Growth

I'm getting harassed for pictures, so here we are... all 3 of us.

My students always ask me, "Mrs. Karly, how are your babies?" My response is always, "Well, I'm growing, so they're growing!" And it's true... I am certainly looking a little bit more pregnant these days, which is kind of fun because it makes it seem a little bit more real to Mike and me. I'm also starting to feel more consistent flutters and tiny punches/kicks that feel like a gentle flick.

One student asked me the other day, "If your babies are only this big [holding up two fingers about  4-5 inches apart], then how come you're so big?!" I had to explain to her that not only are there two, but liquid that they are swimming in, and my body is also storing up fat reserves too for when they squish me so much that it will be hard to eat. However, later, I had a Thai co-worker tell me, "You don't even look pregnant... you're not even showing!"

Well, showing or not, I'm definitely eating like crazy (I've completely ruined our food budget) and gaining weight like a champ. I'm starting to really feel the effects of that weight gain, as well as increased blood volume, which has definitely started slowing me down more and force me to sit a lot to alleviate the pressure from my feet. My students have been so gracious, helpful & sweet during this time of transition, which has made it all the more easier.

All is going well though; I really feel quite fantastic. We are still so in awe of God's goodness to us and how He has so lavishly blessed us!

Words

You know you're pregnant when these are the words that are coming out of your mouth...

K: "Mike, I'm eating this fruit."
M: "That's my fruit."
K: "Okay... I'm eating your fruit. Do you want any of your fruit? If not, I'm going to eat it all."

3 days later...

K: How many watermelon did you buy?
M: 4-- 3 for you and 1 for me.
K: (In the middle of eating watermelon #4) So this piece of watermelon that I'm currently eating and is half gone is yours? You want the half that's left?
M: [sigh] No. Go ahead. I can get more later.
K: Sorry!!! 


While I'm busy packing on the pounds to ensure healthy babies, my poor husband is quite possibly slowly losing weight because I snipe his food. Poor Mike.

Things not to say to a woman expecting (twins)…

1. What kind of water did you drink?
2. Better you than me!
3. You’re going to be huge!
4. I don’t know how you’re going to fit 2 babies in there!
5. Uh-oh! Double trouble!
6. Vaginal delivery or C-section?
7. Any terrible/scary pregnancy story that you know of.
8. Twins...that's so scary!

What I want to say in response…
1. Pretty sure drinking water doesn’t make you pregnant... just sayin'.
2. Yes, better me than you because I CANNOT WAIT to love on them.
3. Better huge with babies than huge because I’m obese?!
4. I’m sure it’ll work out somehow.
5. I prefer double the blessing.
6. Uhm… seriously?
7. Not helpful, people… not helpful.
8. Is it? Scary is being the octuplet mom, in my opinion.

A simple equation

10 more teaching days

+

4 days of finals

+

4.5 days of cleaning/packing up my classroom & getting things ready for the new Spanish teacher

+

5 wonderful weeks in Minnesota filled with family & friends

____________________________________________________________

1 happy Karly

This will be my life...

I'm excited to all take in all giggles that I'll hear from my own two kiddos. :)

Top 20

Q&A: Top questions I've/we've been getting:

1. How are you feeling?  Fantastic! Just really really tired and ravenously hungry. :)

2. Do you have really bad morning sickness since you have 2X the hormones? Nope... feeling super blessed as I only felt seriously nauseous for about 4-5 weeks. The most "annoying" symptom of pregnancy for me has been how stuffy my nose is!

3. Do twins run in your family? No twins in Mike's family Just found out that there are twins in Mike's family! And since I'm adopted, we don't know about mine.

4. Twins... are you happy about that? Ecstatic. You can't beat a built-in best friend & playmate!

5. Are you having weird cravings? Not particularly. Corn on the cob, Mexican food and bacon always sound good though (not together). I do admit to making quesadillas and blueberry pancakes in the wee hours of the morning, and drinking about a quart of milk a day though.

6. Are you still going to stay in Thailand? Yes. We'll be here for at least another 2 years. We don't know beyond that as of now though... wherever God wants us.

7. Will you continue teaching? Nope. This is my last year teaching for a while. Mike will continue to teach at ICS though. I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to stay at hope with the wee ones and get to know some of the other moms in the community better! We have such a great and supportive community here with so many great friends!

8. Do you know if they are fraternal/identical? Nope. I thought they were fraternal since they are separated by a membrane, but identical ones can be separated by a membrane too. I guess we'll find out later!

