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  • Bloggity Blog Blog

    Another thirty-something mama writing about my three and a half year old daughter, my one year old daughter, breastfeeding, birth, car seat safety, motherhood, photography and family. Come see what's going on.

June 5, 2012

16 & 17 Weeks Pregnant

Weeks pregnant: 16 & 17 weeks.

Weight Gain: No idea. I haven’t been on the scale.

Size of the baby: Week 16 – About the size of an avocado. Yum! Week 17 – The size of a turnip – but since that doesn’t help anyone imagine, about 5 inches crown to rump and weighing around 5 ounces.

Emotional stuff: Life is SO much better now that I’m not feeling sick all the time!! I still have bouts of exhaustion periodically but overall my spirit and body feel renewed. It’s been a good few weeks. We’ve seen family a lot and enjoyed the summer weather. We’ve taken Q to the pool twice and she just loves it. Taking my kid to the pool is a part of motherhood I had always imagined so doing that for the first time was really special for me. We’re very fortunate to have a great pool nearby and we are members so we can go whenever we want! Some people love the beach, I love the pool. 🙂 I like to look at the water on the beach and I love being by the ocean and watching the waves crash but when it comes to swimming, I’m a pool girl.

I definitely don’t look pregnant from the front!

The BIGGEST news of these weeks is that I can now feel T-Rex kicking around in there. It started at 16 weeks exactly and with Q it was 16 weeks 5 days so not too much of a difference there. Feeling him move in there makes this baby a LOT more tangible and I’m less likely to forget than I’m pregnant! The movement is really low and went from just a few taps on the first day to full on dance parties multiple times a day. I’m kind of amazed how much I feel this baby after no feeling anything for so long.

Physical stuff: I kind of touched on this already but I’ve been feeling good. I’ve had a few headaches but nothing debilitating. NO PUKING! YAAAAAAY!! And only a few upset stomachs. I’ve had pretty good energy and I’ve enjoyed walking more again. Q is appreciative of my energy for sure. She loves to go for walks and would be out playing all day if we could.

I feel like my bump is really small for 17 weeks but when I compared photos of this pregnancy versus last time I’m about the same size. I definitely am not experiencing the phenomenon of being a lot bigger or showing sooner with the second pregnancy, and that’s ok with me. I have a pretty long torso and lean physique so I have a feeling this is just how I’m going to carry my babies. It’s ok by me!

Also physical, kind of, I finally got my hair cut and highlighted this week and I LOVE it. I can’t get over how much I love it. I was kind of freaking out about the change for a day or so since my hair hasn’t been this short in a long time but it’s fantastic and I feel like I look better than ever, with minimal effort!

I can’t stop eating: I had my first really intense craving this week, for chicken wings from my favorite wing place, Gators. I had to wait a few days to fulfill it but I was able to go with some friends over the weekend. YUMMMMM!!!! Besides that I’ve been eating a lot of frosted mini wheats. They’re great for a quick snack when I just need to eat SOMETHING.

I can’t even look at: Most things that I ate during first trimester are now off the menu and anything that I ate before throwing up is a no-way.

Fitness: I’m back to walking a lot. I love how close we are to downtown so we can walk pretty  much anywhere we want to go! I’m also hoping to get some solo pool time this summer and do some lap swimming. We’ll see about that though.

Birth prep: Continuing our doula search and I checked out four natural birth books from the library so that’s going pretty well.

Baby prep: Not much. I went through some clothes and cloth diapers trying to pick out the gender neutral stuff. Having a girl would make life easier in the clothing department! A baby boy will still be wearing girly hand me downs for jammies and diapers at least. We’ll probably spare him dresses and pink ruffled pants but any boy of ours will still be wearing pink and purple diapers!

Breastfeeding: We are still going! 23 months today! I’m fairly certain my milk has dried up since Q keeps asking for water afterwards and she actually stuck her straw sippy in her mouth WHILE breastfeeding the other day so she was getting water while nursing! That was bizarre and hilarious.

Even though she isn’t getting milk anymore, or at least much milk, breastfeeding is still a huge comfort to her and sometimes the only thing that can calm and quiet her so I’m going to continue. Besides, now that I’m so close, I REALLY want to make it until she’s two! What a cool milestone!

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May 21, 2012

13, 14 & 15 Weeks Pregnant

Weeks pregnant: 13, 14 & I’m 15 weeks today – What the WHAT??? Where is the time going?

Weight Gain: Now I’m back down to below my pre-pregnancy weight due to a bout with the stomach flu in week 13. Not where I want to be but I have no doubt in my mind that I will be gaining it back.

