week 30

average size: 15.2 to 16.7 inches, 2.5 to 3.8 lbs.
what's going on with baby: "Her skin is getting smoother, but her brain is getting wrinklier to make way for all that essential brain tissue. She's now strong enough to grasp a finger!"


10 WEEKS LEFT!!! :D


this past week we got to visit both of our hospital options to choose which one we liked better for giving birth at. it was really exciting to see where she will be born! here's a little rundown of what we saw at the two options:


hospital #1:
 - overall nice
 - nothing really overly "wowed" us, but it was a nice hospital
 - i DID like the fact that they don't do all the newborn testing right away and that they encourage family bonding time with the mom and dad immidiately after the birth, breastfeeding before newborn check-up/shots, skin-to-skin contact, etc. (all things i really want to do)
 - they have safety precautions with matching wristbands for me and remi, and alarms in the wristbands automatically go off/doors lock-down if a baby is taken out of the maternity ward area
 - grandparents also get a discount card for parking!

hospital #2:
oh man. where to begin...

i guess first off, on the hospital #2 tour, they handed us this booklet and a whopping 3.5 out of the 10 pages talk about paternity testing so that should give you an idea of the environment right there. why you would include all that info in your WELCOME packet/sales pitch for the hospital, i don't know.

we both left hospital #2 feeling dirty. the whole place had a smell, and it wasn't a clean/sterile one. the security also wasn't nearly as good as hospital #1. not that i really think someone is going to run in and snatch up my baby, but hospital #1 has security key cards at EVERY. DOOR. and i think hospital #2 only had...1? so it just feels safer (and more advanced in technology).

the labor/delivery rooms were pretty similar between the two, but hospital #1's still seemed nicer with more advanced equipment. also, at hospital #2, there is the possibility that if they are over-booked, i will have to share a postpartum room with someone else, and erik wouldn't be able to spend the night! he would have to leave at 10pm and not come back until 8am! so that's a huge turn-off right there because the FATHER of my CHILD is treated like any other guest for "visiting hours". no thank you. hospital #1 has all private rooms and he would always be allowed to spend the night.

the tour at hospital #1 was about an hour and 10 minutes of full, in-depth information. hospital #2 took 45 minutes and a bunch of it was lame jokes like, "har har...your partner sucks compared to the mom...they should bend over backwards for you, har har" as if all couples pick terrible partners. it sort of angered me. erik is a great husband, and of course would do anything i need him to. the whole attitude towards the guys was, "you're stupid and can't do anything right, so ladies...be sure to pack your hospital bag way in advance because if you don't, he will only pack a towel and washcloth because that's all he needs and won't think about what YOU need". the tour guide literally said this.

hospital #2 also doesn't have a little snack room (not a deal-breaker, but hospital #1 DOES have a snack area with muffins, juice, milk, sandwiches, etc., for us to freely get whenever if we're hungry), and the tour guide went over the food menus and everything during the tour at hospital #1. no food was mentioned at ALL at hospital #2. NONE.

the seats in the waiting room for guests at hospital #2 were also ripped in numerous places lol...minor thing, but still adds to everything else we saw, so hospital #1 is for sure the winner.

i guess overall...hospital #1 was doing a great job with the sales pitch telling you all the benefits you get, and hospital #2 was like, "welp...here you go! this is what you get!". hospital #2 also suppposedly just renovated a bunch of stuff, but you would NEVER know it, and the tour guide didn't even mention anything about it! wouldn't you mention that in a tour?! oh! but hospital #2 DID compare their showers to those of "motel 8" lol...nice. and you thought this was a good idea to mention...why? of course i'm not expecting a luxurious shower, but why tell a tour group you would compare them to a motel 8?! so bizarre...

anyway! on tuesday, i decided to get crafty, and make a pretty sign for the front of remi's room door!

i had seen the whole "melted crayon project" about a bazillion times a long time ago on the internet since it seemed to be traveling around everywhere, but i wanted to add the letter "R" to it to add a little something extra. luckily, i already had everything besides a big pack of crayons! i have a few smaller packs, but i wanted a big pack to get a full range of color. here is the process i used to get there!

