30 weeks

This week marks the first time I felt the baby have the hiccups.  This is much later than when I felt it with Dexter but maybe this baby doesn't get hiccups much?  It sure seems like s/he does.  Now that I have felt it once, I have been feeling it quite often.  I think it is the sweetest little feeling.  I picture my sweet, sweet baby shaking with the hiccups.  Cute!

This week also marks the first time I have had contractions and not be in labor.  On Sunday night around 8 they started to come one.  Not super painful at all but definitely more than period cramps.  They were fairly consistent and lasted a couple of hours.  After reading a bit on the internet, I chugged some water (which I do not drink enough of) and watched part of a movie while laying on my left side.  They subsided after I did that.  I had a few braxton's with Dex but this was the first I've had contractions with no labor.  Thank goodness I didn't go into labor!  That would have been terrifying having the baby so early.

I was supposed to have my doc appt next Friday (we decided to go every 3 weeks since my pregnancies are so easy and uncomplicated) but this whole "3 weeks ahead, maybe move up due date" thing is driving me insane.  I need to know what's going on so I moved the appt up to this Friday.  I am fairly positive he will keep my due date the same and just expect baby a bit earlier but I'd like to know.  We are on a tight budget time-wise as it is...  a couple weeks is a couple weeks.

I have mighty big plans for this weekend.  I am finishing the nursery on Friday (first coat tomorrow, second coat Friday) and over my splendid 4 day weekend, I am sanding and painting the dresser and the changing table for baby.  Max has also finished trimming up the office so we can FINALLY move the computers out of the "new" daycare room.  I'm being a bit of an overachiever in thinking about painting the office as well.  It really needs it and it would be so handy to do it while all the furniture is out of there.  We'll have to see about that one though.  I also want to finish up some sewing projects and get the mobile made.  How I will do all of this with a toddler running around?  I have no idea, but I will do the best I can! 

Ugh... as a side note, my weekly pictures are making me really think about a haircut.  Man oh man is my hair fugly.  I'm terrified to cut bangs though and then hate them.  But sheesh, I need to do something!

Song of the Day

Oh yes, I do enjoy classical music. 

I  downloaded this song off Amazon today and have listened to it about 200 times.  Alright, that is an exaggeration but quite a few times.  I absolutely love it. 

The Heart Asks Pleasure First/The Promise performed by Michael Nyman.  It is from The Piano soundtrack.

A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick

 

 A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick

Summary: Ralph Truitt, a wealth older man who is lonely and troubled by his past puts an ad in the paper for a bride. Catherine Land is soon sent for to come to the harsh land of Wisconsin to meet and marry Ralph. Ralph is soon transfixed and in love with Catherine but does not know she has a secret. Ralph sends Catherine on a journey to help him bring back his long lost son and that decision will change everything.
Readability: Fairly easy. It did get a bit slow but the language was not difficult and it was not difficult to follow along.

Rating: I would say 5 out of 10. Not something I will probably read again. The author tended to drone on and on. It made me feel anxious to get to the next part just because I was bored which I did do a couple of times. I hate to stop a book in the middle though so I kept on reading.

Recommend: No, I would say not. Unless boring is your thing.

29 weeks

Sorry folks, this was a boring week.  Baby is growing like a weed and is very active even for the limited space s/he is in.  Poor babe is getting less and less space every day!  Lots of rolling around and sticking his/her butt up in the air.  It amuses me to see a big bum in my tummy that I know is the baby’s butt sticking up. 

My right ribs are still a fan favorite in there.  Sometimes s/he gets them so hard it really hurts!  Some things are just not meant to be kicks.  

Baby has dropped down even further.  I feel like if s/he goes down anymore it will be time to come out.  The pressure on my pelvis gets extreme when I walk a lot or sit for too long.  Again, this is much earlier than when I was pregnant with Dexter.  Everything about this pregnancy though is much earlier than it was with Dexter.

I have the second coat of paint up in the nursery so once I get my Mom to come over we can start measuring for the stripes!  I’m very excited for that.  AND I actually got Max to agree to carpet now!  My babies won’t have plank/plywood floors!  Yay!  I hate those floors.  Not only are the unattractive in every way but they aren’t child friendly.  Dexter will be in a big boy bed soon and I don’t want him to be playing on floors like that.  Plus it will make daycare parents feel better too since the kiddos will be napping upstairs. 

I started doing some baby prep stuff last night.  This baby will be hitting solids around November/December and yummy fruit is not on sale at that time so I am going to start buying this summer and freezing it so when it comes time to whip up baby food, I am prepared and have good stuff for baby.  I bought tons of strawberries since they were on sale and yesterday I got them ready to freeze.  They should be all ready by now.  I also started cutting up the fabric for nursing pads.  Man alive, my hands were cramping up after cutting up all those circles.  I need to wash my cotton batting and then I can start piecing them together.  I will start cutting up the wipes this weekend too if I find time.  Those I can start using now if I wanted but I think I will wait until the baby comes.

