Pictures at 32 weeks

October 15th was our 2nd wedding anniversary and I had Jordan take a few pictures of me before we went out to dinner.

Christmas Shopping in October?

Yes, I have to say I went Christmas shopping today. Many of you may start your shopping early every year - I on the other hand do not. Usually my shopping begins after Thanksgiving time so you could say I'm a bit of a procrastinator about it.

Unfortunately, I didn't get quite as much done as I wanted to. It's amazing to me at how quickly I get run down and tired. The muscles on the sides of my stomach have not been happy with me today. It's to the point now that I can barely move without some degree of discomfort. Which of course is completely my own fault for not listening to my body. Oh well. I'm drinking a cup of hot cider now and plan on relaxing the rest of the evening. :)

We have two baby showers coming up this month. Three of my girlfriends, Margaret, Kristine & Amy are hosting one on Sunday the 21st. Two close family friends Ann & Martha are hosting the other one on Saturday the 27th. I am looking forward to both of them as I haven't seen many of the people invited since the beginning of my pregnancy. Sorry guys, no men invited!!

I have to say I am so thankful that the weather has turned cooler. Most of the summer I wasn't pregnant enough to really have the heat bother me too much. Although, I did have a few episodes during the summer when I thought I was going to pass out. This only happened if I was outside in the heat & sun for an extended period of time. Twice it happened when I was out showing houses - how horrible would that have been if I passed out in front of clients!! The other time we were out at Falls Lake. I thought being in the shade would help - and it probably did but we were there for 4-5 hours.

The only downside of the cooler weather is that I have to go buy more maternity clothes. :) Motherhood Maternity has some nice things but they do not carry an extra small which is what I need in their tops. Most of their shirts are designed for women who have gotten wider on top - and I haven't. I've read that the baby can push up on the ribs which pushes them out making mom "thicker" so to speak. That hasn't happened to me yet so most of their tops have this extra material on the sides or in the front that just looks ridiculous.

There are higher end maternity stores that have extra small for tops but they are so expensive!! Maybe I'm cheap but I am certainly not spending over $50 for a maternity shirt that I can only wear for a few months! The best luck that I have had finding maternity clothing is at Super Target in Apex & Kohl's. Their stuff is comfortable & reasonably priced and I don't walk out with clothes that look like I'm wearing a muu-muu! (Please see picture of Homer Simpson to understand what I mean)

We've hit 30 weeks...10 weeks left!

It doesn't seem that I've been pregnant for that long. I can't believe she's going to be here in just 10 weeks (give or take a few).

We are still waiting for her furniture to come in. I am hoping that it will be here at the end of this month. We really haven't been able to do much else to get ready for her. Once her crib & dresser are here we'll be able to start putting things in their place. There really is no point of opening things we have so far until we have some place to put it.

90% of the time I still feel great. Over the past few weeks I've noticed that I tend to get tired more frequently. My back will hurt here and there - but not consistently.

She's still moving around quite a bit. Her movements seem more purposeful and controlled. She likes to stretch out on one side which has half of my stomach protruding out and the other half somewhat flat. That is certainly uncomfortable being a bit lopsided but fun to watch. It seems like she is most active at inopportune times. Like when I'm having my teeth cleaned at the dentist or waiting in the doctor's office. I'm sure no one else notices that my stomach is jumping all around but if I can see it I'm sure they could too if they looked!

The doctors said I would probably gain about 30 pounds based on my height and previous weight. I seem to be right on track with that - if I gain a pound a week for the rest of my pregnancy. Not sure if I will gain that much as my appetite has started to decrease over the last week.

Not until I was pregnant did I realize how big of an issue it is with women about how much weight is okay to gain during pregnancy. Most people tell me I am still pretty small for being 7 months pregnant. Although, I don't think Jordan thinks I'm small at this point. :) I have heard other women criticizing pregnant women who gain more than 20-25 pounds. My thoughts on this are that my doctor doesn't think I'm gaining too much weight for my height and build. I eat relatively healthy :) and exercise a few times a week. I gain what I gain and as long as the baby is healthy and getting what she needs I'm happy. Seems like our society is putting so much pressure on women about their weight - pregnant or not. It's just a number!! The baby is healthy and so am I - so what does it matter what the scale says? Just my two cents. ;)

I had my glucose test last week for gestational diabetes. If the test results came back showing levels too high they would call me to schedule another test. I haven't heard anything so I am assuming all is well. 24 hours before you take the test you are not supposed to have food that has sugar in it. This includes fruit, fruit juice, baked goods etc. I had such a hard time that day! I always eat fruit, yogurt, drink a glass of lemonade, and have 2 bowls of cereal every day. Almost everything I wanted to eat or drink I couldn't! Not even healthy cereal because it has raisins in it!!

Hope everyone had a nice weekend!

I said I wasn't going to....

I've been saying all along that I wasn't going to buy anything for the baby until we have had all of the showers. Well......I broke down last week and bought 4 outfits. I was in Myrtle Beach for a real estate conference and on my way home I stopped at an outlet center. Everything was on sale!! I couldn't resist! I saw this cute little outfit to the left and just had to have it. The material is a soft corduroy and I bought it for when she is 12 months old. The original cost for this outfit was about $30 and I got it for $11!! I did buy three other outfits at a children's store that was going out of business. I think each outfit was about $2 or $3. Click here to see them.