i looked through a bunch of letter Rs, and chose "Lucida Bright" as the font. nice and classic :) printed it out, then cut it out with scissors. i used a 64 pack of crayola crayons (amazon, $6), and erik helped take out all the yucky whites, blacks, browns, and grays out of the crayon box since i didn't want those colors on the final project.

i needed a sticky stencil "R" to place on the canvas, but we didn't have contact paper or anything like that (would have been MUCH easier for taking it off later on because it would have been one piece), so i just used painters tape, and lined a bunch of rows and columns together on my cutting mat, then traced out the R in pencil.

then i carefully cut out the R with my xacto blade...

and placed it where i wanted it on the canvas (the canvas is 16"x20").

then i picked out the order i wanted the colors to be in, lined them all up, and hot glued the backs of them to place them at the top of the canvas. 

i figured heating up the crayon wax with a heat gun would make it splatter a bit, so i wanted to make sure to keep the house clean! haha...erik cut this garbage bag and taped it to the wall and floor for me :) 

and now came the fun part! i HIGHLY recommend using a heat gun over a blow dryer if you have one. MUCH faster. i still took my time though because i wanted to control where/how fast the wax came out to get the effect/look i wanted. keeping the canvas at this angle (below) really helped too. not too steep so the wax didn't just drip straight to the bottom. 

once i got it how i wanted it to look, it was time to try and remove that R that was now covered up with dried wax. i took small sections of the R off at a time because i think it would have been too hard to peel it all off at once since you can only re-heat small sections of wax at a time. i flattened the canvas at this point too because when i re-heated the wax above where the R was, i didn't want it dripping down anymore. just wanted it warmed up enough to peel that R off. this was a SUPER tricky process. 

here we are! all finished! well...almost! i wanted to clean up those edges where the wax leaked in under the painter's tape, so i scraped off as much as i could, then just painted the R section with white acrylic paint. 

here's the finished project! i'm SO happy with the way it came out. it's so bright, vibrant, and happy! i think it will look great on her bedroom door :)

erik and i both really love how the crayons just look like sewer tubes pouring out color hahaha...

overall, it was a really fun project! it took about 2 hours from start to finish, but i'm a pretty huge perfectionist, so it might take you less time if you try it yourself! 

i also finished the rug on sunday!!! WOOOOOO!!! i'm so happy that it's done! 

i'm really pleased with how it turned out, and it's SO comfy to walk on! so squishy! should be perfect for once she starts crawling around :) 

what else...

her kicks are for sure different now. she isn't moving around as much, and when she does, it's less punchy, and more rolley haha...i think things are just getting tighter in there for her, so she doesn't have as much space to wind up for a punch or kick, i guess! i even saw her stretch out one day and her foot pushed out on my belly, and then i saw it move down about 2 inches hahaha...it was weird to see! she's going to get stronger over the next 10 weeks, so i'm sure i'll be feeling stronger movement again soon. still no kicks to to ribs, so i'm thankful for that!

on wednesday, erik and i went to a lactation meeting at his med school, only this wasn't for the general public to go to, it was for the students to learn! so that was interesting to sit in on :) i didn't really learn too much because i've already done a ton of research, but it was still cool to sit in on a special lecture. overall, it was "BREASTFEEDING = YAY! FORMULA = BAD MOM!!!" lol...and how they can encourage mothers to breastfeed instead of going straight to formula. of course things change if the mother cannot physically breastfeed, but if she is capable of it, they REALLY want to push it (as they should because it's the absolute best for baby!), so it was fun to sit through their lecture. 

lastly, i got sick this past week! YUCK! but, thankfully, it really has gotten so much better already! erik got sick maybe about a week ago, and i was worried because of my weakened immune system. normally, i VERY rarely get sick, and i NEVER get sick when he gets sick, but pregnant women have a weakened immune system (i think i read it's so the body doesn't attack the fetus like it's a foreign parasite haha), so although i was optimistic, i also figured i might catch whatever he had, aaaaaaand i did. by wednesday morning i thought i was in the clear because he was getting better, but by wednesday night my throat started to get the sliiiightest bit itchy, and right before bed, i could tell i was getting sick. 

