21 weeks!

This week went by relatively fast after a busy week. Last Thursday I went shopping with my mom and the kiddoes. I had a "goof" of sorts and kept trying on clothes that weren't maternity, but had enough room in the waist that I thought it would work. Wrong! Let me tell you, even empire waist clothes are made to cover a belly, not show it off. So nothing fit right and I left the mall with a nice case of low self-esteem. Luckily we stopped off at Old Navy and I ended up with some yoga pants (so comfy!) and this really cute pair of maternity jeans. I definitely felt better after trying on something that was actually made to fit my body right now. My mom left with all kinds of cute clothes and lucky me, we wear the same size when I'm not sporting a baby belly, so I've already called first borrowing dibs on them. :)


Weight gain: I weighed myself about 5 days ago, but I won't know official weight gain until my ob appointment that's coming up on Thursday. Right now I'm guessing that I have gained 4-5lbs this month, but we'll see. I actually started working out a bit last week. Nothing much, just some walking on the treadmill and a few leg exercises before bed. I'm so out of shape that even that has me waking up to sore leg muscles..Haha! 


Movements: Oh yes! In fact, he's been jumping around the whole time I've been writing this. :) He still has quiet moments but he's starting to really pack a punch when he gets going. It's so funny because Declan started out being the child that moved the least and now I think he actually moves more during the day than C did at this stage. My DH got to feel him kicking over the weekend. He asked me if feeling those kicks are as exciting this time as it was with Em and C and the answer is most definitely YES! Just knowing that my sweet boy seems to be thriving and seems to active some days makes me feel just as blessed and excited as when I was feeling those kicks for the first time. Sometimes I think I cherish it even more since this is more than likely the last time I'll ever feel them.


Irrational Fear this week: Again, not much. I did have a moment of "what if the cord wraps around him/his neck" that came out of nowhere and left just as quickly. I'm also talking to my doctor about this discharge (TMI, I know) that I've had since the beginning - although after a normal pap and a normal culture, I'm not sure if he will do anything.


My DH left last night for a week long trip with his work, so this week will probably drag by. Since my husband is the Army, I'm used to him leaving for little trips. We also survived a year long deployment when our daughter was 14mo (he came back when she was 28mo) so I'm no stranger to him walking out the door. But I cried like a baby when he was telling his goodbyes last night. He's only about 4hrs away and I'm more than capable of being a single mom for a week, but I was a mess. Dh was a sweet-heart and gave me an extra long hug before he left (and, of course, made fun of me for being a hormonal mess. ;). 


Things I'm looking forward to this week : OB appointment on Thursday, meeting my mom that afternoon for a playdate of sorts at the park, and hubby coming home on Friday. I also started making my "what I need to do before this baby comes list" and I'm anxious to get started on that.

First bad opinion on our name.

I've been so irritated about it, although I'm not sure if it's just the pregnancy hormones or the fact someone doesn't like something to do with my child. I just don't understand why some people feel the need to let you know their opinions on something that has nothing to do with them, especially when it's not asked for. 


We have a couple friend who are expecting their 3rd boy next month sometime. The names they have picked out are ok (Robert, William, and Zachary) just names that would have never been on my list. But I smiled, nodded, and never really thought about it again. So a few months ago Declan started being on the table if this babe was a boy. DH mentioned it to our friend (the husband) in passing and our friend was all "oh, don't name him that" and blah blah blah. I didn't give it much thought since we didn't even know if we'd ever have to worry about naming a boy. A few weeks after that, I ran into the husband at Walmart and he asked again if we had any names picked out. I said "not really, we're just waiting until we know gender" since I KNEW he'd acted negatively toward our name in the past. He went "Didn't you guys have a name picked out...starts with a D?" and I said "yes, maybe Declan if we have a boy". He acted all surprised and said "oh, I thought that was for a girl. I told Jess (his wife) it was your girl name and we thought it was a little weird". I explained that, no, it was for a boy (for a girl??? really??) and then went on my way.


