Sweet!

At my last diabetes clinic, I was jokingly complaining about how hard it was to go to Coldstone twice last weekend, and to sit and watch everyone enjoying their ice cream. I had to ask, "Are you sure that I can't even have sugar-free ice cream?" My doctor said, "Well, if you have ice cream, just make sure you find one that's really high in fat because the higher the fat, the less sugar it contains." My response was, "IF I have ice cream?! Are you saying that I can have ice cream?!" He said that since I've been doing really well on my diet, my blood sugar numbers have been pretty good, and if I could resist the temptation to have more than just a little scoop, it'd be ok if I had one scoop of ice cream every few days. He recommended Ben and Jerry's. Sweet!! I went out to Ben and Jerry's on Friday night with Christa and Jill and I savored one scoop of "Chocolate Therapy." It's not like I'm fanatical about ice cream like Jason is, but I am definitely going to enjoy it a lot more now, since I know what it's like to be without it.

Even though my blood sugar was a little higher after the ice cream, it wasn't enough to be concerned and I didn't need to call in (I have to call in to the diabetes center whenever my numbers reach a certain point). That was such a special treat!

After an incredibly busy week, Friday was my last day of work. Earlier in the day, my staff members had a staff get-together for me after school. The two people who had organized the shower went to all the trouble of finding a sugar-free cake that I could eat. How thoughtful! So, in just one day, I got to have TWO special treats! I was so excited!

Almost Ready...

I'm almost ready... not to have this baby, but to go off on disability leave! My last day was supposed to be last Friday, but I begged my doctor to let me work this week since I didn't have a long term substitute teacher in place. Jason would probably say that this is one of those times that really shows my stubborn side. Here's why, though: I just started with my brand new 5th/6th combination class last Tuesday, and to leave on Friday would've made me extremely overwhelmed and stressed out to try and get everything ready for a sub that I didn't have yet. My doctor thinks that I'm overdoing it, and well, I am finally going to have to agree with him. I've continued to have several contractions every day, am completely exhausted, and totally uncomfortable. Even with this extra week of work, it hasn't helped that I have an appointment of some kind every day except today. Until the baby is born, I now have to go for non-stress tests twice a week, see my doctor once a week, and go to my diabetes clinic once a week. The appointment times for this week had to be scheduled for early afternoon, which means I have to leave work before the school day even ends. That's not exactly the preparation time I was hoping for with this extra week of work. I was hoping to stay at school later to get stuff done, but so much for that. Thank goodness, though, today my principal and I were able to interview 2 more candidates for the position. We both feel confident about one in particular, and she's agreed to commit until I return after Winter Break. She's going to come and observe me for the remainder of the week (on her own initiative), and I really feel that this will be so helpful! I hope all of this will work out- it'll be a huge weight off my shoulders!

Surreal

This weekend, my close friends flew from Edmonton to San Jose to visit with family. I was supposed to drive to meet with them today in San Francisco. However, the idea of being 8 months pregnant, driving 3 hours there, and 3 hours back in one day wasn't something that I was looking forward to. It's not often that they come this close to where we are though, so I really was stuck with a dilemma!

I am so fortunate because they called yesterday morning and decided to drive here instead. Binh and Thao (both were in my wedding), Linda (their sister), Binh's husband, Neil, and Thao's daughter, Sammy, took about 3 hours to drive from San Jose, and they couldn't stay very long while they were here. I was so excited to show them our house. Then, we took them to Fig Garden Village since it's in our neighborhood to walk around for a little bit. I asked them what they wanted to do and guess what we did... Well, Neil and Jason went back to our house so that Gracie and Sammy could go swimming in our pool. The girls? We spent about an hour and half at Target!!! There aren't any Targets in Canada (in the western part, anyway)! It was certainly my pleasure to spend that much time at Target. I easily can spend that much time there on my own, and I can go any time I want.