I went through and found all the cloth diapers we have so far for the baby.  While we have a lot, we still need quite a few so I will be searching the sales online.  I think we need a minimum of 10 more diapers.  I would feel more comfortable with 15 more but we will see.  I don’t mind buying secondhand as long as I know they are in good condition. 

As far as I’m concerned, based on my current due date of August 1, I am planning on 9 weeks until baby!  Based on my size though, I’m planning on less than 8 weeks!  Baby will be here so quickly… I can’t wait to see my little lovebug and see who has been causing such havoc in there!

Nothing Better!

Look what a happy face I got to wake up to :)  There is just nothing better than being a Momma!

Happy Mothers Day!

28 weeks

We are officially in the third trimester!  Every week I say the same thing but time whishes by like the springtime wind.  Before I know it, baby will be here and I will finally know who is in there!

Baby and I have had a very good week.  My back hasn't been bothering me at all and while I'm still not interested in food other than breakfast foods, I don't have a problem eating what's put in front of me.  My bump is an excellent resting place for my poor teething toddler who needs comfort from Momma quite frequently.  I think I will miss having that extra support to hold Dex since he's such a hefty fellow.

Baby's favorite place to kick has shifted from my bladder to the ribs on my right side.  S/he is continually kicking/rubbing his/her butt against them.  It doesn't feel good I can tell you that.  I don't like to say it hurts, makes me feel like a wuss but dang, that baby is strong!  Too bad s/he couldn't at least trade off sides so my right side gets a break. 

I had my 28 week appt yesterday.  I got that nasty glucose test done.  That orange sugar concoction tasted exactly as I remembered.  It's not as horrible as one would imagine but definitely not pleasant.  I decided with Dexter and stayed the same with this one that chugging is the just the best route to go.  My appt went well.  Baby's heart rate was at 131.  I am having no problems.  I feel a lot more pressure on my pelvis than I did with Dexter but I'm carrying this baby lower than I did with Dexter.  I've had a few braxtons I think but not very many and the doc didn't seem worried about it.  We did have a slight surprise in that when he went to measure me (for the first time since the ultrasound where I was measuring 9 days ahead) we discovered that I am now measuring 3 weeks ahead.  He seemed a bit surprised but assured me there was only one in there.  Since we had to guess on the due date for this little one he said we probably guessed wrong.  If I measure that large at my next appt then we will do another ultrasound and re-determine the due date.  Hopefully it's not gestational diabetes since I know that produces large babies.  I do NOT want to attempt that diet they make you go on.

Either way Max and I have decided that our very small time crunch has now gotten smaller so all this stuff we still have on our list needs to be done even quicker.  Yikes!  We are still installing trim, need to figure out carpet, need to figure out either a bed/crib for Dex or baby, prep for daycare, organize all the clothes and have newborn boy & girl washed and available, prep all the diapers (and buy more diapers), and the list goes on and on.  Yeeowzers!

Just call me Martha

Max's family likes to call you a Martha (or Martin) if you are doing something particularly crafty or fancy in the kitchen.  Hence, just call me Martha :)  I have been doing my best to make things myself for this coming baby and I do have to say I really enjoy this crafty business!  I didn't take any play-by-play photos while I was making any of this... sorry, but I can show you the finished product!  My Ass Bank friend Erin was kind enough to help me through the beginning stages of figuring out my dang sewing machine and reading the patterns.

Most of my projects I found on pinterest.  You just have to love that site right!  So many ideas and DIY tutorials on there!

Here is my new hooter hider for nursing.  I can't seem to find the blog where I found the tutorial for this but it was very easy.  I adjusted the pattern a little bit to suit myself... I have two layers of fabric instead of one and I don't like having the boning in my hooter hiders so I left that out was well.  The blue with the flowers is the outside, the light blue with the polka dots is the inside.  It's nice and big so when baby is moving all around under there, there is no risk of a nip slip.  If you've used one of these before you know what I'm talking about.

Next on the list was a carseat canopy.  I know you can find these cheap enough online but it's so nice to be able to pick out your own fabric and customize it to what you like!  Here is the site we used for the tutorial.  Isn't it beautiful!?  I just LOVE it.  I have only gotten to test it on Angel's carseat since Caitlin still has mine but it looks like it will work great :)  The brown polka dot material that makes the straps is also the backside.  No bright sun in this baby's face!

