Oh baby, baby

| Aunt Jemima at 40 weeks |

| Obviously, make-up is no longer a priority in my life |

It would probably be a little self-centered of me to think that you may be wondering if I'm still pregnant or not.  So I'll just talk about other stuff.  

| Before |

| After |

| Brent officially owns his own SUP board and he is happy happy! |

| Stand up paddling at 38 weeks |

I call Brent's new friends his apostles...Brent's first name is actually Christopher (bearer of Christ)

| This is Paul |

| and this is Peter :) |

Kai, my friend Bubba's sweet baby swam to his mamma (water-birth) on August 25th, all naturally and at home.

Kai and Ariella kisses :)

The weather is nice today.  The weather is nice every day.  Yesterday, I was like, "Can it please just rain or something, geez?!"

Just kidding haha (I really did say that though)

Ok, so I am still pregnant, y'all.  Today marks 40 weeks and 4 days.

I refuse to call myself "over-due" because last time I checked, our baby did not get checked out from the library.

I've been trying to lay a little low on texting, Facebook, and Instagram because after trying and failing at every single type of natural induction method since week 39, I realized that it kind of put me in the wrong state of mind.  All this time, I thought surely Ariella Love would come early.  Then it dawned on me that every pregnant person probably thinks that way.

Ways that I tried to naturally induce labor:

1. Labor cookies.  Ok so I had to make them twice because the first batch that I made were literally not fit for ingestion.  They are a lot like ginger snaps, just spicier (cayenne pepper).  Since I was set on going into labor that day, I may or may not have added WAY too much cayenne pepper.  I thought something was a little odd when my hands started burning while rolling the dough into balls...Needless to say, I ate half a cookie and thought I was going to die.  I made another batch the next day with the appropriate amount of spices, but they were still too gross for me to eat more than one.  I think for them to be some what effective, you may have to eat like 3 or 4 in one sitting.  Brent sure liked them though! He was chugging those babies down with a huge glass of milk and a huge grin on his face.  Too bad he's not the one pregnant.

2. Walking.  This is more like walking with a mission.  I mean, I walk around the house and I walk to the grocery store and such.  But this was me going to the treadmill, setting the incline to 2.0, at 3 mph, and walking until I could barely walk anymore.  I ended up walking 4.75 miles.

3. Spicy Food.  I've had Hawaiian Jerk chicken, extra spicy.  We ordered wings the other night with the mango habanero sauce that burned my mouth and gave me extra horrendous heartburn.  I add Louisiana Hot Sauce to pretty much every meal I eat.

4. Pineapple.  It contains a proteolytic enzyme called bromelain and is said to help soften the cervix, stimulate muscle contractions, and may shorten the duration of labor.  Living in Hawaii, this was easy and delicious...until I ate enough pineapple that it gave me a sugar high and made me a little sick.  Brent was like "Keep eating!"  I was like "Por favor, no mas, no mas!"  I'm not sure why I'm suddenly speaking Spanish.  Then I find out that apparently, you're so supposed to eat like 5 pineapples for this to "maybe" work.  Yeesh.  Over it.

5. Love making.  Bow chicka bow wow.  It's all about that love (oxytocin) hormone, y'all!  I won't elaborate on this, however, I do think it's important to stock up on love making prior to having a baby since you won't be able to do so for a few weeks post-partum.

6. Acupressure.  I got a mani/pedi last week and told the sweet little girl to make sure that the majority of the massage happens around my ankle area.  It freaked her out a little, "But what if you go into labor here at the salon?"  I was like "yes, that's exactly what I want to happen!"  haha  I also tried acupressure between my thumb and index finger (another labor trigger point).

7. Evening Primrose Oil 500mg.  I've been taking this since week 36 and have titrated up to 2 tablets in the morning, and 1 tablet at night.  My midwife recommended not to start taking it until week 35-36 as it has the potential to induce labor.  If you know me enough to understand the severity of my ridiculousness, then yes, the thought of overdosing on EPO has indeed crossed my mind..but Brent talked some sense into me!  Its major function though is to ripen the cervix and get it ready for birth.

8. Red Raspberry Leaf Tea.  Currently drinking this as I type this post and it's delicious.  I add some honey for a tinge of sweetness.  Though it's not known to induce labor directly, it helps tone the uterus.  I just started drinking it yesterday because for probably the majority of these past 2-3 weeks,  I just couldn't be bothered with leaving the house and actually waddling my way to the health food store, or anywhere for the matter.

The only well known natural labor inducer that I am not willing to try is castor oil.  Our midwife doesn't recommend it unless as an absolute last resort.  It can cause major diarrhea and lead to dehydration, which both don't sound like any fun if you're trying to birth a baby.

We don't plan on artificial induction unless the baby or I start showing signs of distress (positive stress test, low amniotic fluid, abnormal heart rate, placenta decomposition, etc).  Close to 40 weeks is when I finally came to be at a state of peace about baby Ari Love's arrival.

Brent and I have complete faith in God's perfect timing.

Happy living y'all!