Monthly Archives: July 2019

30 Weeks

Baby Size

Caleb is the size of a zucchini at 15.7-16 inches long and about 3 pounds. Apparently I can expect him to gain half a pound a week from here until the end!

Highs

30 Weeks is a fun milestone! It’s like the final lap of a mile race, time to kick it in. I’m also excited for August since we have lots of exciting things on the calendar like baby showers and hospital tour and a childbirth class.

Big shout out this week to my best friend Jenn for a couple of reasons. First, she gave us a bag of hand-me-downs from her nephews/son, so Caleb has some clothes in his closet now! It was fun to go through the items and squeal over how tiny some of the items. And little overalls!

Second, because she’s a PT and let me come over and lay on her floor for a couple of hours on Sunday while she worked on my back. While there’s nothing that cures the fact that my back is literally pulling itself apart to make room for the tiny human, I can definitely get some relief!

Only other baby prep was a trip to Costco where I bought some diapers and wipes for the first time as well as a lot of protein options to start stocking the freezer.

Lows

Have I mentioned that my back hurts? I feel like a broken record, but it’s been a week since I’ve been able to run-walk since the pain on my left side is just too much. I’ve forced myself into a couple of walks, but they are more waddle-limps than anything.

I also struggle with the disparity between my mental energy and ambition and my physical energy. It just takes me a long time to get through my to-do list on weekends because I have to take breaks or stretch my back or even take a nap. I’m not the most patient person, and I’ve got things to do! I’m also not very good at relaxing in general as Josh can confirm.

Some of my fatigue is certainly coming from the difficulty I have falling asleep. I start getting wired around 10pm every night and just lay in bed trying to turn my brain off, so I can fall asleep. I would guess that I’m getting about 6 hours of sleep every night right now which does not bode well with all of the “store up on sleep now!” advice that people like to give (even though that’s now how sleep works anyway).

29 Weeks

Baby Size

Caleb is the size of a butternut squash at 15.2-15.5 inches long and about 2.5 pounds.

Highs

The nursery is well under way! Josh’s dad came down this weekend and assembled the crib and helped us set up the rug and generally clean up all of the tools we had accumulated in the room from building the closet last weekend.

If you want your excitement level to increase exponentially, put a crib in your nursery! I just love the setup so far and find myself sticking my head in there whenever I walk by.

Venus also approves and has tested out Caleb’s bed for him. So considerate of her.

We also finished up the closet with Josh mudding over the old nail holes and sanding it down, so I could patch up the paint. I caulked the closet unit to the wall, so everything looks nice and clean. Now we can start filling it with tiny clothes!

I had another doctor’s appointment this week, and everything continues to look good. Caleb had a strong heartbeat at 145 bpm, and she said I’m measuring well. I felt very prepared when she asked me about a hospital tour and a childbirth class since we have those booked for August. Now that I’m in my third trimester, I get to go to the doctor every 2 weeks instead of every 4. Oh boy!

Lows

It hasn’t been the best week for my self esteem. I don’t particularly care about the number on a scale or the baby bump, but I’ve really seen the weight gain in my face this week, and that has been hard.

(I don’t say any of this because I need encouragement or for people to tell me it’s normal and all that. I understand, but it doesn’t mean I’m happy to see my puffy face.)

Other than that, today has been a bad day for my back, but I’ve had quite a few good days, so I’m sure it’ll feel better relatively soon.

28 Weeks

Baby Size

Caleb is the size of an eggplant at 14.8 inches long and about 2.2 pounds.

Highs

We made some good progress on the nursery over the weekend! Josh bought a closet organization system weeks ago, and a dozen or so boxes have just been sitting in there waiting to be assembled.

We spent about 5 hours on Saturday and then maybe 3 on Sunday to get it finished up. It was definitely a more complicated project than my bookshelf since Josh had to cut the shelves, but I got to use our impact driver for the first time! And now we have a nice closet AND space in the rest of the room to start moving his furniture in.

We toured a few additional daycares and are pretty much done touring commercial places in the area. Just still need to decide on budget and commercial versus in-home versus…some other arrangement. You just have to decide so early because one daycare we called had a waiting list until May 2020!

Caleb moves a LOT some days, and I love it. I don’t always love when he pushes specifically on one spot, but that has been rare. I’m getting so excited to finally meet him!

Lows

I overdid it with my run-walking early last week and got pretty sore. The weight of the the belly really pulls on you and all of the surrounding ligaments!