After our Target spree, we ate dinner at Chipotle and parted ways after dessert at Coldstone (that's twice we've been there this weekend and I didn't get any!). I kept thinking to myself how surreal it was to have my friends here. It's been many, many years since they've seen my "neck of the woods." I am truly grateful that they sacrificed an entire day to drive way out here to Fresno to basically do nothing except see our family. I was just so filled with joy to see them and spend some time with them. It took Gracie no time at all to once again cling to Sammy. She cried when we told her Sammy had to go home on an airplane. She kept insisting that we go along as well. The very first thing she said when I woke her up this morning was, "I see Sammy and Uncle Neil." I had to sadly remind her that Sammy had to go home already. Thank you, dear friends, for coming to see me! Love you guys!

Thao, me, Binh, Linda

These two bottom pictures are for those of you who haven't seen me in a while-

Yup, I'm huge.

Papa's in Heaven

Today would have been Jason's dad's 64th birthday. While at the hospital during one of the last days of his life, one of the last things that Jason's dad told Jason was how he wanted to "go to that place where they cook the food in front of you." So in accordance with that wish, we decided that we'd get together every year to remember his life and celebrate his birthday at a Japanese restaurant. We had a delicious teppanyaki dinner at Yoshino's tonight.
Earlier in the day, Jason had told Gracie that it was Papa's birthday. She kept asking about balloons and cake. Later on in the day, she began saying that Papa was in heaven. We got the idea that it would be symbolic if we released balloons to Papa in heaven as another way of remembering Papa. After our meal, we went to get balloons, sang Happy Birthday, and released the balloons to Papa in heaven. There was a slight breeze outside, perfect for the release of balloons. We couldn't think of anywhere to go for cake, so we went to Coldstone instead (as hard as it was to watch 8 other people savor their ice cream, I didn't have any). It was a very special evening- Happy Birthday, Dad- we love you and miss you.

Update about Jason and Gracie

Okay, I've been blogging so much about the stuff that's been happening in my life that I haven't shared anything about Jason or Gracie for a while. Jason's doing great- his volleyball season started up the first week of school and he is always so excited about that. He has some tall girls on his team this year. Hopefully, that'll be an advantage. There have been a few years where he's gotten tall girls but they're pretty much on the court for their presence and not much else. Also, his team has done so well in these past few years that he's gotten moved to a much tougher league this year. His team is going up against girls who play club volleyball and have had experience playing the sport. A lot of girls who play volleyball at Wawona are learning the sport for the first time. It's pretty amazing to see how much he's able to teach them during their season. As for teaching, well, he still says he'd quit teaching to coach full-time if that really were an option. Once again, he's teaching 8th grade US History this year. It's really interesting to hear about some of the things he does with his class.

Gracie is also doing really well. She was with us almost every second of the day for 6 weeks during the summer, so when we had to get back into the swing of things, it took her a while to adjust. In fact, she still cries when we leave her in the church nursery. What is up with that?!

Quite a bit has happened over the last few months of Gracie's life: 1) her vocabulary is growing by the day; 2) she now enjoys being in the pool; 3) she isn't terrified of the bath tub anymore; 4) she's been potty trained since our Edmonton trip (how is it that I did not blog such a momentous milestone?!); 5) she can spend an incredible amount of time playing by herself with her puzzles; 6) she can count up to 12; 7) she doesn't swallow her toothpaste anymore; 8) she's beginning to remember a lot of things that we never thought she would; 9) she's really good about cleaning up her toys and play areas; 10) she prays for our dinner meal (it sounds like this: Dear Jesus, Loves me I know, Bible says so, a few gibberish words, Amen); . I can't believe she's turning 3 in October! I wonder how she'll interact with a new sibling... It won't be too much longer of a wait!

Gracie can now carry on a conversation with her Ba (Vietnamese for Grandma)... Well, actually it's pretty one-sided. My mom tries to ask her all kinds of questions, but her response is always the same. She just sings some of the songs she knows, ends by saying "Wuv you, bye," puts the phone down in any random spot and continues doing whatever she was doing.

