36 weeks, 2 days

5 more days until Rhina is considered full term. This week she is the size of a Crenshaw Melon.

According to my weekly email from babycenter.com, strange dreams are likely to occur from this point on. From this point on? I've been having pregnancy nightmares for months! The most common is, of course, that my water is breaking or that I'm in labor and something is keeping me from getting to the hospital. What's funny about the water breaking dreams is the water between my legs always feels so real! You know when you were little and you would dream that you were walking into the bathroom, and then sitting on the toilet and going? And then you ALWAYS woke up peeing the bed? The sensation of water between my legs is so real in these dreams I always wake up thinking that my water MUST'VE actually broken. I quickly reach down to feel my pajamas and the sheets and am always shocked when I feel nothing but dryness.
I'm sure these kinds of dreams are to be expected, but some of my other dreams have been extremely scary! Apparently I've even woken up Berto from the panicking in my sleep. He'll shake me and try to wake me up, without much luck, at least that I can remember. The next day, I'll have no memory of him waking me up, just very vivid memories of the horrible dream. Two dreams in particular that stand out and have reoccurred in some form:

-Someone breaks into our house. Berto goes downstairs to investigate and the intruder stabs him with a large steak knife. I go downstairs and pull the knife out of Berto's back and stab the intruder. The intruder's wife/girlfriend (apparently they are some kind of Jack & Jill robbery team) then shows up with another knife and stabs me directly in the stomach! I'm horrified but slowly realize that I don't feel any pain from the knife. Maybe everything will be ok, I think. As if reading my mind, Jill smirks and says, "you know when it doesn't hurt, it's because the baby's already dead." Then I wake up.

-Berto & I are on a hike somewhere in the desert when a snake comes from out of nowhere and bites the top of my hand. And when I say out of nowhere, I really mean it. I have no visual of the snake crossing our path, or me seeing or approaching it. It's just suddenly attached to the top of my hand, and Berto & I know without a doubt that it's venom is deadly. I take my other hand and rip the snake's fanged grip out of my skin by the back of it's head. Immediately some sort of emergency response and park ranger team is on the scene and examining my hand. They say "We could give you an antidote to save your life, but it will definitely kill your baby. So what'll it be?" spoken as casually as if I'm about to place my order in at a drive thru window. The end.

Terrible, I know. I wish there were something I could do or some way to not remember these horrible dreams. Just another reason I would LOVE it if Rhina could make her debut sooner rather than later! Why couldn't I just have amazing sex dreams like so many other pregnant women?

Hawaiian Winter Rhina

This weekend was the last of our baby showers. Yes, we had 3, though one was a surprise to me. Baby Rhina certainly is loved!
My aunts/cousins/friends threw this shower for me at my cousin Louisa's beautiful home in Oak Park. The best part of the shower was spending the weekend with all of my family members who came from all around the country to be together this weekend! My mom and sister flew in from California, my aunt Laurie from Florida, and my aunt Jennifer took the train from Phoenix. It's always a good time when my mom and her four sisters, "The Wiebers Girls", get together. Living all across the country, they are always so very happy to spend time together. Our family is dominated by women, both in numbers and personality. And now that all 8 daughters of "The Wiebers Girls" are "grown up", we make for quite a congregation; each of us stubborn and unusual in our sense of humor, among other similarities.
For example, I'm not sure everyone at the shower quite understood or appreciated our Hawaiian Winter Salad recipe. My aunt Amy found a recipe in an old Lutheran cookbook for the most vomit-inducing jello salad recipe you could ever imagine. The ingredient include:
Lime Jello
Tart Apples
Canned Pineapple with Juice
Radishes
Green Olives
Green Onions
Avocado
Celery
Garnished with Sour Cream and Green Peppers
What?! Have you ever read a more foul listing of ingredients that just do NOT belong together? Well, neither had Amy, so she promptly cut the recipe out of the cookbook, framed it, and hung it on her kitchen wall for all to read, laugh, and be appalled by. And appalled we were this weekend as we all of us ladies gathered at her home on Saturday afternoon/evening to eat pizza, watch movies, and catch up. My sister was especially intrigued by the recipe and it was decided the next morning at brunch, a mere hour before the start of the baby shower, that we needed to make the Hawaiian Winter Salad to add to the shower menu! I'm still not sure if Berto really understands why it was necessary that we rush to Jewel and spend $26 to make the world's most repulsive jello salad, but he went along with it. My kitchen was a frenzy for 20 minutes as we quickly boiled water and chopped ingredients.
I guess to really understand you need to know a bit more about my aunt Amy. She is the youngest of "The Wiebers Girls" and was, of course, brutally picked on as a child. During road trips, my mom and other 2 aunts would point out the most run down, trashy house, shed, barn, or any other free standing structure that they could spot out of the car window and shout "There's Amy's house!!" until Amy cracked and broke down crying. Today, maybe or maybe not because of the taunting, Amy lives in the most beautiful and tastefully decorated home in Highland Park (in my opinion of course). It is upscale without being ostentatious, chock full of vintage pieces and antiques without trying too hard, equipped with every modern convenience but full of country charm. She loves to shop, decorate, and entertain. The only thing more perfect than her home or more fun for her to do (other than perhaps to hold infants), is to plan the perfect table display. No one can coordinate table linens, candles, and china or make a homemade floral arrangement or seasonal centerpiece like my aunt Amy.
So to see my aunt's face as we presented the Hawaiian Winter Salad, instantly destroying her perfect "Christmas Tea" themed shower table while simultaneously bringing the horrid recipe from her kitchen wall to life, was priceless.

We never did get the jello to set correctly with all the ingredients, but we didn't care because we never dreamed anyone would actually dare to try this mess. We did have a couple takers in my friend Tanna and Berto. Everyone got a good laugh when Berto ate a couple bites, declared it "not bad" and continued eating! Not that I should be surprised by his rhino diet taste buds by now!

I'm so thankful for all of my friends and family for being so outrageously generous and supportive during this exciting time! 5.5 weeks to go! Hopefully a bit less than that, but I am trying to come to terms with the fact that everything is on her schedule from now on!

Berto with "The Wiebers Girls", and Rhina

In our holiday coordinates

Some of the family at the shower

A Couple Pics from the Hyatt Shower