So fast-forward to this afternoon. My DH went to their house this morning and ONCE AGAIN our friend asked if we had names picked out. DH said "Declan" and our friend goes "oh, you're still going with that?".......and then he has the weirdest explanation ever for his negative opinion a few months ago on the name. Not sure if he felt bad for laughing at it earlier or what, but his reasoning for making fun of it last time was "we were watching a movie with a character named Declan and we were making fun of the name and then you called the next day and said that was a name on your list". Uhhhhh, how does that make it any better? I guess that was his way of apologizing? I honestly have no clue. Dude, just freaking smile and nod. Besides, what happened the the explanation of "oh, we thought you were naming a girl that"? 


I've just been aggravated about it all day. My DH isn't bothered in the least and said "oh hell, he's just giving me a hard time".. I know I shouldn't care, but I'm a protective mom! Plus, if you want to give your friend a hard time, their child should not be fair game.


We absolutely love his name and I have no doubts about it. We've actually gotten A LOT of positive feedback on it, which surprised me a bit, since it's still not that common in the US quite yet. But it's not like we made it up or gave him a normal name but completely changed the spelling to make it "unique". I


I'm sure I'll be completely over it tomorrow, since that's how I tend to be. But tonight I'm fuming. :)

a 20 week baby belly

Ok, I am feeling HUGE at the moment. I still didn't weigh myself yet because I am scared of my Wii fit. I mean, it say's "whoa" when I step on it* and doesn't give me the option to put pregnant so it gives me grief for going up every time I step on it. Obviously I have issues. ;P

On with the pic!

My 40 week belly is going to be insane. I am loving it, though. He kicks me all the time and it's nice being out of that awkward "is she just getting chubby or is she....." stage.

*In my defense, it says "whoa" even if you lose weight. My Wii fit is so rude. :)

ETA: Ok, I finally mustered up the courage and weighed myself this morning. It has me gaining 3lbs in the last 3 weeks. So that means I'd be right on target since I'm supposed to be gaining about a pound a week. Does anyone else have issues with every scale saying something different? The scale in the bathroom had me 4(!!) lbs lighter this morning. I'm using the one in the doctor office as the "real" weight, but it never matches the scale or my Wii fit, either.
Doctor appointment in one week! Can't wait to hear Declan's little heartbeat!

20 weeks -Officially half way!

I've had a busy couple of days, what with the ultrasound late last week and then my husband and I really sitting down and making sure we were set on a name. I also ordered the first newborn item on Friday. Nothing much, just an initial shirt for newborn pics, but those first few items makes it so much more real.


Weight gain - Still no idea. I don't think much of a big difference, still my sucky scale in the bathroom hasn't changed much (if at all). It's such a hassle getting up and getting all the Wii stuff out because I'm usually being pulled in two different directions by a 2 year old, am sort of sick to my stomach because of being hungry, plus having to take off my clothes in the cold living room. No thanks. But then after I eat I don't want to weigh myself since it's most accurate before eating/drinking anything. I'll probably force myself to do it some time this week, though. Just looking at what I weighed at this time with my other two, I think I'm doing ok. Bump is definitely getting bigger!


Movement - Finally the little rascal has decided to make his presence known. I feel him a lot throughout the day. Still not hard kicks/rolls or anything, but I can lift up my shirt and watch my stomach jump up and down. Since he's breech right now, the places I feel movement the most is right around my belly button (his hands) and some nice kicks in the bladder, cervix, and hip area (his feet). I'm cherishing these movements so much. I feel such a deep bond with him already and I love it.


