33 Weeks!

A co-worker just came into my office and asked how I was feeling. She asked if I'm at that point yet where I am feeling so sick of pregnancy. I remember reading lots of pregnancy blogs where around the 34 week mark, the mom says something like "I'm so uncomfortable. I just want this baby to be out already!" Luckily, I am not at that point. There are nights where I feel really large and it's hard to get comfortable. But normally, I still feel fine and am glad that Evan isn't here yet, because he's still got some growing to do and he's much safer in my tummy right now! I STILL can't complain about pregnancy at this point, because I think I really do have it very easy. My back is tired and sore most of the time, but other than that, I think I am very lucky as far as pregnancy symptoms go. No leg cramps, heartburn, constipation, swelling, varicose veins, stretch marks, or anything like that so far. I did have some nausea for a few days, but I've accepted that as part of a normal pregnancy, since my body is still producing some crazy hormones. My weight gain thus far is 12 pounds. I still have no idea how this is possible, since I love sweets and certainly don't deprive myself of them! The one symptom that I've noticed is that I am SO thirsty most of the time. No matter how much I drink (I aim for 3-4L per day), I am still parched by the end of the day. I used to try to stop drinking water around 7pm so that I had a chance of getting some sleep, but lately, I've been drinking water as much as I want at night, and even though I have to get up to pee a little more, it hardly even bothers me anymore because I can fall right back to sleep. I think my sweet dog Maci is actually making it harder for me to sleep than the frequent peeing is. She loves to sleep between Jon and me, and usually sleeps the whole night curled up by my stomach or in back of my knees when I'm on my side. She's my baby though, so I just let her sleep wherever, since she won't be the only baby for much longer. We try to give her lots of attention now because even though we both say we will work hard to give her attention after Evan comes, it may not be as much as she's used to. She truly is very spoiled right now, so a new baby is going to be a hard adjustment for her I think. Speaking of spoiled, we went to DQ last night, and got Maci her own vanilla ice cream...haha yes, we are those people who get their dog ice cream.

Evan is doing well. He's still kicking up a storm all the time, and getting lots of hiccups. I listen to his heartbeat a lot with my stethoscope. He's still head down, and seems to have one leg tucked in and one leg stretched out that likes to kick me in the side when I lay down. I went to my midwife yesterday, and she said he feels long and big. I definitely take everything she says with a grain of salt though, because everything she says about him kind of changes with each appointment. There is no way to know how big he will be until he's born. Either way, I'm not worried. He will be the size he's going to be, and that's that!

I've felt really confident and excited about labor during this whole pregnancy. Lately, I've started getting a little worried. I think that's normal though, to have anxiety once it gets this close to the end. I just am going to try to read and be as prepared as possible, even though nothing can truly prepare you for birth. I know that I can do this and I just need to keep reminding myself of that. I think part of the problem is the fact that women in our society love to tell other pregnant women how hard and painful birth is. That's practically the only thing I ever hear about birth! If women were constantly talking about how wonderful and amazing birth was, instead of the pain and the horror stories, I think a lot more women would go into it thinking positive things about birth and not fearing the pain so much. I just need to keep reminding myself that I don't have to be controlled by the pain and the fear of pain.

Baby Room Sign DYI

I had found a sign with a saying on Pinterest that I loved...but to buy a custom-made sign like that was going to be at least $100. I decided I wanted to figure out a way to make one. After looking at stencil options at the craft stores, I was pretty discouraged because I had a very specific image in my mind of how I wanted the sign to look, and I wasn't finding any stencil/font options that I liked. I bought a canvas anyway, and went home to research some other ideas. I found a blog on how to make your own stencils, and I decided to try it. I liked the idea, because instead of stenciling each individual letter and trying to space and align single letters at a time, I could position the whole entire saying before painting it. It worked wonderfully, but it took FOREVER. I kept telling my family "I should have just spent the money to have someone else do this!" While I was in the middle of carving out each individual letter with an x-acto knife, I told Jon "This quote used to make me cry cause it was so sweet, now it's making me want to cry because I hate doing this tedious project!" It took me (with help from my mom too) about 10 hours one day to prepare the stencil and a couple hours the next day to paint the canvas. It ended up being exactly what I wanted though, and now I can tell my son that I made it just for him!

