25 Weeks

Yep, she's growing! 

As I type this, I'd like to just let you know that it's currently 63 degrees outside.  Very. Nice.  Off-topic I know, but I just had to rub it in a little!

Baby H and I had our 25 week doctor's visit today along with my glucose test - blech.  Everything is going great with her - she's measuring right on schedule for an early-mid December arrival, and she is still super-active.  Every time we go to the doctor (except of course for the gender scan - go figure) they comment about how extremely active she is!  Today, when the doctor was trying to get her hearbeat on the doppler, she'd kick the sensor every time it got over her!  At least there was no need to stress out over her well-being since it was clear, both from the inside and looking at the outside of my stomach, what was going on.  She finally settled down and her heartbeat was great, but the doctor said "I think you're going to have a very active and stubborn baby on your hands!"  Wonderful............Just kidding!  Of course Nick and I are thrilled that she's doing great, and although her activity level can be tiresome at times for me (some days she kicks, punches, and stomps almost constantly, and let's not even get into what she does at night), I'm always grateful to know that she's happy in her little home.

On my end, let's just say that based on the scale baby girl ought to be growing VERY well.  I'm still where I'm "supposed" to be weight-wise, but I stand amazed at how a person can gain so much weight in just 4 weeks!  We'll leave that there, and we'll remember that a healthy baby is the most important thing.  I was actually instructed by the doctor this week to dial back my exercise.  I'd been having some pretty bad lower-abdominal pain after my walks, and today she suggested that I limit myself to 1 mile several times a week instead of the 2-3 I'd been trying for.  Yoga is still recommended so that made me happy!  I loooove my prenatal yoga. 

Aside from blimping up, I've continued to feel pretty good this month (I say month since I haven't given you an update in 3 weeks).  My appetite has increased in a major way (no kidding, right?)  I'm also starting to feel tired more easily, and getting up and down and moving around is getting a little tougher.  I've noticed myself starting to do the waddle, which I'm fighting as hard as I can.  It's so weird how your hips just kind of open up on their own and make you sway side to side when you walk! 

I can't believe that I'm almost through my second trimester.  Time is flying by!  I know she'll be here before we know it, and I'm just trying to relish every minute of anticipation and preparation.

Projects

Today I finally finished this project for Nick. I've been working on it for over a month, and it's finally up on the wall! Of course, the bigger accomplishment is what's represented inside this box. As a rule, I hate "brag blogging," but I think you'll all appreciate knowing what the items in this shadow box are and what they mean. Okay, starting with the top row: the bronze items with straps are spurs. Nick was given the right to wear them as an honor from the cavalry unit with whom he worked in Afghanistan. Especially since he's not in the Army this is a huge tip of the hat to him. In the middle of the top row is Nick's biggest Afghanistan honor: his Bronze Star. This is the military's third-highest honor for meritorious acts or service, ranking just beneath a silver star. It is a very distinguished honor for Nicholas, and one that was very hard-earned. Directly beneath it is his Combat Action Badge. This means what it sounds like - he actually saw combat action, i.e. took fire/was attacked by enemy forces. Thank goodness for body armor! On the left of the middle row is the Army Achievement Medal. This is from the Army - since Nick was working with and for them, they decided to give him this award because of the amazing job he did on the deployment. The next medal to the right is the NATO-ISAF medal which signifies that he was in Afghanistan as a part of the ISAF mission. The far right medal is the Afghanistan Campaign medal, which is self-explanatory. At the bottom are the badges from the cavalry unit, the army brigade (4 ID), and ISAF that Nick wore on his uniform every day. I'm so happy to have this up in our house so that all of Nick's achievements are proudly displayed for our visitors. I also can't wait to someday use it to explain to Baby H what a war hero her daddy is! He certainly worked hard enough to earn them; he deserves a pat on the back every now and then too!
Today Nick completed another household project - much less exciting, but so much more necessary!