Next up, burp cloths.  Now I hated those little ones you'd get at the store.  Seems like after one time at the boob and the stupid cloth would be soaking wet.  Dumb.  I found the tutorial for these here.  These were honestly the easiest things ever to make.  Someone who knew the basics of working a sewing machine could do these.  It's just a Gerber cloth diaper on one side and flannel on the other.  Takes less than 10 minutes to whip one of these bad boys up.  My package of diapers came in 10 so I now have 10 top of the line (and super cute!) burp cloths for cleaning up after feedings.

Here is the diaper side.  

Another pinterest find :)  I know we won't stay at this house forever so this seemed like a great thing to make to keep for the kids growth chart.  We haven't been able to hang it up yet since we are doing all these home improvements and I don't know what's going where yet but I can't wait until we can hang it up!  Again, tutorial here.

I didn't get this last one off any tutorial.  I start crocheting this blanket for my baby and I had no idea what I was doing.  I just made squares and crocheted them together.  The result was cute, but an obvious newby had one it.  I put the circles on there to hide the corners.  They didn't look so good!  I really like how it turned out though and I love that I made this blanket for my little bug.  Crocheting takes so much more time than whipping up a blanket with the sewing machine.  This blanket was definitely made with a lot of love.

My squares were made up with a single crochet and the border I did in a treble crochet.  This was all super easy to do.

For the circles I just chained 3 and started a circle.  Followed that around until I had the circle as big as I wanted.

I still have some projects that I want to get done before baby.  Erin and I are going to have another sewing day to whip up some boppy covers (here), and I found this playmat that would be great as well (here).   I have been using cloth wipes on Dexter since we started using the cloth diapers but with baby's appearance, I think I'm going to actually make some nice ones.  I found this tutorial last night which I think I will follow.  I also plan on making some nursing pads instead of buying so many this time.  They seem super easy to make and you can just toss them in with the towels for washing. 

I think I'm getting a bit ambitious with all the projects I want to get done since I have so many other things going on with the house and the daycare prep.  I will find time though.  Who needs sleep, right?

Video of the Day

I know this video is super "old" but it still cracks me up :)

27 weeks

This previous week and the next couple weeks have been very busy for us.  We are in full out home improvement mode/daycare prep mode/baby prep mode.  Never has time moved as quickly as it is right now and IF this baby follows in Dexter's footsteps in coming at 38 weeks, that only give us 11 weeks to finish up what we need to get done.  And there is A LOT to get done folks.  Max has been working around the clock to get things done, I have been busy tending to Dexter and doing projects after bedtime.  I don't think Max and I have gone to bed before 1030 in a while.  We. Are. TIRED.  I look very tired in this weeks photo. Or maybe because I am so tired I just think I look tired?  I know I have bags under my eyes but this bad boy is photoshopped so I can pretend I look fabulous when I look back on these photos. 

Baby is doing well and growing like a weed.  I think something hormonal is developing in there because the nice "glowing" pregnant skin that I had last week has turned into 14 year old puberty stricken teenage boy skin.  It is not good.  I am trying to just keep my head up and know that it is all pregnancy related but your self confidence can only take so much!  Hopefully whatever is going on in there is just about done so my skin has some time to calm down.  Good thing my hubby loves me no matter what!

I'm confused as to when the 3rd trimester starts.  I've heard 26 weeks, 27 weeks and 28 weeks.  To be safe, I will wait until 28 weeks to consider myself in the third trimester.  Not that I care much... Dexter's 3rd trimester wasn't bad at all.  You just blow up like a German sausage is all and with this baby being in summer, I should expect wayyyyy worse.  I can tell my feet and legs are starting to swell up a little bit already.  Almost time for Max to start rubbing my feet again :)  Haha.

I can't wait for my appt next week to see how I am measuring.  Just today I got a weird look and was told "Are you sure there is only one in there?  Are you sure they have your due date right?".  At your 28 week appt they start measuring so we'll see if baby is still measuring 9 days ahead.  Or more.  I hope they move up my due date. 

Bug has been moving around a lot in there.  I wish I could see sometimes what s/he is doing.  Sometimes I just can't pinpoint what the devil is going on in there!  Some sort of crazy dancing.  From the way it feels it seems like limbs are flying everywhere while baby is head banging or something.  I think we are going to have a crazy baby on our hands!  As long as baby is even tempered.  His/her brother has a temper big enough for two kiddos.

I got the nursery all primed.  I was planning on painting the main coat last night but Max's dad came over to help him with trim and by the time bedtime and after bedtime chores were done, it was after 9 and I wasn't about to start painting at 9pm.  Tonight will be another late night.  I don't think I will be able to paint tonight either.  Maybe I can on Friday.  I'd like to try and get the nursery finished painted by the end of the weekend.  I'm planning on some stripes on the walls so I know measuring will take up a good amount of time.  I need to have two of me... or work part time.  Or not require sleep.  Something!