Third Trimester

I'm 34 weeks and wondering how many more I have left! If baby comes at early-term (38 wks) that's 4 more, full-term (40 wks) means 6 more, and late like August (41+ wks) gives me almost 8 weeks. It's crazy not knowing if I'm going to go into labor, or have to be induced again. I'm feeling pretty good, and am hoping I have closer to 8 weeks left. I still have a lot to do!

I wanted to do "one last trip of 3" where we'd just spend a night in a nearby hotel and go do a waterpark. We were supposed to go this weekend, but Doug got in a car accident the day before our babymoon. We thought our car was just dinged doors, but there is major frame damage. So instead this weekend he is flying to Florida to get a (hopefully) no to low rust vehicle.

To Do Before Baby List:

- I've been buying girl's clothes from the Salvation Army, but have to wash everything. And find a place to store them! She'll be in our room for awhile, but sharing August's dresser/closet until we move them into the bigger room. So that leave me with not much storage space for her stuff. This has been a major stressor.

- Buy newborn diapers. I bought a couple girl-colored cloth diaper covers, but I figured we'll probably do disposables for the first 6 weeks for easy- sake.

- Make freezer meals.

- We have a Natural Birth Workshop class coming up in 2 weeks, so it'd be nice to still be pregnant before the class!

- Finish knitting her bunny hat

- Pack the hospital bag

- Because of my work weekends and that class, the next free weekend we'd have for our getaway is 4 weeks away, I'm really hoping we can go do that. And just soak in the last time of individual attention for August!

- A so special cousin of mine who also went through a heartbreaking divorce has found love again, and there is an engagement party to meet her fiance end of March so I want to go to that.

- Just looking at the calendar it'd be nice if she was here for Easter which could happen if she were 1 week late, but not 2. But I'd pretty much like to go as long as possible, which also would extend my time off work further which would be great as there are already weddings and graduation parties and family visit plans in the works.

So, 34 weeks and I'm happy to report baby and I are still doing well.

yowza!

Pounds gained: about 19, looking at my last tracker I'm 3lbs heavier and about 1.5 inches wider than I was with August at this same stage.

Cravings: Fruit! And when I'm at work I constantly have a cup of that hospital ice in my hands to crunch on, much to the annoyance of my co-workers unfortunately. But thankfully they let me do it without banning me to the back hall computer, haha.

Sleep: Pretty ok. I do notice instead of just rolling over I have to pretty much wake up and heave myself over, but go right back to sleep. And either one night-time potty break, or sometimes none!

Exercise: Still doing good. I'm pretty much still doing my same exact strength videos or walking on the incline treadmill as I work my way through Blacklist. I've not been doing my videos with a lot of jumping around. But still occasionally doing Barre videos too.

At work the other day I was taking care of an OB/GYN patient and a doctor came to take care of her. After we were talking about her plan of care, he started chatting with me about my pregnancy and offered me a free 4d ultrasound. I hadn't planned on doing one, but then I thought, well this might be my last baby, and hey it's free, so yesterday we went and got to see baby girl.

She's already head down and was sleeping with her hands over her face.... awwwwww....

So they rolled me around and then she was waking up and gave us some good pics

The tech said she thought she looked like August :) and is guessing around 5# 6 ounces so far. Yikes, if babies gain 0.5lbs a week that could put her at almost 9lbs total. Which August was 8# 10 ounces, but it'd be nicer to have a tad smaller baby!

That precious little face. I'm so thankful for this blessing of a healthy baby, healthy pregnancy, and praying for a smooth and safe delivery!

Speaking of 2...

It's about time this new little one got a proper introduction!

I am 18 weeks today and expecting this little one in April 2019.

Doug and I had wanted another child, I was actually hoping to get pregnant around August's first birthday. However, I didn't even get my period back until he was almost 16 months. About 4 months into trying we had a 'chemical pregnancy' which is where you get a positive pregnancy test and go around for a few days excitedly thinking you're pregnant- only to get your period and be crushed. That was pretty sad. I had a bit of a clue something was wrong when the pregnancy strips weren't getting darker, but you still hope. A couple months later I was looking at this pregnancy app on my phone and thinking I could take a test in a day or so when I realized that my cycles were around 27-28 days and I was already on day 28 so I just took one, and the rest, as they say, is history!

