31 weeks

So this week I will be 31 weeks pregnant. Pretty cool. Nothing really to report on the baby front. My baby shower is on Saturday, sorry to all the out of towners that aren't able to make it. I hope you did appreciate your invites and didn't just take them as solicitation for gifts!! But judging by the gifts arriving I'm worried it came across as the latter ;-) I'm grateful though, and so is the little boy I'm sure, oh and the bigger boy too.

Saturday the art group I work with (the CAI) did our project for the IMA On Procession parade in downtown Indianapolis. We created the CAI SpaceTank and it was awesome. I got sunburnt though. And I walked for two+ miles and spent the morning building the thing. Wow, my pregnant body gets tired a lot faster than the previous body! Anyway, once that was done I felt a lot of relief and freedom. So good that this stuff is all coming to an end and I can focus on baby time!! Sunday we had a b-day bbq for our friends Esteban & Tain, and that was fun too, though the weather was cold. Aaron and I have been prepping the house and it's starting to feel less like art studio and more like home, so that's also good news. All in all it was a good weekend! And no more goose attacks!!

I am moving into the 8th month of pregnancy, I'm feeling pretty big, he's moving around in my belly all the time, and discomfort is increasing. I'm still feeling pretty darn good, but I do suffer regularly from heartburn, occasional knee pain, and it sure is hard to bend over!

fowl play

today was an eventful day.

first, i think i am developing "THE MASK OF PREGNANCY" which just sounds scary. actually, i don't even know if i have it. i get freckles in the summer and this year they look weird. like they are kind of clustered together tightly on my nose and cheek. hmmm. it's pretty subtle so far.

second, aaron and i went to see a movie tonight! it was fun. when we got to the theater there was a goose in the parking lot. we watched our movie, and when we left, the goose was still there! in the same spot! we walked along the sidewalk, keeping our distance, and it started to walk towards us. we thought it wanted some candy. then all of a sudden it started to charge us. aaron yelled "run!!" and i yelled back "i can't!!" and then i turned around and the goose had flown over aaron and was running towards me!! i started to run and it took flight towards my head. i covered my head and ducked (heh heh) and the goose flew past me, first hitting my arms with his wing or something. eek. then we got away. looks like another goose was sitting in this walled off planting bed near the theater, so this goose must have been protecting a nest?? aaron felt as though he should have done something else to protect his nest, ha ha, but there wasn't much to be done. anyway, we luckily escaped unharmed. it was pretty wacky. didn't get any pics, so you can enjoy this youtube video and imagine aaron and i in a parking lot being attacked by these geese...

Doc Update, Week 30

Well, I'm not 30 weeks yet, but we had our doctor's appointment so I thought I'd check in. Once again, all is well and normal! Heartbeat is 143, I'm measuring right on track so there just isn't much to report -- I guess that's a good thing!

Only physical change is that I have been experiencing what I would call morning sickness during this past week, so that's a bummer. It is not like the "real" morning sickness I experienced during the first trimester. This time it's really just in the morning -- I have like three hours of nausea and uneasiness, and then it fades away. I asked the doc about it and she said it may actually be related to acid reflux. Even if I don't have the heartburn/chest pain feeling, taking some Zantac before I go to bed might help. So I might give that a try. I have temporarily switched my schedule to work in the afternoons instead of the morning, since I've been feeling fine then. Ooh, I do get hot quite often now, and the weather is just starting to warm up too, so that makes it a bit worse. And I am starting to experience a little swelling in my hands -- nothing to cause concern yet though.

I guess that's all!

29 wks (almost)

Ok, I'm jumping the gun on this one. I won't be 29 weeks until TOMORROW but I thought I hadn't posted some belly pics in a while, and since I'm complaining a lot about how big I'm getting I might as well share some images that might be closer to reality than my complaints are!

Thanks for the support from you guys via emails and comments. It means a lot, even though you'll probably hear me voicing the same ol' concerns over and over.

Also, baby shower news: We're planning a Lafayette shower Saturday May 3rd. Time and location TBD. If you can come, that's awesome!! Thanks to Ingrid & Meg for putting this together.

Here are the pics!!

concerns

As I sit here, less than three months away, a number of concerns, big and small, still float around my head.

