Phew!!

Oh. My. Gosh. Phew!!!!

John just found my bin of good maternity clothes. Up until now, I've looked and looked, but just could NOT find it. All I had was a couple of crappy pants - one pair too loose and one pair too tight - and virtually NO shirts. I've been alternating between the hated maternity pants and unbuttoned or buttoned-uncomfortably-low regular pants.

Have you ever slipped into a pair of really comfortable maternity pants after having gone without for a really long time? It's like... it's like... well, it's like slipping your feet into a tub of hot peppermint wax after a long day in really tight, really high heels.

It's like laying down on a super soft feather mattress after laying on hard, rocky ground all night.

It's like putting on your favorite soft cotton pajamas after wearing a scratchy Christmas dress and hoes all day.

It's pure relief.

It's also too bad I'm already almost 34 weeks pregnant, but hey, the next 6 weeks are going to be fucking amazing!!

Cute as a Button!!

I had my second ultrasound for Baby Boy... he is SO cute!! The ultrasound showed his face and his little lips and nose, and oh my I was just a beaming mess at the end of it! He already has hair!! And his kidneys are within the limits of normal now, so that's great news too! The ultrasonographer confirmed that my placenta is on the back wall of my uterus - which is why I can feel him move so much more clearly than I could feel Ellen. Looking back, I could hardly feel her at all!! Baby Boy is all elbows and knees!

Only 10 more weeks to go!! Oh my! Where does the time go????

Getting Excited!!

I'm getting so excited about meeting my baby boy and having him on the outside!! I just wish we could decide on a name!! It'll definitely be a change going from one baby to two and I wonder how Ellen is going to adjust, but I just can't wait to hold him!! He'll be so tiny and perfect!!!

Ellen is more and more fun everyday. She still doesn't have any teeth, but she is teething pretty fierce these days. Her bottom left tooth is visible just under the gums, but it's been that way for days. She LOVES books, she loves Cookie Monster, and she's just an oomph away from walking.

We are starting to transition to one nap a day - she's still months away from that, but there's hardly enough time in the day for two naps and a decent bedtime. She's been waking up later too (almost 7) which doesn't help with the bedtime. I'd rather she wake early and go to bed early, but even though I'm usually mostly awake in the early morning hours, I just can't seem to actually get up until she calls me. And we are trying to increase her solid intake. She seems to be doing a little better with it, but still not enough to replace a bottle. We're at five bottles right now and I want to get it down to four. The ladies in my birth club are mostly down to three, some of them two!! I just can't seem to get her to eat enough solids for that though.

Tonight I made jalapeno cream sauce chicken. George brought home grown peppers to work and said most were mild, but the small green ones were mildly hot. HA! I burned the CRAP out of my whole mouth when I merely touched my tongue to one, and my FINGERS are still burning from preparing them!!! Yes, I said FINGERS - those non-sensitive digits that are at the ends of your hands!!

What I Love

I love how excited she gets to see me in the mornings, but especially after she's been at my sister's all day
I love it when she gets mad and protests (usually at diaper time) and then looks to see how I'm reacting
I love when she snuggles me after naps and lays across my ever growing belly
I love when she plays games and laughs so hard
I love it when throws her arms around my neck and hugs me tight
I love how she sometimes tilts her head to the side to look at someone or something from another perspective
And I love it that she laughs in delight when I do something right - something she wanted - like reading a book, giving her water, etc., and that she laughs when she realizes it's bath time.

A Taste of the Future...

Yesterday I had a taste of how horrible it can be with two babies... wow. Ethan is a happy baby and a pleasure to watch. He has been here before and it has always gone just perfectly - no tears, simultaneous naps, two happy babies, etc. etc. And truly, it wasn't so bad yesterday because Maria was expected to pick Ethan up only about 30 min after it got *really* bad, but I was still almost in tears. I was completely paralyzed because I could only hold the two crying babies and no limbs left to fix anything. I had a 22lb baby on each hip and couldn't even sit down with them... I tried a few times and had to get back up with them both still in my arms - I'm still sore. It would have been different if Maria had not been on her way, because I'd have had to put one down and just take care of highest priority first. But Ethan just needed his mommy - which I obviously couldn't fix - and Ellen needed a bottle and a nap, which would have taken too long to leave him with Maria on her way so we all three just rode it out. And DS was kicking the entire time, just to tell me that in three months this is gonna be my life.

