25 Weeks Pregnant

Belly shot explanation: Travis bought me some really cool temporary tattoos. J

I have a lot to talk about this week! I’ll start with the usual stuff.

I can’t believe how big I’m getting! I need more maternity clothes! I think I’m starting to see a faint “linea negra” (the dark line that runs vertically on the front of pregnant bellies). Norah is now about the size of an eggplant. I’m not going to speculate beyond that – this seems to be the point where babies start to vary in size. No speculating necessary about her strength, though -- she is kicking surprisingly hard sometimes! All through church the other day I kept nearly jumping out of my seat because I was so startled by her acrobatics. I was sitting there staring at my belly because I could clearly see every move she made, and sometimes it was on opposite sides at the same time! It’s insane. What is it going to be like three months from now?!

She might be moving around so much because, according to The Bump, she is starting to tell the difference between right side up and upside down. Speaking of which, I asked the midwife what we would do if Norah was in a breech position. She said she would have me do some exercises/positions that would encourage her to turn, and if that doesn’t work we can do an external version. This involves going to some sort of specialist (I guess just an OB), who would give me muscle relaxers, and then, with the aid of an ultrasound, attempt to flip the baby around as shown here:

She said that in over 500 births she has attended, only two babies were breech and could not be turned. So I guess that’s one less thing to worry about! J

My appointment last week went very well. Everything is perfect, and I still feel great – I’ve even been getting fewer headaches than I normally do. My weight is up to 124.5 lbs, which she said is right on track, and my belly was measuring just one week behind schedule, which is completely fine. She said even if I was three centimeters (three weeks) in either direction, she wouldn’t worry much about it.

I told her that the ultrasound tech said Norah was a bit smaller than average, and she made note of that so that if I go a couple weeks beyond my due date (please, no), they will give me a little more time before they recommend induction, which is something I want to avoid if at all possible. Inductions are riskier than most people realize. If your body just isn’t ready, it won’t work, and the medicine (pitocin) creates unnaturally strong contractions which few women can stand without an epidural, which I also don’t want. If the induction fails, they will do a c-section, which I REALLY don’t want. Anyway, I’m glad I’ll be given some leniency if Norah wants to arrive late.

I really wanted to be able to tell you all about our Bradley childbirth class, which should have started yesterday, but it was cancelled because the instructor had the flu. We are so excited about this class – the midwife has nothing but great things to say about it. Since it will now start a week later and it’s a 12 week course, we will only have TWO WEEKS until the due date by the time it’s over! That is crazy.

This past weekend we went to Hobby Lobby to pick out fabric for the changing pad cover! I had been ridiculously excited about this shopping trip, because I’m just so excited to get everything ready for Norah. And since the changing table was the only thing I was going to get to decorate (not having an actual room for the nursery and all), I was just really looking forward to it. People have been asking me what colors we are using in “the nursery,” so I took a picture of the fabric in case you all were curious. Actually, Travis took the picture. Can you tell? J

We could have gone with a more subdued palette, but in the end we just really loved this fabric. It's very "us."

Now, here’s the REALLY exciting part: the more I thought about it, the more I found myself really wishing we were doing a whole nursery. The moment I said that to Travis, he was completely on board and ready to rearrange the house. So…I guess that’s our new plan! It’s been all I can think about since we got that fabric! I have everything completely planned out in my mind.

Step one is to pare down to what we need. Sunday we started in the attic. We went through most of the stuff up there, took a lot to Goodwill, consolidated stuff, etc. (I also found a huge stash of fabric up there – woohoo!) As soon as we have another free afternoon, we’ll be finishing that part of the project, and then we’ll go through the whole house the same way. Stuff that we want but don’t need out will go up to the attic for now. And I actually went through those two closets I was talking about last week. We took a lot of that stuff to Goodwill as well. I’m so excited to have less clutter around and to have more space to put things that we actually use. I also think it will appeal more to potential buyers. We probably should have done this long ago.

Ok, sorry this was another long blog! We’ve had a lot going on, and I have a lot on my mind. See you next week!