11 weeks

Whoa, looks like he/she is at a rave.

So our little gremlin is about the size of a plum this week. It is developing its sense of smell and should be getting tastebuds soon. I can't say I envy him/her - I'm guessing the aromas in there are weird to say the least. It is getting hair and nails and will soon be demanding expensive trips to the salon. Its kidneys are starting to function and amniotic fluid is starting to collect. He/she is starting to develop gender characteristics but we'll have to wait another NINE WEEKS to find out. Suck.

Nate and I had a great time in Chicago - thank you again Tom and Jan for everything! I tell you what though, traveling pregnant is not all it's cracked up to be...I have motion sickness now. MOTION SICKNESS. Somehow I can no longer tolerate taking off, landing, or any sort of turbulence. I have to clutch Nate's arm in a death grip and repeat my mantra of 'don't vomit...don't vommmmiiiiit...' until we either flatten out or land. Also I'm not as good at walking around as I used to be...I had to sit down a lot while we were exploring. Everyone was very understanding though, so thank you all very much!

I went shopping with Nate's cousin Kilie and went a little bazonkers at the maternity store...got two pairs of jeans, some comfy pants, some shirts, a sweater or two....she just kept bringing me stuff! All I wanted was jeans, honest!!!

Other than the tiredness and nausea I felt pretty good this week. I did end up spending one night in our hotel room with a headache but otherwise was quite participatory, hooray for me! Jackson needs a Cheesecake Factory and better shopping...I re-discovered how much more fun it is to shop in an actual store than online. Oh well, maybe someday there will be another mall in my life.

vacation

yup, that's right, we're getting the heck out of dodge. Nate and I will be enjoying ourselves in the Windy City for the next five days, so I probably will not be blogging until we get back on Thursday. I'll just have to be extra funny to make up for the posts I miss while I'm gone. In the meantime, here's a way cooler 10 week photo:


It has ears! It's almost like there's a real person in there or something. Madness.

10 weeks

a photo:


All these pictures are looking pretty similar to me, just different angles. Hm....suspicious.

We officially have a fetus now, wahoo! It can make a fist, it's head is about 1/2 the length of it's body and it is about 1 1/2 inches long. Apparently it's started wiggling around a bit but is still too small for me to feel it.

Not much else to report I guess, just building a baby and all the fun that comes with it.

fetus week

Week 10 is when the gremlin will officially change from an embryo (I think) to a fetus. They grow up so fast *sniff*....

Had a bad night last night. It turns out that reading on the bus leads to car sickness which leads to general nausea which leads to being very unpleasant to be around. Thank goodness we got takeout in a timely fashion and cleared that nasty pukiness right up. I did have a lingering headache though and went to bed early. I'm definitely looking forward to the 2nd trimester when (hopefully) I won't be quite so tired and I'll be able to pop a Tylenol when I get a headache. I know, I *could* take one now but I'm doing my best to make it to 12 weeks without any drugs, just to be on the safe side.

I have my 2nd yoga class tonight, hooray for stretching! Ingrid is feeling better so I hope she'll be attending...I felt a little out of my element not knowing anyone last week. I still plan on sitting at the back of the class though; I don't need any extra eyes on my butt.

fancy new header

I have put a fancy new header on the top here. Pretty sweet, eh?

Sorry to go on and on about my weight, but I swear my stomach is getting bigger EVERY DAY. It's really quite amazing. This morning I put on a flowy drapey t-shirt and you can pretty clearly see the outline of my bump, or belly, or baby, or whatever b-word you'd like to use. I'd like to avoid the 3-letter f-word though, thank you very much.

Not much else to report other than the powers that be decided that the water line to my building needed work yesterday. There are three pregnant women in the building and they decide to render the toilets inoperable for an entire day.

Unacceptable.

looking pregnant-er

I have gained some weight. It still looks (to me) like I'm just getting fat, but sometimes I'll walk by a mirror and surprise myself with my pregnant-ocity. I'm only gaining in my stomach, which is good (right?) - my pants and skirts still fit except for in the belly so at least my butt and legs aren't gaining too much. It's weird how your body knows where to send those extra calories. I know that some women make it to five months or so without showing or putting on any weight at all, but it looks like I am not going to be one of those women. Just not the right metabolism I suppose. Or possibly it's the chocolate milk?