luckily i still have some sort of a healthy immune system because it's pretty much gone! thursday i had a sore throat, friday the sore throat was pretty much all gone and it switched to leaky faucet nose/sneezing, saturday the runny nose wasn't as bad, and sunday i felt TONS better. i only had to blow my nose a few times, and the runnyness was completely gone. today i'm feeling pretty great! just a little bit of a stuffy nose, but i will definitely take that over the non-stop runny nose! i HATE the damage kleenex does to my nose after all those wipes! so painful! so i'm glad that part is over with. i'm so relieved that it didn't last long because pregnant women really can't take any medications to help things move along! at least if we both got sick now, we can't get sick for when remi gets here, right? haha...

wow! lots to write about this past week! tomorrow i have another check-up visit with my midwife, but nothing too exciting since it's just a routine check-up! 

week 29

new veggie this month! squash baby!

average size: 15.2 to 16.7 inches, 2.5 to 3.8 lbs.
what's going on with baby: "She’s not just moving a lot, she’s also plumping up. And as she continues to put pressure on your digestive system, you’re going to feel the effects: hemorrhoids, heartburn, pelvic pain and frequent urination are all common at this stage in the game."


YAY, FUN! hahaha...

let's start with GREAT NEWS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I PASSED THE GLUCOSE TEST!!! WOOOOOOO! so i don't have to do the 3 hour test! SO happy about this. oh, and so happy that i also don't have gestational diabetes, of course! lol...but yeah, the test was last tuesday, and by thursday i was wondering like CRAZY if i passed or not, so i figured a little phone call couldn't hurt, right? ;) they were only going to call me if i failed the test, but i really wanted to know if i passed or not since no phone call would still make me wonder if i was just waiting for a bad phone call! so, i called because i couldn't take the wait haha...the nurse on the phone said, "let's see...your sugar came back fine, aaaaaand...you're also not anemic!", and she also gave me a little, "YAAY!" lol! SO WOO-HOO! I PASSED!!!!!!!! i don't know my exact number for how much i passed by, but it doesn't really matter. if it was borderline, sometimes they like to test again, so i must be in a good spot :) i could always find out at our next appointment. i'm just so happy i passed!!!

for the rest of the day after the test, remi actually didn't move very much. it was a bit concerning to me since a lot of people said that after the test their little one was bouncing off the walls in there because of the sugary drink. however, i looked it up, and it seems like it's pretty split in half. babies either go crazy after the drink, or sort of crash after the drink, and i guess she was a crash-er. so that eased my mind a bit. it was still weird to not get her usual kicking spree late at night (she only gave a few kicks here and there), but by the next morning she was herself again and kicking a lot at all the usual times :)

let's talk about some changes to my body lately.

feet: they can get a smidge bloated now if i don't keep them propped up. gross.
bellybuton: becoming more and more flat. not sure if it will pop out eventually or not, but it's definitely heading OUT!
gums: more sensitive! not in an "owwie" way, but in a "they can bleed easily" way. a while ago i had a little piece of food stuck in my teeth, and when i went to remove it with my nail, it came out with no pain, but then BLOOD. like i struck a vein or something! lol! it was crazy! we both had dentist appointments this past saturday, so i knew it would be worse than usual. luckily, the hygienists already know about sensitive pregnant lady gums, so she took extra care to help with the bleeding. still said i had great looking teeth and no cavities though! i've been trying to be extra careful with brushing while pregnant because pregnant women can get cavities and gum disease much more easily due to all these weird changes. in fact, some insurances cover more than 2 visits to the dentist per year if you are pregnant because of this!

other things...
i'm almost done with the rug!!! i only have 15 more rows left to cut the loops on, so based on past calculations i'd say about 2.5 to 3 hours left of work. luckily it's been cooler lately, so i've really worked on it a lot lately. upstairs in the heat with no air conditioner and a heavy crocheted rug my lap is not fun to work on haha...so i'm hoping to be done with it in a few days!

