33, Look at Me

I know I just did a 32 week update, but I feel like there has been so much to write about and I missed out on a lot in last post. Plus, I love writing. I'm starting to think that instead of posting statuses on Facebook, I might start blogging more so people who are actually close enough to me to want to read through my blogs will be able to know about what's going on in my life. I'm on a new "unplugging" kick where I'm trying to detach from social media and spend more quality time talking to people... through talk, not type. 

At 33 weeks, I'm feeling at my best. I thought the whole third trimester was filled with aches, pains, hormones, and basically three months of trying to get this baby out as soon as possible. Even though I still have some annoying symptoms, it's exceeding my expectations. As I said in my last post, we are finally close enough to the due date that reality is kicking in. We are building up the nursery, starting to pack and prepare for when I go to the hospital, and getting prepared for when baby Ryan comes home. It's exciting!! I haven't been this excited about the baby since we first found out I was pregnant. 9 months is a long time, and after a while, you tend to lose interest in the final product which makes all of the pregnancy symptoms more irritable. 

I feel energized, happy (rather than bitter) about my big ol whale belly, and I'm still able to stay active. I originally was going to stop teaching Zumba as of Aug 1, but I still feel beyond great when I teach so I extended my classes another couple weeks and I couldn't be happier. Teaching Zumba is my sanity and my passion and I was dreading the day I had to slow it down. I'm glad I get a little extra time with my students before labor. 

I love that I still somewhat have my "ab" lines. I really am just a belly. It's cute to see how small of a space Ryan really has in there. My belly button still hasn't popped but it's sure getting close! 

If anyone is pregnant and reading this, I want to recommend registering at Babies R Us over Target. Why? Well, they mostly have the same things, but at Babies R Us, you get rewards back whenever someone buys something off of your registry. We did a bunch of shopping this week-and we were able to add more to our registry, buy it, we'll get money back off that purchase after my due date, andddd when I got home, we had a coupon for 10% off our registry purchase so I brought my receipt back the next day and they did a price adjustment and gave us back our $38 savings in cash. They are so good and helpful there. Target does have some awesome stuff-mostly the cute outfits/bedding that Babies R Us doesn't have, but they don't really give you any rewards back nor did anyone at guest services really seem to have knowledge about the baby registry. Plus, at Babies R Us, you get 12 months from your due date to return any gifts you don't use. Target just has their basic return policy. 

When we were back home, we went to Buy Buy Baby (we don't have it out here) and it was awesome! They are owned by Bed, Bath, and Beyond so they honor their coupons. Yesterday, we went online and ordered a bunch of wall decals for the nursery. I wanted to see if they'd still accept coupons so I did their "online chat with a pro" option and the guy was really nice and price adjusted our order to give us 20% off an item. Very cool. Another good place to register.

I finally finished writing out thank you notes from the baby shower. It brings me joy when you have the EXACT amount of thank you cards vs. people. I ordered them months ago so it was exciting that I was right on the dot. I have this weird obsession with putting stickers on envelopes, so I went and spent $10 just on baby stickers that I know will end up in the trash probably 5 seconds after opened. But I think they are super cute and I have some left over for whenever I get to scrapbooking baby Ryan's life. 

My baby stickers :)

I'm a nut! But I love it. 

I still have a couple weeks before my next drs. appointment and our first birthing class (finally!), but I think I'm going to spend as much time as I can just reading up on labor (I know you seem to forget everything once you go into labor, but I like the comfort of knowledge beforehand because that's the kind of person I am) and post-delivery to have an idea of what to expect when we go home and, you know, what we are actually supposed to do with this baby once he's here. I truly am excited and each day has been super fulfilling this week :)

32 Weeks, lots of updates

I am at the end of week 32 of pregnancy. We have less than two months until our due date. It's power hour. I'm slowly becoming more and more ready for this. I have had a lot going on in the past three weeks, so let me update you all. 

A couple weekends ago, my husband and I ran probably my last 5k for a while. It felt long, and I felt very heavy and out of shape. I kept trying to pinpoint what it was that was bringing me down (cramps, breathing, aches/pains) and I really didn't have one specific thing that was causing me to run more slowly than usual. I literally just felt out of shape-like my legs weren't in enough shape to carry my stomach. I may have left footprints in the cement with the way my feet were dragging. I'm so grateful for my husband because he stayed by my side til the end and encouraged me the whole way. I probably would have given up if he wasn't there with me. We finished the race in 29:02. I was hoping for a better time, however I'm still proud of the time we got considering how far along I am. 

