not bad for feeling like a beached whale

just 1 day shy of 34 weeks!

the "nesting" instinct has really, i mean REALLY kicked in. unfortunately i'm an uncoordinated ungraceful, clumsy pregnant lady! (i've slipped/fell twice, once this last saturday at sam's club, and another time at 26 weeks, both required a nice long afternoon/evening being monitored at the hospital... fun stuff!) i'm usually most productive in the mornings, and the peeter out by 11... maybe i get another boost of energy for the afternoon, but not likely...and even if i do, my back most times freezes. oh it's lots of fun! :) anywho,

so far i've

• ordered, washed/prepped and readied all baby jk's diapers!
• washed and organized all his clothes newborn and 0-3 months
• reorganized sb's room and closet to fit baby jk in there too
• figured out how to have the baby in our room for the first few weeks with some of his things needed for those night-time feedings/changes too :)
• started compiling a "friends" list of people to be "on call" for when THE time happens :) my mom will be here the 13-22... the 13 is my actual due date, but we'll see how all goes :)
• the crib is up and in place
• the bedding is washed and on
• the swing is here... not put together, but here!
• we have the carseat! (which is good, bcs they won't let us leave the hospital unless we have one!)
• nursing pads and boppy pillow.... check!

i'm sure i've done more, and forgotten just as much...

oh, and just to keep all updated on our next phase, brad will most likely be graduating in december (fingers crossed) His advisor still has the other chapters, and he's done all the corrections for the 2 he's gotten back, so, now we're just waiting... and waiting... and, well, yes, so anyways... and the job hunt? still prowling.  even trying out the community college here that does not as of yet even offer french.  I know something will work out, just not sure how, but it always does :)

The Back Up Plan

Everyone has a back up plan... right? well what happens when your backup plan doesn't work as you though it would?

I'm sure (maybe) that some of you may have been wondering how things have been going with our adventure of the end of brad's school career, no?

Well in short (maybe longer, cause i'm NO good at reader's digest version, but here goes...)

Brad DID finish his dissertation if you'll remember the post What's in the Box? And he has since received 2 chapters back to correct, which he has.  So to move forward on the dissertation, well, he just has to wait to wait until his advisor (who is on sabbatical) is able to get back to him on the rest... he has applied to almost 50 schools and had 4 interviews.   If he didn't get a job this go around, we were ok with that... really. we WERE OK!  we figured brad would just stay on another semester maybe 2 (like his advisor suggested/encouraged) and try again next time.  

HOWEVER, last week another one of his committee members told him that he won't be able receive his assistantship, but they still could give him a french business course to teach.  unfortunately that won't work financially for us. so brad will graduate this summer. but now we have NO idea what comes next.  We have spent a lot, i mean a LOT of time fasting a praying over this, individually, as a couple and as a family.  And there are a few ideas in the works, and some that are on the very very verrrrrryyyyy far back burner (you know the ones.... the ones that involve moving in with family???, yeah, verrrrrryyyyy far back burner :/ )

There are still quite a few schools that aren't even beginning their interview processes until as late as the middle of april!  There are just too many "IF s" in all of this that it's getting to be quite stressful.  Anytime I contemplate on this I feel as thought I might have a panic attack (that seems to happen a lot, but it MIGHT be because i'm 2 months away from having our fourth kid....), but then at the same time I also have that feeling of "it will all work out, we'll be alright." I hope that the spirit and not just me rationalizing... i have a tendency to do that.  But looking back we have always been taken care of, if we have just shown the faith.  

Our biggest example that keeps coming to mind was when we moved from arizona to oklahoma.  I was 4 months pregnant with tj and sarahbeth had just turned 1.  We had hardley any money... just enough to rent a moving truck and pay for gas... actually i think we used a credit card for the gas, anyways, we tried to get a place to live over the phone, and jobs, over the phone, but that didn't work.  so, without any money, without a place to live, and without any jobs, we packed up our 1 year old, our belongings and drove to oklahoma where by miracle of miracles we were able to use my school financial aid to use to get an apartment, and the next week brad got a job thanks to his cousins networking! That entire year of living in oklahoma was full of miracles, both that we were able to recognize and many more that i'm sure we were completely unaware of.  It was a very trying time for us, but one of our happiest times too! (we still have incredible friends from there!!!! and i loved that apartment!)

So for now, that's it, and i will try to keep you all updated! Happy Monday!