tonight and wednesday we're visiting the two hospital choices we have for delivery, so i'm pretty excited for that! haha...sounds kinda lame i guess, but i'm interested to see which one i like better. they are REALLY close together, so i'm betting they are probably pretty similar since they compete, which is good! if they are both good, then that's even better because if i go into labor, and i find out my midwife is already at one of the hospitals delivering someone else's baby, then i'll just go to whichever one she is at. if no one else is in labor that night, then my midwife will meet me at whichever hospital i liked more, so we're both excited to see where i'll be delivering lil remi at! i'll write about them in next week's post.

that's all for this week!

week 28

average size: 13.6 to 14.8 inches, 1.5 to 2.2 lbs.
what's going on with baby: "She's starting to develop more fat, so her wrinkly skin will start to get smoother. Her lungs are mature enough that she'd probably survive if she was born now. Wow!"


here i am at 28 weeks!

she grew a TON since the last photo at 24 weeks!

i mean...seriously?! haha...she is just pushing straight out! i've felt a lot of low stretching in my uterus this past month, so i guess that explains it! i'm really glad i'm taking photos like this because i don't notice the big changes when i see/feel my bump everyday. it's really cool to see the change over time!

well, today was the HUGE appointment day with the glucose test, ultrasound, and monthly midwife check-up. let's start with the glucose test:

this morning i wanted to make sure to avoid sugars and carbs, so i made myself some scrambled eggs for breakfast at 10am, and i just drank water after that until it was time to drink the glucose drink (1:45pm). 

as for the drink...IT WAS EASY.

it tasted totally FINE to me! i know a lot of girls complain about the taste, and it IS very sweet, but, it just tasted like sweet orange hi-c! or, it actually REALLY reminded me of those "fla-vor-ice" push-up popsicles that you have in the summer! i was supposed to have the whole bottle drunk within 5 minutes of starting, and i drank the whole thing in 59.7 seconds lol...EASY! not bad at all. 

the ultrasound location is about 30 minutes away from us, so we left at 2pm, because i wanted to make sure we got there with some time to spare before they had to draw my blood 1 hour later (at 2:46). good thing we left at 2! we got there at 2:40! traffic seemed worse than usual for whatever reason. so, she took my blood, said they will have the results in a few days, and that they will only call me if i didn't pass, so no news is good news! hopefully i don't get a phone call! lol...and then the fun part came! we got to see our little girl on the ultrasound screen!

i had to have another ultrasound because we needed to check to see if my placenta moved away from my cervix. it only needed to move 1cm, and it moved 4cm!!! SO YAY!!!! we're all clear for a vaginal delivery again :) SO happy and relieved about that. of course other things can happen to cause a c-section to be necessary, but at least i know this won't be the problem! 

she also looked at my ovaries, and of course baby too :) you know what? i keep saying "baby" or "little girl" still hahaha...her name is going to be remi :) i know i've mentioned it on facebook a few times already, but i dont think i said it on here! so yeah! remi :) 

anyway!

she said remi is looking great! she scanned a few things, and measured all her parts again. here's what she told us:

- she's 2 pounds and 10 ounces right now! she's in the 50-75th percentile for growth which is a great spot to be in because it's the average range for growth

- her thighs are already 56mm (2.2") long! the tech mentioned, "long legs!" again hahaha...i was wondering if she was going to say something about them since she said she had long legs at our 20 week appointment too

- her heartbeat was 150, which is great. before scanning her heart, she mentioned how it might be a little high because i basically just drank the most sugary drink in the world for the glucose test, but she said, "oh! no! she's handling it nicely with a heartbeat of 150!" so that was good too!

- she was in the "head down" position which is great for delivery. i'm sure she'll still move around, but at least she's getting used to the idea of being in that position! her back/butt was up against my right side, and her feet were right on my ribcage. the tech asked if i could feel her on my ribs, but i couldn't! i'm sure eventually i will, but for right now, i'm glad i can't haha...i've heard kicks to the ribs can be brutal!