More to Stress About!

Okay, here's a continuation of the crazy stuff that's been happening! Our district's 5th grade enrollment is unusually low this year. My grade level partner, David, and I each have 20 students! It sounds great until you take into consideration that schools don't get funding for lower class sizes in upper grades. Most districts try to fill up their upper grades as much as possible. This past week, we found out that our school is receiving about 100 new students on Tuesday morning. All of these kids are from other schools around the district. Their schools don't have room for them, so they're being sent to our school. None of those 100 students are 5th graders. 18 of them though, are 6th graders. Our 6th grade classes are completely full, but not our 5th grade classes. So how does a district save some money? They combine the two! We will now have one 5th grade class, two 6th grade classes, and one 5th/6th combo class. Originally, my principal wanted David to do the combination class since I'll be leaving on maternity leave pretty soon. The more I thought about it though, it just seemed to make more sense for me to do the combo class. So, I volunteered to do it. Here's why: First of all, I just felt really bad that David was being assigned to the combo simply because I was going on maternity leave. The two of us have spent many, many hours planning for this year, and we both feel like the year is "ready to go." He's a 2nd year teacher, still involved with BTSA (beginning teacher stuff), and he coaches after school. It'd be a lot to ask, having him completely switch gears now to do 6th grade. Also, since we've put so much time into getting ready for 5th grade, it would be nice for at least one of us to see how it all turns out. I won't get to anyway since I'll be on maternity leave for 3 months. In addition to thinking about how all of this affects David, I couldn't imagine leaving my long term substitute to teach an entire grade level completely on his/her own- with no grade level partner, with no help (since we're a new school, programs are slowly being implemented), no deployment... Teaching 6th grade would mean joining a team of two other 6th grade teachers. In October, we will begin deployment for Language Arts- all 6th graders would be leveled by ability levels, receiving Language Arts instruction at their level. Each teacher would focus on one area. As well, in 6th grade, Science, Social Studies, and Writing would all be departmentalized. That means that my sub would not have to learn Social Studies or Science, instead focusing only on teaching Writing to 3 classes. In the end, I decided that this was the best way to go. This decision was so incredibly hard to make. I was extremely overwhelmed when reality finally hit and I realized what I had gotten myself into. Fortunately, I now have two grade level partners who have already helped me out a great deal. Thank goodness!
I had to say goodbye to my class on Friday. I was so sad to let them go- in such a short time, I have really connected with them. I had scheduled to visit 13 of them at their homes this weekend, but since most of them won't be in my class after all, I ended up only visiting 4 homes. I was able to keep 7 of my students, and I will be getting 18 new 6th graders on Tuesday morning. It won't be a 3 day weekend for me- I'm definitely going to school tomorrow to get ready! You could pray that I'll be able to find a good long term substitute... especially if on Tuesday, my doctor tells me I'm going on disability leave at the end of the week. There is much to do from now until then. Sorry for these long posts! I promise to try and post about Gracie and Jason in this next week.

