Proud Daddy feeling baby move
We're almost to 20 weeks (2 days until this pregnancy is half done!) but there were a couple things from week 19 that I really wanted to update before tomorrow's *hopefully* big announcement (if this baby even has it's legs crossed...).
About a week and a half ago I felt the baby for the first time (that I *knew* was the baby) while we were watching Daddy try on a new suit for my cousin's wedding this past weekend. I think I'd felt the baby before that but wasn't sure and without really knowing I couldn't count it. Anyway, ever since then the baby seems to be moving a little more each day.
I'd been avoiding starting to take the Zofran again (anti-nausea drug), but after throwing up 4 times this week, Tom insisted that I start to take it again...can't blame him I guess...the first was in the car Sunday afternoon on the way back from my cousin's wedding in Chicago - mostly my fault though, I waited too long to stop for lunch, holding out for a Hardees. At least we had the "puke bucket" in the car with us. Then on Monday baby did not care for my snack of popcorn and orange soda and I proceeded to throw up 3 times within just a couple hours - including on the side of the road "I think you're going to have to pull over honey" (we were in his car) and at Chipotle. Still I'd much rather have this random throwing up at this stage in the game than the constant nausea and throwing up and being confined to the house/bed that was weeks 6-16.
Just a few more days until we find out the answer to the question everyone's been asking - is baby a boy or a girl? I thought it might be fun to guess based on the wives tales...
Sorry I didn't update last week...not much going on to report. I went two weeks without throwing up, but this week baby decided I needed a reminder that s/he is still there and I threw up 3 times.
Two weeks until the big ultrasound - I can't wait. We'll be starting our baby registry once we find out if it's a boy or a girl, so I've been looking at baby gear and trying to pick out what we think we'll need...travel system or just a stroller? Do you really get much use out of a bouncer before the baby grows out of it?
So mom's...what do/did you use a lot and what just took up space?
I'm a few days late posting the 16 week update. The week started off with an email from fitpregnancy.com, telling me that my baby is now the size of a gerbil. The funny thing about it is that I am much more familiar with the size of a gerbil than the size of an avocado, which is the size comparison that babycenter.com uses.
I had a doctor appointment on Friday, he said the baby's heartbeat sounded good. I had lost another 2 lbs though (for a total of 15 since the 6 weeks mark) and he said if I haven't gained weight by the next appointment he's going to make me start drinking ensure shakes to add calories to my diet.
The other big news is that while I threw up 6 times at the beginning of week 16, I have now gone 7 days without throwing up at all. This is the most consecutive days since the morning sickness started at the beginning of August.
At the next appointment we get the 20 week ultrasound which we'll have a chance to find out if it's a boy or a girl!
Also known as "a record 4 consecutive days of non-puking" week. Started the week off though by throwing up 4 times from various smells - a potato cooking in the microwave and car exhaust for example... It's been nice actually feeling well enough to get out of bed and actually do something!
I guess the only other milestone this week is that since I am no longer dehydrated, I've immediately entered the stage of "having to pee every 30 seconds."
Much better this week, I only threw up 3 times...and once was in between eating Doritos on the couch and getting up to get a soda from the fridge. I immediately went back to my snack afterward too with no adverse effects.
Not much else this week to report, just trying to work and keep the house clean (you know those normal things that I didn't used to think about). We had to rush Chili to the emergency vet Wednesday night after she passed out in her cage, to which my sister said to my husband "Boy between the wife and the Chinchillas there have been a lot of emergency room visits lately!" They didn't find anything obviously wrong with Chili and she's been ok since...here's to hoping it was a one time thing!
Baby bump at 13 weeks (to quote Tom, "you're going to be huge")The "feeling good" that I alluded to last week was short lived...this week I've felt horrible nearly every waking moment, and threw up 13 times in the last week, including at the former Crestwood Macy's last night (made it to the bathroom, don't worry, however I don't think the bathroom had been cleaned since they closed the store...). In addition to the nausea and vomiting, this week I've also had a headache nearly every day.
Yay, we made it to 12 weeks so I have now posted all the previous blog entries that I wrote up while we were waiting for this point.
At our doctor appointment today, the doctor used the fetal doppler to listen to the baby's heart beat, but Tom and I couldn't distinguish my heart beat from the baby's from the background noise so we got another ultrasound so we could see the heart beat again. This time we also saw some little arms and legs and fingers and the baby was bouncing around too. And of course the baby's heart beat blinking away. Watching the baby on screen is SO much better than just looking at the ultrasound pictures. I told the doctor today that I could sit and watch all day long. That got me about 10 extra seconds of baby watching time - lol.