31 weeks-getting ready for our 5K

Last night, we got home at about midnight from a week-long vacation to see family. I learned A LOT about my body and baby:

• Sleeping on a plane at 7 months is probably the most obnoxious thing I've encountered. Our flight left at 10pm, and my body was in spasm mode the whole time. My poor husband who felt me move and twitch throughout the 5 1/2 hour flight was a trooper. Not only was my body achy (and unable to stretch out), but I had a sinus headache, and felt incredibly nauseous while baby H kicked me from the inside all night long. It was miserable. Pretty sure I cried at one point due to body pain. Oh, and I was itchy-it felt like I had fleas to top it all off. After 3 hours of sleep, it felt great to finally be back on land and take some morning naps on my parents couch.

• I can still be in shape and take it easy at the same time. I worked out every day while home except for our last day (when a good 12 hours of it were dedicated to travel). I did three Zumba classes, ran a couple miles, swam, and spent Thurs morning walking around the Shedd then over to Millennium park. I told my husband a few times that I didn't quite reach the workout levels that I had wanted to (as I usually do in my daily routines out here) however, I also didn't have the luxury of just stopping and resting my feet whenever I wanted. I would much rather have spent my energy walking around shopping, downtown, or wherever with my family than going all out at the gym. It was definitely worth it. 

At the bean in Chicago

• Swimming is better than chocolate. Being in Alaska, we don't have hot summer days like they do back home, which means outdoor pools are nonexistent. Not only does the water feel AMAZING as a way to cool me off from the humidity, but my body felt heavenly. I felt mobile again. I could twist, roll, turn, and dive without the unattractive grunting attached. I was weightless and it was incredible. And the baby loved it. The first time we hit the water, he was happy and kicking the entire hour that I swam.  

While I was home, my mom, sister, and aunt threw me a baby shower which means that I got to see so many more friends and family than I usually get to. I am so lucky to have a good support system out there, and now baby H has a room full of adorable outfits and other goodies. The hardest part about the shower is that I felt like I barely had time to talk to anyone. Every time I sat down to say hi to someone, someone else walked in. I never get to see family so it's hard only getting 5 mins at a time with everyone! But it was such a lovely shower and I'm grateful for even the couple mins I got with my guests. 

Baby shower at Ditkas. 

Our trip back to Anchorage sucked. We had a layover in LA (LAX is the worst airport I've been in thus far) which means we had about 9 hours of flight time alone and due to LAX sucking, our hour and a half between flights turned into me being able to sit with my feet up for about 5 minutes while waiting for food before boarding. My feet were very swollen last night, so my goal this week is to make sure they get lots of elevation and to stretch my body out while resting between activities. 

Other updates during pregnancy:

I feel like I'm back in my first trimester-only fatter. Smells make me nauseas (I can't tell you how many times I almost used that barf bag on the plane or have to walk away while cooking), my body is so tired from minimal activity, I am back to being able to nap during the day, acne-everywhere, my back aches, and I have cravings only for certain foods. A good handful of foods makes me sick or have acid reflux. Unfortunately, these foods consist of anything healthy. My body tends to draw towards ice cream, anything with sugar really, and carbs, so my goal now that I'm done with vacation is to get back to clean eating and try to pump up my protein intakes while reducing sugar. Safe to say that Tums is again my new best friend. 

Other than that, things are really starting to sink in-especially since we had our baby shower. Our next big step is having the baby!!! We have settled on the name Ryan for baby H (my husbands middle name). We are still debating middle names, but now that we've named the puppy, we can't give him up. It's becoming a reality and I'm getting very excited about our next stage in life. In the mean time, I'm just organizing the nursery and making sure we're loading up on all that we'll need. I think we're getting close to being due-date ready :)

Decor I painted for the nursery

Third Trimester Beginnings

*Just a warning, this is a long post-lots of updates :)
Boy oh boy!!  I cannot believe how much has happened in the past few weeks and how BIG I am. Remember the days when I kept looking for a little bump and getting all excited to finally start showing? Well now there's no hiding it. I'm out of the closet and there's no turning back. You know you've popped when complete strangers bring up the fact that I'm pregnant without even asking first. I really want to pull that, "I'm not pregnant" card and make them all feel like jerks, but I don't think I could say that to someone with a straight face. 

This was at the beginning of week 28. I'm plumping up quickly. 

I am 29 weeks pregnant (and 5 days). At my last doctors appt a few weeks ago, she (some new chick that I've never seen before) assured me that my weight and belly growth are right on track. I refuse to know how much weight I've been gaining-for me, weight loss and scales never mixed, and the thought of adding pounds stresses me out, so guess what? I go into complete denial and tell them not to tell me my weight, and only tell me if I need to start gaining/losing more. So far, I've had no problems. 

