Andi’s exciting life.

I now feel like a real pregnant lady. After waiting weeks and weeks for it, today a stranger commented on my condition! In fact, two separate strangers in a row said something. I met my friend, Elaine, for lunch, and the waitress asked if we wanted garlic on our pizza. I said no, and she said, “I guess the baby doesn’t like garlic, huh?” I was so happy! Then, after that I went to the post office and the male post office clerk asked me how many months along I was. Finally I can feel like people can tell I’m pregnant and not just chubby! Maybe I had a growth spurt last night or something. To commemorate the day, I took a picture of myself and posted it below.

In other news this week, I got a new cell phone! Getting a new phone is always exciting for me, but I am especially happy this time around because my old one was crappy and would crash periodically. I got a pink Razr, and I love it so far. I wasn’t due for an upgrade until September 16, but I checked in at the Cingular store and they said they could do it early because I am a VIP. I don’t know how I earned that status, but at least my celebrity is recognized somewhere

Today I had an appointment with the midwife, which went fine. Matt went with me, and this was the first one he had been to besides the ultrasounds. I was happy for him to meet the midwife and to see where I go and what my appointments are like. I just got weighed and my blood pressure checked, and then we heard the heartbeat. She answered a couple questions for us and we were done.

At the next appointment in August, I’ll do my glucose tolerance test. I’ll have to drink a super sugary soda there and wait an hour and then have my blood drawn. That is to check for gestational diabetes, and hopefully the result will be normal. She will also give me the third trimester packet of info and start talking about the hospital tour and choosing a pediatrician and things like that. She’ll also start measuring my belly to make sure I’m growing at the correct rate at that visit.

As for exciting developments this week, I have started to be able to see my belly move when the baby kicks sometimes. That is very fun. I think later on I’ll be able to see more, but right now I can just see my belly kind of jump up from a kick. I saw it a couple of times just today.

Tune in next week for a new picture of my expanding waistline

Well, this week I hit the halfway point in this pregnancy, 20 weeks. That is an exciting milestone for me. I made a big dinner of gumbo with banana pudding for dessert in celebration of the day. This was also the day that I have felt the baby kick the hardest so far. I was resting my hand on my belly and saw my hand jump up from the movement! That was fun and exciting on its own, but especially because I hadn’t been feeling him move as much for the past week. I like it when he lets me know he is there.

The next milestone I am looking forward to is a stranger commenting on my pregnancy. That’s when I will know that I really do look pregnant to the outside world and not just to myself and Matt.

Things are coming along great in the nursery. We put the border up a little over a week ago and surprisingly had a lot of fun doing it. We are very happy with how it turned out! We received the crib and took that out to start assembling it, but one of the pieces was slightly damaged. The scratches/dings are in pretty prominent places, so we ordered a replacement part. Until that gets here, the room looks like a big mess because the crib parts and boxes are spread out all over the room. When we get it a little more in order I’ll post a photo.

As for shopping, I have held myself back on getting most everything but clothes. I LOVE buying baby clothes, and now that we know we’re having a little boy it’s even more fun. Besides the nursery furniture/bedding, stroller, and clothes, I have managed to restrain myself from buying other things so far. It’s tough though because I’m so eager to get everything ready for our little man. I’m so excited about his arrival, but I know there is no reason to fill up our house with everything baby four months ahead of time.

Well, I feel adequately large enough to share my first pregnant belly picture here. I just took this today at 19 weeks, 2 days. This is kind of a funny one because I attempted to put on a nonmaternity shirt, and this is how well it covered my growing belly. I still don’t think I look very pregnant to strangers when I’m fully clothed and don’t have my belly halfway out, but I bet I’ll pop out a lot more in the next couple of weeks. Anyway, here it is!

Matt hates it when people tell about their dreams, so I’m thinking as I write this that he will think this is a boring post. I have been dreaming a lot about the ultrasound though and thought I should document it while I can still remember. Friday night I was thinking a lot about the ultrasound and realized that I had only been thinking about the gender and hadn’t even considered the possibility that they could find a problem. I truly think our baby is fine, but it did get me worried a little. That night, I first dreamed that we had to do some kind of group ultrasound in a pool. We went into a big room with an indoor pool, and all the women getting ultrasounds had to get naked and get into the pool. I don’t think my dream actually got any farther than just being mortified about getting naked in front of all those strangers. Then it jumped to getting a letter that said we had to come back in for a follow up ultrasound to recheck a blood clot that was found on the first one. Hopefully that was just my nerves making me dream that.