Irrational Fears this week - Actually, not much. I KNOW, RIGHT?! That's not like me at all. I mean, I've had a few instances where I think "what if they missed something on the ultrasound?" but I haven't dwelt on it much. It was just reassuring to watch her fill out the ultrasound form and everything - brain, organs, size, etc- she put normal on. At the end was a little box for additional details and all she wrote was "anatomy scan normal. Gender male" and I liked that because I wanted a really normal, boring ultrasound. His movements are also constant enough to not warrant any worrying, either. I've just had a nice weekend imaging life with a little girl and 2 little boys. :)


Finally, his name. I had this name picked out before I was even pregnant again. I heard it the first time on the movie Leap Year and I thought "there's a nice Irish name" (since Connor is irish and we wanted to stick with that if we had a boy). I then heard it again on that tv show Revenge and that just sold us even more. It's still not that popular here in the states and hasn't cracked the top 100 yet, although I think it will shortly. I figure I better get dibs on it now. :)

Declan Finn to be exact. I'm so in love with his name. I did read that if you like buying the monogrammed items like sippy cups, you can only find them online or ordering from Irish companies. That cracked me up a bit, but that's ok. I also worry a tiny bit about people not being able to pronounce his name right (it's Deck-lin since lin/lan/lun all sound the same when said) but luckily I haven't heard any weird Dee-clans or Deh-clan's yet..haha.
I'm starting the slow (and sad) process of going through E's baby clothes here soon to get rid of and sale. It's bitter sweet knowing I'll probably never have another baby girl, but it's also exciting to go through all of C's cute clothes and know I get to use them again. E, at 5, is so incredibly fun to buy for, so I don't get too down about bypassing all the cute infant girl stuff.


Belly pic soon.

Ultrasound at 19w 4d

I had my anatomy ultrasound this morning and I wanted to get the visit down before I start forgetting. Pregnancy brain is no joke!

I got the kids up and dressed and we were out the door right on time. I picked my DH up at his work and we headed on up to my doctors office. We stopped at McDonalds on the way since the kids hadn't had breakfast yet (or me) but I was so nervous that everything I tried to eat made me sick to my stomach. We got there and I ran up to the office while my husband got the kids out. I had gotten there RIGHT on time so I wanted to get in there and get signed in since if you are late, they sometimes skip you and go to the next person. I get off the elevator and the lights are off and the door is locked. I was about to freak out when I noticed that they had a sign on the door stating that they had moved locations (and I had just been there 2 weeks before and no one mentioned a move!). In my haste I just took the letter off the door since it had the directions on it and called the office and told them I was on my way.

We get there exactly 7 minutes late, which isn't too bad considering we had to book it back to the car, get two angry kids back into seats and read directions as we headed back the way we had come.

So anyway, we get in there and the ultrasound started. I was pretty much praying in my head "please be healthy, please be healthy". She started with the head, so that's where I'll start.

Head ~ Head was measuring around 18w 6d or so the brain looked awesome. I got to see a sweet little nose and lips and 2 eyes.

Chest ~ The heart was beating at 152 bpm, had all 4 chambers and looked awesome as well.

Stomach ~ It was measuring around 19w 3d, which proves that all my children are chubby little things...lol. Stomach looked good, kidneys were developed nicely and there was urine in the bladder, so everything is working. Umbilical cord also looked great. Like I figured, I have an anterior placenta.

Legs and arms ~ 2 arms, 2 legs. All the bones that are supposed to be in them. His legs are measuring around 19w 1d or so,  which is good. One of my weird fears was brittle bones disease (although that's genetic and would have probably shown up by now) and one of the first signs is having leg bones that are much smaller than the rest of the body. So one fear gone! Also 2 hands and 2 feet. :)

Spine was also fully formed, so no neural tube defects.

Let's see. Amniotic fluid was good, my cervix was good (so there goes my incompetent cervix fear)

Based just on lmp, I am 19w 4d today. At 9w 4d baby was measuring 8w 6d, so about 5 days behind. At 12w 4d baby was measuring between 7-5 days behind. Today baby was measuring 19 weeks exactly, so he's gained 1-3 days since the last ultrasound. That makes me happy and makes me wonder if I am going to continue my streak of big babies.

So in conclusion, I have a very healthy baby.......BOY in there! Oh, I can't wait to snuggle him and kiss his sweet face!