Recently the city of Clovis opted to discontinue the polycart trashcan program that it had been trying out for several months. Apparently, many of the area's citizens found it too difficult to get their carts to the curb on trash days, and other residents were frustrated that the carts would sometimes blow away in high winds. Personally, my message to these people would be to suck it up and deal with it because now that the polycarts have been confiscated by the city, all residents must take all their trash to dumpsters located about every 200 feet in alleyways behind our houses. I ask you, which is easier, placing trash in a trash can, taking it to the curb for pick up, and then bringing the trash can back in or hauling bags full or trash and other household waste to a dumpster located several houses down from yours?!
My objections to the discontinuation of the polycart program aside, we are now relegated to dumpster use, which brings with it an entirely different set of issues. You see, although the area between our fence and the alleyway is not technically a part of our property, the city will not maintain it, i.e. get rid of the tree-sized weeds that grow up along all of the backs of fences in the alley. Since people haven't had to utilize these alleys for months, most of us have let the weeds get out of control, as you can see from this view of my street's alleyway. Now, though, Nick and I need to get out of our back fence and into the alley to get to the dumpster, and these ridiculous weeds have made the task almost impossible. Here's what ours looked like today.

My brilliant and hardworking husband had a plan, though, for dealing with these ferocious weeds, and he executed it today, even after working all night last night. He cleared away the trees, whoops, I mean weeds, with a machete, a weed wacker, and a shovel. Then he put down weed killer, then sand, then these concrete blocks. Now we have a permanently clear passage to the alleyway, and hence to the dumpster. Look at what a great job he did!

While I'm still not happy about this dumpster situation, I am very very grateful to Nicholas for making it much easier and more pleasant to get to the dumpster. Great job, honey!

Ready, Set, Go!

Last weekend started baby fever at my house! I traveled to Dallas and Waco to register for baby showers, to shop for Baby H, and to spend some good quality time with my family. We've just got the beginnings of baby girl's nursery up, but I thought I'd give you a peek at what's in there now. I'm sorry I don't have any belly pictures, but those are hard to come by when I'm in my pajamas anytime Nick is awake since he's on nights right now. Okay, so here we go.

The crib! I know it looks old fashioned, and that's the point. My favorite aspect is all of the turned detailing. It's all over the bars...
And even the feet are turned! So sweet.

Here's the changer. I liked this one for several reasons, but went with it because it's small enough to fit in this spot, unlike almost all the others. The baskets are lined in pink and green, which are the nursery colors. No theme, just colors.

On the other side of the window are her dresser and closet. This dresser was in my room when I was a little girl, and even traveled to college with me. Nicholas has the exciting job of repainting it. Lucky him! It will still be white, just needs to be cleaned up.

Here are a few other little things I've picked up. Udder Covers (purple thing) was giving away free nursing covers during National Breastfeeding Awareness Week. I snagged one! The shoe-socks are a gift from "Aunt Rebecca", the Beatric Potter box set is a gift from Grammy (Nick's mom), and the little golden books are three of my favorites from my little girl years.

I never thought I'd find myself saying this, but I love my new diaper bag! It's got all the bells and whistles and it's super-cute. It was a bit of a splurge, but I think that if I've got to give up cute purses for a while, I might as well get a cute diaper bag instead!

Baby girl had her first Northpark shopping spree last weekend. This is a tradition my mom and I have always shared a few times a year, and now she gets to join in the fun. Lucky for her, Neiman's was having Last Call so she got some super-cute spring/summer clothes to grow into as well as a few sweet things for the first few months. Her "Homecoming Outfit" is in there, but you'll have to wait until December to see that!

If I had to pick the most precious thing in her closet right now, it would be this baby bunting. I honestly didn't know that those really existed outside of nursery rhymes! Hers is a super soft, barely pink, bundle of fluff. Apparently, she wears this instead of a coat in the winter. Since it actually does get really cold in New Mexico, this was a must!

Finlay watched, with some level of perturbation, as I took all these photos, and then walked into the middle of the room and started posing for the camera. I said, "Oh, Fin, do you want me to take your picture?" He immediately struck this pose, held it while I snapped, and then pranced happily out of the room. We are really in for it once this baby actually gets here with this little attention hog running around!

Thanks for indulging me by looking at all these pictures! I hope everyone has a great weekend. We're finally trying out our first Clovis church tomorrow so I'll be sure to report on that experience ASAP.

Pop Goes the Tummy!

At 22 weeks pregnant, I've finally popped! No more walking around with the "beer gut" look. I'm finally, actually looking like a momma to be. Baby H is moving all the time now. If I'm not actively doing something else - cleaning the house, going for a walk, etc. - I can pretty much always feel her kicking, punching, and rolling around in there. This is cute now, but I wonder how painful it will become a few months from now?! At any rate, though, I'm very grateful for the constant reminder that all is well with her. My popping tummy coincided with a major uptick in my appetite for a few days this week. I guess she was just going through a growth spurt because things have gone back to normal now.