The total cost for the project was $28

-Canvas: $10

-Paint: $4

-Paint roller/sponges: $2

-X-acto knife: $4 with a coupon

-Contact paper: $2

-Spray adhesive: $6

Step 1

Paint the canvas white. I just used simple acrylic paint and painted a thin layer so that there was a base to paint letters on.

Step 2

Measure out a piece of contact paper to fit the size of your canvas. I just bought some cheap contact paper (like what you use to line drawers/cupboards) at Big Lots. This is what you will be using to make the stencil, so make sure it fits the canvas correctly.

Step 3

Print out your quote and lay it out on the contact paper to get the spacing and arrangement that you want. What I did to get the quote was this: I opened Word and made a text box that was 1/4 the size of the canvas. For example, The canvas I used was 22 x 28 inches, so I made a text box that was 5.5 x 7 inches. I typed the quote, using several different fonts and sizes/styles, so that it was a mini replica of exactly how I wanted it to look on the canvas. I then took each word and multiplied the font size by 4, since the canvas was 4 times the size of the text box I used. I printed out each word, cut the extra paper from around the outside, and taped the words together for each line of the quote, as you can see below.

Step 4

Once you have made sure your quote fits on the canvas and is spaced the way you'd like, you need to attach the words you printed to the contact paper. I did this using adhesive spray. You want to attach the whole word, not just around the edges of the paper. Attach each word (or whole line, if you taped all the words together) to the contact paper in the exact arrangement and spacement that you want. This is what you are going to be stenciling onto the canvas.

Step 5

Next, the fun part. NOT. This part took so long, and I wished I would have just bought a Cricut machine haha. Cut out each letter. Cut through the paper and the contact paper - leave the sticky backing of the contact paper on for this part...don't peel it off yet. I started cutting the letters with an x-acto knife, but found that it was much easier to just use a utility knife, because it cut through all the layers better. I used a cutting board so that I didn't cut through the wooden surface I was working on. My mom helped a lot with this part. She and I both sat watching the Oscar's while we cut letters out.

Step 6

This is how it should look once you've cut out all the letters. For the letters with an inner circle, like the O pictured below, I left a small section attached at the bottom so that when I painted, the entire inside of the letter wasn't filled in. I then went and hand painted the bottom of the O once I was done painting the whole stencil.

Step 7

After the entire stencil has been cut out, peel the backing off the contact paper (slowly, so that you don't rip any of the letters) and attach it to the canvas. I used a credit card to make sure all the letters stuck really well to the canvas. Any parts that weren't completely adhered to the canvas would allow paint to bleed under and mess up the letter. I then took a small paint roller and rolled paint over the whole stencil.

Step 8

After the whole stencil was painted, I peeled the paper off the canvas, again, VERY slowly. Some of the paint had dried a little, but it didn't really make a difference. I then went back and did touch ups and filled in the letters that needed to be completed, like the O's.

The finished product!

31 Weeks!

I can't believe we're down to a single-digit week countdown now...9 weeks left!

