Walmart baby Box

I love getting things and the mail, so I order the #WalmartBabyBox. It was only $5 that seems like a steal. As a lover of samples, I have to say that I was patently underwhelmed. The Box took so long to arrive that I had forgot I even ordered it. Additionally  and likely through no fault of Walmart, the Box look like it had been kicked around the mail room before it was delivered.

Luckily, there was nothing that great inside.

This is a sample box, in the purest sense of the word.   You get a few samples and coupons.  Dassit. Let's go over the contents

 Let's start with the trial size items.

There is a pack of Huggies wipes, which is probably the most useful thing in the entire box. I stashed them in my glove compartment. additionally there's a trial size bottle of baby Dove body wash, an adorable Nuk pacifier, a sample of All Free & Clear (my preferred baby detergent), a 4 pack of Stayfree pads and the single dose of Tum's.

Now the samples:

An Olay cream and a Burts Bees foundation. Or concealer? BB cream, maybe? I legit don't know because it nowhere near matches my skin.

I wish they'd put a coupon for me to go get my own at Walmart.

Finally, the coupons:

The $5 Huggies coupon means I essentially broke even, so that's a plus. I may try the Slow Fe as my iron levels are fairly low.

The final item was a Bio-Oil informational pamphlet.  Not a sample, not a coupon.  A tiny booklet that looked like it came out of the box.  Super disappointing because I really want to try Bio-Oil.

Overall, this box isn't great.  Compared to  other sample boxes, like Target's registry bag or Amazon's Welcome box-both of which contain MUCH better items-it wouldn't matter. But it definitely wasn't worth the $5 and I wouldn't recommend ordering it. Sorry, WallyWorld. This was a miss.
Here's a belly shot to make up for this disappointing sample box!

Poly?

[It's a twofer!  I haven't blogged as much as I meant to due to some tech issues.]

I went to my 32ish week appointment. My funeral measurement (pelvic bone to top of uterus) has been 4 cm/weeks greater than expected so a growth scan was ordered.  Turns out I have a lot of fluid.   (Baby is **estimated** to weigh 4lbs 6oz right now.  It's within a pound of it's papa's birth weight. ) This is called  polyhydramnios.  The main concern is early labor. It makes me wonder if this is why the Mechanic was a touch early.   Anywho, enjoy this sweet baby face and make a guess on what it will be!

It was hard to catch this pic as baby was waving its arms about. It's a busy bee.  On another positive note, the wee one has already wriggled to head position.

Enjoy the moments

So I'm abt 33 weeks now. I'm not a big believer in due dates. The doctors said August 14 based on an early ultrasound. To me, that means August 10-24, based on how I birth. This really is the last baby for me. I'm 36 now.  That's twice as old as I was for my first.  I'm trying to savor every moment.


Last weekend, I did a thing.  I took maternity pics.  When  I was pregnant for the first time,  I don't know if maternity pics even existed. [Was Facebook even a thing? I I didn't have that until 2007.] I have so few pics of that pregnancy.  This one,  there will be lots.  These are a few shots Princess took on her iPhone 8 and my S9.  They look so amazing-I can't wait to see the professional ones!

Little Fish

So we're having a baby.

A real baby.

In about 11-13 weeks (ya'll know I don't believe in due dates), The Mechanic and I are adding a little person to our brood, and I do mean brood.

There are seven children in this picture.  SEVEN!

I know this is a late announcement but it took me some time to reconcile this whole adult child/newborn thing I'm going to be doing.  Yep, the Astronaut is turning 18 in October.    My kiddo will literally be the age I was when I had him. It's wild.

In my coming  posts, I'm going to compare being a pregnant teen to being of "advanced maternal age,"  being a primapara to being a grandmultipara, and raising kids at literally every stage. In the meantime, go head and make a guess of what Baby Fish will be.

Why I love spring break

I love teaching. It's fun and meaningful.  It's also all-consuming and stressful.

I feel like I sacrifice so much time with the crew.  That's why breaks are so important. My squad gets all my time and I get to relax. Today is day 2/5. It's 9:20 am. I'm in bed. It's glorious!

Astronaut and princess left because they are teenagers and have lives.  Just kidding! They are with their grandparents. Nerds.  Yesterday, I had breakfast with mechanic bae & squirrel, took squirrel to 2 doctor appointments, helped the little girls clean their room, helped side salad go through his clothes and weed out the small stuff, had lunch with them at Chickfila, saw a movie ("Coco"), did laundry, and went to bed at a reasonable hour.