Something new and lingering is serious round ligament pain in the lower middle of my abdomen. I'd had it on the sides for a while, but now I can feel some serious stretching going on right in the middle. It's pretty uncomfortable at times, but another great reminder that baby girl is growing! For about the last month I've had a lot of days where I felt like my whole stomach was stretched to the limit, and one thing I've done a lot that's seemed to help is prenatal yoga. I can't recommend it highly enough! Although I still get these stretching pains, they feel so much better after some gentle yoga stretching, especially the cat/cow pose (for my yogi friends out there).

We're gradually getting the house ready for baby - I ordered a crib and a changing table this week! I can't wait for them to get here. My mom and I are also making a shopping trip to Dallas and Waco this weekend to register and pick up some other baby items. Does that seem a little excessive to you? Well, you obviously haven't tried to baby shop in Clovis or Lubbock! I'm hoping to find a Babies R Us with a good selection of items in Dallas, and then I'll also hit up the Waco Target. We also get to do some fun shopping around in the children's wing at Northpark! I don't know who's more excited about that part of the trip - Edie or me.

Be thinking about Nick this week as he moves to the night shift (starting tonight) and has to handle Finlay and the household stuff all by himself from Friday through Tuesday while I'm gone. I figure that if I could do it for a year, he can do it for a few days, though.

Happy Tuesday everyone!

Manchester United Game

On Wednesday Nick flew down to Houston to watch the Manchester United vs MLS All Stars game with my brother Mark. These two share an obsession with Man U (an English soccer team), and Mark got tickets to this game for his birthday. He was really sweet and shared them with Nicholas as his birthday present so they both got to see their favorite team play in-person. All reports are that these two had a great time, even if Mark did have to drive back to Waco after the game to be at work by 6am the next day. That's what I call dedication! Here are the two boys in their seats before the game, both wearing their Man U jerseys.

Nick got to the stadium early and hit up a few tailgates. This crew of guys is trying to bring a pro soccer team to San Antonio. They gave Nick grilled stuffed jalapenos and beer so they are now his friends for life!

In other news, we've started accumulating a few things for Baby H, and it's completely throwing Finlay off. So far we have her stroller with bassinett, some socks, a little stuffed animal, and a precious Polo onesie I got in the mail today from Carolyn, my second mom. We've put it all in the nursery, but there's no furniture in there yet so I've put the other items on top of the bassinett cover. Before I've put each item up, I've let Finlay sniff it so that it's familiar to him. Well, now he can't figure out why they're not his toys, and he just goes into the nursery, lays down on the floor and stares up at everything with his ears pricked. I ordered the crib and changer today so I'm interested to see how he reacts when we really start moving stuff in there!

Happy weekend everyone!

It's a GIRL!!!

Here I am at 21 weeks after an absolutely exhausting but exciting day. Much to our surprise, (we've really thought we were having a boy this whole time) we learned that Baby H is a baby girl. We almost didn't get a definitive answer because little girl was being so modest this morning in our ultrasound. At first she wouldn't open her legs, and the cord was in the way of our viewing. Then, about 30 minutes later, when she finally did open her legs, after much poking by the ultrasound tech and rolling side to side on my part, she then covered the area with her hand! Finally, we got a good view of the three little lines that meant we'll be welcoming a sweet baby girl sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Here's baby girl's 2D profile: (wondering where her legs are? she's folded completely in half right here so they're floating above her head)
My doctor's office automatically does 3D/4D ultrasound each time. I think they images come out kind of creepy, but here's the best view we got of her:

Since the big gender reveal, people have been asking about names. Yes, we have a short list, but no we won't be telling until she's actually here. That's all the news for now. Check back this weekend for pictures from Nick and Mark's big trip to Houston for the Manchester United vs. MLS All Stars game tomorrow!

Prayers Please

I'm forgoing my 20-week post (hey, I really don't look that different this week anyway) and instead ask that you take a moment to pray for my lifelong friend, Emily. She lost identical twin boys yesterday at almost 34 weeks. Obviously, this is devastating news for Emily and her husband, for their families, and for all their friends. I can't imagine what they are experiencing, but ask that you pray for peace and for healing for this sweet family.