33 weeks- Merry Christmas!!

At 33 weeks, our little growing baby boy is getting to be big! He now weighs about 4 1/2 - 5 lbs and his length ranges between 17.5-19 inches, about the size of a pineapple. According to thebump.com, he may grow up to a full inch alone this week! His body is still fattening up as he gains about a half a pound a week, and his bones are starting to harden. His skull will continue to remain soft and not fully fused together- this allows him to pass through the birth canal, and it will continue to be fairly soft after birth, to make room for his growing brain through childhood.

Mommy has been doing pretty good this week. My sweet husband has taken to sleeping on the couch, which has allowed me to get almost a full 8 hours of sleep each night (minus the bathroom break of course!) I guess our full sized bed is just running out of room with my humungous belly! My feet continue to swell, and sometimes I am having Braxton Hicks contractions, but not too often. I am definitely getting some stretch marks now, unfortunately, and my biggest complaint is usually that I am just plain uncomfortable and huge! But it was fun to think yesterday, as we woke up on Christmas morning, about 12 months from now when we will be pulling a 10 month old baby out of his crib to open the presents that Santa brought : )

Our baby room looks a bit more complete now, we have the crib put together, which is a huge eye opener to us first-time parents. Kinda helps to make it real! I am looking forward to the glider that the Skinner side of the family will be pitching in for- now we are looking for some sort of dresser and nightstand to put in the nursery as well. Here is a link to the facebook pics we have accumulated of Sean's room in progress.

Christmas was nice this year. Mike was home for it, which is always wonderful. I also appreciated it a lot, because I am very used to having a full house, and both of our roommates went to Seattle this year for Christmas, so I probably would have been a bit lonely and even jealous if Mike had not been here. We got up in the morning, opened the presents that my parents sent us, and went to making breakfast- stuffed french toast, yum! Then we showered and got ready to go see the movie Avatar. We got there early, to find out they were opening late for Christmas. So we went back to our house with our two couple friends that were hanging out with us for the day- Tiff and Dan, and Katie and Carl. We watched some movies, the boys played video games, and I made some crock pot chili to sit while we went back to catch the 3 o'clock showing of Avatar. After the movie we just came back to our house to relax and enjoy the rest of Christmas. I spent the end of my day watching Mike play his game on xbox as I fell asleep on the couch. It was a very relaxing day, just like it should be : )

Last week I made a gingerbread house with some friends over at Kylie's house. Mike was still offshore, so we unfortunately didn't make the 2 story plantation style home he was drawing up blueprints for : ) But we did have fun, and took some pictures while we were there- here is the link to my facebook album.

30 weeks

Just as a disclaimer, at this point in the pregnancy, the updates I have been doing may vary a lot more for each baby, as development can vary so much. But just for fun sake, I will keep doing them anyway: D

At 30 weeks, our baby is about the size of a cabbage (our very own cabbage patch kid!) weighing in at about 3 lbs and getting close to 16 inches long. His skin is becoming more smooth, but his brain is getting more wrinkly, increasing the surface area making more room for that essential brain tissue. Now that he can regulate his own body temperature, he is shedding the downy body hair called lanugo which was previously keeping him warm.

We went to the doc on Thursday, and had another ultrasound. No good pics, unfortunately- he is a bit too big to capture very much in one screen, which is a good thing! I was 29w5d at my appt., but he was measuring at 30w3d- about 3 lbs. 8-9 oz. So our little man is growing healthy and strong! His head is about as far down into my pelvic bone as he can get- I am starting to feel the results of that. They were trying to get a good look that the placenta and my cervix, and his big head was in the way most of the time! They did see that the placenta moved a bit since my 20w U/S, but not quite enough. Doc says he still considers it placenta previa, just meaning that the placenta partially covers my cervix. He recommended one more U/S at 36 weeks, since it is almost out of the way, and it if continues to be stubborn, it just means I have a scheduled c-section instead of a normal delivery. In the meantime, I am on light duty activities for the most part, but I can continue to work until 36 weeks since it's just a desk job.

My sleep schedule is constant now for the most part- I wake up about every 3 hours. I am guessing that will be Sean's schedule when he gets here, I can't see any other reason why I can't sleep more than 3 hour at a time without waking up! He kicks a lot now, to the point where my stomach looks like there is an alien trying to break out inside! I was even telling Mike that I think he has somehow bruised parts of me on the inside. He will kick, and at first it doesn't bother me, and then he will kick another spot and it feels so tender it hurts. But I am so happy and excited to think about meeting this little guy, in as little as 6 weeks, or hopefully no longer than 10 weeks!

In other news, Mike was sweet enough to cater to my needs of having Christmas decorations up soon after Thanksgiving. He hung the Christmas lights on the house on Monday night with Josh, and then we picked out a tree and put that up in the living room. I was too exhausted to do much on Monday (I actually stayed home from work that day because the exhaustion was too much to handle) but then when I went back to work on Tuesday he got the tree all decorated for me! Our living room is a little short on space now, but it's beautiful. I have been listening to a lot of Christmas music, especially instrumental (my favorite). I broke out the Tchaikovsky and the Nutcracker, and have been listening to that full blast in my car. They say having your baby listen to classical music helps with brain development- I don't know if it's true or not, but it calms me down and I like it, so that alone must be good for him.

