37 weeks - FULL TERM!

Hip Hip Hooray - I'm officially full term today!

How Far Along: 37 weeks! Officially full term!

Size of baby: Your baby weighs 6 1/3 pounds and measures a bit over 19 inches, head to heel (like a stalk of Swiss chard). (thanks, BabyCenter.com!)

Milestones: Your baby is now considered "full term," even though your due date is three weeks away. If you go into labor now, his lungs will likely be mature enough to fully adjust to life outside the womb. (Thanks again, BabyCenter.com!)

Total Weight Gain/Loss: 20 lbs

Maternity Clothes: Yep! I've been sporting my maternity yoga capris and yoga shorts a lot and loving my stretchy maternity dresses (hooray for no-waist!)

Gender: BOY:)

Movement: YES.

Sleep: It's getting increasingly harder to fall asleep and I'm up several times a night to pee...but that's ok:) I still get a short nap in the afternoon (until I have to go potty:)

What I miss: Hmmm...shaving my legs is getting harder! So - bending over?

Cravings: Mexican! I've had the pleasure of eating yummy Mexican food both last night and tonight:) MMmm.

Symptoms: My belly, waddle, moans getting up and down, etc...

Best Moment This Week: Being FULL TERM! If I go into labor I can do my waterbirth! I needed to be at least 37 weeks to do one at my hospital and now that I've passed that mark I'm ready to roll:)

What I'm Looking Forward To: Meeting my little baby soon! I cannot wait:) Come on babe...

Full Term Tomorrow

I cannot believe I will be FULL TERM tomorrow! well, I guess I can believe it since this little man have inhabited my body for the last 9+ months:)

The past 37 weeks have both flown by and seem like forever (more so on the 'flown by' side though..)

I have been having lots of Braxton Hicks the past few weeks/months and I'm hoping soon they turn into the real deal! I had a few today that were noticeably harder so.....hopefully soon! Getting the prep work done downtown I say;)

Any guesses on when the babe will come? I'm guessing within a week or 1.5 week - that may be wishful prego-mama talk but I've dropped and I'm 'softened' and Braxton Hicks are taking up my days....only time will tell!!

I would post an almost 37 week pic but I don't have one and honestly I don't want to move off this couch to take one right now -- sorry folks. I'm hoping to get one for tomorrow's actual '37 week' update post. Just take last week's picture and add an inch and some bags under my tired eyes:)

p.s. I got the most adorable swimsuit top for my waterbirth today! Well, as adorable as you can look full-term prego in a sports bra-ish swim top... The one I was originally going to use was an old top of mine and when I tried it on and remembered how my ribcage gets much bigger when prego - good excuse to buy a cute one right? I think so.

Freezer Meals

I've said it a million times...I'm nesting. A lot:) The last two days I've gone to town with making freezer meals!

Earlier in the week I sat down and made a list of oven meals that I could easily make and freeze. With my list in hand I hit up two grocery stores (I couldn't get all my ingredients at my 'discount' grocery store so I had to stop at good ole Target:) and picked up some tin-foil baking dishes to ease cleanup!

Yesterday was the big day: I had half my meat thawing in the fridge over night; I got up and got to work! At 7:30am I made myself at home in the kitchen and cranked out 4 meals by 9:30am - way to go me! By 9:30 the boys were eager for some more attention and I was eager to get out of the kitchen. Ethan did help me with 2 of the 4 meals - and was actually a help!

This morning I was determined to crank out the remainder of my meals I had planned...I didn't start as early (come on..it's Saturday) but I had the added bonus of Joe being home and playing with the kids. I browned up a HUGE 3 lb tube of ground beef then made the rest of my meals!

Here's what my list of freezer meals:
Oven Mac-n-Cheese (big dish)
Ravioli Lasagna (big dish)
Tator Tot Hotdish (2 small dishes)
Turkey Chili (2 meal size baggies)
Sloppy Joe meat mix (1 meal sized bag)
Beef/Bean Enchiladas (2 small dishes)
Chicken Mexican Lasagna (1 small dish)

Count 'em TEN meals! And the 'big dish' meals will definitely give us leftovers:) I'm hoping that these meals in conjunction with meals from my MOMS group and meals from friends/family will keep me out of the kitchen for dinner time for a good chunk of time!

9 months!

*don't mind the tired eyes, forced tired smile and general "do you really need to take a picture of me?" look - It's after 10pm and I was productive today!*

How Far Along: 36 weeks! 9 months! Crazy to think that my little Judah was born at this time...

