Pregnancy Photoshoot, or Why I Hate Modeling

I've always been hyper-critical of myself in pictures... and I've always hated taking pictures. These are my favorites that Joshua captured. I wish the ones in the black dress had turned out a bit better though... I look much more at home in the jeans and t-shirt.

But that's pretty indicative of my personality anyway. This is me at 30 weeks.

29 Weeks

I don't know why, but I've always avoided odd numbers. Odd dates, odd months, they're all weird to me. 1 and 5 are the only exception, because they have an order about them. Multiples of 5 are orderly and simple. And 1? It's a straight line. Nothing threatening about that.

So, given my weirdness, I am not really a fan of the fact that this picture was taken at 29 weeks. I am getting more comfortable with the fact that I continue to grow, though.

It's fun to watch that white shirt continue to stretch.

25 week belly

Ta-da!

Also, "ta-blah" applies. Thankfully she's just pushing out forward, not sideways too.

It's a regular Tae Bo gym in my tummy lately. I can see her karate chop from the outside now, which is strangely endearing. Mostly just strange though. Squirrel is still being such a good girl... she lets me sleep all the way through the night. Keep that habit, child.

Went through a mess of nesting this past weekend. Bought paint for Squirrel's dresser, new stuff for the house and started sorting through Random Boxes of Crap that have been sitting in our closet for 2 years. I put a bunch of stuff up on Freecycle for porch pick up, but nobody wants it... at least not yet. I'll give it a week then it all goes to Katy Christian Ministries. Also started rolling ideas around with Mom for our girl's first scrapbook pages, starting with the ultrasounds. Once I get those put to paper you can bet I'll be posting them!

Also, I've forgotten to post this because I didn't have it scanned until last week, but... for my birthday I got a 24 week ultrasound. You can see her little face...the first pic is a sweet smile, the second pic is a death metal scream! Expressive little Squirrel!

I'm late. Again.

I told you guys I was terrible at this.

Since last update I have...

*Played awesome hostess at a killer July 4th party. Here's a picture of all the pregnant ladies at the party, due November, September and June (born July 7!) in order left to right.

*Turned a year older (now 27)

*Gazed nervously at the still unfinished pink baby headband, afraid to do the final finishing stitch

*Most likely eaten my weight in Pringles

*Started crying MUCH easier than I ever thought I would

*Purchased this super cute crib bedding for Squirrel's room

*Popped

That's right, the dreaded "pop". When viewing my from the side, my boobs no longer stick out the farthest on my body. As evidenced below...

Whiiiiiiiiine. Everyone says I look great. I certainly feel great, and I think I look ok. It's just hard to watch yourself go through so many changes, no matter how expected they are.

So that picture was snapped at 22 weeks, 3 weeks ago. And this is at 24 weeks, taken after a night on the town for my birthday, July 15...

Next up? I want to start sanding and preparing to paint the dresser that will eventually go in Squirrel's room. And paint, definitely paint.

It's a squirrel!

TP measurement for today is 11.75 squares... but that's not at all the biggest news of the day.

We're having a sweet baby squirrel... I mean girl and I couldn't be more thrilled!!

I'd gotten to the point of quitting trying to decide what I felt like "it was" and just let it be. Not like I could change anything, nor could anyone else who may have wanted things one way or another. So, with that attitude, despite all my trepidation and whining about surprises, we were off to the land of 30 minute ultrasounds.

The found the placenta and Head measurement first, looked great. The technician said there was a good-looking brain in there, like her mom. Then onto arms, hands, spine, stomach, kidneys, legs, feet, heart, arteries and those "3 lines" they always look for when they don't see a twig and berries. Her legs were crossed during the ultrasound, which if I remember correctly from my mom, my legs were also crossed at my ultrasound. We're ladies.

At one point the tech had her foot in full view. The tech was pushing and prodding around still, and baby girl did NOT like that at all and kicked away from the wand. I can't wait until Joshua and I can really feel her kick and punch. We got to see her face too. She was just chillin' and grinning.

Two of our friends also found out the sexes of their little ones today... a girl and a boy. Out little jellybean will surely have her pick of all the boys in our group of friends.

I have to say, calling her "she" instead of "the baby" or "symbiote" or "it" feels a lot better. We got a video and pictures, albeit only a few pictures. Once I get them online I'll add them to the blog.

Week 18, or The Santa Effect

This is pretty torturous, looking at the growth of my belly over spans of time. This is a fat kid's worst nightmare.

But I'm glad I still haven't fluctuated on my weight, up or down. Hold steady!