I think I may dye my hair back to brown as soon as we get out of the first trimester here - I want to minimize my exposure during the incubation phase but something has to be done about it now. Between the roots, the oranger stuff on top, the redder stuff on the bottom and the blackish stuff underneath it looks like my head was tie-dyed by overenthusiastic colorblind hippies. I'd really like to get in before we go to Chicago on Saturday but that's still only 10 weeks so I guess I'll just have to hit up the big city looking like a hair experiment gone wrong. *sigh*

No sign of heartburn or nausea, just the constant hunger and the stupid hormone soup still! I asked the dr. if there was anything to be done about the roller-coaster and he pretty much said 'No, deal with it' but a lot nicer.

K, off to make some gluten free blueberry pancakes....mmmmmm.......

yoga

Whoa, two posts in one day. This is getting serious.

On Wednesday after work I went to my first pre-natal yoga class. There was one other woman who looked to be in the early stages but everyone else looked as if they were about 7 or 8 months along.

It was embarrassing. These women who have put on anywhere from 30-50 lbs in the past few months were so much more flexible than I was (and likely still am today. I probably did not gain that much stretchiness in one session). With my legs out in front of me in a 'V' shape I can barely get my upper body to less than a 90 degree angle...I'm guessing I topped out at about 81 degrees to the floor. One of the super pregnant women had her belly in the floor and looked like she practically had her head all the way down too.

Thank goodness I was in the back of the class so I couldn't hear the giggles. Next week I should have some moral support if Ingrid is over her cold.

My favorite part of the class was the very end when we just got to lay there for 5 minutes relaxing with our breathing. I also enjoyed the Haagen Daaz bar I treated myself to after class a great deal...and before you get all 'junk food!' on me, my mom sent me an article about chocolate being good for pregnant women and how it helps to prevent preeclampsia. So I'm just watching out for my health.

Neener neener neener.

FYI for those who are new to blogging - if you'd like to leave a comment please just click on the link at the bottom of the post that says '0 comments' (or 1 or 5 or however many comments there are for that post) and it'll take you to a screen where you can post a note. I don't believe you have to sign in or register for anything; if you want to post anonymously it won't even make you put your name in. I love reading everyone's notes so please comment at will! Throw caution to the winds!!

9 weeks, 1 day

this might be roughly what the gremlin looks like now:



I doubt the accuracy of labeling on google images, but oh well. It's still interesting!

It's started to dance and move around in there but it's still too little for me to feel anything. It has fingerprints and will grab onto anything that touches its hands. It's about an inch long at this point and weighs .07 of an ounce. I don't know where all this extra food I'm eating is going...straight to my butt I suppose.

I had a little scare yesterday with some cramping but spent the day in bed and felt much better around 1 or 1:30. First pregnancy paranoia more than anything I'm sure.

Status report....eat eat eat drink drink pee. The heartburn seems to have completely disappeared for now and I'm having little to no nausea. I'm still guzzling chocolate milk and hot chocolate and doing my best to eat well and not spend a zillion dollars on food every day...it's harder than you'd think.

ultrasound pics

As promised, we got the ultrasound pictures scanned. It's still a white blob in the middle of a black blob, but it's quite a bit clearer than the picture of the picture I posted earlier.







Isn't it cute?

I'd also like to note I've added another poll above the name polls - make your voice heard!

fries

McDonald's has an unholy power over me. I'm about to drive into town to get fries and a shake. And 'town' in this case is 12 miles away.

The food I have at work is just not appealing in the slightest, but I must eat soon or else my stomach will come raving out of my body and eat my head.

edited to add:

ooooooh the pregnancy gods are laughing at me now...I collected orders from other people on the office, got all the way into town, started to place my order only to hear the following:

"oh, I'm sorry, the ice cream machine is broken."

Rat farts!

I got my fries and a salad and tried to get a vanilla frappiccino from Starbucks and heard this:

"oh, I'm sorry, we're out of the cream base we use to make those."

Double rat farts!

Apparently I am not meant to have a tasty frozen treat today.

mother's day

so I got to celebrate my first mother's day - woo hoo! Nate was so sweet, he got me flowers from the market and had breakfast ready when I got up - eggs & sausage & blueberry pancakes...mmmmmm.......

We spent the day playing Lego Star Wars on the PlayStation. It sounds geeky, and it is, but it is also hilarious and so much fun.

My flowers -





The hugest time-suck ever -



Also - ultrasound pictures! They are just pictures of the printouts as we got the actual prints scanned pretty late last night, but it's better than nothing for now, right? Right.



So that's our little gremlin (it's the white blob inside of the dark blob)...pretty cool, huh?

Status report...I'm definitely getting into morning sickness land, but only as a tourist. I almost threw up while brushing my teeth this morning but usually I only start to feel sick if I haven't eaten in the last hour or so. And since I really enjoy eating, there is generally not that big of a gap between meals.

wow

So it's really in there.

