don't go wrong. I'm feeling more excited about the birth than I had ever imagined I could be (I could never understand these women that said they were excited when they went into labour). I don't look forward to the pain thing but I know it's for a reason I'm hoping that that will help me get through. J has been awesome and helped me out sooooo much around the house. I think he's the one nesting now! We've been 'spring cleaning' and had half the flat out on the balcony to clean properly. We have just a little more to go but now we feel like we're living in cleanliness again!

My blood pressure remains low which has brought some comical times... the other day at 2 am I woke up really dizzy, so while j made me some food I lay with my feet up again the wall trying to get more blood circulating! I wish I had a camera on me!!! At today's midwife appointment it was 80 / 45! but the baby's loving it so I shouldn't complain. I've been amazed that all that happens at my appointments is that I have my blood pressure taken and they feel the bump. I had blood taken at the very beginning and not since and I've had my iron level taken once or twice but other than that, nothing!

Anyway this has become long again! Here's this weeks link: Enjoy and maybe read the stuff about water birth if your not sure what I'm getting myself into!!

http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/36weeks/

http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/labourandbirth/waterbirth/howtousebirthingpool/

Koningendag - April 30th

Happy Koningendag!

This day is a national holiday here...... more important than Christmas to alot of people! It's basically one big national party and one huge great car boot sale!

It actually celebrates the old Queens birthday but the current Queens birthday is in January so it's too cold to do much (I should know!). So she decided to keep it on the traditional day at the end of April. All the shops are closed and from early in the morning people take their spots on the pavement along high streets to sell the 'stuff' they've been collecting all year! I have never seen anything like it! So many stalls and SO many people.

Here are some pics of Amersfoort. Quite a small scale thing compared to Amsterdam and The Hague. There were bands playing in town the night before that went on till the early hours. Then like I said all day Monday were the stands and more bands playing through the town. This would be the same throughout Holland.

33 weeks and a message from Kimberley

hoi allemaal weer een hele mooie foto van Sam. ze ziet er weer stralend uit zoals altijd maar ja je kan ook niet alles hebben he :p.

33 weeks!

This pic was actually taken at 31 weeks. So I'm a little bigger now - as the kids at school like to remind me!! I'll post a new picture very soon. Just decided that I hadn't written in so long that I needed to now. We've had a busy few weeks. Everything is still going well and pj is growing steadily. 'He' (?) has chosen his position and seems to stretch out very often, booting me in the process. I feel a bum pushing out to the left of my belly button and then a foot kicking out on my far right side!! Sometimes it hurts too! It's head is down which always a good thing. It's been there for a few weeks now ( I can't imagine sitting upside down in a confined space for that long.... but it's still got 6 weeks to go!!!)

I've decided to try a home birth for as long as possible. I have ordered a birthing pool as I've read loads of positive things about the effect the water can have on you during labour. I'm also aware that anything can happen as well and strangely for me I seem to have no expectation except that the baby has to come out somehow!! Who knows what it'll be like. The closer it comes the more apprehensive I'm feeling about the pain bit but the more excited I am to meet this little person!

A few weeks ago my friends gave me a surprise baby shower. It was a big surprise and really really appreciated by me. Here are some pics. We tasted baby food and had to guess the flavour....er yuck, and I had some fantastic presents. Thank you ladies!

Time is really going fast now. I finish work next Thursday which is freaky in itself. Plus tonight is my last anti natal class. I'm really glad that I've been to these classes but it's been a struggle for me. As I said before it's all in Dutch and I feel silly asking questions that I know the teacher has just explained to the rest of the group. I'm glad too that J and I have done another course where the teacher came to our home and gave us 2 sessions in English. So I'm able to relate whats said on the Wednesdays to what was said in our other class. Here are some pics of my anti natal group. I have the last due date (31st May) and I thought that my bump was pretty small but seeing these pics suddenly made me realise that it's actually pretty big.

We're standing in order of due date, so I'm at the end. The lady standing in front of me was due on the 28th May and she has already had her baby at 31 weeks! (kind of freaked me out a bit - I suddenly realised that I could have pj any minute!) - The baby is in Hospital still but doing really well. Also the lady with the red band around her bump has also had her baby!! Freaky!!

J and I have also been away for a weekend together - maybe our last for a while! We arranged it ages ago and suddenly it was here! We went down to Limburg (South Holland) for a long weekend over Easter. We stayed right on the Belgium border and in fact on Easter Sunday spent the day at a place called 'Drielandenpunt' (3 country point). We had breakfast in Holland, went for a walk in Germany and had dinner in Belgium!

It was a really good time to talk and catch up after a manic few months. Limburg is Holland most hilly province. Ok so it's not hills to English standards but against the rest of Holland it's really beautiful and felt a little like home.

