It's official, I'm sick.

I'm so mad and sad at the same time. Seriously, I don't know what else I could have done to prevent myself from getting sick. See my post 2 days ago to see all the preventative measures I was taking, and in addition taking extra Vitamin C AND sleeping in the guest room...

And here I am today, sick as a dog. Of course Jeff could take all kinds of medicines to make him feel better, but I'm stuck with throat lozenges.

Is my immune system seriously that crappy that given all the precautions I took, I still can't keep myself from getting sick?! I might as well have licked his dirty kleenexes.

The worst part about it all is that I wont be able to hold, cuddle, or come within 20 feet of of sweet Micah. Being sick stinks, but I'm most upset that I don't get to spend quality time with the little guy I'll probably only get to see 1-2 times a year! :( So sad.

Maybe I should pack rubber gloves and a breathing mask, and see if they let me hold him for a minute or two. hehe.

I love Liz Lange Maternity at Target!

For all my pregnant and someday-to-be-pregnant friends:

Be sure to check out Target! I find great stuff every time I go. Yesterday I made a trip over there, just to see what they had. I ended up with:

Gaucho-length grey trouser pants, that will be perfect for work in the spring. $6

I also got a pair of super cute black dress pants! They have 3 decorative buttons across the pocket which I think are ugly, but I can remove them easily and have a way cute pair of pants! $6 (Wearing them to work today, actually.)

I also got a dress, made out of a silky/satiny material. I bought it one size bigger because it's definitely a warmer-weather dress. Cute for showers, or work, whatever! $12

Plus I had a $5 off coupon thanks to my friend Terra. :)

So yes, while all of these items WERE on clearance, any of these items, even at Old Navy, would be at least 2x the cost even on clearance, but I feel like the quality is at least comparable, if not better at Target.

The red shirt I'm wearing in our Christmas picture is from Target too!

They key to finding great deals at Target is they mix their maternity clearance clothes with the plus-size clearance clothes. So sometimes you have to dig a little bit, but it's usually pretty easy to spot the wonderful maternity waist band. :)

18 Weeks

Sorry I'm a bit late, but here's my 18 week post and picture!



Look how round I am!! I love it! Everything is going so well. I'm loving every minute! You really forget about how miserable the first trimester was when everything is so fun in the second trimester. But that being said, I really don't have a WHOLE lot to complain about the first.

The worst thing that's going on is the baby's sporadic activity. He/she was really active last week on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday with several kicks per day. Saturday I didn't feel a whole lot until late in the evening, I ate a piece of cake, and got one good kick out of the baby. Sunday and Monday, I felt nothing. Let me tell you, that is scary after you've gotten used to activity!! I read in all my books and asked my online mommy friends, and they all say it's normal to go a few days without feeling anything while the baby is still this small. It could have changed positions and is now kicking inwards instead of outwards, or something like that. This morning, after eating a few Cornflake wreaths, I think I have felt a little stirring a couple of times, so that's making me feel better. I'll be glad to feel a swift kick again though!

In other news, Jeff is sick. :( He came down with whatever he has over the weekend. It started as a sore throat, and has now moved on to severe congestion. I'm scared to death to get sick, because I can't take anything, and we're leaving for Arizona in 2 days, and I want to be able to cuddle with Micah! Jeff isn't allowed to touch me, I walk around the house every day spraying everything he touches with antibacterial spray, I wash my hands every 20 minutes, and carry around antibacterial hand lotion at all times! haha, Overreacting much?? Oh well. Better safe than sorry. Today I'm noticing a little increased congestion, but otherwise still normal. So please say a little prayer for me that I can stay healthy!

The other biggest development of Week 18 is that tummy sleeping is done. I've been dreading this day. But that's pretty good that I made it almost halfway before having to give that up! And I'm doing surprisingly well. Right now the most comfortable position is lying half on my tummy, half on my side. I'm sure it won't be long until even that won't work anymore, and I'll be fully on my side, but at least it's a slow process and I have time to get used to anything!

I'm spreading Cocoa Butter on my belly every night. That stuff smells so darn good! I love to get in bed about 30 minutes early, rub on my belly butter, and then just sit there and enjoy the scent for a while before I go to bed! Yeah, I know I'm weird. My belly button is getting a little bit shallow, that is weird to watch stretch out, and a little scary to think it's going to stretch all the way out!