Last night, I dreamed about the ultrasound again. This time the baby wouldn’t cooperate and get into a position where we could see the gender (my current worry). At the very end, the baby finally moved so that we could see, and it was a boy. I remember very distinctly seeing the testicles and being told it was a boy. We’ll have to see if that comes true!

On another note, this morning I was pretty uncomfortable when I woke up. My belly felt so tight like it would pop. I have been sleeping OK, but I’m trying to sleep on my side, which is best for the baby but which I do not find to be very comfortable. I’m sure that as my belly grows sleeping is going to become more and more of a challenge. I’m so eager for that big pregnant belly though that it will be worth it

Well, in the last week I have started feeling even more pregnant. I feel the baby move a lot now, multiple times a day, and I love it. I tried to see if Matt could feel it last night, but he wasn’t able to. We’ve only tried that one time though, and I think he’ll be able to feel it soon. It’s tricky because a lot of times by the time you get your hand to the belly to feel it, the little bugger quiets down and stops moving.

Also, my uterus feels so much bigger now that starting Tuesday I feel like I really can’t roll over onto my stomach. It feels like trying to roll onto a beach ball or something. You would think this would translate into me looking pregnant by now, but still no luck there.

We only have three days left until the big ultrasound. I am beyond excited to find out what we are having. I will probably start sobbing with disappointment if our baby doesn’t cooperate and the ultrasound tech says she can’t tell the gender. Hopefully this baby won’t be shy and will give up the info.

I didn’t actually mention that I was going away, but I went to Vegas this week with my mom. We got there Monday, and I got home Thursday night. It was a fun trip, and I think we saw every casino and every store in town. I feel like we walked at least 5 miles each day, and my feet were killing me by the evenings. My energy level has been really good lately though, and I don’t have any more nausea at all, so the timing was really good for this trip. I didn’t have any trouble keeping up.

While I was away, I could start to feel like there was something in my abdomen when I bent over, which was kind of a weird feeling. Today I can feel what feels like a round, hard mass in my belly. Although I’ve felt a few questionable twinges, I haven’t felt anything yet that I can definitely call fetal movement. I can definitely tell the baby is growing in there though, so hopefully that will happen soon.

I have an appointment with the midwife on Tuesday, although I think it will be pretty uneventful. This will be my first appointment with her in 6 weeks, and I think I will start going every 4 weeks after this. As I have mentioned, we have the big ultrasound on the 26th, so I’m pretty much counting down the days until we know if we’re having a son or daughter. I probably won’t be able to sleep at all the night before that because I will be so excited!

Here’s a photo of some of the stuff we have for the nursery so far. We’ve decided to keep the blue walls. Today the window shades and rug came in. Also, we got the sample of the border we are thinking of using, which is taped to the wall under the window. I really like it, but I think I want the version that has brighter colors instead of the pastel colors. Everything else we have is in bright colors, so the pastel doesn’t exactly go. Other than that, I love it. The pictures standing up along the wall are pictures of little dog sculptures made out of fruits and vegetables. I actually took them from a calendar, but I have had them framed and waiting to be hung in our future baby’s room for probably about two years.

I guess the next step is painting the trim around the windows and the door trim and doors and then hanging the border (if Matt approves it) and the window shades. By the time we get that done, it will probably be the end of June, and I’ll go order the crib, dresser, and glider.

Today I am 15 weeks along. I’m showing a little, but still not significantly so. I’ll post a photo of myself in a couple weeks when I start to look legitimately pregnant. I’ve been feeling good for the most part, though today I have a killer headache. I just finished my work for the day, so I think I’m going to lie down now to see if my head feels better.

I have always enjoyed Sundays. We can stay up late the night before and then sleep in on Sunday mornings. Matt and I go to get lunch at a nearby Chinese restaurant every Sunday, and we love that. But now I look forward to Sundays even more because it’s when a new week starts in my pregnancy. So this morning, I am now 7 weeks pregnant (which means I have been pregnant for 7 weeks and am starting my 8th week today). It’s like a little milestone every Sunday.

This week our baby will grow to over 1/2″ long. From the pictures I’ve seen, this week he or she starts looking more like a baby and less like an alien lifeform. The tail is still there though, which I think is awesome.

I still haven’t had any morning (or afternoon or night) sickness, but I have been getting mild headaches for the past week. I had a headache yesterday from about 6:00 in the evening, and I thought it would go away overnight. This morning I woke up and it’s worse. The only thing I can take that isn’t baby poison is Tylenol, so I did so. I hope it goes away very soon. I read that headaches in pregnancy are common. Awesome.