10 thoughts

1. I've been so hot blooded lately. Throughout our whole relationship I was always cold and Doug was always hot. It was perfect because I had my own personal heater and he had a cooling system. I love being in a cold room with lots of blankets. I'd rather be too cold than too hot. But lately we've switched. With all the extra blood in my system (your body makes 50% more than usual when pregnant), I'm constantly warm. Not in a hot flash way, but I'm a lot more comfortable in cooler temperatures. It's really weird when Doug will close the sliding glass door and say that it's a little chilly and I'm not effected at all. Last night I felt bad cause I had the window cracked an inch and he had to get up in the middle of the night to grab another blanket. This morning when I left for work I opened the door to see how cold it was. I decided I didn't really need a jacket; it felt good outside. Yeah, it was 51 out! But I wasn't cold! This "symptom" really sucked when we had that heat wave last week. I had to take two cold baths one day because I felt overheated.

2. I don't know why this is the trend but I find it completely ridiculous: horizontal stripes on maternity clothes. Maybe in pregnancy people want to exaggerate their belly? But I feel like most women are so self-conscious about the weight that they're gaining that horizontal stripes making you look even bigger is a bad thing. I don't like them! And I'm not at a perfect size! It just makes me laugh. You'd think they'd try to have "slimming" maternity clothes. I guess that's just anything in black...

3. We've started to slowly pack our apartment. I went through our bathroom cabinets and packed up stuff that we won't need for a few months (I have way too many lotions) and threw out a lot of clutter. That's the one thing that will be a relief, to get rid of all of our extra clutter. I've also started going through our closet and our book shelves. I really got on a packing streak on Monday but had to stop because I ran out of boxes here. Which is good cause I needed to take it easy. I need to slowly pack, not do a ton at once (we have more boxes, they're just at my parents, not here). Luna seemed bummed that we took her boxes away.

4. It is so fun watching baby boy rolling around inside my tummy. It is such an indescribable feeling. In some ways it feels exactly how you think it will. Before I got pregnant I'd try to imagine what it'd feel like having someone else rolling around inside me and kicking and punching. But the actual sensation is so different than what you think it will be. So much better! I am definitely going to miss this part of being pregnant. I tease Doug by saying that it seems like my body really likes being pregnant, so we should be pregnant often. He thinks 18 months total will be often enough haha.

5. So sometimes when he moves it will make this weird cracking/popping sound. The first couple times I didn't understand the noise at all. Upon searching google, it seems like the two sacs will rub up against each other and make the popping sound. It will happen at random times and sometimes with the smallest movements. It happened the other day and I turned to Doug and said, "Did you hear that?!" He responded, "THAT'S the noise you were talking about? Weird!" It's definitely an unexpected sound. And something I had never heard of before!

6. It's weird to be winding down to my last working days. And at the same time, the last known days that I'll get to sleep in for a looong time. I work almost every morning at 7 in the morning, so I have maybe...4 days before my due date? Well, except that I'm going to stop working the week before my due date. I'd rather not push it. Especially if he comes a little early.

7. Doug and I have made it a point to keep date nights going. I really need to make this a priority especially as we start this new stage of our lives. Cause even these last couple of years we didn't have a regular date night. We have before, but once I started at Target I had no regular night off, so a lot of times date night would be spontaneous, and with that sometimes it would get put on the back burner. But we really want it to be a regular thing to just have time to spend with each other. Even if it means bringing the little man with us for the first couple of months. Or if it means that date night is ordering pizza and watching 3 episodes of Breaking Bad. It's about the intention of spending time together instead of hoping that we'll magically get extra time to spend with each other. This is super important to me: Putting God first, Doug second, and children third. Those are my priorities.

8. For a while I was really stressing about the changes that this little man will bring to our family. Some are good but still stressful, like moving. I'm actually going to be sad to leave this apartment. I love our little cupboard. I'm excited for more space and everything that will come with owning a home, but I'm not good with change. We planned this little bundle but I still was focusing on all of the stuff that wouldn't be the same. We wouldn't be able to randomly go camping one weekend. We couldn't just have lazy days just the two of us. We're going to have to be careful what we watch and listen to. We're going to have to learn how to parent and deal with all the challenges of that. Financially it's going to be tight. But I realized that I was thinking of all of this stuff and that I had already robbed myself of some of the joy of being a parent. I have wanted this my whole life. Reagan asked last time he was out what I wanted to be when I was a kid. I told him I wanted to be a mom. (To which he replied, "No, like a real job" haha...). I am so excited to have children with Doug, but fear of the unknown was getting to me and I felt so convicted. So I started focusing on all of the great stuff that I'm going to get to do with my son. Taking him camping and roast marshmallows. Take him to the beach and teach him to surf (and Doug can build sandcastles and hunt for crabs with him). Make play dough on the stove and chocolate chip cookies in the oven. Trips to the library to pick out stacks of books. Teach him how to make a whipped cream pie (and what to do with it!) Watch him learn how to read and write. Watch him learn to ride a bike. Discover what he interested in. What kind of music he likes, his favorite color, his favorite food. There will be many challenging days ahead, but so many joyful memories to be made!

9. I haven't really had any new or weird food cravings. I've been focusing on eating healthy and balancing my carbs. My doctor said to take it easy on carbs so that baby doesn't get too big since I'm a little glucose intolerant (based on me failing the one hour glucose test). So I've been measuring my carb intake and eating every 3-4 hours to keep my blood sugar levels stable. I still cheat sometimes. Especially during that heat wave when ice cream was irresistible. But you always hear all of the stereotypes of pregnant women having intense cravings in the middle of the night. Doug has not had to go to the store to get me anything once during this whole pregnancy.

10. I've started filling out the baby book. There were pages about his parents and the baby shower and other pre-birth events. I'm hoping I can stay on top of it so that we have a great memento of this precious time that will go so fast!