The Baby Loves Choir!

Last night was a dress rehearsal for our Christmas Event/Concert at church. I sing in the choir. During our first song, the baby started kicking me a bit. During the second song, I felt a completely NEW sensation... The baby must have done backflip or something! It was the weirdest thing I've ever felt! The only way I can try to describe it is if you have an aquarium fish cupped in your hands and it squirms! It was definitely a different sensation from kicks. I've never really heard people talking about squirming or flipping, so it was sort of unexpected! Definitely cool though. I hope the baby does it again soon!

All my books say the baby is just starting to be able to hear, so I'm sure it was just enjoying the music! I need to pull out the headphones and start playing all my favorite songs for the baby. :)

Tailbone Pain and a Baby Girl?

Yesterday brought another new pregnancy joy to me - tailbone pain. It was nagging a little bit early in the day, but by the afternoon I was just plain miserable. I was literally sitting tilted sideways on my chair, sitting on my thigh/hip, alternating butt cheeks, and slouching way down in my chair so I was sitting on my lower back, trying to keep all pressure off my tailbone! I'm not sure what happened. I didn't sit hard on anything, or injure it somehow... Probably just the beginning of pregnancy aches. I had to leave work early because I just wanted to lay down on my stomach, taking all pressure off my tailbone. I went home and took an hour nap, that was great. When I woke up, it felt a little better, and I tried to remain in a lying down position for the rest of the night, whenever possible. This morning it feels a little bit "nagging" again, so I hope I'm not in for a similar day. If this continues I may have to go out and look for one of those nerdy donut pillows!

Yesterday on Babycenter, a girl predicted that I'm having a baby girl based on my belly shape. I love to hear speculation!

In non-baby news, I've made the playoffs in both of my fantasy football leagues. Yay me. I'm actually in second place in my work league, where I actually have some money riding on the league! Woohoo!

I'm also on a cooking roll. I made dinner Monday night and last night... And have plans on making dinner tonight! That is a record for me. I haven't had a streak longer than 1 night of cooking my entire pregnancy. PLUS I brought my lunch yesterday for the first time the whole pregnancy. I stopped bringing lunch because in the first trimester, I could never plan on what I was going to eat. I never knew what I would be able to eat that day until I was actually hungry for lunch, so it was useless trying to plan ahead!

My latest craving is apples. I can't get enough. I have one every day, if not two a day. They're just so yummy, crispy, juicy, and delicious!

I'm really missing snow this week. Hearing all of my northern friends talk about snow (and see their pictures) it's making me homesick for a white Christmas! I just keep telling myself I'm going to Minnesota in January, so I'll get my fill then. Jeff said some year he wants to spend Christmas somewhere up north so he can experience a true white Christmas. I think that sounds like a lot of fun. Maybe when the kid(s) are old enough to appreciate the snow, and go sledding. I miss sledding. I'd love to go in January, but I don't know if that's probably too risky.

Some other good news for the day - Yesterday I got my AFP test results back, and it came back negative! So that's great news! (The test basically looks for downs syndrome and spina bifida.) So praise the Lord for a healthy baby thus far.

17 Week Picture

Here we go! Now I think I'm just plain fat.



Ouch. Oh well, we can always hope it starts sticking out front more soon rather than coming in all around! I've gained my first weight now in the last 2 weeks, I think I'm up 3-4 pounds or something. I'm sure Thanksgiving was the main contributor! haha. I had a doctor appointment on Friday, he said everything is looking perfect. I got to hear the heartbeat again, which is always fun. We've scheduled my "BIG" ultrasound for December 27. It's referred to as the Big u/s because that's when most people find out if they're having a boy or girl. For us, we'll just get to see the baby again, which will be fun because it's been a while, and this time it will be unmistakable as a baby, rather than blobs of various shapes and sizes! That will be fun.

Jeff and I had a wonderful weekend. We went down to San Antonio for the Big 12 Championship. Being here in Dallas, I always associate San Antonio as being "waaaay down there" and simply too far to ever take a trip to. It really isn't too bad at all! Closer than when I used to drive from Oklahoma City to Austin! We left Friday night, and spent the night in Round Rock. We got up the next morning, hit the outlet mall in San Marcos, then went into San Antonio.