- she's measuring right on time. i'm 28 weeks, 1 day today, and she measured at 28 weeks, 2 days

- and the tech said she's got some chubby cheeks already! starting to fill out and gain more of that baby fat which is great :) here's a pic of her face! it's on it's side, with the top of her head closest to the right side of the photo. you can see her eye sockets, her little nose, and her mouth is open. her hands are by her mouth :)

for fun, i asked the tech if she ever looked at the pubic bone with the ultrasound wand if women complained about pubic bone pain, but she said the ultrasound won't pick up adult bones since the ultrasound is only sound waves bouncing back. she can see baby bones because they are still basically like cartilage. later on in pregnancy they can't even get a good look at baby bones because by that point they ossify, and turn into more solid bone. so, oh well. i was hoping to see how far my pubic bone has shifted hahaha...i'm happy remi is still looking healthy though!!! that's all that's really important! 

afterwards, i knew i'd be hungry because it had been 5 hours since i had some scrambled eggs, so i packed a snack to eat on the way to our midwife appointment. really glad i did that! the midwife appointment went great as well. just the usual check-up to make sure everything is going great, and allow me to ask questions if i have any. we listened to her heartbeat, so that was nice too :) now we meet with her every 2 weeks instead of once a month! that means we're getting closer to the end!!! so exciting! i'm also supposed to pay more attention to her kicks by this point. for example, she's been kicking a lot at night, so if i notice her not doing that, i'm supposed to notify them immediately, and they will check-in on her and monitor me to make sure she's okay. 

other than all THAT, i was really "nesting" a lot this week. our house has an attic, but we don't keep our stuff in it since it's filled with our landlord's junk, so we use one of the bedrooms in the house as an "attic" since we need storage space. suddenly, i decided it needed to be all re-organized, so i really cleared through it all, and put everything in it's own place lol...our daughter wont even ever be going into this room!!! WE barely do! i just felt it had to be done lol...so now it looks nice and neat and i'm happy :) i've also been cutting all those loops in the rug i crocheted, and i'm about 1/3 of the way done. it still takes a long time, but it's not as bad as crocheting. 

tuesday night i had a dream i was shopping at sephora and i was feeling our little girl kick me while i was shopping. turns out, she was actually kicking around in real life while i was sleeping, and it just transferred over into my dream! haha...so that was funny and weird at the same time. 

actually in general, she has been much more active, and seems to like to move around a lot right at bedtime. erik has now felt her MANY times, and there were even a few days this past week where he felt a lot of rapid-fire punches/kicks! she is definitely getting stronger, and still seems to prefer my far right side as her kicking spot. guess she must be comfy there! 

well, that's it for this week (and i guess that's a lot!). next week we have two visits to two different hospitals to see which one we prefer to deliver at :) excited for that! 

week 27

average size: 13.6 to 14.8 inches, 1.5 to 2.2 lbs.
what's going on with baby: "She's practicing inhaling and exhaling with her rapidly developing lungs, and she's showing brain activity! Her brain will keep on getting more complex from here on out."


this past saturday, i went into the 3rd trimester! home stretch! and what a great way to celebrate by...re-painting the windows? hahaha...

erik and i have been trying to think of a good time to re-paint the windows to cover up all that chipping lead paint we have, and it's been difficult because he's always so busy with school (obviously), and i can't do it myself because of the paint fumes and lead paint exposure. so last week we thought saturday might be a good day because his dad offered to help, i could leave the house, and we could stay the night at his parent's house since easter was the next day and we'd be out of the house visiting family all day anyway, so that's when they did it! they worked ALL DAY, and chipped/re-painted 13 of our windows!!! i'm SO glad it's done and over with. they look so much better, and most importantly, now they will be safe for our little girl :) here's a little before and after:

the inside part is all we cared about because these windows don't open anyway, so the outside still has lead paint chipping, but it can't get in to harm her. we also need to clean up the edges on the window's glass, but that won't be hard (just take a razor blade to the glass and scrape off where they painted past the wood). 