Size of baby: Your baby is still packing on the pounds — at the rate of about an ounce a day. She now weighs almost 6 pounds (like a crenshaw melon) and is more than 18 1/2 inches long. (thanks, BabyCenter.com!)

Milestones: He's shedding most of the downy covering of hair that covered his body as well as the vernix caseosa, the waxy substance that covered and protected his skin during his nine-month amniotic bath. Your baby swallows both of these substances, along with other secretions, resulting in a blackish mixture, called meconium, will form the contents of his first bowel movement. eww. (Thanks again, BabyCenter.com!)

Total Weight Gain/Loss: I had my 36 week appointment today and I'm 19 lbs up from when I got pregnant! Not too shabby!

Maternity Clothes: Yep! I've been living in my maternity yoga pants, yoga capris and yoga shorts. What can I say...they're super comfy!!

Gender: BOY:)

Movement: YES.

Sleep: Hard to fall asleep but once I'm out...I'm out...till I have to pee. Which is like 2 times a night:)

What I miss: Sleeping through the night? (see peeing comment) I am FULLY aware that it will be quite some time before I sleep through the night again though:)

Cravings: I was able to conquer my watermelon craving from last week and single handed (almost) eat an entire personal size watermelon-- they call them 'personal' sized for a reason right? :) Today: Not sure what sounds good enough to be called a craving....maybe an ICEE?

Symptoms: Same same...Belly - check. Absence of lap - check. Swollen fingers - check. Pregnancy brain - double check!

Best Moment This Week: Having my appointment and getting the great news (and anticipated) that baby is HEAD DOWN, DROPPED and I'm 'softening'...I'm also dilated to 1+ but that doesn't mean much seeing that when I labor everything goes FAST (ie: dilation from next to nothing to 10 in record time!) Now hopefully baby will stay in and cook another week...I really want to do a water-birth and they won't let me unless I'm at least 37 weeks!

What I'm Looking Forward To: Laying low for the next week; I wanna keep him in there for another week then watch out - I'm back at the gym (I've taken a week off) and will try and encourage little man to make his entrance!

Missed It

I was so excited to do a fun post when I hit my 35/35 mark! I've seen a few friends and fellow bloggers do it and had it tucked away in my brain waiting for it to happen....

...and then I totally missed it. argh.

It should've been last Wednesday - 35 weeks done + 35 days left till my due date! How cute is that? 35/35!

I don't know how cute it is now that I'm 35wk5daysDONE/30daysLEFT. ah well. You win some and you forget some...this prego seems to forget:)

I must be a bird...

..'cuz I'm nesting like mad!

Remember when I said I made my 'to-do' list for pre-baby? and that is was super long? I am proud to say that I have crossed off a good ole chunk of it! Thank you nesting!

Here's what I've been up to:

*went through the boys clothes
*changed the bunk beds to traditional format
*moved the boys toy kitchen and blackboard/whiteboard to the sunroom (make more room in their room!)
*got a new shelf to store/organize the boys toys in their room
*went through ALL (when I say 'all' I literally mean ALL!!) their toys and reorganized them! whew. that was a back breaker.
*got all our preemie and newborn boys clothes out of storage and washed them
*got a free (thanks Heather!) drawer-storage thing for the baby clothes - it's going to fit on top of the boys dresser so it won't take any floor space...score!
*got our infant car seat down from the attic - cleaning it is on my to-do list for tomorrow:)
*bought material at Walmart (who knew Walmart had fabric? I didn't! that rocks.) to make a Moby wrap! I spent $11 on enough fabric to make TWO wraps (so if one's in the wash I have an extra) $11. enough said.
*rearranged (Joe..not me) our bedroom to accommodate the cradle - there's a beautiful little spot right next to my side of the bed:)

Do I sound productive? I sure feel it!

Here's an uber-embarassing photo of the ridiculous amount of toys my kids have....I have ALL of the toys they own in the room here (everything from their room, the living room, the sunroom, etc..) Don't think that they were living with all that in there - I went around and got ALL their toys and pulled them out of bins and organized everything....like I said - back breaking! But I did it! Pat on the back for me:)

Here's the new shelf we picked out to help organize all their stuff; the boys LOVE it! It's nice that everything (or almost everything) has a place and the boys know where to put it. I hope this will help maintain a clean room - so far so good! I can say "clean up your toys before we go" and within 5 minutes their floor is clean - all I can say is awesome.

We had to give our free drawer-storage-thing a quick rub-down with soap and water and I enlisted my little helpers...They had a blast washing them out! And I had a blast NOT bending over to wash them myself;)

I still have a few things (ahem...more than a few) on my list but the big ones are getting crossed off! SO exciting! We're picking up the cradle this Sunday and will have that in our room to stare at and dream of our baby - awwh:) Way to go nesting!

