25 Weeks Pregnant

Well here we are, only 15 weeks left to go until our due date! 105 days to go, and feeling more and more excited every day. I will say that lately there have been so many people that try to “scare” me and say things like “Well you better get your sleep now!” or “Your life is about to be so different.” And my personal LEAST favorite, “Well you’re going to find out how tough it is soon.” Okay, I get it. Having a baby is hard and time consuming and overwhelming and completely life altering… but I also knew that before getting pregnant. I am mentally prepared for sleepless nights full of dirty diapers and a crying baby. Possibly shedding tears myself on more than one occasion. I am more than ready for the difficult period figuring out breastfeeding, and juggling house work, and not to mention continuing to work my part time job for Jonathan’s company while on maternity leave from my full time job. I am now and always have been one of those people that puts my mind to something, and I make it happen. And I do not foresee that changing after having giving birth to my son.

I am not sure why people feel the need to make comments like that constantly. I’m sure most have good intentions, but sometimes it just comes off like they are down playing my ability to handle what is to come or like I don’t know what I’ve gotten myself into. I know every pregnant woman ever has had to deal with these comments, but sometimes I just want to reply with, “Trust me, I know, and it’s going to be the greatest thing I will ever do.” I am so excited and ready to give up any selfish habit I have so I can take care of my child to the best of my ability. To be able to still maintain my home. To be able to get back into shape. To be able to juggle all of the demands a new mother has. I am a 28 year old woman with every capability of doing this. I am ready for all of the sacrifices. Giving up my “me time”, my tv shows, my weekend naps, my fun girls nights. It’s all going to be worth it. Its not forever, and because I know this, I am fully able to embrace what is to come. Yes there will be hard days and times when I’ll be so behind on house chores. I will feel so disconnected from my friends and the rest of the world I am sure. But nothing compares to the great love and joy I am going to get to experience with having and raising my child.
 

Now that I got that off my chest, here is a little update on how things are going. I am feeling really good for the most part. My only real complaint is still just my hands/fingers/wrists. Oh how I hope they regain feeling after delivery. They are numb all of the time. They also hurt sometimes, and I am pretty clumsy because of having no feeling and weakness in my grip. My back is bothering me a little less, which I give credit to regular stretching for that miracle. I am tired, but I also am not sleeping very well in the evenings anymore. Tossing and turning for comfort, plus the moment I lay down, my nose gets stuffed up on whichever side I lay. Kicking is much more frequent and stronger now, Jonathan has been able to feel him a couple times. Which he things is sooooo weird. And I am starting to have tree trunk ankles in the evenings… haha! At least that’s what I am calling them. Just a little swelling on the average day. But on days where I stand more than others and have a lot more to do, they look pretty crazy. Most of my shoes are too tight for comfort. The swelling does go down though with elevating them and overnight. At my 24 week appointment, blood pressure was normal, urine was good, heart beat was strong, and yet again… weight gain is up (28lbs total so far). I do hope it slows down these last 15 weeks, but I am not stressing it anymore. Because at that appointment my Dr told me that I look fine, I don’t look like I am piling on the pounds (looking at pictures I would have to disagree…talk about a round face, double chin and HUGE nose). She also said with the carpel tunnel I’ve had since 12 weeks, and the swelling in my ankles/feet… I am clearly going to retain lots of water all pregnancy, which some women do. And I should expect to lose a lot of water weight following delivery. I am trusting her knowledge and giving myself a much easier time, now that I can visibly see my ankles swelling to help wrap my mind around some of the weight gain actually being fluid retention. We are just chugging right along with the next appointment being on 4/9. They sent me home with my fruit punch flavor glucose drink to do before coming next time so we can test for gestational diabetes. I am nervous about it, but staying hopeful that I will be lucky and pass. They will also check for anemia at that time. Then following that appointment we will proceed forward with a checkup every two weeks.
 

Home projects have slowed way down, but should be picking back up soon. We are hoping to have the nursery done (painted, carpeted) and ready for furniture in the next 3 weeks. At least that’s our goal. That way, when we going on our babymoon to Charleston, our guy can go to town and get the hall and living room done while we are away. That’s our hopes. And of course I will share any progress when we start making some again. Our bedroom is done though, and I think the carpet I picked out goes really well with the wall color.  

Last weekend, myself and a few others put on a baby shower for my long time best friend Jessica. She is due with baby girl number 2 in April and I was so excited to be able to be a part of making her baby shower special. I decided to take on the task of baking her cupcakes FROM SCRATCH! And they turned out pretty good if I do say so myself. I made Vanilla Bean Cupcakes and Chocolate Cupcakes, some had Vanilla Bean Buttercream and others had StrawberryButtercream. I received a lot of praises for how yummy they turned out. Thankful for Cupcake Project for the awesome recipes I followed word for word.

This weekend is the St. Patrick’s Day race at Virginia Motorsports Park, which Jonathan races at every year. He hasn’t gotten lucky enough to win at this event or at this track yet for that matter, so keeping my fingers crossed that the truck runs good and this year he will bring home a win one day! Saturday will be the first race I attend of the just getting started season. I’m not sure how many I’ll end up making it to later on in my pregnancy, and once baby boy is here I doubt I’ll make it to any in the later part of the season. So going to get out now while I still can and enjoy being at the track. Hope you have a Happy St. Patrick’s Day on Sunday!