Ya know, some days I just don’t feel good. Not always full days. But the extreme amount of energy I’ve had before is definitely gone. Sometimes I just need to eat (like half a pizza, eat), and sometimes I need a nap, but I still have the ambition to get a lot of things done, so there’s some tension there.

Other than that I’ve noticed some shortness of breath or inability to take a deep breath, especially when I sit since it feels like my belly just takes up all of my lung space.

27 Weeks

Baby Size

Baby Mo aka Caleb is the size of a cabbage at 14.5 inches long and weighs 2 pounds. My own little cabbage patch baby!

Highs

Hellooooo third trimester! I am excited to be in the home stretch even if the third trimester is the equivalent of the last 10k of a marathon.

I got to do Peachtree! My friend Jenn ran-walked with me, and it went by much faster than expected. I thought it was going to be hard to walk so much of the race because it would stand out, but there are so many people, that it didn’t matter! We did a pattern of 5 minutes walking, 2 minutes running for the first half and then 5 minutes walking, 3 minutes running for the second half, and then ran the full last half mile or so. It’s probably the first time I’ve never negative split at Peachtree!

Since there’s walking to the start and walking to the car after the finish, it was quite the day on my body! I took a lot of rest days after the race and have been able to run-walk longer segments since then – sometimes even with no pain! It certainly isn’t easy with my ever-growing belly, but at least my back doesn’t feel like it’s breaking.

We made some great progress on the nursery as well! My parents spent Saturday with us, and we moved my desk upstairs. I feel like I have to do a double-take every time I pass the nursery now because it’s so empty! That will certainly change as the giant pile of boxes in our entryway are full of nursery items.

Moving out my desk really helped with my visual planning as well. With the back wall cleared out, I measured the whole room and windows and doorways and closets and drew out the floor plan to scale. Then I drew the planned furniture pieces to the same scale, colored them and cut them out, so I could move them around the floor plan. I’m getting excited! And I got a lot of enjoyment out of all the planning this weekend.

Last nursery update, isn’t this the cutest clock you’ve ever seen?! It was only $8.50 at Bed, Bath & Beyond!

We went on our first 2 daycare tours at the end of last week and have some additional tours planned this week. Josh has been spearheading the daycare search, and it’s been great to just show up when I’m supposed to and not have to do the research.

We also registered for our childbirth class. I’ve been reading a lot about them, and since I’ve never had a child before and would prefer to not have an epidural, I’d like to prepare myself. I saw one quote from a woman where she said it’s not enough to just want to make it through without drugs. It was like she read my mind! I just assumed since I’m an athlete and am decently mentally strong and understand dealing with pain, that would be enough. Probably better to be prepared, though! Interested to see what we learn there in August.

Lows

Mainly just the general aches and pains of growing. I’m hot a lot, my back hurts a lot, and I find myself out of breath very easily. I had a rough Monday in my new office space since it is so much warmer, but it’s improved with a small fan and with using natural light from the window instead of having the overhead lights (aka generators) on.

26 Weeks

Baby Size

Baby Mo is the size of an acorn squash at 14 inches long and 1.7 to 2 pounds. For a non-produce comparison, he’s about the size of a VHS tape!

Highs

We are in the DOUBLE DIGITS until my due date! 98 days to go!

I feel better about making some nesting progress compared to last week. We finally picked a crib, and it arrived today (thank you to the Morrisons!). I think I need to officially relocate my desk to upstairs to make room for all of the assembly we need to do. I’m a little sad about leaving my office (mostly the ceiling fan), but there are a number of to-dos waiting on me to relocate as the first step, and I might as well do that now.

I also had lunch with my friend Jacque (who is a great mom!) and spent two hours picking her brain about childbirth and doulas and daycares and all sorts of topics. There are a number of advantages to being a “second mover” when having kids, and getting advice like this is near the top, followed by the trash bags of borrowed maternity clothes. 🙂

I also have progressed to a little bit of running with my walking! Running isn’t terribly comfortable, but it’s also not the excruciating pain I was having a few weeks ago. I feel much better about my Peachtree prospects now that I know I can run at least a few minutes here and there.

Oh – and I passed my glucose test so no gestational diabetes here. Which is good news because ice cream is a pretty important part of my diet right now.

Lows

Not being in constant pain makes everything else in life seem pretty good, so there’s not much here. I did have a pretty drastic “pregnancy brain” moment earlier this week where I could NOT figure out how to spell the word “succinct.” I even said it out loud, sounded it out, and couldn’t get close enough for Google’s dictionary to help me out for quite a while. It was both frustrating and amusing.

Other than that, I’m not sleeping terribly well, but it isn’t bothering me too much.