It's like my SAHM days, but temporary and  paid.  Today, I'm going to do more laundry-it never ends in a family of 7-and consider taking the kids to the pool. I organized my closet this past weekend.


I loved being able to do things with my crew but I don't think I'd want to be a SAHM now. For one, I have no kids at home. They are all in school now.  It's kind of purposes when they are this age.  Also, I truly LOVE my career, my students, and my school.  The balance part is hard, though. I leave before most of the kids.  There are days when I don't get off until 6:30 or 7. I don't get to chaperone field trips and I miss programs. It's stressful, too.  Extremely stressful . But it adds a different type of value to my life. 

In a perfect world, I would have a job with equal pay but half the hours and twice the flexibility. 

One day...

Roughing It-Post 100!

The kids are getting big.  The Astronaut will be 18 in 6 months-and graduating from high school next year.  Princess is turning 16 at the end of the year. Squirrel will be a teenager in the fall.  Side Salad hit double digits last month.  And Popcorn will be 6 this week.

 So in my quest to create lasting memories as well as do things I want to do, regardless of the opinions of others, we went camping.

It. Was. Awesome.

I had a lot of reservations. What do we need? Where do we go? How do we do it. And I'm not particularly close to anyone that is a camper. I like I know some people But I don't *know* them.

Luckily, the SC State Park system employees a crack team of mind readers and created a program called the Palmetto Campout . Apparently, it's been going on like a whole decade but who knew? [Actually, a friend of mine posted about it on Facebook and I stalked the park people until registration opened.]

So I applied and.....we got accepted! I paid my registration fee ($50) and now we're campers!

We learned so much, how to pitch the tent we got to keep:

The astronaut and the princess did an amazing job building and maintaining the fire. And encouraging the flames with their dance moves.

It was a super cool experience.  We cooked over the fire and on coals, we made campfire cobbler.  We survived a surprise cold snap (overnight low was about 37° and rainy). We weren't eaten by raccoons. We created epic memes.

But mostly, we had fun. We did something new. We learned things. We spent time together. We survived. And we made new memories.  

The lesson? Do that thing you were thinking about.   New experiences are amazing.  What's something  you've always wanted to do?

Goodbye, Nexplanon!

**WARNING: This whole post is going to be TMI but I think it is important to talk about these things**

So today I had my Nexplanon removed.  I ended up going alone since the Mechanic overslept (as well as some other drama).  It was the fastest doctor's appointment I have ever had. Seriously. Like they must have sensed my fear and told the good Doctor see me posthaste.  My appointment was at 9:30 & I was out the more door before 10.

I had it removed for several reasons, the first being that my 3 years were up. That was the least important thing, though.

The main issue I had was heavy and frequent bleeding.  The average blood loss is 30-40 mL.  Heavy is 60-80 mL. Or so says the NHS.  I knew I was heavy but I really had no way to quantify it. So I stuck with it for the full 3 years. Also, I was scared to have it removed. The insertion had already traumatized me.

Then I switched to the Diva Cup.  In 24 hours, I bled about 3 0mL. 

And I go for DAYS. 13-15 each month. probably 6 of those are heavy days.  6 × 30 mL is 180 mL.  Add in the not heavy days and I had to be losing at least 200 mL a month.
Let's do the math:

• Normal=30-40 mL
• Heavy=60-80 mL
• Me=200+ mL

My iron level was a little over 9 in February.

The thing is, I knew it was bad but I couldn't quantify how bad until I had the Diva Cup.

There are other issues, possibly caused by the devil's matchstick.  I lost a LOT of weight.  Double edged sword: I'm definitely toting extra pounds but I'm really getting questionable.  Y'all know how people get when you lose weight.  I developed fibroid tumors. I'm too young for fibroids.   And my uterine tissue is going rogue.  I've developed a condition called adenomyosis.  Basically, my uterine tissue is growing into the walks of my uterus .

It hurts. The cure is a hysterectomy . Mine isn't bad, though, and we're going to see if it progresses after the demon splinter is gone and reassess the situation then.


So my doc and I agreed it had to come out and out it came.

As far as the removal, it was scary because I'm a sissy. I shed a few gangster tears.  The needle hurt, the numbing meds tingled. After that, I could only feel the pressure and pulling.  Mine had moved and was encapsulated in scar tissue.  It literally took like 5 min because my doc went slow.  I couldn't bear to watch and I didn't record, which sucks in hindsight.

Funny, such a small thing but such a big issue.

Have you tried Nexplanon or Diva Cup for that matter?  What were your experiences like?