J and I have decided to hold off on the buying a house thing right now. It was becoming way too stressful especially with J's work being busy, with the baby coming and with the housing market the nightmare that it is. We know that we don't want to be here in the flat for too long either so we haven't closed it off completely, just put it on hold. We're also more open to the possibility of finding a different rental house to live in. We'll see what happens. We both feel really good about this decision, it gives us more time to focus on the coming baby instead of worrying about moving house! We had found somewhere we liked but it needed a HUGE amount of work. It would have been a fab investment..... but now isn't a good time to engage in that.

J has just come home from a really good weekend back in England with his family. His Nana is not so well and he really wanted to go and see her. It was fab for him to be able to catch up with his cousin and her 7 children, that he hasn't seen for years. I decided that flying wasn't something I was comfortable with at this point so I stayed home.

So there you go, a busy few weeks and a very busy few weeks coming! Below is the link for baby's development at 33 weeks.

http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/33weeks/

30 weeks today.... oh boy!

Again... not such a great picture of me but I guess it's the bump that's the focus not me!
So I'm 30 weeks!!!! I'm even growing out of my maternity clothes that I bought!!! Things are still going well. We went for our next Midwife appointment on Monday and found that my iron is low (66 - they start prescribing iron tablets when it gets to 63) and my blood pressure is still low (90/55) but there is nothing to worry about. I really love hearing the babies heart beat. I find it all so amazing! He / she kicks like mad and has made J jump a few times when he's been waiting for it to kick and it does a huge karate chop!
We are still looking at houses. We had a completely flat week with absolutely no houses coming through. We are hoping to see one house but I'm not holding my breath.... I don't feel as desperate as I did before, but all we can do is keep looking. baby stuff is also slow. I went shopping again the other day to get sheets etc but there are bags of things and I have no idea what anything is! A good friend has said we can go shopping together soon so she'll explain a lot to me then!!

It's funny I had tonnes to say last time but this time I think it'll be short. You had a lot of reading to do last time!
So here is the 30 week link:
http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/30weeks/
Pj is definitely getting big!!!

28 Weeks!

Hello again! I seem to have got out of the habit of writing every week which is a shame so I'll try better from now on.
We have had a lot on these past few weeks (as usual!). The last time that I wrote I talked about how my dad, sister and her children came over for a week. Well they left and a few days later Cathy Fooks came to visit (for all you that were at our wedding Cathy was one of my fab bridesmaids - but she's now 18!!!!!!!!!) We had a really nice week together although having another chocoholic in the house is fatal!! I was ill for a few days of her visit but she was very patient with me and we relaxed a lot - cinema a few times & umpteen films!! Yay that was nice!
As I dropped off Cathy at Schiphol I hung round for a while and then collected my mum. J went away for a week snowboarding with Church to Switzerland. We haven't had a chance to download his photos yet so I'll put them on here in a few days time. I was a really fab time away for him, bonding with some good friends & getting to know more people from Crossroads (our church) He says that by the end of the week he was getting pretty good so now he needs to go back and make the most of it.... any excuse. While he was away I really didn't want to be here alone, so it was great having mum here. Nothing like being pampered hey!! I have a midwife appointment that week so mum was able to come with me and hear the baby's heart beat.

On to baby stuff. Everything is going well. I've had no complications and the baby is growing well. I have been having quite a bit of back ache recently and it's sometimes making it hard to sleep but I'm back at the gym now (after a few weeks break) so hopefully I can exercise the right areas to help. It's great going there and the staff are really helpful & kind to me. I will hopefully be able to go to the 'Zwanger & fit' (Pregnant and fit) class now with other mums to be so I'll let you know how that goes!
I have also started my 'Fit en gezond zwanger" (fit & healthy pregnancy) course. I decided to do it mainly to meet other mums to be but I knew that it would be a huge challenge for me. And it is! The teacher speaks good English so if I don't understand something I'm supposed to ask her. But there are 9 other mums in the room all Dutch. The entire evening is in Dutch including all the chit chat, questions etc. I understand very little other than the words I recognise and can pick out. You might say why go then but I feel that I should go. It'll give me confidence & hopefully I will build up some kind of relationship with the ladies over 8 or so weeks! J and I are also doing a "Samen Bevallen" (together birth) course. (Courses coming out our ears but in another country I decided that it's best to get as much info as possible.) This is usually a group thing over 6 weeks but the lady doing it said that having a non Dutch speaker on the course made it hard for me and everyone else. So instead she's coming here twice for 2 hours to go through everything we need to know.... ha.. including my "puffin"!! She's really nice & gives me a lot of peace. I even got the giggles whilst practicing the puffing which in this circumstance and considering I want to cry at the other course, is quite a feat! It was really good to be doing it together. The other course is only me, J comes to one session in April. So all in all it's been a manic few weeks!
We've started to look into buying stuff for the baby. Sat. we bought the bedroom set (even though it's going into our bedroom for as long as we're in the flat - we will move into the lounge if we decide that having the baby in the same room for too long isn't so good.) We are looking frantically for a pushchair thing... something basic and something we like. However I stood in the shop crying at one point! Bit of culture shock. All the 'buggy's' you can buy over here are very fancy - huge wheels, flashy frames, big pram parts that clip in and out and all other gadgety stuff. I want simple (one like the UK) but can we get it here????.... NO!!! I'm still not sure how we're going to fix the prob but I feel I can't justify buying stuff that I'll use fora very short time (maybe) the store in an Attic for a few years or more! You also have to order stuff here and pushchairs can take up to 15 weeks to arrive.. Get this... we're even thinking about coming over to Harwich to get one from there (maybe order one and get it delivered to J's Auntie & Uncle that live there! Mad or what!!!! Anyway I'm sure it'll work out!

