Bump Update #19

We've got a stubborn one on our hands! She's still way too comfy to even consider coming out.  I have been running a couple of miles a few times a week, in additional to my daily 2 mile walk, since I haven't had to watch my activity level and NOTHING.  Nada.  No contractions, no nothing.  She is one content little girl.  Guess I'm just starting my postpartum recovery early.

How far along: 3rd Trimester

Weight gain: 25-26lbs.  Not really gaining at this point.

Maternity Clothes: Nope

Gender: Girl!

Name: it's a surprise!

Movement: Still all over the place, moving like crazy.  I think she has way too much room left at this point and that's probably part of the problem..

Cravings:  nothing in particular.

Sleep: Up every couple of hours but it doesn't really phase me too much at this point.  I think I've just gotten used to it.  A pillow propping my stomach up is a must (and has been for several weeks now).

# of Days since m/s has hit: The further along I get, the more the nausea has come back.  I am tempted not to fight it and just let it hit...maybe the force would break my water in the process!

What I'm most looking forward to after the baby (besides the obvious): Um, not having people ask me when I'm due and if I've had the baby yet.

Last baby items purchased: a custom Ravens headband for her to wear while cheering on her favorite football team this fall.  :)

Other Craziness:  Well here we are, to a point that it did not seem like we would reach.  I blame all the drugs they pumped me full of to stop the pre-term labor as to why I haven't gone into labor now.  That and this child is STUBBORN.

What to Wear: Back to School Style

I found this link-up via AP and thought it would be fun to participate in.  Especially considering how badly I am dying to drag out all my fall clothes and be able to get them on.  The hips I'm not too worried about...it's the waist line that might create some delays...  Here are some of the outfits I'd be pulling out and wearing from my closet, if I weren't still lugging around a 25 pound basketball on my front.

Back to School by ourlifeaccounts featuring kendra scott earrings

Untitled by ourlifeaccounts featuring vintage style dresses

Untitled by ourlifeaccounts featuring top handle handbags

Untitled by ourlifeaccounts featuring skinny fit jeans

Fall Style by ourlifeaccounts featuring leather tote bags

So what about you? What would you sport for back-to-school night? Link up with I Pick Pretty!

Bump Update #18

The last couple of appointments have not been ideal with my Doctor, I find I come in perfectly relaxed and leave stressed. I am tempted to just stop going and meet up with her in the hospital. This last appointment she had the nerve to say she thought the baby was breech. I think she was smoking something... Yes the baby wasn't as low as she has been the previous week but from the movements I was pretty convinced she was head down (as much as one can be convinced when you have nothing to compare it to) but instead of listening to me, she told me the baby was probably jack-knifed and started talking c-sections. Talk about stressing me out! Anyway, long story short, the Doctor was wrong, the baby is/was head down, is not jack-knifed and we are praying she continues to stay that way.

How far along: 3rd Trimester

Weight gain: 25-26lbs.  Not really gaining at this point.

Maternity Clothes: Nope

Gender: Girl!

Name: it's a surprise!

Movement: Oh yes, her newest trick is to push off as hard as she can off the top of my uterus and headbutt me as low as she can.  One of these days she'll take it too far and break my water in the process.  I am savoring these last few days/weeks/however long she gives me.

Cravings:  nothing in particular.

Sleep: Could be worse, I'm up every couple of hours, sometimes more sometimes less depending on how low she is sitting.

# of Days since m/s has hit: hoping the answer on this one will stay a no until labor hits (at the least)

What I'm most looking forward to after the baby (besides the obvious): Skinny jeans!  All my comfy clothes fitting!  With the cooler fall-like temperatures I am missing my jeans and tees!

Last baby items purchased: Mini Boden from Nordstrom. :)  So delighted that they were happy to price adjust to Boden's pricing but extend their generous return policy.  Now I don't have to worry so much about whether RP will still be fitting in 3-6m or 6-12m for the majority of winter.

Other Craziness:  My co-worker had her baby today and she was due a few days before me.  You'd think that would make it more real but I still can't wrap my brain around the fact that at any point we could be heading to the hospital to have a baby.  A baby!  It still hasn't fully sunk in yet.

