P.S.

To those of you that recommended Viactiv, thank you!!!! One little yummy chocolate chew and I've got half of my calcium requirement for the day. Brilliant.

First Purchase

One question that I've gotten quite often is "What have you bought for the baby?" And up until a couple of days ago, the answer was, "Nothing."

But that has now changed. And I figured that I waited 12 weeks to buy anything, so the first purchase should be big, right?

So I bought a glider!

I'll be honest...I went against every bit of advice I've been given regarding buying a glider and bought it sight unseen. But I had good reason. I just happened across it on Target's website. It was originally $399.00, on sale for $280.00. Plus, they were running a special of an additional 15% off furniture and free shipping. So a glider that would have cost me more than $500.00 after tax and shipping (more than I would ever pay, quite frankly) only cost me a total of $250.00. But what really sealed the deal is the fact that you can return anything you buy on Target.com to a store for no charge. So in my eyes, it was a no lose situation.

It arrived on Monday. In a box bigger than our doorway. Chad wasn't home, but I was determined to get that thing in our house, so I took it out of the box on the front porch and scooted it into the living room, piece by piece. I'm sure it was a sight. But once inside, it only took me about 5 minutes to get it together (slide the back into the seat and screw on the rockers - easy peasy). And turns out? It's PERFECT.

[I haven't had a chance to put anything on the rockers to protect the hardwood floors, so it's actually sitting on a piece of cardboard right now.]

First, the seat is super deep. I can sit all the way back and really cuddle into it. But it's not so deep that my feet can't touch the floor when I'm sitting in it. The fabric is the perfect color and I love the texture. The arms are at a good height that should be comfortable for breastfeeding. And I love that it's actually a rocker rather than a glider, because I prefer a rocking motion to a gliding motion.



In other words, I totally lucked out. And now I have the itch to buy the rest of the nursery furniture.

12 Weeks

[Amusingly, I just realized that you can clearly see my undies in this picture. Guess it's a good thing I wasn't wearing a thong...]

I think this week's picture proves what I kinda thought last week - that bump was nothing more than bloat. But that's OK with me...I'd prefer a real bump over a bloat bump anyway! The bottom part of my stomach is getting hard though. And my stomach is usually flatter in the mornings than in the evenings.

The baby is now the size of a plum. Which is a little ironic, considering I bought one at the store yesterday and couldn't even wait to get home to eat the darn thing - I chowed down in the car. Baby is now moving into the growth and maturation stage. That means all his organs and systems are formed, and now they begin to mature. Which is really crazy to think about. There is something the size of a plum inside of me, and yet that little something has ears, a heart, lungs, and fingers.

Mama isn't doing so hot. Remember how I said I was feeling so much better, the nausea was nearly non-existent, and instead I was always hungry? Yeah...not anymore. I think that lasted about 2 weeks. Last week, I started noticing that I would still feel a little nauseous in the morning, and it seemed that every day, it got progressively worse. And this weekend was probably the worst I've felt throughout the entire pregnancy. I've finally been able to pinpoint a trigger for the nausea - dairy. Which really doesn't surprise me. Besides the fact I find milk to be just about the most disgusting product on the market, I've always felt a little off after eating dairy. But a few weeks ago, I started craving cereal. And apparently, I'm a little dense, because it took me an entire week to realize that every time I ate cereal, I felt horribly sick. Same goes for ice cream (which is really, really sad). Oddly though, I can eat things like cheese and sour cream and be fine. As of Monday, I eliminated the two offenders from my diet and it has helped some, but I still feel a little bit sick in the mornings. Luckily, hot tea helps tremendously, so I drink a cup every morning. Hopefully, this will all go away soon. General wisdom is that morning sickness only lasts through the first trimester. There's no definite end to the first trimester - it's somewhere around 12 or 13 weeks - but since I'm close to that, I'm hoping to begin feeling better soon.