This facial expression cracks me up because his older brother (who is only 2) is known for these really disgruntled faces. I call it his "Sean Connery" look because the boy can work his eyebrows. And it looks like littlest brother can pull a "Sean Connery" look just as well. :)

We are hoping to have a 4D scan done with this one, since we never did it with the other two. Most places say between 28-32 weeks are the best time. Since I am a small person and my babies do tend to be larger, she says anytime between 26-28 weeks would be the best for me. That way his features wouldn't be squished. So, thinking that here in about 6.5 weeks I can get another glimpse of this precious baby makes me so happy.

Name to be announced shortly. DH has to go over the list one more time, but I think it's pretty much set.

I'll never fully breathe a sigh of relief until he is born and in my arms, but I left the office really content and happy. :)

A sweet moment last night....

My 5yr old has suddenly decided to start co-sleeping again. I'm not too worried about it right now, but we're certainly going to be in trouble come July if both of our kids are in our bed when the baby comes. Luckily, right now, my husband is sleeping in the living room to be close to his precious baby chickens (seriously, it makes me laugh how well he's taking care of them) so our bed isn't too uncomfortable for a 5yr old, a 2yr old, and a 5mo pregnant lady. :)


So anyway, I was laying on my side trying to fall asleep and the baby started kicking up a storm. He'd been fairly quiet for the latter part of the day, so it was nice to get that reassurance before sleeping. The kicks were coming regularly enough that I said "Emma, come here" and she crawled over her brother and sat beside me. I placed her little hand right on my stomach where I'd been feeling the most kicks and within seconds BAM, the biggest kick yet right underneath her palm. Since it was dark, I could see her face, but I could just feel her smile. She was so excited and kept saying "my hand raised up and then went back down!" and saying "I think the baby is trying to kick a hole out of your tummy". :) It was just a nice moment. I now can't wait until daddy and big brother get that chance as well.


Friday is the big anatomy ultrasound! I am on pins and needles. Of course, I'm mainly hoping and praying for a healthy baby. I have no reasons to thin that that WON'T be the case, but I think every expecting mama goes through this. I also hope that maybe the baby has caught up a bit to my due date. He/she has measured 5 days behind on both ultrasounds that I've had so far. I'm almost positive I ovulated late, so that accounts for the measurements being a bit off, but my doctor doesn't change due dates unless I'm measuring a week either way. My next fear is going in there and the baby is measuring even further behind. Gah, I'm going to be in a loony bin before this baby comes. I was so chill with C's pregnancy, so I don't know what happened.

19 weeks - maybe even half way there already!

Today I am 19 weeks. Most would consider 20 weeks as being half way there, but since I did have Connor at 39 weeks, maybe the same will be said of this baby and I've hit the half way mark today! A girl can dream, right?


I'm feeling pretty good here lately. I still get sick almost every day around 5pm, but it doesn't last long and as soon as I eat dinner, it's over. It does suck when it happens when I'm in town or in the car because food is not always readily available.


Weight gain - No idea since I haven't weighed myself yet. I normally try to weigh myself on the Wii fit Monday or Tuesday mornings. My husband went in super late to work this morning because of the snow (yay! snow!) and I certainly didn't want to stand naked in the living room while he stood there and laughed at me. The scale in the bathroom doesn't seem to have changed much, so I'm assuming not a lot of weight gain since 1.5 weeks ago. I actually feel like I don't eat enough, but my belly gets so full so quickly. My newest craving, besides my precious, precious watermelon is pizza rolls! And only if I fry them in a nice pot of grease. Talk about a heart attack! 


Baby movement- Finally! I mean, I've felt for sure movement since 13w 4d, but he/she is finally making his/her presence known more than a couple of times a day. I've felt tons of movement today. Although it's still small movements, if I catch it right I can feel the kicks with the palm of my hand. I always get this big goofy smile on my face every time. It never gets old! I'm trying to soak it up as much as I can, since this will probably be the last time I ever experience it.


