Oh Yeah......

I have a blog! I guess I should stop neglecting it. Many people have been giving me a hard time for not updating them on my pregnancy. It's hard to want to want to post pictures of myself right now when I feel fat and ugly. Ugh! But even though I still don't have an updated picture of my current self, I am at least going to blog. I will be sure to have Preston take a picture of me the next I time I actaully get out of my PJ's and dressed.

Life has been crazy busy these last 9 weeks. Preston and I have been working on the house and yard more, getting together the last minuet items that we will need for the arrival of our baby Peanut, going to our birthing class every week (we had our last class last Tuesday, yay!), celebrating our baby peanut with an incredible baby shower thrown by my sweet and talented sister in law, entertaining dinner guests multiple times every week, shooting weddings (at 9 months pregnant and down in Las Vegas), editing weddings, shooting and editing multiple bridal and engagement shoots, celebrating the graduation and return home of my big brother from Officer Candidate School, celebrating several family birthdays (including mine and Preston's is in just 2 short days ), celebrating our 3 year anniversary, Preston has been going to night school, I've been working on some sewing projects that needed to be completed before Peanut arrives, oh yes and all while growing a baby. That's a lot of work, if you ask me.

I cannot believe we are down to the last few days before Preston and I are rewarded the title of Parents. My pregnancy has been going well. Every once in a while I will have a day or two where I feel very uncomfortable. Randomly my tail bone/hip (I don't know which it is) will freak out and make it so I can't even drag my leg let a lone walk with it for about 30 mins. That has only happened to me 3 or 4 times but it KILLS! For about 6 weeks of my pregnancy I had a hard time sleeping on my left side due to the movement of one of my ribs but I would lodge a small pillow just under it making it bearable to sleep on but now I'm great! I don't need to sleep with a pillow and I can comfortably sleep on both sides. Of course little Peanut pushes up into my ribs every so often especially if I'm slouching on a couch but I think he may have dropped this last week so it doesn't happen really any more. All-in-all I'd say I've had a very easy pregnancy and boy am I grateful. I hope I get this lucky every time I am pregnant.

There is no doubt the worst part of pregnancy for me is the weight gain. I feel SO fat. My face looks huge to me. I cannot wait to have my old body back, although I am told it won't be exactly the same. Probably true but I'm determined to get it back. I've been lucky enough not to get any stretch marks on my belly. I think I have gotten a few spider veins or stretch marks on the backs of my legs but they are small and there are few. They will disappear for sure when this baby comes out so I'm not worried about them. Two weeks ago I went walking for an hour, (30 minutes longer then usual) yeah, not the best idea. I was swollen for a good week. My fingers feel like sausages sometimes but I hear I am lucky to not experience any swelling until my last couple of weeks of pregnancy so I am grateful.

I've got a bunch of pictures to share with you guys but I'm not at my computer with all my pictures on it so it will have to wait a little bit. Hopefully tonight or tomorrow I will be able to get to it.

Life is going well and Preston and I are more than anxious to meet out little guy. Only a few more days until he's due to arrive!! I'm sorry if I've bored you all with my post. I'd be surprised if many of you made it this far into the post. I consider my blog to be more of a journal for myself than a place to share my life with the world.

Until next time,
- A pregnant momma

Week: 39 weeks and 3 days
Cravings of the Week: (or past two months) FRUIT!

T-Minus 10 Weeks!!

I guess since I've hit and passed the huge milestone of the 3rd trimester and am now 30 weeks along, I should post an update.

30 Weeks

Today marks Week 30! I've started jogging again. Not quiet running but it feels good to get my blood pumping again. Since I slowed down on exercising for the past 7 weeks, I can tell I've gained a little more weight than I probably should have while being pregnant. Not fun. But I have high hopes that I can get back into some shape that's not just a huge blob.

I'm lucky to say that I still do not have an outtie belly button nor any stretch marks. Thank you Fish Oil!

For the past three or four days I have started getting more uncomfortable. I'm finally feeling pregnant! As miserable as aches and pains are, I'm thrilled to be experiencing what every expectant Mom talks about. Every so often my tailbone starts to hurt. I woke up one morning and it was killing me! I guess it has to do with the way Peanut is laying. He will push against something (I forget what it is) and it will trigger pain in my tailbone. Weird. A long with my painful tailbone, my left side hurts a bunch from my rib cage. It hurts mostly when I've been sitting for awhile and when I lay down. I have one rib that pokes out from all of the belly expansion and because of it, it kills to lay on my left side. I'm pretty limited on sleeping positions now. I mostly sleep on my right side. Just today I started getting slightly painful kicks from Peanut. It feels like really strong muscle spasms and so far has occurred mostly on my right side.

