26 Weeks and a $.99 shirt from Goodwill :)

 26 Weeks

26 Weeks

Before I brushed my hair and did a little makeup, I didn't want to show my face :-P

So here we are, 26 Weeks.

Today when talking to my Yoga instructor about different poses, etc, I mentioned about being 6 months and her eyes got so big! She was baffled! lol

Again, at night, when my muscles relax more, it pops out more than in the mornings, but still.

Status:

How Far Along:  

26 Weeks - 6 1/2 Months!

Weight:  

155lbs. Puts me at 14 lbs gained. I'll start going from the first weight I told my midwives, which was after I had lost 4-5lbs from morning sickness, which was 141 lbs.

Bump/Showing: 

Measuring on target at 25cm today according to midwife. My baby bump is starting to stick out more and more. Pretty much any normal shirts I had I can no longer wear unless they were extra long or larger than most all my other clothes.

Today I found some cute cheap clothes at Goodwill. The blue blousy top in the picture above I found at Goodwill today for $.99! Awesome! and it's Maternity! I love a great deal! I also picked up 2 other sweaters that I can wear.

Food Cravings/Aversions:

Just hungry all the time still mostly. I've been a little hooked on cookies the last couple days. I'm sure I'll pay for it in my weight gain by next week.. lol!!

Nothing is making me queasy. :)

Gender / Names:

Surprise gender :) Some people think it's nuts to not find out. Oh well, we'll make it work!

Though I've had a few people lately say they "think" it's a boy.. being I'm carrying lower, but who knows. It's 50/50! lol

Nothing solid on name ideas yet. :/  Need to start working on this.

Activities:

Started back to the Yoga class last week and today. I'm using the blankets for support, etc. and not doing poses that are flat on the belly, but rather lying on my side and doing leg stretches when they do those. Most of the other poses the instructor does are safe for me to continue doing. I will of course come out of a pose or not do ones when/if I feel uncomfortable, outside of the normal "I'm out of shape" discomfort.. lol.  I definitely feel good when I leave the class. The next day a lot of my shoulder, leg and arm muscles are sore, but that's normal. I really like the class and hope to continue on for the rest of my pregnancy. I think I will benefit a lot from it during the labor as well.

We'll probably miss out on skating this Thursday, as the rink is having a massive crazy school night that we don't want to be there for. I especially don't, since I have to be super careful when skating. My balance is definitely shifting and the movements I'm used to doing aren't as easy as they were. My skating will probably continue for a while, I just really have to take it easy and be careful.

Supplements / Diet:

Still trying to remember to take the Cal-Mag for my leg/muscle cramps. It definitely helps. 

I also bought some new Prenatal vitamins today, as my first stash is just about out and were a cheap vitamin. I decided to go up in quality a bit. 

I've been making myself very aware of my iron intake. My iron was low from the beginning and my blood pressure has been low as well. I've been eating oatmeal or grain cereals in the morning, along with Orange juice or another Vitamin C beverage to go with it. The body supposedly absorbs iron better when taken with Vit C, so I'm making it a point to do this. I've also been trying to add greens, etc. to my dinners. We had cooked kale the other night and I really liked it. Instead of regular lettuce on my sandwiches, I'll use spinach. Things like that.

Today at my appt, my blood pressure has already shown an improvement

Last month it was 105/65. Today it was 110/75. 

My midwife said we can test my iron levels again maybe after next month, just to make sure we're good. She wasn't concerned with my levels being a tad lower, since they weren't crazy low, but we'll keep an eye on it.

Movement:

Tons and tons! This baby is a mover! My 26 week update said that the baby can start opening it's eyelids and "seeing". The other morning at about 6am, the baby must have woken up and seen that there wasn't any room inside there and started pushing everything around to make room! lol. I swear it was more movement than I'd felt ever! It was crazy!
I'm feeling random kicks in my right lower rib area. This morning I was feeling flutters and movements down at my left hip area. My midwife says it's likely the baby is somewhat diagonal to the lower right side, with the head being close to my left hip and the feet being curled up at my belly button area. This would definitely make sense to the feelings I feel when the baby kicks. If it's kicking forward, it would kick to the left of my belly button, which is where I feel it. When the baby stretches it's legs, I would feel it in my right ribs, which I do.  

I'm about to tell this kid.. you can try to move other parts around, but baby I don't think that my hips and ribs are going to move.. lol. The baby must know I'm talking about it, because it's in here kicking and moving like crazy right now!

Baby heartrate:

The baby's heart rate today was about 140 again. She said it started out in the upper 130's, but I started laughing, and then it went up a bit into the 140s.  :)

Baby's Room and Baby Items:

I still need to do my registry... someone is a slacker and it's me!

A friend of my just passed down some of her baby stuff to me. We got a boppy pillow, a baby bathtub and a ton of toys! She also gave me some nursing tanks and a couple more maternity shirts. How awesome is that!!?!?