But this brings me to my question - without adding another supplemental vitamin, how can I get enough calcium each day? Honestly, it's not something I worried about before I was pregnant, but now that I am, I want to make sure I'm getting enough. There is a little bit of calcium in my prenatal vitamin and I do add calcium fortified soy milk to my smoothies...but that's really not enough. I eat cheese sometimes, but not every day. And while I love a big dollop of sour cream on my baked potato, again, that's not something I'm eating every day. Chad even made me buy the calcium fortified butter at the store on Saturday. I'm just not sure where else I can add calcium into my diet.

In other news, we toured St. Luke's maternity ward on Saturday. We're deciding between two hospitals (St. Luke's and Missouri Baptist) and I'm supposed to have made a decision by my next doctor's appointment (14 weeks). We are required to have one ultrasound at the hospital I'll be delivering at, and it takes place at about 20 weeks. I don't want to make a decision before we've even seen the other hospital, but I loved St. Luke's. I think they are about as close to a birthing center as I'm going to find in St. Louis. But we'll make our final decision after our MoBap tour.

And I've got to include a little bragging on my husband. He's been so awesome and sweet through everything so far. He's made an effort to be so involved in everything, which I love and which totally surprised me. Chad is such a laid back guy and normally just lets me take the reigns, which I like (of course, haha), but it's been so nice to have his input and involvement with everything. And there have been too many times when I've had big plans for the day - get laundry finished, clean the floors/bathroom/kitchen, empty the dishwasher, etc - but then I just feel like crap and end up doing absolutely nothing. But his response is always the same. "Babe, it's OK. You're pregnant!". Then the other day, we were driving somewhere and out of the blue, he looks at me and says, "I'm so excited that you are pregnant." It was so random and so sweet. He's said he's excited before, but it's usually after some prompting from me. ("Are you excited about the baby??") It was so sweet to hear him say it out of the blue.

I think that's it...sorry for the long winded update!

A New (Baby) Project

Of course it's baby related. Because what else do I talk about anymore?

Have I ever mentioned that I can knit? Well, I can. I taught myself about 5 years ago - went to Hobby Lobby, bought a book, needles, and yarn, and went for it. Because I taught myself, I'm not all that great. I can cast on, knit, purl, and cast off...that's it. No increasing, decreasing, yarning over, slip stitches, etc. Which means I can make one thing - scarves.

The other day, it occurred to me that I'd really like to knit a baby blanket. I can't make anything fancy, but I think it would be cool to be able to use a blanket that I made. And a blanket is basically just a big scarf, right? So I hopped on YouTube to watch a few baby blanket knitting tutorials, then went to Michael's, where I spent 45 minutes picking out the perfect yarn.



It's the first time I've ever knitted with circular needles, but it's really no different than knitting with straight needles. And I'm a little obsessed with the yarn I chose. The color is perfect, it's soft, and I love the thick and twisty texture. Plus it's machine washable and dryable - a must when it's being used for a baby!



I'll update you as I make progress. It'll probably take awhile - I'm only on row 5, and I need to do about 120 rows, if not more (120 would make it perfectly square). Guess it's a good think I've got 6 1/2 months left.

Mishmash

Just a few random things...

1. First, two things I forgot to mention in my nursery plan post. One, I plan on making something like this:



It's a super easy project (just requires a balloon, some twine, and glue) and it'll go well with the neutral room. I'm not quite sure if I'm going to use a light kit and make a light for the room or if I'm just going to hang a few from the ceiling with no light in them...I love the idea of creating an actual light, but I would also like to have a three of these rather than just one, which won't work if I use it as a light. So we'll see what happens.

Second, I want a big white fluffy rug. Not a flokati rug, but something like this would be awesome:

I feel like fluffy is totally necessary because it's a baby's room and I'm really excited about the way the white will look against the floors.


