36 Weeks (Finally!)

Ok, so we're now at the point where some people say the baby is full term. Thank you, Jesus! And not a moment too soon, as Emily had another doctor's appointment on Monday and she is now dilated to 1 cm. So the process has started (officially, even though it seems to have been going on for seven weeks now!) and we are on our way. Emily has had a little bit of bleeding but nothing too worrisome, it is often a sign of the coming labor. The doctor was not concerned. And as you can see, not much change on the outside!

Noah's room is basically done except for some further organization and we feel ready to bring him home ASAP after the delivery. Our bags are packed and ready to go as well!

We will try to get a quick update on here when Emily goes into labor but that will not be our first priority! Just know that as soon as we can we will post pictures and get a message out about what is going on. Keep praying for us, please! The next couple weeks will be the craziest and best of our lives. What a Merry Christmas this will be!!!

Love you all,

John, Emily, and Noah

35 Weeks

Today (Tuesday) is 35 weeks. We are so close. Yesterday was another doctor's appointment and thankfully still no dilation but the thinning is now to about 75%. So we are getting closer every day. Emily is still planning on laying around until about 36 weeks and then we will let Noah come when he comes! But the doctor was so encouraging and was on board with nearly all of what we were planning for the labor and delivery. That was great and we are looking forward to the process.

I also finished my semester last night with a Hebrew final. God gave me so much grace through this whole thing and there was no way I would have been able to finish it without Him. So that is a relief for a few weeks while Noah comes into the world. I only have 15 hours left and plan to get them done in the next year.

The baby room is nearly done (only the border left) and it is going to be so cool. I will post some pictures (if we get it done before he comes). This picture is what we are planning off of, and it should be close!

I am leading worship and teaching at youth tomorrow night, so once tomorrow is over I will be able to relax a little bit while getting ready for Noah. I love to do what I do with the youth and I am really looking forward to tomorrow night! Pray for me as I teach on one of the harder parables in Matthew 22.

Love you all and the three of us will see you soon!

The Woogie's

Nearly there...

Hey everybody, not much change since last week! Emily went to the doctor again on Monday and still no dilation but her cervix is thinned out to about 50% now. So we are still progressing a little too quickly for comfort, but the doctor is fairly confident that Noah will not come for at least another week or so as long as Emily stays on her back. So at this point we are really not worried about anything but we are getting anxious for Noah to get here! It is amazing to think that we could have a son in the next few weeks. God is so good; may we be good stewards with what He has given us.

After this weekend (hopefully!) we will have Noah's room done so we will post some pics of it. It will be a great room for our little pilot (that's the theme). Thanks so much to everyone who gave us all of our great decor!

Our Young Married's class at church (and many others at church and in our family) has been amazing through these last few weeks by cleaning our house, cooking a ton for us, and helping decorate both Noah's room and for Christmas. We are so blessed to have a 'family' like we do!

We are so close to the end of this it seems surreal (which is actually the beginning, but you know...). We are so excited to share Noah's God-ordained life with you and have you help us raise a godly man who is both a warrior for and a slave to Christ. May God give us the grace and strength to do this.

The Woogie's

32 Weeks (or so...)

So Emily is now at a little over 32 weeks, which is great because we are still progressing along nicely! We went to her doctor again on Friday (Nov. 21) and had a sonogram to make sure everything was okay, which it was. Also, Noah measured out at about 35 weeks (they said he was a little over 5 pounds!). So we still think he will come a little early (like the first of January). We also recorded his heart beat and womb sounds to place inside the teddy bear that I built for Emily and him when we found out it was a boy. The pictures are from 7 weeks and 32 weeks, amazing difference!

Emily’s doctor was not too concerned with the ongoing contractions but did say to stay off of her feet even more so now because her cervix is beginning to thin a little bit due to the pressure of the baby’s head. No dilating yet (thankfully) but the thinning is the preliminary step. So now even minor laundry, dishes, etc., are out of the question for her, and she is only supposed to get up to use the restroom and very few other times. Some of you may have experienced this before and you know that it is not much fun for anyone. We are ready for this baby to be full term now ASAP and move on to the next stage!

Because of this bed rest, Emily wasn’t able to go to the baby shower in Stillwater last weekend so I went alone. It was an amazing blessing to see everyone and to hear their concern for us and to have them provide us with so much great baby stuff! So many family members and Hillcrest people (our church there in Stillwater) came to love on us and we are so grateful. And, as usual, my sister (Lori) and cousin (Sarah) put on an incredible display of décor and creativity. It was so cool! Check out some of their pics through our Facebook pages or at this link.