Size of the baby: Week 13 – About 3 inches long (“medium sized shrimp” wasn’t giving me a good visual!), Week 14 – a lemon, Week 15 – an apple

Emotional stuff: There’s a reason I haven’t updated in 3 weeks, it’s been a bit crazy around here. I’ll start with the good. We had our NT scan and bloodwork and not only were we able to see the baby again, which always makes it feel more real, but the blood tests came back perfectly. We don’t have any markers for genetic abnormalities and baby is measuring well with all limbs, fingers, toes, brain, heart, etc. Very happy to see a healthy baby in there. Besides watching the baby, my favorite party was watching S’s face as he watched the baby. He’s just as excited as I am.

Not so good stuff. For about 10 days in this period I was bedridden with migraines and the stomach flu. Holy hell, I wouldn’t wish that upon anyone! I’m so thankful for all of the help I had with Q between S coming home early from work a few times and my dad coming in and also Q spending time with my sister in law when I was sick. I have no idea what I would have done if I had been the sole caregiver for Q during that time. She had a rough time being away from me so much but I think she has recovered and I’ve had 4 days straight of feeling REALLY good so I’m hoping I’m in the clear.

I had my first real pregnancy cry somewhere in the middle of the flu/migraine marathon because I was feeling so useless but, per usual, getting my emotions out and having a good heart to heart with my husband set the world right again.

Mother’s Day was quite understated this year since I was in bed all day but I had a few precious moments with Q that still made my day special, including her first “I love Mama”. Next year I’ll be a mama of two and it blows my mind.

Physical stuff: I went from having morning sickness to migraine to flu to migraine to flu to feeling so good I almost forget I’m pregnant. It’s been quite the ride. I hope to continue feeling well because I’m really enjoying it!

I can’t stop eating: I’m feeling pretty put off by most of the staple foods I had been eating because I now associate them with feeling sick. So, it’s time to branch out into new foods!

I can’t even look at: I don’t want to talk about it. LOL. Too much.

Fitness: I’ve had some really good walks the past few days and my hips haven’t been bothering me too much after so that’s good. Q and I went to the zoo on Friday and did LOTS of walking and I felt pretty great afterward so I’m looking forward to lots of walking. The weather has been AMAZING so I want to be outside as much as possible.

Birth prep: We interviewed our first doula candidate right before I got the flu and now I’m looking at other candidates and trying to narrow down who we’d like to talk to.

Baby prep: Nothing much. Mostly focusing on fun activities for Q after being sidelined for so long.

Breastfeeding: We are still going! It hurts less, Q seems less into it but still really needs it sometimes. For example, it’s all she wanted today when I got home after being away from her all day but a few hours later at bed time she wanted to read books instead. I thought my milk was pretty much gone but there’s still some there! It’s pretty cool to see my body still providing for her needs.

I’m way overdue for some pictures but I’ve barely touched my camera, let alone edited any photos so I need to get back on the ball now that I’m starting to feel better!

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May 16, 2012

Dear Q, 22 months

Dear Q,

In two months you will be two years old and this fact completely blows my mind! Nearly all traces of Baby Q are gone and you are quickly morphing into a little girl.

There is so much going on with you that I don’t want to forget so this is going to be a long letter!

You’ve had a verbal EXPLOSION over the past few weeks and you not only repeat but remember pretty much everything we say. You are speaking in phrases now. You say “What doing?” to the cats whenever you see them. You also say it to us and sometimes to yourself. You call Stella using the “pssss pssss” noise that I use to call her. “Where Dellas? DEEEELLLLLLLAS!!! psss psss psss” so funny.

You love to call people from my phone and know who is who on my favorites menu without any help. You’ll say “Call Papa” go to favorites, tap my dad’s name, put it on speaker and then go back to looking at pictures until he answers. Although when he answers you usually just wave instead of talking. You LOVE Facetime though. It’s such a fabulous invention! I grew up thinking video chat was something crazy futuristic and now we use it almost every day from our handheld devices.

Last week you wanted to call a few people who were busy at the time and when I said “busy” you said “Izzy!” (your cousin) so we went to facebook to look at pictures of Izzy. Now your favorite thing is “Izzy Pictures!” and since Facebook can take awhile to load you say “Wait. Waaaaait. Here comes! Here comes!” which is apparently what I’ve been saying to you while the page loads.

Sometimes you’ll just say “More” and I won’t know what you’re asking for so I’ll say “More what, honey?” and you’ll say “More, Please!” which is funny since that’s not the prompt I use for please but I’ll take it.
You’ve also picked up “Bless You” this week and most often say it to George who sneezes a lot. 🙂 You’ll also pretend to sneeze and say “Bless you Q”. 🙂

You like to put the seat on the potty, sit on it for a second, “wipe” yourself and then flush the sheet of toilet paper. You do this all with clothes on but we’re starting to make diaperless potty time a part of the day. You know when you have gone to the bathroom because you tell me each time. I’m hoping this awareness will translate into knowing when you’re about to go so we can get you on the potty. We’re taking it slow.