Honestly though, I really do enjoy having these pains. It's just more reassurance, aside from all of the kicking and punching that's going on inside my belly, that I have a little guy growing in me and that makes all of this discomfort worth it!

I can't WAIT to meet my little man. It's driving me crazy!! I held my cousin-in-law's 3 week old baby boy, Miles, the other day (I even had the privilege of babysitting him for a little while a couple days before that) and it made my heart ache to hold my own son. I can't describe the feeling I get when I long to hold my son. It's so strong and incredible. I love my baby so much already.

Preston and I have been working on Peanuts room a little more. We've picked up supplies to build a closet system and we're going to start working on it this evening. I've also been busy with some sewing projects which I will have to write about and post later. I'm so excited for my baby to have and use them.

Life is very exciting for us these days and will only be getting more exciting. I love my husband so much and couldn't have asked for a better Father to my children. Preston will be, without a doubt, the best Daddy! He is so cute with our little man already as is just as anxious as I am to meet our little Peanut.

Week: 30
Cravings of the Week: Root Beer Floats

Unbelievable

Can you believe it because I can't.
Our garden area has been tilled!!

For the past couple of weeks we have been working hard to get our garden prepared for some growing. I weeded, Preston tilled and we put down clear plastic together to kill all the seeds from the weeds. It only takes a couple of weeks (some say days, others say weeks) to kill off everything but I think this year we're just going to leave the plastic down all season. I don't know if I can keep up with being a new mom, photography and learning how to garden all in one year. We're probably going to plant some tomatoes and squash on the end of the garden just so we can get some experience in before next year.

We are looking forward to having a garden!

Duke was so cute and did a great job at being a watch dog. I'm pretty sure he was afraid the tiller was going to attack Preston but thanks to Dukes impressive watching skills, Preston returned in alive and without injury at the end of the day.






Amongst all of our dead weeds, spring is found :)




FINAL RESULT

Before


After

St. Patrick!

This year I cooked a St. Patrick's Day dinner. It turned out perfectly!

Menu
Corned Beef
Cabbage
Mashed potatoes
Carrots

Confession: Due to a series of events, I was unable to cook this meal on March 17th. Preston's brother came over to enjoy the meal with us and I didn't want to freak him out with green mashed potatoes and milk so I left the food in it's original color. Next year I will be sure to go all out on the festive colors!

Week: 28

Cravings of The Week: Strawberry's and lemonade

What a month!

So, I guess I failed at updating my picture within a day or two of my last post... oops.

This last month has been extremely busy for Preston and I. Don't ask me what we have been busy with because I have no idea but some exciting things have happened. First off, I've made it to week 26!!! WOW!! What an accomplishment! And I now I'm counting down the days on one hand for the THIRD TRIMESTER to begin!!! Next Monday (4 days away) marks the beginning of my third trimester. I cannot believe how quickly time flies yet, June 13th still seems so far away.

(This picture was taken at 25 weeks and 5 days... 10 mins after I woke up. Excuse the tired face)

We went in to see a specialist last Monday (start of week 25) because our Peanut has some big kidneys for his age and my OB wanted to double check to make sure it wasn't anything serious. The specialist gave us a bunch of statistics on what large kidneys could mean but both her and my OB think there is nothing to worry about. Peanut is doing just fine :D At my specialist appointment they weighed baby Peanut and he came in at a whopping 1lb 14oz which is apparently the average weight of a baby at 27 weeks. Our boy is huge!! (I'm scared for delivery. Eek!). Peanut moves a TON! I know everyone says that about the baby inside of them but seriously, this guy is active. Sometimes it creeps me out to watch my belly doing the wave in directions it shouldn't. The specialist even mentioned it and jumped the first time she saw my belly move with her eyes. Maybe I'm eating too many treats??

As for me, I'm still doing great! I'm not running any more due to my little scare on Valentines Day but I am walking and lifting light weights. If I feel comfortable, I may start running a little bit here in the next week or two. I don't have much pain. Sometimes my lower back hurts but that happened before I was pregnant so I don't think it's because of the pregnancy. It's our dang couch and love sac. Uncomfortable! I can't sleep on my belly any more which really sucks. I think that is the biggest down fall of my pregnancy but I have gotten quite used to it. When I first started sleeping only on my sides, my right leg would always fall asleep no matter which side I laid on but I have now started putting a small pillow between my legs and that has helped a lot. I've gained 14 pounds which scares the crap out of me but apparently it's just below average so I guess I'm doing alright. I know most women get excited to ware maternity clothes because they make pregnant belly's look so darn cute but I actually like the look of my naked belly more than my clothed. Too much info? Probably.