Insulin

Okay... here's my drama from last week... My blood sugars were unusually high first thing in the morning almost every day last week. I couldn't make sense of it since I was still being really cautious about my meals so I called the Diabetes Center. They returned my call while I was with my class and informed me that I would have to be put on insulin. I guess my blood sugars through the night are being affected by my hormones, something that a meal plan can't really help with. In fact, as I near my due date, my hormones are probably going to require larger doses of insulin. Anyway, I broke down in tears at the news because I absolutely hate needles! Needles on top of everything that I already have to do! They insisted that I come into the center either that day (Thursday), or Friday. Waiting until the following week was not an option. So... after sharing the news with my principal, completely unable to do so without crying, he suggested that I take Friday off. Reluctantly, I did. My appointment the next morning was an hour long and the nurse taught me how to inject myself with insulin. I must've held the syringe for 10 minutes, unable to even look at it. It took a lot of coaching for me to finally do it. It feels like when I prick my finger- not painful, but I am definitely very aware that something is being put in my skin. I know it's completely psychological- I really have to work at building myself up to do it... When I went to pick up my supplies at Rite Aid, I was given something completely different due to my health insurance. That means that I spent an hour learning how to do something that I won't even be doing. I had to leave to head to Stockton, so it wasn't like I could go back to the center to learn how to use this new insulin pen. After the Josh Groban concert, my mother in law and sister in law both helped me in our hotel room. Jennifer read each direction (there are a lot of steps!) while my mother in law helped to make sure the insulin was completely injected. All of this has been incredibly overwhelming. I can't even begin to tell you how emotional I have been. I now have to inject insulin once a day, right before I go to bed so that the insulin can help lower the blood sugars by morning time. It has not gotten easier each night- it is definitely the worst past of my day!
One of the nurses mentioned that since my pregnancy is considered "high risk," my doctor will probably not allow for the pregnancy to be full term (40 weeks). Gestational diabetes causes babies to put on too much weight and because of that, usually are born at 38 weeks. That moves up our due date by two weeks!!! I'll find out for sure on Tuesday. My doctor has mentioned on several occasions how he'd like to have me induced. I think it's very likely that I'm going to be put on disability leave next week. Yesterday, I was given some news about my job that ended up leaving me feel so stressed out that I had 6 contractions last night, the longest one lasting 10 minutes long. For a short while, Jason and I wondered if I had gone into labor! Thankfully not, but that just reminds me how close we are to meeting our new baby! I'll share about my job news next post since this one's already too long.

Girls' Weekend

For my birthday present earlier this year, Jason got me tickets to see Josh Groban. I didn't get to see him when he was in Fresno a few months ago, but he had a concert date in Stockton (so random, I know) just this past Friday, so I got to go! In fact, I went with Jason's mom and sister, Jennifer. We made it a girls' weekend, probably my last hurrah for a while. We left Fresno on Friday afternoon and were able to have a nice dinner in Stockton before the concert. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of my own to share- cameras weren't allowed. I will say though, that it was GREAT! His music really calms me and it was such a treat to hear him live. I also really enjoyed the fact that he was so personable and interactive. He has a great sense of humor, and talked as if he were talking to just a few people, not an entire arena. At one point during the concert, he even walked through the arena- he was right in front of us (3 rows) and it took a second before we realized that it was him. Thank you, Jason, for such a special night!
We spent the next day in Sacramento's IKEA. I'm actually serious when I say "the next day-" we were in IKEA for about 6 hours. And I ended up leaving with the most stuff! I love that store...
After a really emotional and overwhelming Thursday and Friday morning, I am grateful to have been able to enjoy a great weekend! (I'll try to blog about the other stuff later this week).

Life with Gestational Diabetes

Well, I'm 31 weeks along. Depending on who you talk to, I'm either going to "pop" any day now because I look so big, or that I look "just right." It's been a real adjustment, dealing with gestational diabetes and changing the way I eat. I now eat 3 meals and 3 snacks everyday, and I test my blood sugar by pricking my fingers 4 times a day. I have a pretty defined meal plan that states how many servings of different kinds of food I can eat at each meal/snack. Out of convenience, I pretty much eat peanut butter several times a day. It's been hard remembering to test my blood sugar when I'm at school- sometimes I get so wrapped up in what I'm doing that I forget. A positive thing though, is that having this has forced me to leave school at an appropriate time to make sure that I have dinner at the right time. It's been hard to eat out so we really have to be intentional about what we eat. I LOVE fruit and now I can only eat it in really limited amounts. That's been disappointing... And, I haven't been able to have any slurpees or bubble teas for weeks now!!! AAGGH! I've never been crazy about desserts, but not being allowed to have any has made me really want to have it! When this is all over, I'm going to celebrate by going dessert-crazy. I'm thinking a dessert potluck or something. Who's with me!?