Irrational Fear this week: I'm almost past the incompetent cervix now, although I'll probably bring up perhaps doing another culture when I see my doc here in about 3 weeks just to make sure the discharge I've been having since the beginning is still normal.
But anyway, my irrational (or not that irrational??) fear is that my child has Down Syndrome or some type of neural tube defect. My NT scan with the blood test came back normal but I never did the triple screen between 15-17 weeks. My doctor is of the mind that if everything looks good at the NT scan, then the triple screen a few weeks later isn't really needed. I could have had it if I had remembered, but truthfully, it slipped my mind. So anyway, I've been running around here the last few weeks thinking I have a perfectly healthy baby in there. Also over the past few weeks I've started reading some blogs that I've come to really care about. Most seem to be about fertility issues, and while I don't have that, it's been so touching reading about their journeys to get their own little miracle baby. I've also learned from reading them that sometimes things don't go exactly as planned. I won't get into details, since it's not my story to share but lets just say that my confidence in just one test is sort of shaky at the moment.  


I told my mom about my strange feelings this morning and she said "if that happens, that we just deal" and that made me feel better. Obviously that story I just mentioned was a special case, but it goes to show that you just never know what could happen. Lets just say that I am very happy that I have an ultrasound in 5 days. Funnily enough, every time I start to worry I feel my little man (or girl) start moving, like he's saying "Mom, chill. I got this". :)


But anyway, feel free to think I am a lunatic.

Rough day in baby land

This child is sure keeping me on my toes and he/she isn't even born yet! Yesterday I felt little movements pretty much on a consistent basis the entire day. It was nice laying there while putting my 2yr old to sleep and feeling those little thumps and kicks. I thought "ok, the time of always feeling movement starts now" and I went to bed happy.

But today. Today I pretty much felt nothing all day long. I might have felt a roll or two in the mid-morning hours but nothing since then. I did have a few errands to run in town and I just told myself that he was just being extra quiet since I was busy. But still nothing when I got home. Nothing during dinner and then still nothing while putting my boy to bed. At the point I was starting to panic a bit and I'd be lying if I said I didn't cry at one point (I'm a crier anyway, so this was not unusual). After C was asleep, I took a nice long bath hoping to get him moving.

About 15 minutes into the bath I felt a little something. I tried to just concentrate on my book but I felt it again and looked down at my belly just in time to see a little kick/punch. I turned in the water on to my side and put my hand on the underside of my belly. Almost immediately I felt 2 firm kicks right into the palm of my hand. WHEW. I feel so much better now. No idea why he was so quiet all day long, unless all the movements yesterday just tired him out. I'm also starting to think I might have an anterior placenta, which would be blocking a lot of the kicks right now. So anyway, this baby now's how to get to his mama. :)

In other news, about a month ago my DH decided that he was going to hatch, raise, and sell chickens. No real reason, just another one of his ideas he gets and runs with. So for the past 2.5 weeks we've had an incubator full of eggs sitting on our kitchen table. Tonight this happened:

 And then this:

It's nice to have babies in the house again, even if it's not mine yet. E is absolutely thrilled and has named 1 of the 2 that have hatched so far "Sally".

18 weeks!

I'm really trying to refrain from being all "omg, can you believe how far along I am!" because I feel like I start out that way every week. But seriously, it is just zooming by. I think some of it is how busy life just is in general. PreK twice a week, gymnastics, all the doctor appointments, etc. Plus the fact that this winter really hasn't been a winter at all, so we haven't been stuck in the house at all. I think this might be our first snow-free winter, like ever. I'm kind of sad about that I keep thinking that we will get hit with at least one good snow fall, but alas. Nothing.

But anyway, on to the good stuff.