I had a rough couple weeks last week and the week before, mostly due to exhaustion. My iron and blood counts were low, so I was so tired and had a few meltdowns. But I started taking some chlorophyll and iron liquid supplements, at the suggestion of Wendy, and am feeling a difference. I'm still tired, but I somehow manage to have the energy to get through each busy day. My stomach is getting larger and larger, and it seems to have really popped in the last few weeks cause I've had a lot of people now that ask me when I'm due and stuff. It's getting harder to breathe, and I get winded pretty easily. I get out of breath and my heart starts racing just from trying to adjust my position in bed sometimes. I've been bumping my stomach on things more, by accident. Clothes are getting more uncomfortable, and I finally bought a stretchy band so that I can keep wearing my regular jeans. I also broke down and bought some comfy baggy maternity shirts from Target. They were only $5 and I needed something that I could wear with leggings when I want to lounge around the house. A lot of my regular shirts still fit, but are getting tighter and tighter. I weighed myself this morning and was 142...so officially 10 pounds more than I was at the beginning of my pregnancy.
I still feel lucky that I have no major complaints so far. Of course, the bigger I get, the more uncomfortable I get, but that's normal. I haven't had any issues with constipation, swelling, nausea, stretch marks, varicose veins, or anything like that. I've been getting a lot more Braxton Hicks contractions now. They feel weird, but aren't painful or anything. I had a ton of them the other day while I was at clinical, and that night too, but I know it was because I hadn't had enough to drink during the day. I have to be careful about that. I've also been drinking Red Raspberry leaf tea because it supposedly helps to strengthen your uterus and make labor quicker and less painful. It can't hurt to try, right?
I don't know if I mentioned this in my last post, but I can finally hear the baby's heartbeat with my stethoscope. It's so exciting! He is kicking harder and harder every day. He can now reach my ribs, and will sometimes kick them. It's not my favorite feeling. He mostly still just kicks my sides. Sometimes it feels like he's having a seizure in there because of how quickly and jerkily he moves. Last night I was lying on my side, and he was like moving his leg/knee up and down my side. Sometimes it felt like he was going to push his foot through my skin, that's how far he was pushing out. It was the coolest feeling. He gets hiccups several times a day, and usually around the same time of night each day. I feel like he must be head down, kind of facing my right side, because I always feel hiccups down toward my left side. However, the other day, it felt like he had rolled over because I felt hiccups on my right side. I have no idea, though. I wish I could see exactly where his little body is positioned. I go to see my midwife today, so maybe she will be able to tell where he is.
According to the websites I visit, Evan is about 4 pounds now and something like 18 inches long! It makes me feel really relieved that he's at the point where if he was born early, he'd most likely be just fine. 4 pounds is still really little, but it's not THAT little when you think of how small some babies are that are born early and survive. The websites say that he is almost fully developed, except for his lungs. Luckily, these days they have steroid shots that they can give babies to speed up their lung development if they are born early. I'm not worried though, I think he's going to be in there for a while longer. He seems pretty comfy. I can't believe how excited I am for him to be born though! Things have been so busy, and will only get busier soon, with finals, and moving, and all that. The last 9 weeks will fly by so quickly, and before we know it, we'll be holding our little boy. It is going to be the most surreal thing ever. I can't even imagine how amazing it will be, to look at him and know that we made him and that he is OURS! I feel him move all the time inside me, and love him so much and feel so connected to him, but it still doesn't feel real sometimes that he will be born and be a real little human being that we get to take care of. It's the craziest thing to think about...in a good way :)

29 Weeks

I'm 29 weeks now. Wowza. I say this every time, but this pregnancy has been flying by! I'm dying for him to be here, but at the same time, I won't mind waiting another 11 or so weeks, cause I feel like there is so much to be done still. We aren't even living in our own house yet! We are getting closer to moving in though, and I'm really looking forward to getting the baby's room done. It will be a big project - we have plans to paint the walls and try to strip the paint spatters off the wood floors, which I know won't be easy or cheap. But I think it will be fun, especially since I won't be the one actually doing it :) Haha.

