Baby Update

Well, our baby decided not to be a part of the 5% of babies that come on their actual due date! So we had our regularly scheduled weekly appointment today. We did another non-stress test today and it went similarly to last week. For the first 20 mins, she was sleeping and didn’t move at all. But after some prodding and pushing on my stomach by the doctor, she woke up and they were able to record her movements and heart rate. And it seems that she is still doing ok in there.

Then we went down to see Dr. Huang. She checked the baby on the ultrasound and said her guess is that the baby is weighing in around 8 lbs. But for the entire pregnancy, the baby has measured one week farther along than her gestational age, so we could’ve been a little off on the due date. Because of that, the dr would like to induce this Wed. So at 9 am, we’ll go in to the Labor and Delivery floor and they’ll give me a shot of pitocin to induce labor and we’ll see what happens. If I haven’t made any progress and there’s still no baby on Friday she’ll likely want to perform a cesarean. So we’re praying that the pitocin will be just enough to kick start labor so we’re not just waiting around for three days at the hospital with nothing happening and then have to have a c-section.

We’ll try to keep you updated from the hospital as best we can. We’re told that the 8th floor (where we’ll be after the baby is born) has wi-fi. But we tried it today from the 7th floor (the labor and delivery floor) and didn’t have any luck. So we’ll do our best!

Due-Date Eve...

it's the night before our due date and it's really got me reflecting on the past 9 months. if you've been around me much at all (especially if your my poor husband) you know that the last 40 weeks have not been easy on me. i always thought that being pregnant would be this magical time of awe and wonder, a time when life was at it's grandest and you felt like you were walking on top of the clouds. and please, don't hear my wrong, i do believe that this is a time of awe and wonder--a tiny human being has formed and grown inside me. when i think of this i can't help but KNOW that there is a Divine Creator who put this all in motion. and in those moments i couldn't be happier that i'm pregnant. and while it is a true miracle from God, it doesn't mean that my body has loved every minute of the past 280 days. but tonight, i started thinking about things i would miss about being pregnant. before i get to that list, let me just share a few of the things i won't miss...

• frequently visiting the toilet (sitting ON it or hovering OVER it)
• people not making eye contact with me, just staring at my middle
• leaving trash, crumbs, or even important objects i need on the floor when i drop them, b/c i can't bend over to get them
• not being able to shave my legs
• riding the "once you get on you can never get off" emotional roller coaster
• waddling slowly behind friends as they walk at a normal pace
• cankles

i realized those are silly and trivial, but all things i won't miss about being pregnant. here's the good list... things i'll miss about pregnancy...

• not feeling guilty about taking a nap (in the morning and afternoon!)
• stretchy elastic-waist pants without zippers
• watching my stomach dance around with the movements of our baby girl
• not feeling like i have to "suck it in" all the time
• dreaming about what she'll look like, wondering who's eyes, mouth, nose... she'll have
• feeling her many bouts of hiccups
• experiencing the outpour of love from our friends and family making sure we have everything she needs
• knowing that a miracle is happening INSIDE of me

those are my random thoughts on our due-date eve. i will be happy to not to experience the things on my first list, but it makes me even happier knowing that soon we will be holding our special baby girl in our arms.

baby hampton update

Well we’ve made it to 39 weeks! We went in today for our appt with Dr Huang. She first had us go up to the Labor and Delivery floor for a fetal non-stress test. It took about 30 mins and they measure the baby’s heart rate and movements and also for contractions. I was nervous in the beginning that they would make us come back and do it again, b/c she just wasn’t moving. This was right after lunch and Lance thought maybe the warm potato soup I had for lunch just made her really sleepy. :) But during the last half of the test, she really started to perk up with lots of big movements and with each movement her heart rate jump up and then come back down (which is what they hope to see). So she passed with flying colors. And in the last few minutes of the test, I also had good sized contraction.