I randomly check Craigslist for good deals, and there are tons of them, but I haven't made any purchases. Biggest thing is, we want to catch up on bills and start getting ahead now, plus we have to pay off the midwives, so money isn't free flowing right now. lol

I started cleaning up the room upstairs. I had all the Christmas tubs and mess in there. I got all of that cleaned up. I also moved my sewing desk back over to the window and got that reorganized... I can't wait to get furniture and stuff in there! :)

Sleep, Moods, Misc.:

I've been sleeping a lot lately. Today I woke up the baby woke me up at 6am. I laid there tossing and turning a bit before deciding to go ahead and get up a little after 7. I went to yoga this morning, stopped to the Goodwill and when I came home, the bed with my dingle-doggies on it looked overly appealing, so I snuggled up with them and we all took a cat-nap :) It was nice.

I do find that I wake up randomly at night and am sleeping on my back. I try to sleep on my side as much as I can. I tend to keep my head propped up a bit and my knees are usually bent, but I'm constantly finding myself on my back again. 

The other day I was having ligament/muscle pains/cramps. This belly is already stretched more than it's ever been, and is only going to keep growing, so I expect to have those kinds of muscle cramps and pains. It was a tad more than usual, so I laid down and propped a pillow on my side and that did wonders! I was too tired for a bath, or else I would have taken a hot bath. .. which actually sounds really good right now... hmm.. 

I've also had odd pain in my belly button area.. more so just sensitive than it is pain. Either way, it's weird. lol. 

I'll save all my other randomness for another post :)

Headed into 5th Month!

Well on my way into the 5th month of pregnancy. Not that anyone would know it by looking at me! I've hardly any belly at all! lol. Oh well. Count my blessings I suppose. I've noticed a little belly pop out, but very little. I do know that it's very low and I can no longer button any of my jeans and using hair ties to loop around the button isn't much working anymore either.


So the other day I made a pair of maternity jeans out of a cheap really cute pair of jeans that I bought for $9 solely for the purpose of making into maternity-wears. I must say they turned out great. I used an old spandex-type camisole that I was no longer wearing, cut it, and sewed it onto the top of the jeans. Works great. Especially since maternity pants are over $50/each, and hard to get really cute ones. The ones I bought on Craigslist are short on me, so I'm planning on running a seam up the pant legs and making them into straight-leg, skinny type jeans instead so I can wear them under boots for the winter and still make use of them.


Biggest thing this past week..
I'm quite certain I've started to feel the baby move inside there. I'm feeling constant bubble-like, tapping feelings throughout my lower belly.. especially after sugar or eh-ehm.. coffee.. not that I'm having it in abundance, but I am drinking some. lol. Baby gets active after that! lol. But it's a pretty consistent feeling, so I'm quite certain that's what it is. It is a very cool feeling. I can't feel anything on the outside yet, so no one else can feel the little kicks, etc but me.
I have my next appointment with my Midwives next weekend. I'm excited for that. I'll get to hear the heartbeat again. I've actually been stalking craigslist for used/cheap Fetal Dopplers for sale, but haven't found any yet.. if I found one for a really good deal I'd probably buy it. I actually may see if I can find a cheap stethoscope for now and see about finding the heartbeat with that. Though it's harder to find than with the doppler.


Now we have to decide when we want to get the ultrasound done. We're not going to find out the baby's gender until birth, so the ultrasound is strictly to make sure the baby looks good and for my own enjoyment, since my midwives don't require it.


Everything else is going very well. I've been eating regularly and have totally gotten my appetite back, which is a totally wonderful thing, considering how much I love food. It was sooo difficult going those couple of weeks being sick and not being able to eat much. NOTHING sounded good, hardly anything stayed down, and I felt nauseous constantly. Very happy to be in the 2nd Trimester now.


This past week I went and applied at Target for a seasonal job, and they hired me on. Should be fun. Some times the thought of being tied to a random schedule and work is not appealing, but then on the bright side, I think it will be fun, and I'll get to be out and about, and meet people. So all in all it will be a good thing, plus it'll bring in a few extra dollars for the Holidays and to help with paying for the midwife. The hardest part will be that it's retail and I will have to work Black Friday, which limits our travel ability for the Holiday :( I think my husband really wants to go to Oklahoma to see family for Thanksgiving, and this will put a damper in  those plans.. whereas now, not working, we can pretty much do whatever. But we can really use the extra income. Unless I can find something else I can do between now and then that I can make an income doing that doesn't tie me down for the Holiday.
So today I'm going to hit the Goodwill for 50% off clothes and be on the lookout for my khaki pants and red shirts. I'll probably have to "Maternity-size" my pants after I get them, so I'll try to take pictures.


Welp.. That's all I can think of for now. I will be back soon enough.

Making my first Baby Bib...

One Side of the baby bib

So this morning, I decided to make my first attempt at a baby bib. It didn't come out too bad.. to the untrained-sewing-eyeball, it may look ok.. I mean, it's functional.... and for my first attempt.. aka I didn't bother to look into any instructional videos or how-to's.. it's not horrible, HOWEVER.. I have now learned a few things.
1. How to use Bias Tape.. and surely it's not the way I attempted to use it :)
2. Watch videos and read how-to's the first time around.. you might actually learn something..

Other side of baby bib

It was totally fun though. I love doing this kind of stuff. Really, I love the finished product of something I've made...  and then seeing the progress I make from when I first started a project, to when I've learned a lot more.. So I look forward to the next baby bib, and to see how much better it will look compared to this unevenly-sewn venture :) (notice there are no close-ups.. lol)