We've been calling the baby Evan (I can't remember if I mentioned that in the last post), so I guess that's what I will start calling him on here. It feels more real to call him by a name, instead of just baby or "the boy" as I like to say. We will have to see once he's born if he is, in fact, an "Evan." He is weighing in at 3 pounds this week and is 15 inches long! It's crazy to think that he's that long already and will grow even more. I don't know how he fits in there sometimes! My midwife thinks she could feel his head jammed down toward my pelvis. I've never really been able to tell if he's breech or head down, but when she explained to me where she thinks he is positioned, it matched where I've been feeling kicks and punches. I was so excited the other night because I decided to try using my stethoscope again to see if I could hear his heartbeat, since we got it pretty easily at my midwife appointment. I got it! It was very clear, and I could tell when he rolled over and had his back facing out, like against my stomach, because his heartbeat would get so loud. It was really cool and I listened for quite awhile. Then, I tried again last night to see if my mom and Catie could hear, and I couldn't get it. He must have rolled over or something. It was exciting though.

Since I wrote last, I had my bloodwork done...finally, and my glucose test. The bloodwork came back saying that I'm anemic and have a low platelet count. The anemia explains why I've been so sleepy lately. I have no energy and am always tired. I was worried that it was just part of the whole third trimester thing, but hopefully once I start taking extra iron and chlorophyll, I'll have more energy.

My glucose test was interesting. I had no problem drinking the drink. I love sugar, and thought it just tasted like super sweet orange pop without the carbonation. I didn't feel sick from drinking it or anything. I felt jittery, of course, during the hour that I had to wait before getting my blood drawn. Anyone would after drinking that much sugar that quickly! I felt kind of shaky and a little sick on my drive home, and I was so tired and had a headache, which is also to be expected with that much sugar. I ate some real food when I got home and then felt fine. I don't know what all these pregnant women are talking about when they make the test sound horrible. I did notice when I was drinking the sugar that it said it contained 100g of sugar, which I thought was a little odd, because I thought I'd read somewhere that you have to drink 50g. I googled it when I got home, and sure enough, I had drank twice the dose I was supposed to! The lady at the lab accidentally gave me the drink that you're supposed to drink if you fail the first glucose test and have to do the 3 hour test. I was a little worried all week that I'd have to do it, because I thought my sugar would undoubtedly come back high since I had consumed twice the amount of sugar that I was supposed to. I was shocked when my midwife showed me the results and my blood sugar came back low! I'm not sure that's a good thing though, because it means that I am either way more hypoglycemic than I thought, or my body is so used to large amounts of sugar (I can't help it, I have the worst sweet tooth ever) that it was like "100 grams of sugar? No big deal!" Ah well, at least I don't have GD.

Let's see, what else? I guess I still don't really have many complaints about being pregnant. I'm gaining about 4 pounds a month now and have gained a total of 9 pounds from my starting weight (I was 132 before getting pregnant and now I'm 141). That's by far the largest number I've ever seen on the scale, and I don't like it! I feel large and bump my stomach on stuff a lot. My skin is starting to feel uncomfortable from stretching, and when I twist certain ways, it sometimes feels like it will rip or something. I think part of that is my stomach muscles hurting from being stretched. I can't eat big portions, or else I get a little food that comes up when I burp. Gross, I know, but it is what it is. I never thought I'd be the pregnant chick complaining about having a difficult time putting her shoes on, but, here I am. It's hard to put socks and shoes on...wah, wah, wah. I do not enjoy tight clothes, and I need to get some new maternity pants because the ones I have just have a low band of stretchy material, and it's getting too tight. I can still fit into a few pairs of my regular jeans, and am not wearing maternity shirts, but most days I come home from work/school and immediately put on sweat pants and one of Jon's shirts, because baggy clothes are my friend. I've given up on getting more than 3 hours of sleep in a row. It just doesn't happen anymore. Some nights I wake up every hour to pee. I try to stop eating and drinking a few hours before bed time, which helps a little, but not enough to make it worth it to spend the last few hours before bed dying of thirst. I manage to make it through the day though, so my body must be adjusting. Which is good, because I'd better get used to functioning on no sleep for when Evan is born and I'm still going to school!

Speaking of school, I have to brag a little. I somehow got 100% on my second lecture test and 100% on my lab test. My brain can't even remember the littlest, simplest day-to-day things, so I have no idea how I did so well on my tests, but I'll take it!