38 Weeks Down...2 to go

I'm definitely feeling like I'm in the red zone now. I've been getting up earlier just because I can't lie down for very long any more. I get about a half to a full hour of sleep in bed before I need to get up because my hips are killing me. If I sleep sitting up on the couch I get about 2 hours ... much more comfortable, but then it's my bladder that usually wakes me up. It sounds bad but actually it's not too big a deal. I've been an insomniac for a very long time, 5-6 hours is normal for me and I've been down to 2 hour bursts since the beginning of my third trimester. Good practice for nighttime feedings right? :) My hands and feet (and a little on my face) swell up some, I find warm baths help that. As long as I don't swell up inside my wedding ring I'm okay, my shoes are still functional. I wasn't expecting my fingers to swell up out of joint in my sleep though, I just pop them back into place. It feels like pregnancy arthritis. Again...that all started at the beginning of my third trimester and has gathered speed since. I think Holly had another growth spurt yesterday because I napped on the couch a lot. Or I just needed the sleep because I had a headache. Or both. :) I haven't had any contractions just yet, just Braxton Hicks and I don't always notice those. She's moving around a lot less, probably because she's running out of room and Mommy's ribcage only has so much give. All in all...I feel fine. I little tired but I've always been a little tired. These pesky little symptoms are merely worth noticing, but not too bad really. I'm expecting the real pain later at birth.

P.S. My mom told me a story about my great great grandma giving birth to my great grandma on her bear rug when she lived in the Canandian wilderness only to pick herself up, do the rest of her chores and take care of the rest of her kids along with the brand new infant...so I don't have a right to complain do I? :)

37 Weeks Doctor's Visit

I'm considered full term now...and I was right, she has dropped. It was kind of weird feeling exactly when it happened. My blood pressure has gone back to normal, it was 124/68, so no worries there...and because it is normal now I don't have to do a non stress test. I did test positive for the Group B Strep, but that just means I get antibiotics in my IV when I go to the hospital. Not a big deal. And because people are asking me, there probably won't be any more ultrasounds. My pregnancy is almost as normal as you can get so it's not considered necessary. So shots of the baby at 19 weeks from November (if you want to go back and look) is all you're going to get until the baby's born. I'm getting the feeling that I might be my doctor's only OB patient right now, you see she's also my regular doctor, so there'll be a lot less competition for her attention when I go into labor. She's also going to be Holly's pediatrician. It's kind of nice going to just one doctor for everything.

Awwwwwwww

David got his "having a daughter" pink converse shoes yesterday...and yes, he wears them. We also received a packages from Grandma Linda and Uncle Mike of which one of the items is a pair of little crocheted pink converse shoes shown above.

I think the baby dropped last night while I was vegging out on couch. I was feeling a lot of random jabbing on the inside and my tummy felt much heavier, which makes it really hard to get out of bed and getting up from a seated position. I also spent last night getting up to pee every 30 minutes, so I'm a little tired today.

By the way, those balloons from my baby shower are still inflated, they haven't sagged at all.

36th Week Doctor's Appointment

My doctor says she still considers the baby average in growth, so not too big or too small. My blood pressure shot up again, but in my defense there's a lot of stressful stuff going on. I'll go back to checking it again, that really wasn't too much of a big deal, do some breathing exercises, maybe I can do some pregnancy yoga in the evenings. My blood pressure hasn't hit the rate of requiring any action as yet. We're on the weekly doctor's appointments now so I'll be closely watched. I'm finding that I've been more thirsty than hungry lately, my skin is really dried out. It doesn't seem to matter how much fluids I intake, I'm still parched. The kid's stealing all my moisture. If I get much bigger I won't be able to tie my shoes. :) Seriously...David's already had to clip my toenails. David's finished painting the door and putting in the door knob. I just need to do the touch ups on the walls, that shouldn't take too long. So the nursery should be completed this week. Hurray!

Latest Nursery Updates

These are pictures from last week. As you can see, the curtains and all the furniture are set up. There have been developments since then however. Over the weekend I got all the baby stuff out of packaging (including all the stuff we bought this weekend) and started putting it out on the shelves. I have one load of baby stuff to wash and put away still. We have a diaper bag and a mobile on order, we should get it next week. The biggest change is that David bought a door over the weekend and installed it on Saturday. Considering that the house was built by someone that had no clue David did very well at putting in a door that's straight and level into an opening that's not. The door still needs to be painted, along with touch-ups to both bedrooms, and a door knob put in. But we're really close to getting the nursery done. We'll put up more pictures when we're finished.