During the test they put us in the labor room, and behind the next curtain over, a lady was in labor with contractions coming pretty quickly. I’m not sure how long she’d been there, but we’d only been there about 5 mins before she had had enough, saying “I can’t take it anymore!” and was begging for the drugs. Lance silently chuckled, but I did none of that—I know it will be my turn soon. :)

Then we went down for our scheduled appt with Dr Huang. She was pleased with the results of the NST and wanted to check the baby on the ultrasound. She said the baby had dropped down a lot since last week, so much so that it was difficult for her to get a head measurement (which helps her determine size and weight). She thought the baby was around 7.7 lbs, but it’s anyone’s guess at this point. And there was a little bit of good news about her position. She’s made a slight turn and is looking more towards my side, so the Dr encouraged me to lay on my right side as much as I can to help her make the turn the rest of the way.

Sunday is the due date and while I pray my baby is a good girl and arrives on her due date, I know that only 5% of all babies actually arrive on their due date. :) So, the Dr said if she doesn’t see me earlier, then I need to come in next Monday and we can make a plan of where to go from there. But she was thinking if we didn’t have the baby by Monday, we could induce Tues or Wed. Keep praying that the baby fully turns over and looks toward my spine. You can also pray for my mom who leaves Wed at 6 am and arrives in Taiwan Thurs pm (Thurs am IL time).

That’s what we know for now! We’ll definitely keep you posted! Thanks for praying!

a waiting game

one thing i've realized is that the entire 9 months of pregnancy is a waiting game. we had to wait to hear the heartbeat for the first time, see the first sonogram picture, find out the sex of the baby, and now we wait for the baby to decide to make her appearance. honestly, it's quite maddening to me. i like to make plans. i don't really like to fly by the seat of my pants. i'm not very spontaneous. but there's no making plans for delivery. we just have to wait on her. and something i've learned over the past 9 months is i'm not a very good wait-er. i'm praying that i can be patient over the next few weeks and enjoy the home stretch. (as much as you can enjoy the last weeks of pregnancy!)

Global Rest Retreat

We recently had the opportunity to attend a Global Rest retreat with some fellow Team Expansion coworkers in Kenting, Taiwan. Kenting is a beach town on the southern coast. Originally the plan was for us all to rent a charter bus, but in the end a few families couldn't come and it didn't seem worth the cost to go that route.So it was every man for himself to make the trip down (about 4 hours from Taichung). When we realizedthis, we knew it was time to step up our car search. Thankfully the week before the retreat we were able to purchase a new (to us) car. It ran very well and was very comfortable. We were so excited to be able to take this first road trip in our new car.

We were blessed in a variety of ways on this trip. One of the ways was our hotel. Usually these kinds of retreats are spent at hostels or retreat centers, but because of some special connections, we were able to have the retreat at the Howard Beach Resort. It was a nice change from the hotels we're used to staying at! :) Our room was huge and had a decent view of the ocean. It was a very comfortable place to spend the week.

The Howard Beach Resort

The view from our hotel room

We were also blessed by the team who came from the States to lead us. Every morning we were led in worship (in English!), and heard the Word (in English!). This was a highlight to us. Being "newbies" still in Chinese, we crave for times of being fed and worshiping in English. We do participate in our weekend Chinese services, but there is something quite special about worshiping in your mother tongue.

This week away (just a short time before the birth of our first child) was also a blessing to our marriage. We were able to have some long talks and share some hopes and dreams with each other, that sometimes aren't always possible with the day to day life routines. We also had the chance to play a lot of cards with each other on rainy afternoons and play games with friends in the evenings.

I (Kimberly) was especially excited about the retreat b/c I absolutely love the beach. I love the sights, sounds, and smells. Unfortunately it rained nearly every day! I did get to the pool on the first day, but it was quite windy and cloudy that day. On the last day of the retreat, Lance and I walked down to the beach, but didn't even bother with our beach gear b/c we knew the rain wasn't going to hold off much longer. But it was nice to spend an hour walking and sitting along the shore--even if it was cloudy and overcast.

