Week 21

The belly is growing! I feel like I'm getting big already but I know I have a long ways to go! So my ups: I'm feeling him move a lot. It's so exciting and so reassuring. It's nice to be able to feel him move and know that everything is ok (he's kicking me as I type this!). My downs: I'm starting to start feeling uncomfortable! My back hurts, I'm worn out by the end of the night and the bathroom trips are definitely becoming a lot more frequent!
We're still trying to pick a name. We have, however, picked a nickname. We bought a really cute pair of PJs for him that have little monkey's all over them. So our baby has now become "Our Little Monkey".
I was just looking at baby pictures of Brieana and it made me really excited to meet our little monkey and see what he will look like. No cute pigtails this time around but I'm sure he'll still be cute!

What week is it?

Ok, I'm blaming it on the 1st trimester exhaustion! I haven't written for weeks and weeks!! I was so tired!!! I didn't have the energy to do anything other than get up, go to work and come home (and that included a nap at lunchtime!!) Not much got accomplished during this time. This includes Birthday and Christmas preparations and presents and definitely the house. Thankfully I have a wonderful husband that picked up most of the slack. I can't say the house was immaculate but he made sure Brieana and I had everything we needed. Eric has been wonderful!

Ok, so I'm 19 weeks pregnant now....what did I miss? We've several ultrasounds with 2 of them being the diagnostic ultrasounds. One at 14 weeks, I think. At this one they look for birth defects. Thankfully nothing stood out as concerning. The second one I had last week and we got to find out that we're having a little baby boy!! We're so excited. Eric and I were both really hoping for a boy. Of course a girl would have been great as well but we're really excited for a boy. Brieana on the other hand was not as excited. Unfortunately we couldn't bring Brieana with to the ultrasound due to our schedules. So we didn't get to tell her until that night when we all got home. Eric is working later so she had just got home and was just in bed by the time I got home from work. I was so excited and wanted to share the news with her - she wasn't sleeping yet so we decided to call her out and tell her. I told her that I got to tell her that she was going to be a big sister so Daddy gets to tell her what it will be. Daddy told her that she was going to have a little baby brother. She was hysterical! She was so upset!! She started crying so hard. When she could finally get a few words out she said "I wanted a baby sister!" It was so funny and heartbreaking all at the same time! So I guess after she was exhausted and in bed wasn't the best time to tell her but we'll have a great story to share with her when she's older! Now she's pretty excited about having a little brother.

I went out at my lunch after we found out that we were having a boy and bought two too cute little tiny blue outfits. They are so cute and it's fun to finally know what we're having and start to really get ready for him.

I didn't have a lot of food cravings with Brieana but this time around it's a very different story! I've had so many cravings. The most prevalent - tacos! Among the cravings: vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce, ground turkey nachos, orange slices, pizza, ice cream and pickles (not together but on the same night). Eric patiently fulfilled every single request I had. Our grocery bill was out of control but I always had what I was craving! He's been wonderful!

Another great development is that I'm finally able to start feeling him move. I've been feeling him for about 2 or 2 and 1/2 weeks. It's not all of the time but it tends to be more often when I finally stop moving for the day and lay down to relax on the couch or sit in a chair or go to bed. It's so great to finally feel him moving. Before now I had to rely on my doctor's visits to hear the heartbeat or see the ultrasound scan to know that everything was ok. Now he can tell me on his own. It's a wonderfully reassuring feeling.

So now to choose the name! With Brieana her name was picked before we even got pregnant. The only thing we had to choose once we knew that she was a girl was how to spell it. We have a favorite this time around but I'm not 100% positive that it's the right name so we're still looking. Eric wants something "traditional". The one thing we are certain of is his middle name will be Eric. Eric's middle name is his dad's first name so it was important to him to carry on the tradition.

Ok, so that's all the catching up I'm going to do tonight. I definitely want to keep up much more often. I'm hoping now that I'm well into the 2nd trimester and feeling much better that it will be easier.