I am getting frustrated with the JBER medical clinic right now. I'm in the 3rd trimester-it's go time. But the doctor I've been seeing for the first 2 trimesters is all of a sudden "too busy" or whatever so my last appt and my next won't even be with her. When I called to try to change my next appointment so that I can see her, they told me, "chances are, when you have the baby, Dr. Hansen won't even be available to deliver your baby. You usually don't get your practitioner when you deliver." Um... excuse me? Could you maybe have $#(*@&% told me this to start? So I guess she has a "team" of 6 people that I rotate with and I'll see anyone on that team-except for my next appt. They tried to make it with some midwife that wasn't even on her "team" and I was not cool with that. I got my appt changed, so next week I get to meet a 4th random teammate. 

Another frustration of mine. I went to take the glucose test. I wait at the lab for an hour before I'm even called up there. Now of course, the doctor didn't really give me details of what I was going in for, just that I had to go in the day before my appt to get blood work done. They call me up, draw some blood (from both arms, two different tests) and I'm off on my merry way. This was at 9am. At 3 pm, as I have groceries and my dog in the car, I get a phone call saying they messed up the glucose test (they were supposed to give me that drink, which they never did) and I had to come back. Well, this was at 3, they closed at 4:30-so they said to come first thing in the morning. I went back before my 10am appt, got my drink, sat there for an hour, and got called back to take blood. The girl giving me shots messed up-twice and had to call another guy over to draw my blood. By the time I left there, I had 5 needle holes in my arm from a 24 hours time frame. I was not a happy camper. I still don't even know what the test results are.. so hopefully they fill me in at my appt next week (oy!). Gotta love the military. I guess you get what you pay for... 

We had a ball for my husbands brigade a couple weeks ago. Not many places sell maternity gowns, in case anyone was wondering. After shopping a bit, I discovered that I can fit my belly and boobs somewhat well into a size 12-so I went with it. I had a good time, as most designated drivers do at a celebration.. but felt large. I didn't feel beautiful like I usually do in a ball gown, and being the pregnant girl on the dance floor honestly made me feel like I was one of those girls on 16 and pregnant or something. I feel like pregnancy and sexy do not mix. I did have fun, but I also felt really uncomfortable most of the time. I even lost my earring down my dress and couldn't find the backing of it until I got home and took my clothes off. It was hidden in the giant abyss of boobs I have going on down there. They are now officially so big you really can lose things in there. 

At the military ball. I must admit-this was a good picture. As the night went on, I looked more and more like Shamu on camera

On a more positive note, my husband and I ran the Color Run this past weekend!! And we actually did run it (I don't do this walking nonsense). We started at 8:00 and crossed the finish line at 8:25. I don't think it was a 5k-at least, it didn't feel like it was 3.2 miles, but maybe it was, but I think our time was really good. My husband said he was proud of me and it feels good to be acknowledged like that :) On top of that, it was so much fun! We both had a really good time, but didn't stay too long because I didn't want to be on my feet all day. I'm going to try to convince him to do another 5k with me next weekend. We'll see how it goes!

After running the color run!!

Overall, I have been dealing with some minor symptoms as I enter this trimester. Acid reflux is a bitch. I try to watch what I eat because that stuff SUCKS! So miserable. I get a lot of muscle spasms when I'm trying to sleep and when I wake up. In fact, the idea of going to bed is no longer appealing because I feel so miserable laying down and trying to get comfortable. My skin isn't comfortable anymore. I'm either itchy, or achy, or dry, or too hot, or too cold. And to think, this is just the beginning... I think I'm overdue for another pre-natal massage. I need to remember that it's okay to spend money to pamper myself. It's just hard when there are so many other bills to pay. *Sigh*

This is been a longer update, so I'll end with this. Over the weekend, a couple girls out here threw my a baby shower! It was so beautiful and special (they made amazing decorations and food-like Pinterest come to life) and I had such a lovely time. It still doesn't feel real that I'm going to be a mom and have a baby, but getting gifts from people slowly is making that thought come to life. Sometimes I get so caught up being annoyed with pregnancy that I forget once it's over, there's an actual purpose to it. I get something back out of it and it's not all just for nothing. I have to remind myself that there really is a baby that will be coming home with me in just a few months. It seems like a DUH thought, but despite all the changes and the hustle and bustle of my every day life (I still don't even feel like I have time to sit down some days) it's very easy to forget. 

Diaper bouquet from my shower :)

Just some of the many decorations