There are less than 14 weeks remaining in this pregnancy – at times I can’t believe it’s going so quickly and at other times I think, “C’mon – lets get this show on the road!”  I usually feel like it’s dragging right about 3am when I’m getting up for my umpteenth bathroom break.  I feel like it’s flying by when I realize, “Good grief!  I have so much to do!”  I made some progress this week, though.  Our nursery has 2 closets, one of which is now empty save for baby boy’s clothing.  The 2nd closet has had some work done, too.  My old trunk is now in the hall closet, along with our tool set + a few other hardware items.  I moved my childhood baby box, photo albums, and the box with Chris’ grandmother’s vintage black taffeta party dress to the top of our master closet.  Whew!

Since people seem to love seeing a pregnancy photo, here’s a recent one of me.  Excuse the bad quality – I’ve never been great about taking self-portraits, it was early in the morning, and the mirror was dusty {guess I need to shift focus from organizing to cleaning…!}:

So, how are things going with me?  Well, let me tell you…

Weight Gain

I have my next midwife appointment tomorrow.  As of my last appointment, I had only gained a little over 5 pounds.  I swear I don’t know how this is possible because I feel like I’m huge.  I told Chris that I look like a chicken drumstick with legs, and his response was, “Well, everyone likes chicken…”  Oi.  All of that weight must have gone to my chest, because I’ve had to go up 2 whole bra sizes, which makes me sick.  I know things are just going to get bigger once I start breastfeeding.  Ai yi yi.  No stretch marks anywhere that I can see, though.

Appetite & Aversions/Cravings

My gag reflex is still pretty sensitive, but the constant nausea is gone, baby, gone.  I’m not hungry all of the time, but I need to eat 3 meals a day on a regular basis, which is new for me.  Come 11:30am, there’s a grumbly in my tumbly!  Other than craving some yummy Mexican food {could someone please Fed-Ex some to New Zealand?!}, I seem to have developed a taste for cake donuts with chocolate frosting.  Weird, because (a) I’m not the type who’s ever said, “Ahhh, a donut sounds good to me right now!” and (b) actually, I don’t have a “b” reason – it’s just plain weird.  Chris was a sweetie and bought me 2 donuts last week or the week before.  They were gone in 10 minutes flat {I was nice enough to share a bite with him, so I can at least say that I didn’t eat them all by myself}.

Sleep

Still getting up 3 – 5 times a night to use the facilities, but now I’ve started waking up for no good reason around 4am.  I’m also getting kicked more at night, which makes it harder to actually fall asleep.  And by getting kicked more, I don’t just mean baby boy!  Chris was spazzing out the other night and kicked me on 3 separate occasions.  I finally just got out of bed at 3:30/4am and did laundry.  He’s gotten so used to me getting up that he sometimes checks to make sure that I’m still lying next to him.  One time, he lost control of his arm and ended up slapping my thigh.  I was awake and could see his hand and arm moving as if in slow motion, arcing through  the air towards me.  The abuse!

Baby Movement

Baby boy is kicking all the time.  Chris and I were watching a movie a few days ago and Chris was resting his head against my abdomen.  He kept getting kicked in the face – payback for kicking me in the middle of the night!  I tend to get a big ol’ grin whenever I see the movements.  The funniest is when I’m reading my Kindle and it just bounces uP AND DOwn, uP AND DOwn.  Too cute 🙂

Pregnancy Brain/Weird Dreams

Pregnancy Brain is called Nappy Brain in NZ {nappies = diapers}.  I think I’ve got both.  I’ve had moments where I’ve completely forgotten what I was going to say, what I was doing, or where I was going.  I’ve had some bad nightmares, like the kind that wake you up gasping for breath: (1) My brother + brother-in-law were in car accident.  They both survived, but when I went to check on my BIL I realized that he’d turned himself into an iron.  Yes, an iron – like the kind you use on clothing.  His head was attached at the point where water is poured in, and my sister was standing behind me, shaking her head and saying, “I told him not to do that!”  All I could think was, “How do I check for a pulse?!  Where do you put the IV line?”  (2) My toe started spurting blood – this was after having dropped a can of tomatoes on it earlier that day.  The dream was so vivid that I woke up and had to go check on my foot in the bathroom.  (3) I ate fish for dinner, and that night I dreamt that I was being chased by a shark.  Just one shark with big, googly eyes.   Now that I think about it, he looked a lot like the shark from the Bert & Ernie fishing clip…

image via

He knew who I was and he was following me.  He finally chased me to a sandbar of sorts, where I just stood, hoping and praying that he would leave before the tide came in.  He just floated and stared at me, and I could see my sister Valerie on the beach, completely oblivious of my Great White dilemma!

So yeah, aside from my weird dreams and absent-mindedness, aside from being kicked out of bed by my loving husband and running out of bras, everything’s going great!

***Seriously – everything’s great 🙂  Very happy and healthy***