Today John and some friends will be working on getting the house ready for this baby to come by painting the baby’s room, putting together furniture, cleaning, etc. We seem to have a lot to do yet and it appears that Noah wants to get here quickly, so we better get on it!

Work is still going well for John and he is getting further along in handling his own stuff as they give it to him. Still learning a ton but seeing a little more light in the tunnel now. And his head is clearing up from the concussion a couple weeks ago as well, but still only to about 97%. Keep praying for our health!

We can’t say it enough, you are awesome to us! Such an encouragement, very needed, and so loving. If only we could reciprocate it to each of you! And just thought I'd include a picture of our boys as they prepare for a new addition to our family as well!

John, Emily, and Noah

P.S. Our SS class is having a baby shower for us at our house on December 7^th. We are still registered at Babies R Us and Walmart, along with gift certificates to www.cottonbabies.com for reusable diapers.

30 Week Update

Ok, so it's been another interesting week! The last two weeks have been the most demanding and challenging weeks of our lives, but I guess it's all preparation for the rest of our time with children!

Last Saturday (Nov. 1) I was playing in a flag football game at the seminary when I came down hard after a catch and hit my head on the ground. The "screen flashed" and I went cross-eyed for a few seconds while feeling dazed, but felt okay enough to finish the game. Had a headache the rest of the day but the fun began that night. I woke up at about 3am and felt like I was on a carnival ride spinning so fast, I couldn't even stand to lay down. Woke up again a little later doing the same thing then felt like I was seconds away from throwing up. Laid around all day and felt a little better but all week I have had those dizzy spells at night and just a touch hazy during the day. The doctor on Friday didn't seem worried and this weekend it has been getting slowly better. Please pray for that!

Emily hit 30 weeks on Tuesday (Nov. 4) and has still been having regular contractions. They increase in the evenings but they are not consistent/severe enough to cause concern. Some of them hurt, but she is more frustrated with the fact that she has to lay around all day and feels like she can't prepare herself for the delivery. Everything else seems to be going smoothly with Noah, he is still moving a lot and nothing appears to be progressing too early. Emily actually went to work for four hours on Friday morning (Nov. 7) and did okay but was pretty worn out and had a few abnormal contractions. Please pray for her encouragement, strength, and healing. God is good and we are so blessed to be saved first of all, and also to have the love of friends and family that He has given us.

We are praying for you as well, and we love you. We hope to both make it up to Stillwater this coming weekend for our baby shower up there, but it may just be me. We'll see how Emily feels.

Rough Week

The last week has been an interesting one, to say the least. Emily has been laid up for the week per doctor's orders, and things were going as well as they could considering the circumstances. But Wednesday night she started to have some more intense and quicker contractions that really worried us both because they hurt a lot more than the earlier ones. So at midnight on Wednesday night we headed to our hospital downtown to check things out.

They monitored Emily and Noah for a few hours and ended up giving her a small shot to stop the contractions (made her a little bit loopy!) and a test to see whether the baby might come in the next two weeks, which came back negative. Also, she is not dilated at all and in fact is very far from it, so that's nice. We headed home about 4am and I got about an 2 hours of sleep before heading to work (slept through the alarm and was nearly late!). But Emily has to stay at home for the next few days until her doctor's appointment on Tuesday and just lay around. My mom is coming today (Friday) and staying a couple days to help out and spend some time with us.

Everything is fine, the Lord has provided and is working everything out first for His good and then our best even when it seems wrong to us or not the best way it could be done. I trust His judgment better than my own!

Continue to pray that Emily has the strength for as much of a natural birth as possible and that she is able to do the things she wants to do in the next two months. Early January now seems a long way off but it will be here before we turn around. We love you all and look forward to sharing Noah's life with you!

Prayer

Hey folks,

We had an eventful weekend, if you haven't heard already. Friday evening, Emily was heading east of Dallas with some friends for a girls' weekend when they had to stop quickly on the interstate and were rear-ended by a pickup which pushed them into the pickup in front of them. The truck that hit them was estimated to be going about 25 mph. Thankfully the girls were in a bigger Toyota SUV so they weren't crushed, etc. But they did get jostled pretty severely and they all have sore backs and necks.