Preston is doing great! He is so stinking cute with my pregnancy these days. He falls asleep with his hand on my belly and I love it. Preston always talks to baby Peanut and calls him by name. I can tell Preston is getting anxious to meet his boy and I'm getting anxious to see him in Daddy mode. He always talks about the fun things he wants to do with his son. First on the list is build a tree fort. We've got some awesome pine trees in the back yard that are dieing to have a fort built on them. Preston is going to be such a great Dad!

Aside from our expecting real human baby, we welcomed another sort of baby into our home this last week. Right now we don't have a name for her and unfortunately I cannot upload her first picture to my computer because I took it with my point and shoot camera that I've lost the USB cord to but here are some internet shots of her. She brought a few friends along as well... :)

I love our new addition!! I started booking a bunch of weddings so I decided to throw down on the Nikon D700 FX-format, a 70-200mm f/2.8 lens and an SB-900 speedlight. I'm looking forward to all the fun I'm going to have with this new camera. I'm also looking forward to buying more lenses for her :D

Last week, with all of that warm weather we had, we put our hands to good use and started to prepare our garden area for it's first official season of production. Here is our progress so far...

Before

During

And After will have to come soon....

It's difficult to tell in these pictures but I worked on trimming and cleaning up our grapes as well. They had grown threw and up to the top of our apricot tree. It was such a mess! I'm looking forward to getting our garden tilled and planted in the next few months :D

Week: 26 and three days
Cravings of the Week: Lemonade and treats

Shot by Cupids Arrow?

Not unless Cupid is a doctor and his arrow is a needle.

We had a bit of a scare yesterday, on Valentines day of all days. To make a long story short, at around 11:30am I started cramping and at around 6pm I started bleeding. Not a good sign if you're over 20 weeks pregnant. It wasn't horrible bleeding but definitely obvious, bright red. I was terrified, or course, that something was wrong with my baby. So terrified that I was shaking and due to rush hour it took us 20 minutes to get to the hospital. On top of that we had to register when we first got to the hospital which is something that is usually done a few weeks before your due date so that you don't have to wait and do it on the day you are rushing into the hospital with a baby's head poking out of you. The good news is, apparently Valentines day is a great day to have an emergency. There was no one there so we didn't have to wait in any lines and we were seen immediately.

As soon as we got up to Labor and Delivery the nurses hooked me up to a machine that monitored the babies heart rate and any contractions I might have had. It took the nurse a minute to find the heart rate which scared me to death but was relieved when she found it and I was having contractions about every two and half minuets. I now know what contractions feel like which I am excited about but of course they weren't nearly as intense as they will be when I go into labor. After hooking me up to that machine and asking a whole bunch of questions, the nurse then poked me with a needle to draw my blood but missed the vein and had to re-poke me. To her surprise she got the vein but went right through it. She felt horrible and said she had never done that before so to put me at ease she brought in her friend to poke me and thankfully she got it on her first try. Did I mention I hate needles? No? Well I do. I hated it but luckily it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.

They gave me another ultrasound which was the highlight of our day because we got to see our baby boy again. He's doing great! The doctors don't know why I was bleeding but they have put me on strict bed rest for the next two days with bathroom privileges every two hours and I can't work out for the next two weeks. Before we left the hospital the doctor gave me a shot which made me shake violently and my heart race for a few hours in hopes that it would stop my contractions and cramping. It did.

So now I am sitting in bed. Bored. Feeling lazy and writing a blog post about our Valentines day which includes no pictures. Lame. But our baby is doing just fine and I've stopped bleeding and cramping. I plan on writing up another post in the next day or two with a picture of my ever growing belly. Hurray for 23 weeks!

Week: 23 and one day
Cravings of the Week: Everything!
I am so hungry I could eat my kitchen cabinets!

It's Just a Bee Sting ...

... A very, very large bee sting!!

So three days ago Preston took a picture for a belly update but it was right after I had worked out, I had no makeup on and I didn't realize how bad my hair looked. I didn't feel comfortable letting the whole world see that photo so today I asked Preston to take another one. Okay, so you see the photo a couple of posts down at 19 weeks? Well, my belly looked exactly like that in the picture that was taken three days ago. Not exaggerating one bit. And today I look like this....

I'm pretty sure I have officially "popped"!

Week: 22
Cravings of the Week: Raspberry Lemonade
(I think I officially have a real pregnancy craving!)