2. Speaking for the floors, our house still smells like polyurethane. Yuck. When the weather was really mild this past week, we kept the windows open to try and get rid of some of the smell. It helped for a couple days, but yesterday when I walked in the door, I was immediately hit by the poly smell again. I really hope it starts to dissipate soon. Granted, it's not nearly as strong as it was, but I still don't like it. And a really weird random thing about polyurethane - it greatly increases the smell of gas. We have a gas stove and every time we turn it on, we're hit by a very strong gas smell. Thank goodness someone in my office warned me about this phenomenon, otherwise I'd think we have a gas leak and would have called Laclede Gas out to our house about 10 different times. BUT - it's all totally worth it so I need to just suck it up.

3. I'm ready for Fall. I know, I know, that's absolute blasphemy to some of you, but I can't help it. Fall is my absolute favorite time of year, and to make matters even worse (or better) I'm beyond excited to be pregnant this fall, especially since I'll actually be showing by then. I've got my vacation at the beginning of August, but after that I don't know how I'll make it through another month and a half of miserable, hot weather. I guess I'll just have to dream of pumpkins and apple cider and football and mums...

4. I didn't really talk much about our 4th of July, but we went to Chad's parents cabin for the weekend. The boys shot off fireworks and we discovered the funniest thing...Butch is obsessed with them. I have never seen that dog go so crazy. The boys would shoot them off the deck and Butch would chase them and bark at them. Funniest thing ever. And after they would land, he'd paw like crazy at them on the ground. Seriously...what dog does that?? Too flipping funny.

5. Random pregnancy worry - I'm completely sold on not wanting to find out if the baby is a boy or girl before he or she arrives. However, as I've said before, my doctor gives an ultrasound at every appointment. And I'm seriously worried that I'm accidentally going to see something I'm not supposed to. I'd be really disappointed, so I hope it doesn't happen. Although, I don't really know all that much about ultrasounds...would it even be possible for me to pick anything out myself?

6. And speaking of the baby and delivery (I'm sorry...I know it's been all baby all the time around here lately.) I'm in the process of booking someone to do birth photography for us. I know this isn't everyone's thing, but I'm beyond excited about it. I've watched a bunch of slideshows dedicated to birth photography and they all make me bawl. I definitely want those moments captured on film, even if I am gonna look awful. I don't want anything graphic - I have no need to see a picture of the child actually sliding out of my hooha (and yes, I've seen pictures like that in my search for a photographer) but the moment that baby is laid on my chest? Yeah, I need a picture of that.

Rearranged

I mentioned in a previous post that we've moved our computer from the office (which will now be the nursery) to the living room.

Not the ideal set up, but we've got to work with what we've got. Our house has three bedrooms, which previously consisted of the master bedroom, the guest room, and the office. I considered keeping the office and converting the guest bedroom instead, but that just doesn't make sense for our family. Nearly all of our family and some of our friends live out of town, and it's important to me that they have a place to stay when they visit. So the office is what had to go.

As I mentioned, after we clean out and organize our basement, we plan on creating a little man land down there for Chad. I considered putting the computer down there, but vetoed that for two reasons. Number 1, I want to continue blogging after the baby is born. And I know that will be a lot easier if the computer is on the main level rather than in the basement. Number 2, Chad spends a lot of time on the computer. And I didn't really like the idea of him being down there all the time. I don't mind his computer time, but it's nice to have him in the next room (or the same room) so I can still chat with him. So, the only place left was the living room.

Our living room is long and thin and at the end where the kitchen is, we had a kitchen table. One that we almost never used. So we decided to get rid of it and put the computer there:



I found a desk and painted it white and Chad got everything set up:



I also found a comfy computer chair:



That conveniently coordinates with the chair on the other side of the room:



See the mirror in that picture, above the console table? I'm considering painting that frame white to balance out the white on both sides of the room. But, I sorta like the green because it goes with the color of the couch. Thoughts?

