34 weeks!

As the title of this post indicates, I am now 34 weeks along in my pregnancy and still feeling well. I am somewhat ready for our baby boy to arrive and am facing the normal difficulties associated with living life with a belly. But we are so thankful that the pregnancy continues to go well! We have decided to have a repeat c-section, and we've set that date for October 8. I go to the doctor tomorrow, and we hope that things are still going well.
Since Annabelle's trip to Jackson/our vacation, we have pretty much just been around the house doing normal activities. I just wanted to post a few recent pictures of Belle (to satisfy the interests of those who check this blog regularly). The other precious girl you see in a few of these photos is Susanna Brink, Belle's cousin. They are almost exactly the same age, and we love having Susanna come play. Watching the two of them grow up together will be such fun!
The seemingly odd pictures of Belle on a large machine were taken at our church's Labor Day gathering at the farm of one of our elders. The kids at this annual event look forward to rides on this "glorified golf cart," and Annabelle took an interest in it as well. At one point in the evening, I looked up from my dinner to see Daniel, Belle, and another elder from church headed off for a ride. According to the reports I received, Annabelle had a wonderful time (despite the fact that her facial expression was stoic the entire time).
I guess the one interesting "process" we've been through over the past couple of weeks is the removal of the pacifier from Belle's life. For a LONG time she had only used it in the car and the bed. After our trip to Nashville in July, we took it away from the car with NO problems. We knew we wanted to have it totally gone by the time she was 2, and I also knew that I didn't want to be dealing with it when the baby arrived. So two weeks ago we decided to take it away from the bed (the remaining area). I would say that we are pretty much past the transition, and as everyone says, it wasn't as bad as I thought. But it WAS hard, especially for the first few days. Her naps got very unpredictable, and she would wake up crying and unable to sleep but still clearly tired. She also spent less time playing happily in her bed after naps and in the mornings and would want out sooner (which affects me more than it does her). We are still dealing with a little of the latter issue, but we are all adjusting. :) Clearly she drew more comfort from it that I realized. But I am thankful to have that step behind us!