Today Mike and I are off to Lamaze- I am so glad my friend Katie (who is 35 weeks tomorrow!) and her hubby will be there with us. Mike and I went to the hospital tour and birthing basics class on Tuesday, and it was waaaay too crowded for my liking, and I could feel the tension from Mike as he tried to not look like he wanted to run away screaming. So hopefully having some friends there will help make it more comfortable. Tomorrow is the baby shower and I am so excited! But the only problem is that it is at my house, and due to my extreme exhaustion, I have not been cleaning house much- and I am embarrassed to think about having so many people here unless I clean up a bit. I am going to see how much I can get done when I get home today, like a quick vacuum and tidying of the living room, and the rest will just have to wait.

29 weeks

11 weeks until the due date, 7 weeks until we're full term.... I am ready to be done with this pregnancy!! At 29 weeks, our baby is about 2.5 lbs or so, and longer than 15 inches (about the size of a butternut squash). He is almost at what his birth length will be, but he will at least double, if not triple his weight by the time he is due! His muscles and lungs are developing more and more, and his head is getting larger to make room for his growing brain.

This week mommy has been busy! For Thanksgiving, and we had about 20 people at our house for dinner! It was nice though- all we made was a baked 20 lb maple glazed turkey, sweet potatoes, pumpkin pie, pumpkin dessert bars, green bean casserole, apple cider, and stovetop stuffing. Everyone else made everything else! Mashed potatoes, fried turkey, more stuffing and yams, pecan pie, corn casserole, cranberry sauce.... all of it was so yummy! It was nice, because a lot of our friends are recent Louisiana transplants, so for most of them it was their first Thanksgiving away from their families... Mike and I, on the other hand, have celebrated 4 Thanksgivings here now, and are kind of used to the idea of doing it on our own. I am hoping next year we will be able to fly Sean to see some family for both Thanksgiving and Christmas, but we will see!

Mike also made some shelves to put in Sean's room- for books, toys, etc. They look very nice, I am very happy with them. It was hard to decide where to put them, since we have no furniture yet, but I think they will be fine where they are at, and we have our shower in a week, so hopefully we will have some things to put in his room at that point! I know it is a bit early for me to be "nesting" but I am so anxious to get everything done!! I am pretty sure that is why I am not sleeping well. I always feel like there is something more to do, not just in the nursery, but all over the house. It never feels clean enough, and there is always a project that needs to be finished. I am really trying not to overdo it, because my energy levels literally cannot handle it, but my brain can only take so much lying down!

Here's my 29 week belly shot. It's cold outside, so I feel like the layers make me look fatter than I really am, but oh well.

Baby is getting big now! I can feel his kicks (or punches, I guess) in my hip bones now, but he seems to stay away from my ribs so far. You can tell he is running out of room- when he is moving around a lot, my whole stomach moves like a wave, it's pretty neat looking. I am anxious for this upcoming week. We are doing a birthing basics class at the hospital, along with a tour, on Tuesday. Then on Thursday we have our appointment, where we will have another ultrasound to see if I still have placenta previa. Saturday is Lamaze for most of the day, and then Sunday is our baby shower!

I am hoping the Christmas lights get up on the house by the end of this weekend, and I can't wait to get a tree. Mike still hasn't been to work yet in about 6 weeks, so I am worried we may not be able to afford one, but we will see. Money is super tight now, with my decreased work schedule and waiting for offshore work, and of course baby on the way. I am trying with all of my heart to trust that things will all work out, just like they always do, but sometimes that seems highly unlikely, or even impossible.

That's all for now- next post will include ultrasound pictures, so look out for that!

Christmas

I had a nice little vacation at home for Christmas- I was lucky enough to get Christmas Eve and Christmas Day off from work- and even luckier that Mike was home for weather : D We spent Christmas Eve at home, we invited a friend of ours over for a few hours, had a couple cocktails and just relaxed. We watched a couple of movies, it was very fun. Christmas Day was nice too- we went for a walk at the park with Buddy, and then went to see The Spirit in theaters. I made sweet and sour chicken for dinner, it was delicious!! 

Today I have to go back to work, but I enjoyed the last two days so much I guess it's ok to get back to the real world! Mike has his fingers crossed that the book he ordered from Borders online comes inthe mail today- he is pretty excited for that!

I wanted to make sure that everyone knows how much I appreciate them- I am blessed to have such wonderful friends and family, I feel so very loved and thankful to be surrounded by the people I know and love, whether I am physically surrounded or just surrounded in spirit- I have been thinking through the holidays about all the wonderful friends and family that Mike and I have been blessed with, and it makes me very happy : )

SNOW!

I forgot to add last week, it snowed!!! Yep, right here in Southwest Lousisiana we had about an inch of snow. Crazy, huh? People were so funny to watch, it was obvious they had never made snowmen or really played in the snow before, it was great. The snow was gone by about 2 pm, but we had fun with it while it lasted! 

So far this month...