But it's not just baby stuff going on too. We are still looking for a house to live in. I have resigned myself to the fact that we will be here when the baby arrives and probably for a few months afterward too. While J was skiing mum & I looked at a great house. We prayed a lot about it and I chatted to J about it too on the phone & decided to make an offer. Our prayer was that if it wasn't right and God didn't want us to have it then we wouldn't get it. Well I'm guessing that he didn't want us to have it as they didn't accept our offer. The estate agent said they were asking WAY too much for it but in the market at the mo I wouldn't be surprised if they got what they are asking for..... houses are selling with a day or 2 of going on the market!!! So we keep looking!!!

So this blogs been pretty long! Sorry bout that! I'll try and write less more regularly if I can. As I write this pj is bouncing around all over the place - so I think it's saying hi!!!!
Here's the link to the website as usual: http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/28weeks/

Til next time, maybe we'll have some new pics to post!

25 weeks... sorry for the delay!!!

Ok not the most attractive photograph of me but the point to the pic is the size of pj!!! It's looking like a mound there hey!!!
I haven't written recently for 2 reasons, one there hasn't really been anything new to report and two we have had lot of fab visitors and I wanted to focus on them for a bit.
After J's mum came out to see us J spent a weekend back in the Radstock area where we used to live. It was great for him to catch up with friends that we saw so often when we lived there. I unfortunately decided a while ago that I wouldn't go with him but it's a decision that I wish I could change. It would have been awesome to meet up with everyone again. Oh well, maybe another time!
When he came back my dad (Alan), sister (Nic) and her children came out for a week. It was a tiring but Fab week. J hadn't seen the children for almost a year so it was really nice for him to see them again and play with them again. They always love Uncle J's time. Unfortunately it rained a lot when they were here but we managed to see somethings and C. was amazed by the amount of bikes and double decker trains he saw and both of them loved the windmills and cloggs.
We also went to Den Haag for the afternoon and visited the palace and the Escher Museum (the artist that painted impossible paintings... )

It was really sad to say goodbye. Lots of tears, but I know that they had a great time here and we loved having them here, so I'm sure that they'll come back!

Onto baby things. I have taken a 2 session breastfeeding course over the past few weeks. I decided that I should glean as much information as I possibly can. I realise that I'll probably learn it most from doing it but I figure that it's good to know as much as possible before. The baby is moving very very much now and enjoying church, music and J's voice. I love feeling it moving. As the months pass I have to say that I'm getting more and more nervous about the birth. I'm not a mess or anything but I have to say that suddenly it's all becoming more and more real. Silly really to say when I have a huge great lump on the front of me! Next week my Anti-natal course starts which is even more freaky. Not only has it crept up fast but it's a Dutch course where the teacher has agreed to have me as an English speaker there. I know it'll be fine when I get there, but the reason that I'm doing this is to meet more mothers to be and so I'm hoping that the language difference won't be a problem. I know that the majority of people speak English but there will be a lot of discussion time and chatting afterward and that's the time that I'm afraid I'll miss out. So there is one prayer point for all you prayers!
We are also having issues with our house hunting (another prayer point). The houses are being sold within a week of coming on the market so we have had bearly enough time to get to see them before they have been sold. We are trusting that God has the right place for us so we aren't panicking but I have resigned my self now to the fact that we will be here in the flat for the birth and probably a few months afterward. It's definitely not ideal but at least I know this place and we don't' have to stress so much about getting out in 2 months!!!

So finally here is the link to the baby centre page as usual:
http://www.babycentre.co.uk/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment/25weeks/
Mum is coming out next week but hopefully I'll make time again to write a new update.

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!