"By far the most common craving of a pregnant woman is to not be pregnant" -Phyllis Diller

And BOY OH BOY is this Mommy craving that!!!!

Here's some couple days shy of 38 weeks pics...

I think this shot is hilarious, it looks like a basketball.

I think it's the angle of the photo...or maybe I'm having a basketball, who knows!

I had contractions Saturday night for 2.5 hours... nice good hard contractions, then BAM they stopped magically. They were just long enough to think "YES! Tonight's the night, finally our little boy is coming". Then panic set in when I realized all of the things that were beyond not ready for him to come home to. That's not the good part of the story though, it wasn't until we got to church that morning that we learned why my contractions stopped suddenly. Let me explain....

Yesterday was the first Sunday service of our new church!!! Ryan and I will be teaching the Holy Sprouts class (3-7 yrs) starting in February but this particular Sunday we were helping the children's ministry class leader out by teaching the Awesome Blossoms (7-12 yrs) while they find a permanent teacher for them. Everyone has been EXTREMELY concerned that I was going to go into labor and there would be no teacher for the Awesome's class on the very first Sunday service we held.

So, back to the contractions... I woke up from a dead sleep a little before 2:00am with a VERY strong contraction. I thought it was just a bad braxton hicks ctx, so I got up to use the bathroom (usually moving stops BH contractions), I laid back down and a few minutes later, another really strong contraction. So I asked Ryan for his cell phone so I could time them (the clock is on his side of the bed so this was easier). For 2.5 hours I continued to have these same very strong contractions every 6 minutes until almost 4:30 when they just stopped. Didn't slow down, just completely vanished.

Flash forward to Sunday morning... Ryan & I were running a few minutes behind to set up our classroom. We walked in the door for church and Jennifer (the class leader) says "I'm so glad to see you!!! We were really worried you were having the baby." I laughed and told her about the contractions. With an almost shocked/stunned looked on her face she says "I woke up last night at 4:00am and decided to say a quick prayer that everything would go smoothly. In my prayer I asked God to please not let Dare have the baby."

So do the math here... ctx begin at 2:00ish, Jennifer wakes and prays at 4:00ish, ctx STOP at almost 4:30ish.

The odd thing about this, I didn't give Jennifer a timeline when I was telling her about the contractions... all I said was that I was having contractions last night for over 2 hours that were 6 minutes apart but then they just randomly stopped. She told ME she woke up and prayed at 4:00 and my mouth just dropped. Then I think muttered something along the lines of "YOU STOPPED MY LABOR!!!!"

Coincidence or the power of prayer???? What do you think?