The last thing we did was organize. The office was just a mess, so we never bothered to keep the desk organized or do anything about the disaster of wires. But that won't fly in the living room. So first, we used zip ties to bundle the computer, printer, and speaker wires together, then we stapled the bundles along the cross board and legs of the computer table to hide them:



We also got rid of junk that was on and in our old computer desk, and nearly everything we have now fits in that little drawer on the left of the new computer desk. The only thing left to do is to put a small wicker basket on top of the tower so Chad can store his computer games in it.

All in all, I'm super happy with the turnout. I love the cute white desk much better than the dining room table we had there before and Chad loves that the computer is now right by the kitchen so he can boogy down to music while he cooks!

11 weeks

I'm going to start doing a recap post of how baby and I are doing every week, but first, I need to play a little catch up.

One of my favorite things about following the blogs of pregnant women is seeing their belly pics. It's amazing to me how the belly grows to make room for the baby and it's crazy how no one seems to start showing at the same time or grow at the same rate.

I started taking belly pics the day I found out I was pregnant, which was a Sunday. My weeks technically change over on Wednesdays (I'm exactly 11 weeks today), but I'm going to continue taking pictures on Sunday just because it's easier for me that way. So even though I might label a belly pic as 9 weeks, it's actually 9 weeks 4 days. Which really means that my pictures will be a week behind each week. Not that anyone cares about that slight discrepancy but me, LOL.

For now, my pictures are of me in a sports bra. But if (when) stretch marks start popping up, that will probably change. No need to subject everyone to that sight.

On to the pictures...my starting point at 4 weeks:



Weeks 5, 6, and 7:



I skipped weeks 8 and 9 because we were on vacation, but if I would have taken them, they would have looked pretty much exactly like weeks 5, 6, and 7.

Week 10. And the beginning of a little baby bump. I can no longer suck my stomach in to make it look flat, haha. I'd say this "bump" is more bloat than baby...we'll see what it looks like next week.



What's crazy is the "bump" sorta appeared out of no where. Twice last week, someone (two different someones) told me I was starting to look poochy. Not exactly what I wanted to hear. I came home the second time I'd heard it and told Chad about it. Then went and looked in the mirror...and wouldn't you know, I DID look poochy, haha. I can even see at the top where my stomach is the size it always was and the bottom is starting to poke out. But like I said, I doubt it's actually the baby yet, but I guess I'll know for sure as the weeks go by. All I know is that some of my pants don't fit anymore...

And now for baby's debut! (I really need to come up with a name for the baby other than just baby...) My doctor's office has the amazing policy of giving ultrasounds at every single appointment, which means we've seen the baby 3 times so far.

First, at 5 weeks. There really wasn't much to see at this point. Technically, there's not even a baby yet. It's just the gestational sac (which is what the arrow is pointing to):



I went back at 6 weeks so we could see the heartbeat. It was so crazy that within one short week, the sac had increased exponentially in size and a little baby had formed:



And at 9 weeks 6 days, the baby actually started looking like a baby, complete with a head, a body, and even a little arm!



As of today, the little guy is the size of a lime. Very surreal. So far, the size comparisons have been things like a blueberry, a raspberry, an olive...so a lime just seems so big! An update on the pregnancy in general...really not much to report. I'd posted before that I was nauseous pretty much all day. That lasted for about 4 1/2 weeks. And even though I never actually threw up, I still managed to some how lose 6 pounds (and no, I'm not bragging. When I gain weight, I'll tell you how much then too!). But, the nausea is almost non-existent now, and in it's place is a never ending hunger. I'm generally hungry every two hours, if not more often. I'm now in the habit of bringing two lunches to work instead of just one. Which means that 6 pounds is going to start heading in the other direction in no time, if it hasn't already. I do have a lot of indigestion and heartburn now, something I never dealt with before getting pregnant. And I burp a lot! But other than that, I feel great. During the time I was constantly nauseous, I hardly made it to the gym at all, but I'm back on track now and it feels so good to be able to work out. Especially now that my boobs aren't so dang sore. I'm actually at the point now where I don't even feel pregnant. Which is a nice switch from moaning on the couch every night! Hopefully I'll continue feeling this way for awhile...