The doctor's appt went pretty well, once we got in. They were running really behind (or, I should say *my* doctor was running really behind) so we were about 45 mins late getting in to talk to the nurses and then just as I was all gowned up for the exam Dr. George got paged to the hospital for some other baby. Hmph. But he was back within an half hour and away we went.

I had the timing exactly right according to the size of the blob - I was 8 weeks yesterday and due on 12/18. The blob cooperated and gave us a nice profile view, which was awesome. We got to see its heart flickering away on the screen, which was also awesome.

Nate is going to scan the pics tonight so I will probably post them this weekend.

Here is the announcement I just sent out -


So welcome any new readers!! Please feel free to forward my announcement email to anyone I have missed, there are a lot of email addresses I don't have or have in weird places, so please please forward!

Happy Friday!!

eight weeks

yet another development photo -



Just look at that pixel-y little guy (or girl)!

It's starting to get a tongue and the intestines are moving to their proper place in the interior of its body. Cartilege and bones are starting to form and it has little fingers and toes but they're webbed. Its eyes are forming and it has the beginnings of eyelids, as well.

Apparently chocolate milk is my big craving item...probably good since I generally don't get much calcium in my diet. I've been drinking a (small) bottle of it a day at least - yum.

Today is our first appointment, hooray! We should be able to see the heartbeat and if there's more than one in there we *should* find out this afternoon. Yikes. I will report back with the results!

mmm.....nausea.....

So this morning I am in Foodtown (or Jackson Whole Grocer, excuse me) looking for something to fill my stomach for the 15 minute drive to the village, where I have yogurt and fruit and nut to tide me over until lunchtime. I was looking for some crackers or cereal and some chocolate milk when all of a sudden the smell of approximately 18,000 different spices, vegetables, and random cooked meats hits me like a ton of bricks.

I almost vomited right into the milk fridge.

I made it out without puking, but sadly also without cereal, crackers or chocolate milk. When Nate came out he was a bit confused -

'where did you go?'

'I almost just barfed.'

'Did you get anything to eat?'

'No, I wanted crackers but couldn't stand it.'

'......well, you realize that I could have gotten you something.'

'........shit.'

Next time I'll just send him in with a list of demands from the gremlin.

On an unrelated note, I've just set up a Facebook profile so if you're on there, look me up!

announcements

I worked on some pregnancy announcements this weekend and am very excited about them. A bit more tweaking and they should be ready to send out after my appointment on Thursday.

I'm developing the 'breathlessness' side effect...it's so nice to have pregnancy to blame it on rather than my general poor lung capacity. It's still a little disheartening to be puffing like a water buffalo after two flights of stairs, but oh well. The joys of growing a whole new person.

Our roommate told me this weekend that I was having triplets. He's just mean.

headaches

So I've already missed some work due to un-medicatable migraines. I know you're supposed to be able to take Tylenol, but a) the gremlin is developing like mad right now and I really don't want to disrupt that and b) Tylenol probably won't do squat for my migraines anyway.

So what's a gal to do? Nate has suggested acupuncture, and I'm going to ask my OB about it at our appointment next week. I have a two page list of questions to ask him, poor guy...although I'm sure he's used to it. Apparently acupuncture can work really well as a preventative for headaches and morning sickness and all sorts of stuff so if Dr. George gives me the thumbs up I'll be full steam ahead. I'd really like to avoid taking any sort of over the counter remedies even though I'm normally a huge believer in better living through chemistry (that will be in evidence when I go into labor and immediately demand morphine and an epidural).

But in the meantime I'd like to keep the pill-popping to a minimum and I think that acupuncture may be a good way to do that.

I'm just about done with my sewing projects for now, I may even put the sewing machine away (gasp!) when I finish up this last skirt. Or maybe not.

Status report - a bit of back pain probably due to spending approximately 36 hours in bed with a migraine, a bit tired, a tiny bit of nausea but so far it's only after I eat, heartburn is still on vacation, hooray!

seven weeks

A photo:
Looks dark in there.

Let's see...this week we have elbows and some fingers and the beginnings of feet. It's teeth are starting to form and the intestines are still hanging out in the umbilical cord. It is less than a half inch long and it appears that most of its size is in its head.

I now have two finished skirts but since it's SNOWING out I'll have to wait a bit to debut the second one. I packed away some stuff that I won't be wearing for a while last night - I don't know how I can fill a big plastic tub with clothes and not have my closet look any different.

Hungry thirsty hungry hungry thirsty hungry gotta pee hungry hungry thirsty pee thirsty pee hungry thirsty pee.

That's pretty much my day.