Nursery Update - Defense Against the Cat Mission

David has put together the changing table and hung up the curtains. He also has a line on a door making company in Shoreline that has a lot of inventory and good prices so we're likely to get a door this weekend. That will be great, I really want to get rid of all the foil I've laid out in the nursery to fend off the kitty. I caught him on top of the changing table in the middle of the night last night. He was stomping around trying to get comfortable and of course he can't because it's foil. When I went in there to get him out he was standing at attention trying to be quiet...nice try buster. I've mailed out the Thank you cards this morning so people will start getting them soon. Our next doctor's appointment is on Tuesday, I 'get' to have a Group B Strep test done. Not a big deal whatever the results are. It's a 'do I need antibiotics prior to giving birth or not' kind of thing...and I've had lots of antibiotics in my time.

35 Weeks and Counting

I've finished sewing the curtains! Woo-hoo! David has fashioned the Beatrix Potter letter figurines that Mom gave us on a little shelf with pegs to hang stuff on. I've got all the baby clothes and linens washed and put away. I have a few more things to go through and David will put up the curtains soon. We'll post more pictures of the nursery when things are in order. I expect the changing table this week along with some other things. David has the car seat installed and we'll try to get it inspected this coming weekend. I guess it's common to put in it wrong and we want to get it right. We did our first load of dishes in the brand new dishwasher last night...works great.

Baby Shower Pictures

Latest Doctor's Appointment

We went to the doctor yesterday for an OB checkup and everything's going fine. I'm pretty much off the hook for blood pressure problems. The doctor just wants me to check it if I happen to be in the vicinity of a pharmacy just to make sure it doesn't sneak up on me. While doing measurements she did confirm that the baby is in fact upside down now so our revolving baby icon is fairly accurate. :) She's facing to my left so the baby's still working on getting in the right position. So that harder spot on top of my belly is a baby bottom. Our next OB checkup is in two weeks, after that it will be weekly.

Last night I finished the curtains for the little window in the nursery. Probably 1 or 2 more sittings at the sewing machine and I'll be finished with the remaining big window curtains. Tonight I think I'll take the tags off the baby clothes and linens and wash them. I have to change things up so I don't get too tired. David will be putting in the car seat sometime this weekend, probably Sunday while we're waiting for our new spiffy dishwasher to show up (David's really excited about that).

34 Weeks Update - post Baby Shower

David emailed me today that our 3D baby icon is now revolving upside down (with exclamation points!!!) I'm pretty sure our baby seat will be installed in the car tonight. :) I knew something was going on in there, my tummy surface has the appearance of rippling waves at times. You can definitely see the movement now.

The baby shower was awesome, my mom was the hostess and my sister Kelly helped quite a bit. The venue was great, BJ's Brewhouse and Restaurant. Everyone (except for some picky nieces) liked the food. It was great to see everyone, there was only a couple of no-shows. David and I came home with a lot of super cute baby stuff. I'll be going through our registry soon and delete the items that we don't want to duplicate. We'll fill in a couple of items ourselves, especially the long-term solution on keeping the cat out of the nursery, so either a door or a tall baby gate. So now I need to do some organization in the nursery, send out a bunch of Thank you cards and somewhere in the cracks finish those darn curtains (I'm actually pretty close to finishing them).

I can really tell I'm fast approaching the red zone here because I'm becoming increasingly more uncomfortable. I get up pretty early on the weekends because I can't spend a whole lot of time in any position anymore. I'm hoping if I can get some naps in that will help. I also am getting heartburn much more often, but Tums work for that. I took an epson salt soak in the bathtub last night and that seemed to help with the aches and pains. I think I was achy yesterday from all the sitting I did the day before in fairly hard chairs. I didn't spend a whole lot of time on my cushy couch as a result, thus the achy hips, legs and feet. My blood pressure seems to be holding in the normal range pretty well though. We have a doctor's appointment tomorrow afternoon so we'll keep everyone posted on our progress.