This week I've had 2 days without puking, and even ate some pizza and bread co without it coming back up, so we are really, really hoping that this means that the sick phase is almost over
September 4, 2009 – Just shy of 2 weeks since the last visit to the ER, we ended up visiting once again. This trip was much less exciting than the last...no new pics to share either. Basically I hadn't kept down anything since dinner the night before (water, crackers, etc), and threw up 3 times by about 11:45 am. Tom insisted we go back to the ER, which was much busier during the day (but I still got in right away, apparently they don't like to leave pregnant women out in the waiting room with all the other sickies!).
They gave me 2 bags of fluids thru IV, and then after I kept ice, then water, then crackers down they let me go home. Total time spent in the ER – about 5 hrs. This time though, Tom packed up our laptops before we left the house so at least we had something to entertain ourselves - and the nurses got quite a laugh at the two of us sitting with our laptops in the ER. And besides, the ER offers free wifi, so why not?
This "morning sickness" thing is really getting old...going on 4 weeks now of non-stop upset stomach, nausea and daily throwing up. I'm really not sure what I'd do if I had to go into an office job everyday...
Warning: if you are not interested in the gory details, just enjoy the picture of the baby above and skip the rest of this post!
August 23, 2009 – After a lovely day spent with Tom's family, after sharing our news with his grandma, aunts and uncles, I came home exhausted and went right to bed. Around 11:30 pm I woke up having to throw up (the first time all day). Then 4 more times by 3:00 am. Tom called the doctor exchange and talked to one of the other doctors in the same practice as mine, who said to go to the ER.
The hospital is ~15 mins from the house, so I grabbed the bathroom trash can in case I needed it again before we made it to the hospital. We made it to the hospital without incident, and luckily right at the ER admission window they had a pile of small puke basins, as the next puke came before I even got checked into the ER (if you're counting, this is puke #6 in the last 4 hours). Most interesting was the color change of the vomit as my stomach got emptier...orange, yellow...
After answering a million questions for the admitting nurse while I'm puking my internal organs (or at least it felt like it) into a basin, they started IV fluids. They kept asking if my stomach hurt and I said yes (after all I've heaved 7-8 times each time I've puked and I think we were up to 7 times in 5 hours now) so they insisted on doing an ultrasound to check the baby (which I really didn't mind b/c it meant we got to see the baby again).
So after about 4 hrs in the ER and 3 bags of fluids (plus a couple different meds to make me stop throwing up), they were ready to let us go home...until I got up to use the bathroom and threw up again (#8 - by this point the puke was green...).
Needless to say, I didn't get to go home, instead I was admitted to the hospital until I could keep liquid/food down. I had a nice private room on the maternity floor and spent the rest of the day getting more fluids (a total of 5.5 bags) and trying to sleep in the extremely uncomfortable hospital bed. Finally by around 3 pm, since I hadn't thrown up anymore, I got to have some water, then crackers and at dinner time they brought a default dinner tray by which consisted of beef stew, carrots and a dinner roll. I ate enough to satisfy the nurses and doctors and finally got discharged from the hospital around 9 pm, for a total of 18 hrs in the ER and hospital.
August 21, 2009 – We saw the heart beat on the ultrasound today at the doctor - it's much more exciting to see the baby on screen than just the printed out pictures. The small circle above the baby is the yolk sac. I've had a constant upset stomach and thrown up nearly every day since the last appointment.
Next appointment in 4 weeks.
August 6, 2009 – not much to see yet, but confirmation that there is really a baby in there. Up to this point I've just been tired, and even spent this whole week volunteering at a summer camp for at-risk kids. The top little white spot is the baby and the bottom spot is the yolk sac.
Next appointment in 2 weeks!
July 24, 2009 – Rather than write a separate blog about the baby, I figured I'd just write up a few entries and then post them all when we're ready to share the news. So for the next few entries, refer to the date in the entry, rather than the date it was posted!
It's been exactly 30 days since my last period, so not being able to wait another day to see if it showed up, I took a pregnancy test, but left it on the bathroom sink before it registered the result and sent Tom in to give me the news (too many "not pregnant" results in previous months that I wanted him to look at it first...).
Tom looked at the result and said "Oh my gosh....you're pregnant!"
Tom had already taken the day off, just to relax after not having a vacation all summer long, so we each called a friend to share the news and then spent the afternoon together at the zoo.
Victory Junction Gang Camp added another stuffed animal to their sewing program, Vic the Horse, so of course I had to attempt it. It went a lot better than the teddy bears that I made for Victory Junction a couple years ago - and it's cuter too! Each camper at the Victory Junction Gang Camp receives a hand-made camp teddy bear or a Vic the Horse mascot to take home. Find out more about the sewing program on their website.
Roo's adorable picture (above) is now featured on amazon.com and gianthamster.com reading the recently released book, Celeste and the Giant Hamster. The book features a Capybara, the world's largest rodent.