Weight gain. No idea since I didn't weigh myself this week. I just had a doc appointment about 5 days ago, so I'm sure the scale hasn't moved too much. At least I hope not! Hah. Actually, for the past few days I have had NO appetite at all. Instead I have been drinking my weight in liquids. I'm always thirsty and peeing like I was back when I first became pregnant. I'm not concerned with diabetes or anything at this point, but just think my body needs some hydration for whatever reason. I admit that I probably don't drink enough even when not pregnant, so maybe I'm starting to make up for that.

Movement: Sigh. Same old, same old. I feel him daily, but still no consistency. Movements are a bit harder since if I catch it right, I can feel the little bumps and kicks with my hand. But I still have constant worry like "when did I feel a kick again?" or " I haven't felt him since really early this morning" and it be like 9 at night

Irrational fear this week: A new category I've started because, really, I can probably hold the world record for weirdest fears and/or worrying during a pregnancy (if you think this is bad, you should hear me when the baby is actually HERE). This weeks fear is incompetent cervix. Why this is irrational is because I've had two successful pregnancies, one of which went to 41 weeks and the other 39. One was 8lbs 4oz and the other 9lbs 1oz. So obviously my cervix knows whats it doing. But I read one little paragraph about incompetent cervix and it said that IC can be caused my damage/trauma during birth. So while nothing too exciting has happened during them, C's birth ended with a 3rd degree tear and both outside and internal stitches. So, I've had a few moments of "omg, I have this!" which my DH is probably tired of hearing about. I do have an ultrasound in 11 days, so if it's still on my mind, I guess I can make a total fool of myself and ask the UT to check my cervical length. I'm glad I'm not married to me.

We are just now getting over a vicious tummy bug that went through both kids over the past week, so I'm wore out. Nothing worse than seeing your baby sick. :(

Ob appointment!

This morning I had my 17w ob appointment. I kind of had a weird morning leading up to it. C (who still co-sleeps) was all over the place last night, waking up multiple times, and even sometimes sort of whimpering in his sleep. I've been so out of it at night lately that I just vaguely remember finding his binky, giving it to him, and going back to sleep. This morning I woke up and felt so sick. I ended up throwing up in the sink (I can't puke in a toilet. I'm a weirdo) and I just chalked it up to some lingering morning sickness.

I get the kids ready, eat a few bites of a bowl of cereal that made me gag, and left to drop E off at preschool. Me and C then had to run into Harps to get E some lunch since I didn't have anything to pack her. C munched on a banana and some orange juice for a bit and then him and I went to the library to hang out for a bit since it was still awhile before my appointment. I noticed that C sort of gagged a few times, but he kept taking out his binky and looking at it, so I assumed that he had a hair on it or something. He acted fine at the library, while I met with a friend to get some maternity clothes, and while I was at the appointment (more on that in a bit). But after we left there and started heading back to Fay, I noticed he looked pale. I said "C, you feel ok?" and he said "I puke" and then about a minute later he threw up everywhere. Poor kid. And poor me because the smell was awful and it made me start gagging as well. We made quite a pair. :)

I took him to DH's work and cuddled him while DH got the car and carseat cleaned up as best he could. He's acting ok since, but I'm afraid he's gotten what E had at the beginning of the week. If he does, we have at least another day of the yuckies.

And now to the appointment.

Heartbeat - a nice 154 beats per minute. That's the lowest it's been so far, if I am remembering correctly. It makes me feel better to know that there is a nice heartbeat going, even if movement still isn't that much. I did feel another case of the hiccups before getting out of bed this morning, so I wasn't quite as nervous going into this appointment,

Weight gain - I've gained 3lbs this month, which the doctor said was awesome. I was sort of expecting more, so I definitely breathed a sigh of relief after that. That means that at closing in on 18 weeks, I've gained 5lbs. Not too shabby, I guess. I'm on par with weight gain with C. At 2 weeks farther along, I was 6lbs heavier with E! So at least I know for the time being I'm at least staying away from her weight gain..haha.

Next appointment is my ultrasound, set for 2 weeks from tomorrow. Oh, I can't wait! I've gotten used to the idea that it's a boy, so I'm going in there expecting to see another cute little man. :)