SO YAY! i'm very happy this whole thing is over with. and, when we came home after being away for 24 hours, i thought we'd still be able to smell a little bit of paint smell, but NOTHING!!! even better! we chose zero VOC paint (zero volatile chemicals), but could not find low/zero VOC for the primer beforehand so i thought for sure we'd still be able to smell it a bit, but nope! awesome!!! 

on wednesday i tried again to hear her heartbeat for fun on erik's stethoscope but still couldn't hear it. however, i cracked up laughing because when i pressed on my tummy a bit with the stethoscope to see if that would help, she punched or kicked it! hahaha...so, i heard her little punch quite nicely on the stethoscope lol...i called erik over, and he did the same thing, and she did it for him too. invading too much of her space, i guess! sorry!

next tuesday is that giant doctor's appointment with my glucose test, ultrasound, and midwife check-up, so i'll just update on tuesday instead of monday so i can include all that stuff :) i'm hoping to get more photos of her at the ultrasound!!!

week 26

average size: 13.6 to 14.8 inches, 1.5 to 2.2 lbs.
what's going on with baby: "At week 26, baby may be interfering with your sleep, messing with your brain (forget much?), and even be giving you a stress headache or two. It’s normal to be experiencing some mild swelling, but around this week, it’s important to watch out for swelling severe or sudden -- it could be the sign of a dangerous condition called preeclampsia. Her eyes are forming, and will soon start to open. Eyelashes are now grown, too. She's getting her immune system ready for life on the outside by soaking up your antibodies. She's taking breaths, too. They're of amniotic fluid, not air, but it's still good practice."


well, she's definitely still more active at night than during the day, but she isn't kicking too hard yet to interfere with my sleep haha...but then again, i'm a pretty sound sleeper. oh, and the "pregnancy brain" seems better now than it did in 1st trimester lol...either that, or i'm just getting used to it! i did catch myself saying, "you have to get the thing for the thing" on saturday to erik though hahaha...so maybe it really is just as bad as 1st tri. he at least knew what i was talking about! psychic husband!

oh! and erik felt her kick on tuesday!!! we were laying in bed, and i felt her kicking a bunch in a specific spot so i said, "give me your hand", and placed it where she was kicking. 5 seconds later *KICK!* and i asked, "did you feel that?" and he said, "...YEAH. WHOA. that was her??? that was strong! i felt it right in the middle of my palm!" SO YAY! FINALLY GOT THE TIMING RIGHT! hahaha...so at least now he knows there is actually a baby in there, and i'm not like secretly hoarding chocolate into my mouth or something. she still kicks all over the place, but she really seems to like kicking my far right side lately. feels strange since it's so far to the right!

in other news, i think i'm done with the rug that i've been working on in the nursery! well, mostly done. i got to a good stopping point (one of the balls of yarn had just run out, and i was at the end of a crocheting row), and  basically just decided to lay it out in the room to see if it was good enough hahaha...

i originally wanted it flipped the other way, so i would have about 3 more feet left to crochet (and so it would cover much more of the room), but you know what? i think this is pretty darn good haha...it's 5'9"x7'9" right now, so it's pretty big, and still covers a good amount of the room for when we want to play with her on it. we can just move that ottoman, and there is even MORE room to play, too. so, i think i'm done with it! i left it this way in the room for a couple of days so i could go back and look at it to see if i still like the size, and i do. so now, i just have to CUTCUTCUT all those loops to turn them into "grass blades" which will still take a while to do, but at least the crocheting part is over. 

also, i don't want to jinx myself, but my pubic bone pain seems to be doing a little bit better! it's still pretty achy sometimes when i go to stand up, or switch sides in the middle of the night, but overall, it feels a little better. i'm not sure if it's done all of it's widening, and so my body is adjusting, or what, but it just seems better than it was, and that makes me happy! i've found that what seems to help most is heat. BUT! i never wanted to put a heating pad directly on the area (don't want to heat up baby too much because it's bad for her), so i started taking warm showers sometimes 3 times a day lol....just quick little 5 minute or so warm showers, and this seems to be helping. i'm sure a bath would help even more, but i dont want to immerse myself in that kind of heat for a long period of time. hopefully i can keep it under control! 

OH! and we're officially in double digits for the countdown!!! only 98 more days to go til our due date!