9. Do you know their sexes? Nope. If they aren't crossing their legs, we'll hopefully find out in June. We'll keep you updated. :)

10. Have you picked out names? Yep. We're 100% decided on 2 boys and 2 girls names (and middle names)... but we're not sharing (yet). :)

11. When is your actual due date? Everything goes out the window with multiples (they generally come a few weeks earlier--37 weeks is considered full term with twins), so it doesn't really matter anyway, I suppose. They could be born anytime in late September or October. We're hoping that they're born in October... obviously the later they are born, the more time they've had to develop.

12. What can I do to help you? For now, pray for a healthy & uncomplicated pregnancy. When I get closer to beached-whale status, I'm sure I'll have some other suggestions. :)

13. Are you showing? Yep... especially since there are twinks in there.

14. Do your students know? How did they react? My high schoolers are super excited, but bummed that I won't be teaching next year (and jealous that I'm CONSTANTLY eating during class). Many of Mike's students didn't even know he was married. Haha!

15. Do you think it will be boys/girls/boy & girl?/What do you hope they will be? We've already placed our bets. Mike thinks it will be 2 boys (he grew up in a family of 4 boys, and has a nephew). I think it will be 1 boy and 1 girl. What we hope? Hmmm... I don't think we really care. It's fun to think about having 1 of each, but I think twins maybe have a closer relationship (but maybe more competitive too) if they are the same sex. Anyway, it's not like it's up to us anyway to decide. :)
16. What was your reaction when you found out it was twins?  100% delight, smiles & maybe a little bit of squealing & excited hand clapping. (Okay, the squealing and hand clapping was more me than Mike... he's not really the squealing and hand clapping type, you know?)
17. Are you going to miss teaching? Absolutely (just not the grading aspect of it). But the thought of staying home with two wee ones and watching them grow and learn is SO exciting to me!
18. Do you feel them kick yet? I think I maybe feel flutters now, but I'm a newbie at this, so who knows.
19. Do have room for them in your current apartment, or will you have to move? We have room, especially when they're little and immobile. We even have bunk beds... which we scoffed at thought were so charming when we first moved in... perhaps  it was foreshadowing things to come.
20. Will you still be visiting MN this summer? That's our hope. We've gotten the initial approval from our doctor, but will have to get a second approval from him the day before we are scheduled to leave. It obviously depends on the health/condition of the wee ones & me. But yes, it's technically still safe for me to fly with the twinks in June and early July.

The real reason...

... that our blog has been a bit silent these past few months:

We've always been big Minnesota Twins fans…

But now "The Twins" have a whole new meaning for us. So move over, Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau because Baby A #1 and Baby A #2 will be making their debut in October!

We can't wait to introduce them to you!

Funny...

Our school is full of ESL students, which can sometimes result in a some funny stories...

Student A (doing timed computer activity): I did it in 20 seconds.
Student B: I bet I can do better... yep... I did it 19 seconds. I won. Now try to win me!
Student A: I think you mean, "Now try to beat me..."

6th grade student writing sample that I saw in the hallway: He was borned with no limbs.


A few other funny stories...

I've mentioned before about how Mike's students think he's SO hairy and they love to pet his leg hair, or pull on strands of it to see his skin pull up. One time, a little first grader was petting his leg hair and said, "You have so much FUR!!!"

The other day I struck up a conversation with a foreigner while eating lunch under the parking garage (instead of the school cafeteria). He complimented me on my excellent English skills, and was a bit embarassed later on to hear that I'm actually American. When he found out I am a teacher at the school down the street, he immediately assumed that I teach English, to which again, I blew his mind when I told him that I actually teach Spanish. Needless to say, you can't judge a book by it's cover!

Oops…

The 2 month blogging hiatus was a bit unintentional, but we certainly have been quite busy---mainly with the normal activities at school.

Re-cap:

December/January:
• My dad visited for 2 weeks and we had a great time (see last post) gallivanting around Bangkok and beyond.
• Construction on the new athletic facility began. This is a bit of an inconvenience for ICS, particularly the PE teachers, but the new facility (which will be awesome) will hopefully be done by next school year, or shortly into the year since they got a bit of a late start.

January-February-March
• Headed back to school after Dad’s departure in January
• Have had many weeks without a break, which has been hard not only the students, but the teachers as well.
• Construction at ICS continues and is noisy!