Just in the past few days you started sleeping well again, after a few weeks of really awful sleep. I really hopes it sticks! Everyone has MUCH better days when we get to sleep at night!

You’ve started giving everything kisses. the cats, the bath water, my belly, today you even kissed my armpit… weirdo. 🙂 It’s super cute. We aren’t nursing as much anymore but you love to cuddle my belly and give it lots of kisses. You’ll lift up my shirt and snuggle your face against my belly and say “Cuddle!!”. I love it. You also say good morning and good night to the baby and my heart sings.

You learn new skills every day. Recently you’ve mastered: Stacking legos, taking crayons in and out the box, moving your step stool to the sink to stand on while you “wash hands”, and you are able to go down the front steps without holding on to anything (although we are always there to spot you). Whenever you accomplish one of these things you shout “I DID IT!!” and giggle with glee. It makes me so happy.

You love the water. You are truly a child of summer. We just got you a water table to play with outside and it has provided hours and hours of fun. I can’t wait for the pool to open and to start your swimming lessons! We are going to have so much fun this summer.

You have started asking for songs and have started to sing along. When you sing the AB’s (as you call them) you definitely skip letters here and there but you totally have a handle on it. On other songs you’ll prompt us with the first few words of the next line if we stop and start. You like to dance, especially while standing on chairs, and you’ve learned to march, spin and stomp your feet. You’ve also started really running.

I haven’t taken as many photos lately as I’d have liked since I’ve been so sick but I promise to share more soon. Sometimes it’s nice to be totally unplugged and hang out with you. I love our one on one time!

The more time I spend on this post, the more I’m going to think of so I’m going to wrap it up.

I love watching you grow. I love spending my days with you. You are smart, sweet, funny and adorable. You are my precious first born.

I love you,

Mama

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April 29, 2012

11 & 12 Weeks Pregnant

Weeks pregnant: 11 & 12

Weight Gain: According to the scale at the midwife’s office I’m up 2lbs from the last visit 4 weeks ago. That’s fine by me.

Size of the baby: Week 11 a fig and week 12 a lime. Baby is about 2 inches long now. He can open and close his hands, he has reflexes and working kidneys.

Emotional stuff: I’m very much ready to feel better. It’s so draining to feel nauseated and exhausted every day and I want to have more energy and tolerance for Q. Hopefully I’m almost out of the woods. I’m ready for food to taste good again. Eating is a gamble. I can’t trust that food is going to either taste good or feel good after eating. One day I can eat something and feel great and then the next day I eat the same thing and feel awful. It’s disheartening to say the least.

Thankfully, I’ve been able to accomplish a few things on my to-do list this week during energy surges so that has bolstered me emotionally.

Physical stuff: Like I said above, I’m still feeling sick pretty much every day but I am having better days here and there. In addition, my joints are starting to ache pretty much daily. I’m talking flu-like aching in pretty much all of my joints: Hips, knees, ankles, elbows, wrists, fingers… This didn’t happen until much later with my first pregnancy. I understand that my system is flooded with relaxin and everything is stretching out to make room for T-rex to grow but it definitely wasn’t this painful this early last time.

I can’t stop eating: Bagels & Cream Cheese have been good to me lately. The only food that I can count on to taste pretty good and calm my stomach is Kashi Cherry Dark Chocolate granola bars. I’m SO sick of them but they are a 110% necessary part of my day. I don’t leave home without them!

I can’t even look at: No true aversions right now. I’m starting to feel hungry again so things are sounding good… until they don’t. I was loving Portillo’s and Chipotle but now they sound awful. I had to spit out bacon the other day. BACON. That’s just not right.

Fitness: When I feel up to it, walking around has been nice. I even thought about doing some wii zumba this week. Thinking about it is half the battle, right?

Birth prep: more casual doula shopping

Baby prep: Planning how to rearrange our apartment to fit baby stuff and not feel totally claustrophobic. Hoping to store some furniture elsewhere. I’d love to move but it doesn’t make financial sense right now. Moving is freaking expensive and our apartment is a really great deal, even though we don’t love it.

Breastfeeding: Still hoping to stop in the next few months but Q is even more obsessed with it than ever. She’s even started telling me she wants to go take a nap to get me to go into her bedroom and nurse her (our pre-nap time routine) and then afterwards she’ll make a break for the door to go play! Smart, smart girl. It really is amazing how 3-5 minutes at the breast, when she’s not even getting milk, transforms her. She goes from a whining, crying mess to a smiling, giggling kid. It’s like magic. I don’t know if I’m actually ready to discard the most powerful calming tool in my arsenal.

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