On the last day of the retreat, the teams from the US shared some incredible news with us. They had raised extra money for the retreat, and it ended up being enough to cover the cost of the hotel! We didn't have to pay for any of our lodging! What a blessing this was to each of us! In fact, the only things we had to pay for during the week was our gas down and back and our evening meals. This was such wonderful news! Thanks Global Rest for a great week of rest and refreshment!

we bought a car!

when lance and i moved to taiwan we got rid of our cars. we'd each had our own cars since we were 16 years old. so it was really weird to move to taiwan and not have a car. when we arrived here we got scooters. boy, was that an adventure! traffic here is not quite like american traffic. there are lots of cars and even more scooters on the road. fact: there are more than 10 million scooters on the roads of taiwan. this tiny island has the record for the largest per capita scooter ownership in the world! that's a lot of scooters!

it took me about 4 months before i was ready to brave the hectic streets, but lance quickly jumped in with both feet! for the past 2+ years we have managed to travel the streets safely on our scooter. but with a baby on the way, we felt it was time to make a change in our mode of transportation. (altho you can see many taiwanese families all piled onto one scooter. it's quite a sight to see mom, dad, and 2 kids on a scooter!)

we started raising support in mid july by sending out letters to our individual supporters and churches. at our last report from our forwarding agent, we had $2,300! we are so blessed with such generous friends and family. at the beginning of september, we realized the birth of our baby was only a short few months away and we really needed to start car shopping.

first we talked about what we were looking for in a car: no more than 10 years old, no more than 70,000 miles, mid-sized (not too small, but not too big to fit easily into taiwan's small parking spaces) not pink (you wouldn't believe all the little pink cars here!), and around $3,000. we had planned that we would take whatever extra money we needed to purchase a car from our general team expansion fund.

it wasn't easy finding the right car for our family. we started our search with our friends Teacher Jang and her husband Peter. they gave us some websites that used car dealers use to advertise their cars. but we quickly learned the cars on the website were never at the dealerships. so Teacher Jang and Peter took us around to look at several places. in the end, the car we thought best suited our needs was the very first car they took us to look at. after a few trips to look at it, test drive it, talk about our budget, we finally purchased it!

it ended up costing us $3,400, but we just couldn't give up such a great car. it's a 2000 silver ford tierra with only around 40,000 miles. the previous owners didn't drive it very much because they often took their scooters to work. plus, it had been very well maintained so it was in great condition. we really believe this will be a great car for our family to safely travel the streets of taiwan! we can't wait to pick it up on tuesday!

thank you so much to everyone who helped us buy this car. without our wonderful churches and individual supporters, it wouldn't have been possible! (by the way, if you had been planning to give towards this need but hadn't yet, you can still send a check to our forwarding agent with "car fund" in the memo line.) praise God from whom ALL blessings flow!

typhoon fanapi

this has been a strange typhoon season here in taiwan. the season usually runs from april-october, and on average we see around 3-4 typhoons during that time. but we have yet to really have one hit this year. a couple of weeks ago there were a couple typhoons out in nearby waters, but we didn't get hit too hard. maybe we're getting a break from the terrible typhoon that hit last aug on chinese fathers day (8/8), typhoon morakot. this was the deadliest typhoon to ever hit taiwan, wiping out total villages and killing over 450 people.

but it seems like typhoon fanapi will be making a direct hit on the island this weekend. here's a clip from a local paper:

Typhoon Fanapi is picking up strength as it approaches Taiwan. The Central Weather Bureau said it could issue a sea warning as early as Friday night. Right now the typhoon has a radius of 180km. It was upgraded from a tropical storm into a typhoon on Thursday night.

At the time of broadcast, Fanapi was approaching eastern Taiwan on Friday night. The outer circle of the storm could affect northern, northeastern and eastern Taiwan starting on Saturday.

The bureau said it may issue a land warning as early as Saturday afternoon. Meteorologists say Taiwan may feel the brunt of the typhoon on Sunday and Monday.

Meanwhile, President Ma Ying-jeou said on Friday that he has asked all related government departments to be on call as the typhoon approaches. Some 600 soldiers have also been put on 24-hour alert as of Friday in preparation for typhoon.

we are really thankful to be here in taichung (the west central part of taiwan). most every typhoon makes landfall on the east coast and we have some mountain ranges in the middle of the island that work to protect us. typically in taichung we see lots of rainfall and some wind, but not usually enough to do significant damage. but we do have friends and co-workers on the east coast, so please be lifting them up in prayer.

we'll be sure to keep you posted!