Capturing The Moment

The Regeti's did an amazing job, as they always do, capturing some memories of this pregnancy for us.  I was far enough along that hearing them say how small I was and how I had a "celebrity bump" pretty much made them my most favorite people ever.  Flattery at this stage of the pregnancy will get you just about anything you want. :)

 

 

 

Bump Update #17

This last week has been an absolute doozy.  Exhausting and rather frustrating.  None of which had to do with the physical pregnancy per-say but certainly related.  Due to some conflicting policies, I will be loosing 6 weeks of leave that I should have had, making my plan to go back to work after Christmas all but impossible.  I could get over the whole working issue but the childcare is another thing.  The childcare she will have after Christmas is not really an acceptable option to me before the Holidays so...I'm not really sure what we are going to do.  This stuff would have to crop up at the end right?  I guess there has to some stress somewhere.  Regardless, the whole operation-get-this-baby-out kind of has had to become stay-in-there-as-long-as-possible out of necessity now.

 This is what happens when your camera on your phone craps out and only saves one of the six you thought you took.  I was really tempted to not even post a photo this week but this is keeping it real folks.  But, perhaps tomorrow's post with maternity photos will make it up for it?

How far along: 3rd Trimester

Weight gain: 26lbs maybe?  It fluctuates too much these days to know for sure but it shouldn't be more than that.

Maternity Clothes: Nope

Gender: Girl!

Name: it's a surprise!

Movement: She has run out of room to get a good wind-up with her kicks but that hasn't stopped this babe one bit.  She now slides and slithers all over my stomach.  The ripples are crazy looking!  I do love though that I can pick out and feel her limbs, even if it is a bit painful constantly having more organs displaced..

Cravings:  Cold sweet stuff and salads.

Sleep: Up a couple of times a night and it takes me a little while to fall back asleep but other than that, I'm pretty dead to the world.  Sleep isn't exactly restorative at this point though.

# of Days since m/s has hit: hoping the answer on this one will stay a no until labor hits (at the least)

What I'm most looking forward to after the baby (besides the obvious):  Being able to actually curl up on the couch and cuddling.  It will be nice to be bendable again!

Last baby items purchased: Giddy-up & Grow posted some adorable fall baby accessories that totally has me swooning for fall.  This little girly is going to have lots of choices to pick from!

Other Craziness: With every day that she doesn't come, the anticipation ups a bit.  It's Christmas time without a date to pinpoint!  I go back and forth on when I expect her to come.  If you had asked me last night, I would have said she'd be here by the weekend.  But most of the time, I feel that she has finally settled into her groove and is going to take her time.  Frankly, I feel the earliest really will be sometime next week but a lot can change between now and then.  Either way, my body is definitely making progress.

Check back tomorrow to see the maternity shots!

Bump Update #16

My mom heads back out of town tomorrow to road trip with my sister down to her graduate program.  She'll be gone about a week so this child has been told that it needs to stay put another week, however, I'm to the point now where I don't know how upset I'd be if she chose to make an appearance in the interim.  It's a tough call (good thing I don't have to make it) but at this point I have a feeling it's going to be a couple of weeks until she comes.

How far along: 3rd Trimester

Weight gain: not really sure, I think its about 25ish pounds.  My weight is still fluctuating quite rapidly and its been hard to pinpoint down.  Add that to the fact that I don't really feel like I'm getting bigger and I just haven't been getting on the scale as much.

Maternity Clothes: Nope

Gender: Girl!

Name: it's a surprise!

Movement: I think she might actually be running out of room now.  The past couple of days, her movements are even more obvious but she's not quite rolling around as much.  Of course I say this and this morning I had one of the most painful mornings to date, it seriously felt like she was displacing some organs.  She definitely still has some room!

Cravings:  Not much has changed here.  Cold sweet stuff and salads.

Sleep: Eh, my body tends to cramp up pretty bad when I'm lying down now.  Definitely feels like I'm being prepped to be up at night with the baby.

# of Days since m/s has hit: I am thinking she must be in the midst of another growth spurt (is there room at this point!?!?!) because the past day or so I have been hit with this crazy nausea where I need food or I'm going to be sick.  So odd.

What I'm most looking forward to after the baby (besides the obvious):  Fall weather and fall clothes.  So so looking forward to cooler temperatures and an expanded wardrobe.

Last baby items purchased: Grabbed some Aden + Anais swaddling blankets from the Nordstrom anniversary sale.  Can't have too many of those!

Other Craziness:  My body is definitely prepping to get this baby out.  It'll be interesting to see what the Dr. says about my progress at this week's appointment.  The past several days it has felt like my legs are dislocating from my body.  I have to be careful getting up because sometimes they nearly give out.  Plus today the contractions have been crazy intense and started up on my way to work and have going all day vs. the usual mode of kicking in late afternoon. Operation Birth-This-Baby has begun!

I May Just Get There

I am finally starting to feel like, maybe, just maybe, we might be ready before this child actually gets here.  Her decision to kick off the pre-term labor quite early was a huge kick in the rear and its been nose to the grindstone ever since.    My final big push will be deep-cleaning the house over the weekend. 

