<p>31 weeks on Wednesday!</p>
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<p>We had a bit of a scare yesterday. We woke up really late, around 9:30, and the kids were keeping themselves occupied so DH and I took advantage of the alone time to be intimate, let's say. Afterward I started getting contractions that were between 2 and 10 minutes apart, mostly 5 minutes apart, and pretty uncomfortable. I drank a bunch of water and laid down on my side but they didn't go away, so I had my mom pick up the kids and we went to the hospital. I was really nervous about going in because something similar had happened with my first daughter and when we went in they totally freaked out and guilt-tripped me into taking narcotic pain killers (actually said if I didn't do what they said that my baby would die or be severely handicapped), kept me overnight, then had me on bedrest for 2.5 months. I was much more impressed with the people at this hospital, maybe it's just newer protocol but they hooked me up to a monitor, gave me a TON of water to drink, took some samples, checked my cervix manually and then with an ultrasound. They said my cervix was open 1 cm and that it was probably not a big deal since this is number 3, but that it was very long (3 cm), so looked "reassuring". So they kept me or another hour and a half or so, checked my cervix again and said it was the same, sent me home and said to take it easy for 24 hours after the contractions stopped, or obviously call them again if they got worse. All in all they just seemed way more professional, relaxed, and rational, so I'm feeling pretty good about my care providers, which is always good.</p>
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<p>I still don't know what was really going on, although the contractions ceased to be uncomfortable after I got some food in my stomach. They kept coming the rest of the day, but this morning were gone. I'm so relieved not to be on bedrest again! And obviously to not have been in labor.</p>
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<p>Other than that things are fine, New Year's Eve was pretty good. We just stayed home and watched movies and played games with the girls, and at midnight the girls ran around the house banging pots and pans, while the rest of the neighborhood shot guns into the air. Yes, seriously. In the middle of the city.</p>
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<p>I got a new game for the girls for Christmas, it's called Equate, it's like Scrabble but with math equations instead of words. It's SO much fun, and, for this house full of math and science nerds, WAY better than Scrabble. It's a good game for a family because you can play at different levels, so the kids can keep things fairly simple while the adults can do more complex things. When the kids don't have anything easy to do the adults can help out and do a little math lesson. Totally recommended! We've been playing almost nonstop all week.</p>