But with Emily being pregnant there was an added worry, so her parents (who happened to live only about 10 minutes from the accident) took her to the hospital and I started to drive from Fort Worth (over an hour away). She wasn't feeling anything was wrong but we wanted to be cautious. The ER checked her vitals and an x-ray and she was fine and also checked Noah's heartbeat and it was strong. But they wanted to keep monitoring things to make sure, so they sent us up to labor and delivery for the rest of the time. We spent the night there until noon the next day and they watched her and the baby. She was actually contracting only about two minutes apart but they were not strong. That worried us (obviously) so they gave her a bag of fluids to try and calm the uterus. The contractions slowed but they picked up again every time she got up to go the bathroom. But they kept slowing and they didn't have to give her any medications, which was nice. The on-call OB told us that she wished every one of the babies she works with looked like Noah in the womb. So everything was fine, but Emily was still very sore.

She has been laid up for the last few days as her spine hurts and her uterus is sore from the contractions. She went to work on Monday but probably shouldn't have, and has since (until at least Wednesday) stayed home. It all seems to hurt pretty bad and she has to move very slowly. Please pray that her strength will come back and that she will not have to be bed-bound since she wants to have the baby naturally and this will severely set that back. Again, they both are fine, the baby is strong, but there are just some precarious things we have to deal with right now. We want him to be a full-term baby but two months seems like a long time away right now.

Thank you for your prayers and for the incredible encouragement I received throughout the process. The friends involved in the accident, their spouses, and our families were amazing through it all and have truly showed us what the body of Christ looks like in daily life. We love you all.

In Christ we place our hope and our trust.

The Start of the 3rd Trimester

We have made it to the homestretch and it seems so close now! It is only a few weeks away that we will be able to hold Noah Wesley in our arms and share life with him. A few things have been going on that make it seem so much closer.

We registered for baby stuff at Babies 'R' Us and Wal-Mart, so picking actual stuff out for him made it a little more real. But it was fun and we have been blessed with so much stuff given to us already (things not on our registry that others won't use, etc.). Also, we have planned at least two showers, one being November 15th in Stillwater at Lori's (my sister) house--if you're in town that day, come on by!--and the other for Emily's family at Thanksgiving. So we don't deserve any of the stuff but it will be great just to get to be with everyone!

Also, we had our childbirth preparation class this weekend at our hospital in downtown Fort Worth. To say it was an eye-opening experience is an understatement. I understood that we were going to see some things, but the nurse didn't even warn us beforehand!!! That would have helped a little bit. But the miracle of childbirth is even more real to me now as well as how intense the curse due to the fall in Genesis is!

Thank you for continuing to pray for us. We are so encouraged by you all and love what God is doing with us even here and now. We don't always enjoy being broken but we have a sense of joy through it all as we realize what He is making us into. May He receive the glory for everything that happens in our lives, including the suffering through which we will all proceed. Get ready now because they are coming if they are not already here!

We love each one of you.

John, Emily, and Noah

The One With The Name...

Ok, here goes.

We have told both of our families now, so it is free game for the blog. The name of our baby boy coming in a few months is..................................NOAH WESLEY WOHLGEMUTH.

John's middle name is Wesley and Noah means peace or comfort in Hebrew. We pray that that is true of him! Please pray with us that he becomes a warrior for Christ and is used by God in a mighty way around the world for His Kingdom!

We love you,

John, Emily, and Noah

26 Weeks

Hello,

So Emily had her 26-week doctor's appointment on Tuesday, and everything was fine, plus she measured at 30 WEEKS! Everyone tells her she is bigger than normal, some even saying that she is as big as they were when they went into labor. So as you can see, her belly is stretching nearly beyond its limit!!! She feels like it will pop if she touches it sometimes! Yeah, he's apparently still a very big boy. We will see if the January date holds up or we may have a December baby! By the way, we'll let you all know the little Woogie's name next week...

My job has been an interesting ride so far. They have put me right in the mix on a couple projects, doing things that my limited knowledge of their systems can handle. I have also made my share of copies. Not the most fun thing in the world, but I am getting paid for it all! It seems like it will be a good place to work, and we will always be busy.

We love living where we now live (close to seminary and church) and we are spending more time with our friends finally. Grandpa and Grandma are coming down this weekend as well and we are super excited for that!

God is so good, He continues to give us peace and joy in the midst of uncertain and often difficult times. Jesus is enough and I am realizing that more and more as we go along!!!

We love you all so much.

John and Emily

P.S. We went and saw the movie "Fireproof" last weekend with Kirk Cameron. It was great and I highly recommend it to all of you! (We will use some of it when we do premarital/marriage counseling with couples in the future!) Plus, we plan on seeing the new movie about Billy Graham this weekend called "Billy." Check them out, you won't be disappointed.