We've de-cluttered quite a few times but when you're working with a very small space that has a specific spot for everything and then you start bringing in copious amounts of new stuff....packaging, boxes, baby accoutrements...good grief it's easy for it to get out of hand fast.  Seems like every other day I look around something to the affect of "I JUST CLEANED THIS UP".  Clearly it's practice for when she's here. :)

The second biggest contributor to the mess besides all the stuff coming in would have to be the freezer cooking.  Thankfully 99% of what I wanted to get done is done and there are 100+ meals/snacks/breads/sides/desserts beautifully organized and packaged in the deep freeze.  If I get bored, I may add a few more things but we've mostly run out of space (and containers) at this point.  I have a max of about 6-7 small things left I may whip up.  I ordered several cases of containers from Amazon in addition to a case each of freezer ziplocks in various sizes and still fell short!  I had to raid my stash of extra foil pans, pyrex & Tupperware quite a bit in order to finish up.

I am quite excited to have my kitchen back.  It seems like its been a constant rotating pile of clean and dirty dishes (we don't have a dishwasher), crumbs & bags of groceries.  I should probably do a seperate recap post on the freezer cooking but my initial calculations have the costs somewhere in the ball park of $300 to prep about 4 months worth of food.  That was a pleasant surprise!

Once the cleaning is done, Operation Get-This-Baby-Out-As-Soon-As-Is-Good-For-Her is kicking off.  Both Hubs and my places of employments are convinced they still have plenty of time and that she's coming late, basically Ostrich head in the sand.  While this is certainly possible and thus will turn August into the single longest month ever, I have every intention of helping the process along to the best of our abilities. I may get very little say on what day she comes but boy am I going to offer up as much encouragement as I can! 

The anticipation of how all this is going to play out is quite fun.  It's like Christmas!  I'm surprised at the number of people who feel that finding out the gender is the last big surprise because frankly, when she's coming, how she's coming, who she looks like and what kind of personality she has will by far be the biggest surprises for us.

Bump Update #15

Some of my co-workers were kind enough to throw a little shower for me last week.  It was weird seeing some of the people pick their guesses for the babies birth date that are right around the corner.  The anticipation will only build with every day I'm sure.

Also, I'd always heard that people love to give clothes at a shower, but the most popular item by far was towels and washclothes.  This child could have a bath every day for a few weeks and probably still not run out of fresh towels.  Did I miss some new baby trend?

Either way, it was nice to be able to check a few things off the list.  It's been a bit stressful at times trying to purchase all the stuff  this baby needs!

So tempting to cut off my head in this one...I think I was running on about 2 hours of hodge podge sleep.


How far along: 3rd Trimester

Weight gain: 23-24 pounds, though according to my OB its only 20.  I've been keeping my starting estimate conservative but either way its not too bad.  Sure feels like a lot more though since its all out front!

Maternity Clothes: Nope and at this point, I'm seriously doubting that it will happen.  I'll go to work in my pajamas before I spend money on clothes that I might only get to wear for a day.

Gender: Girl!

Name: it's a surprise!

Movement: Still tons.  My Dr. has said for weeks that it would slow down and she wouldn't be able to do somersaults anymore but that is just not the case.  She is extremely active!  The only difference now is that they are stronger. It used to be that when I was standing and moving around she'd be lulled by the movement and hold relatively still but even that has been shelved.  She kicks and jabs and rolls all over the place.  As uncomfortable as it is, the comfort of knowing she's doing ok makes it more than worth it.

Cravings:  Still sweet stuff. Yogurt, fruit juice, Popsicles, ice cream...anything cold and sweet is soothing in this crazy MD heat and humidity.

Sleep: Below average at this point.  She's big enough now that she's got me up every couple of hours.

# of Days since m/s has hit: Not puking but definite stomach churning every day, at this point I feel like everything just kind of sits at the back of my throat anyway.

What I'm most looking forward to after the baby (besides the obvious): Not having my organs be quite so squished. :)

Last baby items purchased: Picked up a baby book for her this week, I had a tough time finding much of anything that I liked and ended up deciding I just needed to bite the bullet and commit.  I actually ordered this one without being able to see what the inside pages look like...I'm hoping it's not a total bust because I highly doubt there will be time to order something else instead.


Other Craziness:We are packed.  The camera batteries are charged, the ipod is loaded with music that hopefully I will find appealing come time for labor and there is just one load of laundry left to do.  Strangely I don't find any of this very comforting as all I can see at this point is the remaining stuff to do.  Maybe once the house is deep cleaned I'll be feeling a bit more relaxed and ready to go!