Ultrasound and belly pictures to follow soon! :)

The Belly Project Week 3

Another week down...lots to go! I've been feeling pretty good this week. There has been more nausea and I've still been pretty tired. The baby is the size of a blueberry right now. That's really exciting. I have my first doctor's appointment this week. It's just an initial appointment with the nurse. They educate you on what to expect, what to do, how appointments will go, talk about all of the tests that you can choose to have done, etc. Eric isn't even allowed to go to this first appointment. I wish I could bring him. He was able to go to the first Kaiser appointment when I was pregnant with Brieana, however I switched plans to them in January so I was already 5+ months pregnant for my first appointment at Kaiser last time.

I was called today by a coordinator for the research department at the University of California San Francisco to participate in a medical study. Because I'm on Humira and pregnant and plan to stay on Humira throughout. There haven't been any specific trials done on women before because not enough was known about the drug and who would want to be on a trial while pregnant? So what they did was to start tracking women who got pregnant while on Humira to see what the effects were. All of this data to date has shown that it is believed to be safe during pregnancy and breastfeeding. It is because of this research that I decided along with advice from my doctor to stay on Humira throughout the pregnancy. So, now that I have the opportunity to be a part of something that will help other women make the decision regarding staying on medication while pregnant, I think it's worthwhile.

So here is picture #3...I feel like I'm bigger even though I don't think I look bigger. I know it's from being bloated. The trips to the bathroom haven't slowed down either!! The most frustrating is when Eric leaves in the morning I usually end up waking up and having to go pee. Then I'm usually awake for the next 30 minutes and can't fall back asleep! I'm thankful for my later schedule that I can "sleep in" every morning.

The Belly Project Week 2

So here we are. It's already week 2 of the project and week 5 of my pregnancy. I have decided to take weekly pictures because I saw a really great slide show of someone's pregnancy week by week and it was fun to watch her transformation. I also got a pregnancy journal that is all about the belly. I thought it was a perfect compliment for The Belly Project. There are pictures for your belly each week.

So far I have been still feeling pretty good. I definitely noticed more fatigue all week. If I didn't know that I was pregnant it would have been easy to dismiss it as a busy week, however it's definitely more than usual. That and I've had a few minor, short waves of nausea. However, today I have had a low level of nausea all day. The other new development - cravings!! :) I have been craving a nice salad all week: iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, croutons, cheese and ranch dressing. I was able to satisfy that tonight for dinner. It was so great! Then after dinner Eric made the first cravings run to the grocery store for me. Tonight it was cookies and cream ice cream with chocolate sauce and a peeled orange (the ice cream and chocolate went together, but the orange was on it's own on the side). It was perfect. I was so happy!

Ok, here is picture #2. I am really bloated so it looks like I have a belly already! I'm hoping that it will shrink soon! All of these fun pregnancy symptoms! Oh yeah - and definitely peeing all the time! I have been trying to drink lots of water and have all but stopped drinking soda. I still have about 1 per day but that's about it and I don't even usually finish it.

The Belly Project

So Eric and I decided to start trying for number 2. It took a few months and a few appointments to be able to officially start trying but we were finally able to 2 months ago. Well, my cycle never normalized, however since I had not started my period yet I decided to take a pregnancy test on Saturday....IT WAS POSITIVE!!!! It only took 2 cycles (Brieana only took 1!) I am so excited! I got to tell Eric the great news on Sunday - that was amazing. He got teary eyed and was so happy!

Thus begins the belly project! I only have two sets of belly pictures from my pregnancy with Brieana and neither of them turned out really great, so I have decided to take monthly? weekly? Well, regular pictures of my growing belly. Today's installation I am about 4 weeks pregnant and not showing at all. I have a feeling that will change before I know it. I'm excited to get to see the changes and write about them.

My first blog...

Hello. Welcome to my blog. I have yet to have a blog and I thought it was about time. Today is just as good as day as any. It was actually a very exciting day. My daughter had her very first soccer game. It was so cute. A bunch of 3 and 4 year olds running all over the field. I was so impressed with my daughter as well as the other kids. They all really did such as great job! It was so much fun! Below is a video of one of her goals.



She did so great....until someone else scored a goal on her and she lost it! She ran off the field crying hysterically! The first time she went back again but the next time it happened she came off the field for at least 5 minutes! It was frustrating and cute at the same time that she was so emotional and competitive. I guess we'll have to keep working on her sportsmanship.