Daddy came home and was greeted by August in this cute little announcement shirt. (ok I totally did not realize when Toys 'R Us went out of business it was taking Babies 'R Us with it!! Noooo! Babies 'R Us was the best, and now all I'm left with is super rip off Buy Buy Baby, bummer)

I tried to keep it pretty quiet in the beginning in case little one wouldn't stick around. It wasn't so easy later because right at 6 weeks I started getting sick. In fact I was at book club and hadn't planned on telling my girlfriends quite yet, but had to because I was sitting there with a throw up bucket on my lap. They were all excited.

Yeah so this time around I felt pretty bad. I'd only had one day of nausea with August and I remember just sitting perfectly still on the couch. With this one I almost always had a before or after breakfast puke and often another 2-3 during the day. And it's not fun being sick when you have a busy little one. I remember August one day screaming "milk!!!" and banging his empty cup while 1 foot away I was puking into my bucket. Mom even came down a day and played with him while I laid on the couch all day intermittently puking. THANKFULLY that petered out right at 12 weeks. And also thankfully I never got sick at work, always at home! I don't know why that was. Maybe too busy? I often did get a 7-Up though from the fridge and started drinking that as soon as I was feeling off, so that maybe helped too. But I do feel like poor August had a lame summer as his mother was mostly laying on the couch all of it :(

Like last time we had the genetic study done since I am older and wanted to be prepared if baby was going to have any special needs. I handled it really hard this time. I was just a bundle of nerves. I was sitting on the couch one day and the phone rang with the results. Her voice sounded like someone with bad news. But she told me the baby was fine. I mentioned the bad news voice to her and she just said she was tired (keep it together lady - people are depending on you for their news!!!). As soon as I hung up I just burst into sobbing tears. I called Doug. And I was telling him the baby was fine, but since I was crying so much he thought I was saying something was wrong with it's spine. Eventually he had me spell out f-i-n-e and then was wondering why I was crying. And I just felt such guilt. I had been hoping and praying and worrying that the baby would be ok, and I think that was coming from a place of not wanting a child who wouldn't be 'normal' and I just felt such horrible guilt. And the grace of a good and perfect gift from God when I don't deserve anything good, and also the knowledge that there is nothing wrong with what God makes. Every baby is fearfully and wonderfully made in His image. So it was just a very overwhelming feeling. We talked for a little while, and I cried, and journaled and prayed for awhile, but this has been a hard thing for me.

One perk of the genetic test is getting to know the gender early. So we had the lady leave the gender on a voicemail and then went to Meijer and picked out two outfits. Then we had the cashier listen to the voicemail and ring up the corresponding outfit while we turned around. Then we went out to dinner and opened it together.

and ta-da!!

Honestly I wasn't too surprised since I'd been feeling so different, but it was still a fun surprise.

So yeah, the story of the second child is indeed true, time is just passing by. But I do look at my little pregnancy app and I see that today she is the size of a sweet potato, and I like reading about her development :) I've bought a couple girl things and her baby book.

I'm feeling mostly better, a little short of breath already at times. I'm fighting the maternity pants, last time I didn't need them till 20 weeks, but at the end of the day I either have my button undone or I'm in sweats anyway, so might as well embrace the stretchy panel!! With all the puking I lost 8 pounds in the first trimester, and almost back to my starting weight now. But you can definitely see a bump from the side, and the end of the day bump is like twice the size of the beginning of the day bump for some reason!

We don't agree on girls names, but still have 4 months to go. And we are planning on having the kids share a room (after she's been in our room for several months during the worst of the night wake ups/nursing months) (NOT LOOKING FORWARD TO THOSE). So that will be nice to keep a room free for our use, but is also a source of stress thinking about the kids sharing a closet/dresser/hoping they don't wake each other up. August is sleeping through the night so awesome and I'm scared to ruin it.

So yeah, besides not looking forward to losing sleep, and being super scared of taking two kids out in public, and of course the general terror of the transition from 1 to 2, I am excited. I can't imagine loving this one as much as I love August. And this is from a person that always wanted a girl! I just love my boy so much and I've had 2 years of loving him already! But everyone says you love them all, so we'll see. I'm sure I'll be surprised.

I feel very blessed indeed.