A Boy and His Blog

Archive for June, 2010

Here I am at 34 weeks along. My Mom thinks I look the way I did at the end of my pregnancy with Owen, but I don’t think I’m quite there yet. I think this matches up pretty closely to my 35 week pregnant picture with Owen. So I will be getting larger at a pretty rapid rate now. The baby is supposed to gain 1/2 pound per week until the birth, and I have been doing nothing but eating and taking naps. I feel exhausted all of a sudden, and starving hungry… The more I eat the more I get acid reflux though, so me and my Tums have been good friends lately. Owen is beyond excited lately and is really looking forward to this baby coming! Mama is a little hesitant, especially after reading more about fast births and how likely it is that the next birth will be even faster. At this point, I’m just hoping there is an adult in my presence while I give birth. Daddy keeps fearing the baby will come early (as in before 39 to 40 weeks, not preterm), but there is no indication of that at all, so I hope I at least make it to 39 weeks so I feel nice and prepared in that way. I did order the birth kit, and the tub will be delivered at 37 weeks. I have a few more supplies to gather and a few things to buy, but we are almost all ready for baby.

Here are some of the cute clothes and things we have gathered for baby already (unless otherwise specified these all came from thrift stores):

Grandma (James’ Mom) made this blanket for us.

Brown: it’s the new yellow!

The red outfit should fit for Christmas. And I am a huge fan of gowns for newborns.

I was able to find lots of gender neutral items too.

The one on the left says “Smile”, and I’m showing the back of the brown pants.

Grammy (my Mom) got these at a garage sale. The gown on the left converts into pants.

The black onsie says “benevolent dictator” – but I just bought it because it was black.

Some friends just gave us these recently from their kids. The yellow one converts to pants too.

These were a gift from one of Daddy’s co-workers. I love the iPood shirt! She made the taggy, which I didn’t know what that was until she gave us this, but looks like a great idea!

I found a sleep sack, which I’ve never used, but think it might work out nice since a blanket isn’t really needed then.

Owen loves this one! It’s a little tree hugger sleeper.

This is one of the items I got from an online retailer’s clearance sale. These clothes were a great deal, they are organic cotton and I paid cost for them.

These can be mixed and matched.

I just love brown with green.

I got this Moses Basket off of Craigslist. It has all organic bedding and sheets. I loved the top over it too, it makes it look pretty unique. I thought this looked much classier than a pack-n-play, and I figure it will come in handy when we go places or are outside during the summer. It’s a nice safe place for baby to sleep on the go.

Grammy is rather convinced I’m having a girl, so she picked these up from a garage sale recently. I really love the pink flowered outfit with the hat and it converts to pants too. It is newborn size, if we have a girl, she will be wearing that one really soon.

Here is my latest belly picture. I am 8 months (31 weeks) along now.

We started Birthing From Within classes last night. James said we learned more in two hours than we learned in the entire series of hospital childbirth classes we took last time. We worked on pain coping techniques right away and we had to hold onto ice cubes to mimic contractions. It was surprisingly helpful. It was nothing like a contraction, but it required focus and concentration to not freak out and throw the ice across the room – or at least drop it back into our towel. We had to draw a picture of a concept they presented to us right away and it was hard to do that. I always feel so on the spot in a group of people that it is hard to even think of anything. James didn’t want to draw at all. He started to do one of the topics, but stopped. We only have two other couples in our class, so it is a very small group. Hopefully that will help us to get comfortable enough to do the exercises more fully. The other two couples are a lot more talkative than us, but we started to open up after we got a bit more comfortable in the situation.

I have also made the decision recently to transfer care to a different midwife. I made this choice for a variety of reasons, which I will not be getting into in public. I feel very bad about needing to make this choice, but my future birth experience is more important than not hurting feelings, so the decision had to be made. I have chosen two midwives that work as a team to be at my birth. I had previously interviewed them and I really liked them and connected with them. I hope that this change works out and turns out to be the right choice. It is quite disconcerting to have to do this so late in the game.

We have started to spend some time getting things ready for the baby. I have bought and washed a lot of clothes for the baby. I installed the carseat the other day as well. I was a bit disappointed that I didn’t get the rock solid installation that I get with Owen’s seat, but I do think the infant seats are designed that way. They are supposed to flip up in an accident, and it does not move from side to side at all so I think we are okay. I did have to move Owen’s seat to the side position and put the baby’s seat on the other side. I was hoping to leave Owen in the middle. He likes sitting in the middle and it is good to keep the forward facing kid in the middle so they are more protected. But apparently we can’t fit seats side by side in the back unless we had a narrower carseat. Owen’s seat is pretty wide so the infant seat wouldn’t fit next to it.

It is already June and this baby will probably be coming sometime in July! Hopefully close to the due date at the end of July. I’m hoping we at least make it to 39 weeks so I feel very prepared and ready, but we will be trying to get everything ready by 37 weeks just in case baby makes an earlier appearance. The birth tub will be delivered at 37 weeks, and I need to order the birth kit this week to get here by 37 weeks. I think baby will hang on though until closer to the due date, and that is fine with me because being pregnant is a very special time. Also, it’s far easier to take care of the baby when it’s on the inside