I tried to stay away from pink & purple outfits. We have quite a few of those already. Jordan is afraid that I am going to condition her to like pink. I tried to tell him that she's not going to know what color she is wearing at 3 months old - but he sees all that pink & purple and gets a bit nervous. So for now I will try to buy outfits that are not pink and purple.

For now. :)

83 days left...but who's counting!?

I have my next doctors appointment next week. I have to drink this orange drink and go in so they can test for gestational diabetes. I think after next week I have to start going in every two weeks instead of once a month. Pregnancy is still going smooth. My mid to lower back on the sides of my spine have been bothering me a bit. I have some yoga & pilates stretches that I try to do everyday and that seems to help.

Almost everyone comments on how small I am for being almost 7 months. I've gained 20 pounds, I can't be that small!! Jordan an I were trying to figure out where the weight has gone. We think it's all in my stomach - which probably explains the backaches!

I finally had to take out my navel ring as it was starting to hurt a bit. It was a sad day for me. I've had that piercing for 10 years!! I guess I can always go get it pierced again but I'm not sure I have the courage that I did when I was 19. Although, after child birth I might think getting a piercing is a piece of cake!!

I broke down and had a cleaning service come in a few weeks ago. There were just certain things that I physically couldn't do and the rest of it I was just too tired to get to. Let me tell you, it was the best thing I have done in 7 months!! We are going to have them come in once a month to do a nice deep clean and I'll take care of it the other weeks. The night before I had Jordan help me pick up so they could clean.

His comment, "Why do we have to clean the house for the cleaners to come?" My comment, "Honey, this isn't cleaning, this is called picking up!"

:)

Pregnancy Pictures

I had Jordan take a few pictures of me over the weekend so you can see how pregnant I am. :) These were taken over the weekend of September 8th so I would have been 26 weeks.

The Nursery

We've been working on the nursery for the past week. We've removed all the furniture that was in the bedroom & are working on doing some painting. I painted the trim white & did some touch up paint on the walls. Looks like I am going to have to put a whole coat on the walls as you can see where I touched up compared to the rest of the walls.

So before anyone yells that I shouldn't be painting.....my doctor said it was fine for me to paint as long as I use latex paint (which I am), have the room well ventilated (windows open & fans are on) and take a break if the fumes bother me. The problem with pregnant women & painting used to be that before 1978 paint contained lead - which of course it does not now. :)

I had picked out a crib & dresser that I liked from Target online - they said they didn't have the crib to show in the store. The crib had received great reviews but the dresser not so much. Well our Target in Cary had the crib & dresser set up in the store. I brought Jordan there on Saturday to see if it met his standards. The crib did - the dresser failed miserably. :)

We went to Child's Space to see if they had anything that we liked. We found a set that we liked & that met Jordan's level of quality expectations. Here's the link if you'd like to look at it. We have ordered the crib & dresser that has the hutch on but didn't order the hutch. It looks nice but isn't very practical. She wouldn't be able to reach anything on the shelves until she was 8. So we are looking for a little bookshelf instead. Here's the link if you'd like to see it - we ordered it in the Chestnut color. http://www.babysdream.com/Products/Infinity/

The sales lady also sold me on a mattress. I couldn't resist the sales pitch. I don't know a whole lot about baby mattresses but she told me that foam mattresses are recommended but that they only hold up to 25 pounds. Once the baby reaches 25 pounds you need to buy another mattress. Well, they have a mattress that one side is foam and the other side has springs - so you just flip over the mattress when the baby gets to 25 pounds. The crib converts to a toddler bed then a full sized bed - the mattress will fit the toddler bed as well. Sounds great doesn't it? I thought so too. Well, there's another feature this mattress has. It has a button you can push to have the mattress vibrate for 10 minutes giving the baby the same feeling as riding in a car. Well, isn't that just the best thing you have ever heard of!! Of course the baby will probably hate it and we'll never use it but it's there just in case!

The only downfall to ordering this furniture is that it can take up to 8-12 weeks to come in (Target's was 7 days). My due date is in 14 weeks. :) I had to smother that little nesting voice in my head that was freaking out and remind myself that the baby will not care if her room is set up or not when she comes home. I have also reminded myself that we do have a pack-n-play already so if she comes early we can always have her sleep in that. Crisis resolved.

On our trip to Target I also wanted to get a CD player for the baby's room. I was just going to get a basic little CD player that I could plug head phones into so I could play music for her now - and I figured it would be nice to have it in her room for when she is actually here. I had one all picked out and then Jordan came over. He sees one that you can put an ipod in. Why buy some little piece of junk when we can buy one that has a hook up for an ipod?? I know the baby would have been very disappointed if we didn't get her a CD player that she could hook an ipod up to. So we go to Best Buy and purchase a very nice CD player that you can hook an ipod up to & a remote to control it - tons of bells and whistles. I have to admit it is very nice & as long as she doesn't drop it on the floor at some point & break it - it will be a very nice little player for her in the future.

I have had a few people ask for pictures of pregnant me - I will try to get Jordan to take a few tonight so I can post them for you.

Hope everyone had a nice long weekend!
Stefanie