The football game was SO much fun. We had bought 4 tickets on Ebay, and when we got there, people were basically giving tickets away, so there was no way we were going to be able to sell our other 2 tickets. So we just kept them, sat in the middle 2 seats, and had a buffer zone between us and the people next to us. That was sort of nice! I could sit sort of to the side and had plenty of leg room, especially because the guy in front of me kept putting his arms up on the seat back, and if I would have had to keep my legs frontwards, there would have been some issues there. :)

I got a little nervous when Missouri had that little trickery play to get the 2 point conversion and tied the game up, but we just came out and owned the second half. It was such a fun game to be at. I was SO annoyed with the Missouri fans though. Talk about classless. For some reason, the game was full of injuries, especially in the first half it seemed. Jeff said it was because neither of our teams were used to playing on turf. Anyway, an OU player was the first to be injured. He wasn't down on the ground more than a minute when the Missouri fans started chanting.. "MISSOURI!! BEAT OU! MISSOURI! BEAT OU!" Come on idiots, have some consideration for the injured player down on the field, providing the entertainment for you. Not too much later, a Missouri player went down. Our band stopped playing, and all our fans got quiet. I was glad to see our fans have the class there, no matter what side you're playing on, we respect the fact that a player getting injured is a solemn event, no one wants to see that happen. I was hoping we'd get that point across to Missouri. But we didn't. In the second half, another OU player went down. Did they have the same respect for us? Nope. They started up their chant again, and the band was playing a little pep song for the crowd. Klassy.

But in the end, we beat them. It was funny to watch the Mizzou fans begin to file out. Jeff and I were in the 3rd deck, and spotted some seats down in the front row of the end zone we wanted to go take over after the Mizzou fans left. With a few minutes left in the game, we went down there and hung out. We knew the Championship presentation would be on that end of the field, so we just waited. It was neat, we got to see all sorts of people walk by, Toby Keith included, but he never came over to where we were. After the presentation, all of the players came over to us and were giving us Hi-5's as they were headed down to the locker room. I got to give most of the team a Hi-5, Sam Bradford, AP, and Demarco Murray included, that was pretty fun. I couldn't believe how BIG some of those guys were! haha!

On our way home from San Antonio, we stopped at the Round Rock outlets and got some Christmas shopping done. That makes me less than 1/4 done with my shopping. HA! I need to get a move on.

We picked Bailey up on our way back into town. Our friends Clint and Kristin were babysitting her. While we were there, I had to snap a "Christmas Card" picture of Bailey and her boyfriend Chance.



It's a little dark, huh? I'm still trying to figure this camera out, it was only my second day using it!

For the record, another baby dream last night, except fast-forward a bit. I had a little toddler girl running around. So, Girl: 3 Boy: 2.

17 Weeks and another dream

I'm 17 weeks today! Gosh I can't believe it. My next doctor appointment is this afternoon, I'm not sure what we're going to do. I know they're going to do some sort of blood test, and I'm sure we'll do a doppler heartbeat too. I think we'll probably schedule my big 20-week ultrasound, so that will be super exciting!

I think for my own mental well-being, I really need to get going on the nursery, buying baby gear, and all that jazz! I had another baby dream last night. I had the baby on April 8, one month early! And for some reason I had it at home, I guess we couldn't make it to the hospital because it was so sudden. It was a boy!! Little Noah Ryan. (So now the dream count is all tied up, 2 girls, 2 boys.) Anyway, after he was born, I was so mad because I wanted to know how much he weighed! We decided that we should get him to a hospital to be checked out, but then we realized that we didn't have ANYTHING. A car seat, stroller, baby carrier, we hadn't done the nursery yet, anything! So I freaked out, sent Jeff to the store to pick up a car seat carrier thing, and I remember being so mad that I wasn't able to research which carrier to get and that Jeff was going to go randomly pick one out. Ha!

I think this was triggered because last night I went and delivered a meal to our friends Bobby and Terra, who had a baby a few weeks ago. We spent a few minutes in baby Joshua's nursery, and I got a little overwhelmed just looking around and seeing all the things I still have to buy and do to my own nursery! So all that was floating around my subconscious.

Jeff and I are headed out of town tonight to go to San Antonio. We're going to watch the Sooners play in the Big 12 Championship. It should be a lot of fun!