But anyway, yesterday Ellen's atime was 415 instead of 330 because of all that and she took a 2hr and 20 min nap - which she woke up from at 1.5 hrs b/c her mosquito bites were itching (I watched her wake up) and then when I picked her up, thinking her nap was over, I found her diaper had leaked BAD. I must have put her diaper on wrong, because it wasn't even wet - only her clothes and sheets. So I changed her [i]as[/i] she fell back to sleep, and then had to hold her for the next hour b/c I couldn't put her back in her wet crib Mostly I enjoy the times when I can hold her while she's sleeping, but I do like to be prepared with a comfy place to sit, possibly a book, and whatever else I might need readily available...

But anyway, today she had almost her 3 1/2 hr atime and only took a 50 min nap, so I guess it's time to up it again. I'm wondering if the 4:15 was closer to what it's supposed to be now but I'm not gonna make that much of a jump that fast, even if it is what she ultimately needs. I'm going to probably go up to 3:45 tomorrow and see what happens. I did love the 2:20 nap. Or would have if I hadn't had to unexpectedly hold her for half of it

Yesterday was not a very pleasant day. A day like that ends in a trip to the grocery store for ice cream and candy bars. I just ate some ice cream and I think I might go have another bite even though I keep telling myself I really need to start watching my sugar intake.

Ellen just amazes me every day. She loves to climb on anything and everything and has no fear... even when she should!! We've been putting the couch cushions on the floor in front of the couch so she can climb from them to the couch and then back down by herself. When going down, she wriggles down head first and tries to do so even when the cushions aren't there and it's a long drop from the top of the couch to the floor. Last week I started trying to get her to go down backward - I'd say "go down backward" and turn her around and show her how. This morning, she did it all on her own. It *looked like* she did it on purpose, but I wasn't sure if it was or if it was just coincidence, but she has done it all day. Here's the funny and amazing part: If she's on top of the couch with no cushions to step down onto, she will go down backwards. Then, when there are cushions there, she will go down forwards (head first) onto the cushions and then turn around and go down backward from the cushion to the floor... even though it's the same height from the couch to the cushion as it is from the cushion to the floor. So that means that she associates getting down from something to the floor with going down backwards. I guess it would be better for her to associate getting down from any significant height to anywhere with going down backwards, but I'm still amazed. I'm actually really amazed too that she learned it so fast - I kept showing her but felt like she wasn't catching on, but apparently she was!! So smart my baby is.

And my belly has popped!! It snuck up on me, I'm not sure when it happened, but I definitely feel pregnant now. Baby boy wriggles a lot but not quite as much as Ellen did. However, I think I can feel him and his body parts through my belly more clearly than I could Ellen. Maybe because her placenta was attached in front and his isn't?

The Second Ultrasound...

So we went back to the Women's Center where we had Ellen's ultrasound done and had another one for DS so we could get better pictures and a video. They were SO much better! They told us what they were looking at, they were very friendly, they gave us lots of pictures, and thankfully the video tape worked. YAY!!

They did give us some bad news though. DS has fetal renal pyelectasis... which basically means his kidneys are holding too much fluid. They were measuring 5mm and anything over 4mm is not good. Doesn't sound like much, but if you think about it, it means his kidneys are 20% larger than the maximum they should be. However, neither the ultrasonographer nor the midwife were very concerned. They both told us that it was a fairly common occurrence, especially in boys, and that most of the time it resolves itself spontaneously either before birth or just after. They scheduled another u/s for 30 weeks just to keep an eye on it and make sure that it's not getting out of hand. If the condition continues into his first year, they may have to do surgery to correct it, but it's highly unlikely. They will only do any in utero treatment (surgery) if the kidneys are measuring over 20mm so it would seem we have a pretty mild case, thank goodness.

I bought him some shoes today - little leather moccasins for when he's learning to walk. I know it's early, but I bought Ellen some today and I just couldn't resist...