It's been a busy month of December- and we aren't really even buying Christmas presents! I wish we could- we would both love to. But we are getting closer to having the house we want within reach- we are looking to close on January 30th. We can't guarantee that Mike will work through January or February, and we want to make sure the money we have now is saved for that back up plan, we need to know we can pay our first month's mortgage!

But, as far as the house thingy goes, We had the inspection last week- everything went well. A few minor things here and there that will need fixing, most of it being vanity things that we would like to fix. We have spent the last 2 weeks dreaming together of all the things we will do (some things soon, some things eventually) to our first home that we actually own! We are kind of waiting to hear back from the lenders to make sure the appraisal went through and hear that we were officially approved for the loan.

Mike went offshore again last night. I have a tendency to update my blog right after he leaves- I guess it's because I am bored. I am so glad he went back to work, because I am pretty sure he was not on standby pay this last week, but I am a little bummed because there is a Christmas party for his company this Saturday, and this is my weekend off so I was going to be able to go, but more than likely he won't be here. Oh well, I guess we will see.

Work has been going pretty well too. I am finally fairly comfortable with the position I have, I don't feel so timid and having to ask questions all the time. I'm also meeting a lot of nice people that I work with, which is always nice. We are doing a secret santa this week- we picked names and we had to buy 5 $1 gifts, one gift to bring each day. It's kind of fun because you don't have to feel obligated to spend a ton of money, but it's fun to be receiving a gift everyday. 

And in other news, we found out yesterday that Mike's sister is having a baby girl! We are both so excited to know that we will be Auntie Jenn and Uncle Mike : ) We are hoping to be able to see the new baby sooner than later once she is born. 

I guess that's it for now. One of these days I will get back into updating every few days so I won't feel like I have to write a novel every time I log in!

Looking for a house

I don't have a lot of time to write because I  need to get to work, but I have been meaning to update my blog all week and just have been so busy!!

Mike and I have spent the last week looking at houses- our lease is up in February and we have been thinking and discussing buying a house for a long time now. We have finally decided that time time is right- so we have been working hard to find what we want!

We found a realtor named Virgil, he is awesome! He has been helping us a lot this week, we went and sat with him while he explained to us the process (this will be our first home so we had a lot of questions!) and he walked us through a house we had been looking at from afar for the last 7 months or so.

He also found a bunch of houses online for us and we went and looked at some today. I don't have time to go into detail but one of the houses really stood out to us, so we are thinking about maybe putting up an offer. 

I will try to update more this weekend if I'm not too busy! In other news, Christmas is around the corner, so the house is decorated, the tree is up, and I am totally enjoying the cold weather! Yey for actually being able to wear a scarf in Louisiana!! 

Gingerbread House on a Sunday

On Sunday Mike and I decided to lounge around for most of the day- we gave Buddy a bath ( his first in a long time, since he is finally over his meds and can get a little wound up- we were afraid to bathe him before because he gets so hyper afterwards!) and we cleaned the fish tank, and we cleaned the house a bit. At this point we were still in our pajamas, and we decided to watch Hellboy 2 and make a Gingerbread house!!

We had so much fun : ) I can't remember ever making a gingerbread house before... either way, we had a blast. And it feels like the first intro to Christmas this year- I am excited for Thanksgiving, not only because I love it, but because afterwards I can decorate for Christmas and not feel silly : P

Anyways, thought you would enjoy pictures from our little gingerbread house making experience.

I thought the candies in the dishes were kind of a cute picture..... : D

Had to cut out the excess cookie from within the placement spots....

Mike was filling the slots with the frosting....

.... and Mike frosting the sides and putting the house together. We had to let it sit and dry for a half hour after this, so we just watched the movie and made lunch. 

Mike figured out how to make icicles on the roof sides!

It took me forever to get the timer set and position the camera right for this picture, Mike was little antsy by the end of it.  But I got the picture of us and our finished product!

*Sniffle*Cough*Cough*

Yeah, my roomie Josh got me sick. Boo-urns. I'm trying to decide if I am going to call into work this morning or not. I honestly don't feel quite as crappy as I normally feel when I am sick, but as I am sitting here on the good old computer I can feel myself reading thing over and over again, not understanding what I am looking at LOL. So I am wondering how much good I will be at work today... I am about to take a shower, I figure I will be able to tell after that how much better I may or may not feel. 

Mike, of course, went offshore again. On Saturday night. I get a little annoyed when he comes home and leaves in between my days off ( I was off Thursday and Sunday this week, he came home Friday and left Saturday). We are totally used to this lifestyle now, but I guess it doesn't keep me from missing him, sometimes it affects me more than others. 

I bought the "Twilight" movie soundtrack yesterday. I am listening to it right now, I think I like it very much- it has a lot of artists on it that I normally don't listen to, but it's growing on me. I also bought the entire first season of the original Get Smart, I feel asleep on the couch last night watching that. I love it  : )

So this week I think, I need to start figuring out what I am doing for Christmas cards- they always take me longer than I anticipate, so I figure this year I will get an early start on them. As soon as Mike gets home, we need to take a nice picture taken with Buddy in it. I think that's the first step- I'll figure out the rest from there.