I have to carry these with me all the time- my nutrition journal, my blood monitoring journal, and my blood monitor kit (has the monitor, lancets (the things that prick my finger), and test strips).

When I was pregnant with Grace, I went out on disability leave from work at 33 weeks. I started having contractions and the doctor believed it was stress related (due to work). Well, this past week, I started getting cramps (it was the same with Grace). I don't want to call them contractions yet because the pain is still manageable, but if it's the same as with Grace, the pain is going to start to intensify. It makes me feel overwhelmed to think about having to already plan for a long term substitute for my brand new class! I'm still hopeful that I'll be able to teach as long as possible. Please keep praying for me and this little one.

Back to School

Well, we're back to school! The summer passed so quickly, but overall, it was great- we got to spend time as a family, spend time with extended family, travel, relax, work on the house, and do school work... I am very excited about the start of a new school year at a new school! After 7 years of being at Herndon-Barstow School, this year, I decided to move out of my comfort zone to Harvest School, Central Unified's newest school. What an experience it has been, opening up a new school. I am getting to know my new co-workers and I really respect my principal. Everything's really new at this point, but I feel good about this upcoming year. That's with all the craziness of this past week! We weren't allowed to start moving in and setting up classrooms until last week. Our school's construction was supposed to be done many weeks ago, but the date kept being pushed back later and later for a whole bunch of reasons. Let's just say that crews were and are still working on projects around the school. There are a lot of things that we're still waiting to have completed, but our classrooms were ready to go for the first day! For a normal person, it's hard enough to move all of their belongings, and get a classroom ready- being pregnant really slowed me down! I am so grateful for Jason and my grade level partner, David. They helped me a great deal.

Here are some pictures of the "before"

Here's a glimpse of the "after"- obviously it's still a work in progress! Notice that I don't have a whiteboard yet- apparently, it's still stuck in Texas somewhere, delayed because of Texas' recent floodings? Also notice- I have a T.V. and a DVD player! That's a first for me! The front of our school- plants still need to be planted
This actually doesn't feel out of place right now!
Anyway, to everyone who is heading back to school- have a great year!

Pregnancy Update

It totally dawned on me today that I have yet to share some of our baby's ultrasound pictures from 10 weeks ago. (In case you didn't know, there's a pregnancy countdown at the bottom of this blog- I'm 29 weeks along!) Some people have made predictions about whether it's a boy or girl based on these ultrasound pictures, but the one with the actual label of "boy/girl" is still in a sealed envelope. Surprisingly, we haven't been tempted to look at it. What do you think?!

On another note, I had my glucose tolerance test done last week and got the results today. It turns out that I have gestational diabetes... Does anyone know anything about that? I'm feeling really scared because I don't know what that involves, what to expect because I have that, and how that affects the baby. I also can't think of anyone that I know of who's had that during their pregnancy (or has shared about it). I have to go into St. Agnes' Diabetes Center on Friday to learn how to monitor my blood sugar level, change my diet, etc. I knew there had to be a reason why I have been unusually tired and hungry this pregnancy. Anyway, please continue to keep me and the baby in your prayers!

Trying to Stay Cool!

It has been plenty hot since we've been back from all of our travels. The weather here in Fresno has been over 100 degrees (think 40 degrees Celcius, Canadians!) for quite some time. Today was the first day it has dipped below 100 degrees. I've been really hot and uncomfortable. Anyway, I'm looking forward to these upcoming few days because it's supposed to feel cooler. Cooler still meaning hot, but at least it's not above 100! Here are a few pictures of Gracie in our pool this past week. She's actually excited to go in the pool nowadays which we are thrilled about. Jason's been taking her every day as a way to cool off and keep her interested in being in the water. You'll have to read previous posts from our time in Edmonton if you don't know about how terrified of the water she was just weeks ago.