From amazon.com:
Celeste the Cat is tormented by her human’s insistence on keeping a dwarf hamster, appallingly named Celestina, as a pet. Enlisting the aid of two friends, the brave but intellectually challenged Tiger and overly-enthusiastic Ruby, she sets out to trap a giant hamster that is loose and living in a nearby field. She plans on placing the giant hamster in front of Celestina’s cage to show her owner what she thinks of pet rodents. The giant hamster--actually a capybara--proves to be a larger, stronger and more intelligent adversary than the cats expect, resulting in a series of humorous mishaps that leave the trio battered but not dispirited. Slowly the cats come to realize that the capybara is not the frightening monster they imagined. When the capybara has a litter of eight precocious capy-kittens, Celeste, Ruby and Tiger find themselves doing things they never imagined, like going for a swim and protecting baby rodents from a tough gang of tom cats.
The crown molding was installed today and really finished off the rooms!
dining room before crown molding
dining room after crown molding
close up of the new crown moldingAs promised, below is a picture of our new living room furniture and also of our new baseboards. The crown molding will be installed on Monday. After that, all that is left in this remodel project are a couple of new light fixtures and the installation of the new microwave (that has been in Schmoopy's closet for more then a year...) and possibly a new gas stove to replace the old electric one.
Yesterday the contractors finished the living room, entry hallway and office floors. The whole house except for the dining room had 2 layers of sub-floor so they had to add a second layer to the dining room floor in order to level it out with the rest of the house so that took up the remainder of the work day yesterday.
Today they got most of the dining room and kitchen done. I've posted a ton of pictures below (I couldn't narrow it down). The floor looks amazing and I can't wait to have this project done and to start enjoying it!
A sample of the original kitchen vinyl floor
Another view of the kitchen
Special stair nose piece piece - it looks so professional!
A view of the stair nose piece from the stairs. 
Original dining room parquet floor
Dining Room (with the red wall!)
View of the dining room from the living roomThe contractors got about 2/3 of the living room and most of the office done yesterday. Here are some pictures:
Living room (as viewed from the dining room)
Looking across the house from the living room,
We got the dining room primed last night - next time you see a photo of this room, the wall with the fireplace will be bright red! Eventually there will also be a more modern light fixture as well (good bye 1980s ceiling fan!). There's still a lot to complete in terms of painting this week, but we're closing in on the end of this renovation project that began back at the end of January. Starting next Monday the contractor who did the work on the walls will be returning to install our new wood floor!
The St. Louis newspaper website has launched a new logo. I was never a fan of the old one, so this new one is an improvement in my mind. I would have used a different font though - similar but with less definition in the bottom of the "d" and "a" and the top of the "y". Also, the arch cut into the "tl" is awfully thin and would all but disappear if the logo were to be any smaller.
New logo alert - I noticed on a Jack in the Box commercial last night that it ended with a new logo. Of course I said to myself, is that a new logo or just something special for the commercial?
Low and behold, the fast food chain has reinvented itself and has plans to revamp the restaurant atmosphere as well. I have to say that I like this new logo!
We've pretty much narrowed down the flooring choice to bamboo, but haven't made a final decision on the style.
In the photo above, I am leaning toward the first sample, but after seeing the second sample in the house, it might be a good choice too. The first and second are pretty much the same color, just different cuts of the bamboo - one has narrow stripes thru it than the other. The third choice is called a "carbonized" bamboo which means that the bamboo is steamed to caramelize the sugar within it to change its color. We have pretty much ruled out the darker color.
Today they tackled the old door frame in the kitchen and also taped and mudded the new drywall in both the kitchen and dining room. Pictures are below.
This is what the kitchen looked like. This space was the original door that went out to the patio, before the previous owners had the sliding door put in.
Here's a shot with the junk and cart moved out of the way - it's more obviously a door frame now. They must have thought they were really clever by turning the door frame into shelves.
and after all the work today we have new wall in the kitchen. We are still deciding what we are going to put there in place of the junky cart.
and lastly, here's a shot of the dining room after today's taping and mudding.We had Prestige Home Repair and builders out today to start work on the dining room renovations (that I blogged about a couple weeks ago). I just wanted to share pictures of the progress today. They'll be back tomorrow to mud and tape the drywall they installed today and also to work on the wall in the kitchen. I'll update tomorrow with more pictures!
This first picture is just a reminder of how it looked before. I took these after we moved all the furniture out of the way last night.
By lunchtime today, the new supporting wall was installed.
Next they tore off the old paneling on the other wall. Good bye last of the yellow walls!
and cut and installed drywall on both walls.
It looks amazing to have drywall in the dining room and not yellow paneling. Even though it isn't even taped or painted yet. (The ironic thing is that the drywall is very similar in color to what it will be painted when it's all said and done)