1) How big am I gonna get??? I have been obsessed with my belly size from the very beginning. There are all these websites on pregnancy where you can view pictures of other pregnant bellies, constantly seeing how you compare, week by week. I assume some concern over your changing body is pretty darn normal, but sometimes I'm pretty sure I'm a little too worried about it. It's just that I have never had a very healthy body image, so the idea of weight piling on (even if it's for such an amazing reason) really freaks me out. So now here I am, 7 months along, with an unmistakable for-real baby belly. Strangers are comfortable commenting on it, and now people even like to touch it (only friends so far, so that's ok with me!). I should acknowledge that I am indeed partly proud, because I feel this overwhelming pride for the little guy inside, but I'm also really self conscious. And I still have nearly three months to go. How many more pounds will I gain? How many more inches will my stomach and (gulp) thighs expand? Will the clothes that I can wear now see me through these next few months? Will my belly button pop? Will I get stretch marks? Have my stomach muscles separated in the dreaded diastasis? What will my body be after all of this is over? I have never been a bikini-wearing body-proud gal, but will I be even more self-conscious and unhappy with my body once I get through this? I feel so selfish having these thoughts, as though I should find beauty in my body as host for the amazing little being inside, but I don't know how to shed 27 years of societal training in understanding physical beauty.

2) Diapers. We have been intending to go cloth. I have found these new highly recommended yet EXPENSIVE all-in-ones that fit like disposables and are one-size so they work for the tiny and bigger guys (bumgenius). They are $18/each which seems a little over-the-top, though, and I'm afraid that when the reality of baby hits, we will end up going with disposables anyway. The waste of disposables really disturbs my husband and me, but the waste in water and energy disturbs us with cloth diapers. The answer is really not so black and white.

3) Breast pumps. So it is likely that I will need to return to work not all tooooo long after the baby is born (three or four months). The medical world recommends breast feeding for the first 12 months. This means I will want/need to get into regular pumping. I also like this idea because i think it would be great for my husband to get to share in the feeding of our new son. I bought a hand pump on sale fairly early on, and initially thought that would do it. But now I'm second-guessing. If I am feeding my baby regularly with expressed milk, is it worth it to get those wacky electric pumps? Some women swear by them, others swear they feel like a cow. Many women seem to say they are completely worth the big $$, but are they? What if I don't use it? And what bottles and nipples to get? Do you try a few and see what works? Or just go with the ones that get the best reviews?

4) Can I provide??? Perhaps the thing that brings me to tears most often during my hormonal tidal waves is the fear of not being able to provide. Often this is centered on financial concerns, but really it extends to every possible thing. I end up spending all this time thinking about my feelings as a child, my worries, my concerns. How can I make sure he has what he needs and even some of what he wants? How can I make sure he's happy? Do I have the resources to do this? Are we too young? Did we jump into this? What if I just can't go back to work after meeting our little guy. How will we pay the bills? Will we always drive this old 1990 Corolla? Will we ever find a place we actually want and can settle down in for a while?

5) Daycare. This is a huge worry. Tied to the previous concern of being able to provide: What if we can't afford to live on one income? Day care scares the h*ll outta me. How can I ship my new little guy off to someone else for the majority of the day during his most formative years? This is something I really want to avoid. But can we, with our middle class educations and working class incomes, afford to have a stay-at-home parent? A completely disturbing thought. And I think this is one issue we will just have to wait on ...


There are undoubtedly many more concerns, but my morning is quickly disappearing as I ramble in this blog and chat online. And taxes call.

clyde obama

So we are 28 weeks! Less than 90 days to go. Pretty cool. He's been moving around a lot today, so that's fun. It helps keep me entertained at work.

Today I even got to play the pregnancy card! Yesterday I found out that Barack Obama was coming to Lafayette, so I waited in line for an hour to get tickets. Aaron and I got to see him speak in a "town hall" type presentation at a local high school gym. It was really cool. There were about 3000 people there, and we didn't get there until about 45 minutes or so before it was supposed to begin. When we got there it was standing room only, but I said "I'm a pregnant lady. Can I get a chair?" So the nice girl let us get special seating with the old folks right behind Barack. It was pretty sweet. The speech was good, but the gym made it hard to understand some of it, with echoing voices and cheers from the crowd. Barack seemed a little tired but still remained a captivating speaker. I plan to post some pics and/or video clips (it's hard to understand the audio though and the images are not that great) but they are still downloading from my camera.













In other news, yesterday Clyde went to get his teeth cleaned. We adopted him when he was about 2, and he always had disgusting breath and brown teeth. The vet never said anything about it, but the past couple of weeks Clyde was hesitant to eat his crunchy dog food, and would rub his gums after eating. Poor pup. So we took him to the vet for a cleaning. The tartar came off pretty easily and he only had to lose one tooth, but that's still a lot for a dog his age (about 5). We got some tooth stuff for him and hopefully that will prevent further build up. His breath is great now though, and though he was groggy and grumpy yesterday, today he seems to be back to his perky pacing little self. Yay for Clyde!!

i passed!

i passed my glucose test!

that is all...