February:
• Mike started playing in the 2nd annual CCBL (Basketball league with students and teachers)
• Karly got addicted to Pinterest, finding recipes and card ideas/designs galore :)

March:
• Celebrated Mike’s 30th birthday!!
• Took a personal day together to break up the hum-drum of school. Thankfully, neither one of us has gotten into the teaching slump yet, but there’s always April and May… ha.
• Hot season has starting ramping up a bit. There have been some nice mornings that have felt a bit cooler or have had a bit of a breeze, but it’s definitely the start of the hot season.
• Looking forward to a 2-day school week next week due to taking another personal day, and a 2-day educational conference that neither of us need to attend.
• Mike will be going away for a men’s retreat with church at the end of March

Looking ahead to April
• We’ll enjoy a 4 day weekend because April 6 is Chakri Day and March 9 was recently declared a National Holiday due to the cremation of the daughter of a king.
• We’re looking forward to our spring break (April 13-22). We’re headed to Railay Beach (near Phuket & Krabi), which is a favorite of many friends. Our dear friends, Grant & Carolyn, as well as Carolyn’s brother and sister-in-law, who will be visiting for their break, will be just 5 minutes from us as well, so that will be fun. Railay is known for not only it’s beach, but for its natural rock climbing too. I’m sure you’ll see plenty of pictures. I predict a very HOT vacation with the hot season ramping up. I also predict a few fights over who gets the kindle. :)
Other:
• We’ve been enjoying our marriage small group this year. There are 4 couples and we’re going through a series called, “What did you expect? Redeeming the qualities of marriage” by Paul David Tripp. It’s been a good series, though we do get a bit distracted by Paul’s seriously wicked moustache and cheesy “dramatic” DVD music.
• We’re looking forward to a trip home to MN this summer from June 5-July 10 and already considering what to bring back with us in our 4 suitcases… it’s always a dilemma.

Dad's Visit

My dad was here for the past two weeks. For sanity purposes, he came at the perfect time, as I had been dangerously close to applying for jobs in stateside for both Mike and me. I always get a bit Thailand stir-crazy and homesick around the holidays, but this year was worse than usual.

We celebrated Christmas Eve Eve, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Years Eve with friends. Dad was a trooper and tolerated being dragged from one party to the next, quickly making friends with people that even we didn't know. Dad took in the sights, sounds and smells of Bangkok, visiting the Ancient City, JJ's, China Town, Saturday Market in the King's Park, and The Jim Thompson House.

We traveled to Chiang Mai (northern Thailand) and went fishing, saw a very entertaining elephant show, held monkeys and watched a monkey show at the monkey training center, and went zip-lining through the rainforest with the Flight of the Gibbon.

We also traveled to Koh Samet and enjoyed the beach, muddy motorbike rides, good books, fresh coconut smoothies, fresh sea food on the beach (literally on the beach... our flip-flops had to be saved from being swept away be the water forever).

We watched movies (and watched Dad get a good laugh out of the movie Elf, when he goes up the escalator for the first time), played 12 games of cribbage in which Dad trashed talked us (and rightfully so since he won 7 of the 12 games). His laugh, "thinking about which card to throw into the crib song" and whistling crashing airplane sounds somehow made it hard for us stay mad at him for beating us to a pulp (and skunking us several times) though. :)

Dad loved Thai food, especially green curry. Mike and I ate as much non-Thai food before he came, gearing up for 2 weeks of pretty much straight Thai food, but surprisingly found that we didn't get sick of it during his visit. I even found myself eating Thai food over American food for breakfast.
Mike (as he observed me eating rice & green curry for breakfast instead of french toast, waffles, or omelets) said, "You're going all Asian on me!" Probably not, especially after eating muffins for breakfast this morning, but hey, it's progress. :)

I didn't take a ton of pictures because Dad did, but here is a little selection from his visit.

MBK artist

In Chiang Mai with Christmas tree made out of CDs

small market in CM

Khao Soi-- typical northern thai cuisine: curry noodle dish made with chicken (or beef or pork) and served over Chinese Bah-mi flat egg noodles and topped with crispy fried noodles. It's delicious.

Prune brownies, anyone?

**Oops, sorry about seeing my jeans, several times, I thought I had pressed pause during that time, but apparently had not!

Maesa Elephant Camp near Chiang Mai

Monkey Center near Chiang Mai

Fishing in CM

China Town

Koh Samet