Lots of new milestones...

I'm horrible at blogging.

So, starting this past Tuesday, a day before I hit 17 weeks, some new stuff happened...

1. I can feel the little symbiote in there swimming laps and doing somersaults... and whatever else fetuses do in their spare time. It's always right before bed and it's pretty indescribable. My friend Brittnee let me borrow her home doppler, which has been interesting the two times I've listened. It's like drive-by heartbeats... pretty cool. I'm trying not to use it too much, I don't want to get too used to it. Plus, surprises of this sort are more fun.

2. The hair on my stomach is turning black. I don't want to talk about that.

3. Maternity clothing is more and more a part of my daily life. It depends on the day, but the rubber band with the jeans isn't cutting it like it used to. I have my closet sectioned off now based on tops that are too tight on my belly. I am more and more grateful every day that I get to wear whatever I want to work, within reason of course. And my yoga pants totally pass for dress pants.

4. We got a free dresser for the baby's room off Freecycle. It's a 6-drawer Ikea piece that will double perfectly as a changing table. Just need to sand it down and paint it before we move it upstairs.

Speaking of paint, we painted the living room and rearranged the furniture. Much more open... and baby-friendly, funny enough. We can see everything on the floor from the kitchen now, and the dead corner that used to plague my every waking moment is no more.

Also, my TP measurement for the past 2 weeks has been 11 squares. No change... although I can definitely tell a change in shape. We'll keep growing and see what happens!

Two weeks from today we find out if symbiote is a boy or girl. I'm excited to find out!

Week 15!

"Later today" does not usually mean "3 days later"... but whatever.

Week 15 belly!



Next time I get pregnant I'm taking "before" pictures. I honestly can't remember how flat (or not) my stomach was before this started. I feel like I just look like I ate too many cookies... constantly... for about 15 weeks. I can feel a difference in the firmness of my stomach below my belly button though. I wish I could take a picture of firmness, haha.

There we have it. I can't say I feel awesome about how I look... I just keep telling myself I've lost 7 pounds, this is all for the best and it's all baby, not fat.

This is where I apologize for neglecting the blog

I'm really good at neglecting every blog I've ever had. This one is no different.

So here's a super quick rundown of everything I missed last week...

At week 13 my TP measurement was 10.5 sheets. I shrunk, somehow. I think it's because my ass is migrating to my belly. Seriously, I am kind of upset that it's retreating.

In other news, I finally got a scale via Freecycle, which is pretty much my favorite thing ever. You post "wanted" or "offer" posts to the group, and you get to give or get stuff. It so happened that I was able to trade my unflattering dress pants with pockets (that made me look wider) for a nice, clean, functioning scale from a very nice KISD teacher who had recently lost 70 lbs. after a gastric bypass and was still wearing her size 20 pants. She's still shrinking, and funny enough her two sisters also got gastric bypasses after she did, so those pants still have a lot of life left in them.

Anyway, the scale. I hate scales, I always have. I have always preferred to go by how my clothes fit rather than pay attention to the numbers, either of my weight or my clothing size. However, as my doctor has decreed that I only gain 15 pounds while carrying the symbiote, I have to actually track my weight. Yay.

Good news is... I've lost 6 lbs. since the pregnancy started. Pretty amazing to me, as none of that went away because of morning sickness. We'll see what happens over the next few months.

Also, symbiote has an e in it. I've been spelling it wrong.

That pretty much catches everything up to now. Almost... week 14 belly pics and TP measurement will be up later today.

Happy Mother's Day!

Measuring the belly - week 12

Today's TP test... still 11 squares. Funny, I feel bigger. (If you are confused, see Sunday, April 18)

Now that we have a functioning camera other than our iPhones, we're documenting the belly too! Here I am at 12 weeks. I'll probably do this every week... maybe every other week. Depends how fast I grow!

Measuring the belly

For the first time last week, I wore one of my belly bands for an entire day. As soon as I found out I was pregnant bought four fun colorful bands from this shop on Etsy. We snapped a side pic of me at week 6-ish but since nothing else has really changed we haven't done a pic since... I think I just look like I'm eating too many burritos. But there's definitely more definition there now so I think we'll start the pics again, and share of course.

On one of the baby websites I read, some of the women have started measuring their bellies with toilet paper and counting the squares. Easy! So as of Friday, gestational age was 11 weeks and I am 11 squares around at my widest point.

Next step - to buy a scale so I can see how much weight I lose/gain during this adventure. Lost 2 pounds so far, which is great considering my doc only wants me to gain about 15 pounds total. Easy... right?