35 weeks post!

How Far Along: 35 weeks, 1 day! (opps I forgot to do this last night...)

Size of baby: Your baby doesn't have much room to maneuver now that he's over 18 inches long and tips the scales at 5 1/4 pounds (pick up a honeydew melon) (thanks, BabyCenter.com!)

Milestones: His kidneys are fully developed now, and his liver can process some waste products. Most of his basic physical development is now complete — he'll spend the next few weeks putting on weight. (Thanks again, BabyCenter.com!)

Total Weight Gain/Loss: 20/21ish pounds. We'll find out 'officially' next week at my 36 week appointment.

Maternity Clothes: Yep! I've been living in my maternity yoga pants, yoga capris and yoga shorts. What can I say...they're super comfy!!

Gender: BOY:)

Movement: Yes. Double Yes. This kid is a mover!

Sleep: I nap almost everyday again. It takes a while to fall asleep at night...that whole getting comfortable thing:)

What I miss: My lap? I'm almost positive I dropped and hence when I sit I don't have a lap at all! My baby belly is sitting right where my use-to-be lap is. :) It's a funny feeling.

Cravings: Right at this second: watermelon. Do we have any? nope. I've still been guzzling water like no one's business (oh the joys of pregnancy in the summertime!)

Symptoms: Belly - check. Absence of lap - check. Swollen fingers - check. Pregnancy brain - double check!

Best Moment This Week: My birthday was Tuesday and was really fun! I got to eat out both meals (hooray for NO dishes for me!) and got to tutor math (well, that's a weekly deal but it was fun to use my math brain on my birthday). Everyone who saw me on my birthday agreed that it looked like I dropped...stay in there baby!

What I'm Looking Forward To: My 36 week appointment next week! I want to see if all my braxton hicks and my what-feels-like dropping is doing anything! But on the other hand I REALLY want this baby to stay in there till 37 weeks so I can do a water birth...they won't allow water births unless you are 37 or more weeks. 2 weeks. Stay in there 2 weeks. Watch...I'll go till 41 weeks...wouldn't that be funny? not really:)

Nesting

Ahhh the wonderful burst of organizational, motivated, let's get-er-done right now that comes with the end of pregnancy! Honestly, I don't remember ever having 'that' with Judah (probably because my dear Ethan was still a BABY! They're a mere 18 months apart..)

But this time around? Watch out. I'm on a roll! The other day while sitting outside watching the kids decorate our driveway (side note: our new fave outdoor activity? Each boy has a box of chalk and mama lounges in a chair and watches the masterpieces unroll!) -- anywho, I was sitting outside and had this urge to write down EVERYTHING that needed to be done *ideally* before baby comes....

...yeah that was a BIG list. I then took my crazy long list and organized it into categories of
*TO DO
*TO BUY
*TO GET FROM ATTIC --which is a 'Joe' list...I'm not climbing up there!

I fit it all on one sheet of paper (with 3 columns - hooray for dorky-ness!) and am now planning how to work through it all.

This morning I awoke with some strange, strong, desire to conquer a part of that list! So I did. Booya. I'm calling it nesting.

8am this morning I plopped myself in the boys room with my cup of decaf coffee, my phone, turned on classical radio and got to work!

My goal today: Go through ALL the big boys (Ethan and Judah) clothes and pack away stuff that doesn't fit, pull out the upcoming/current sizes and clean off the top of their dresser (which was piled HIGH with jammies and other random clothes!) FOUR (yes...4!) hours later I emerged victorious! Those kids had a lot of stuff crammed in that dresser/closet!

I think some of my nesting energy must've rubbed off on Joe because he came in and helped with some of the BIG moving (which obviously I can't do!) - we had the boys' bunk beds staggered to we could sit in the bottom and we (aka: JOE) re-arranged them so they are right on-top of each other now (think classic bunks). This way we made room for the crib! wahoo!

Our home is a 2 bedroom so we have to be creative with beds and toys storage; hence the changing of the bunk configuration and we are going to invest in a mini-crib...I found out about mini cribs a few months ago and LOVE LOVE the idea! Babies never take up all of their crib anyways so why do you need a full-sized one? Plus, we make small babies and our older 2 were out of the crib by 1.5 and 2 yr old.

All this jibber-jabber to say that my nesting is in full-swing and hopefully we'll have the 'boys' room set up and ready to roll soon! I didn't take any 'before' pictures today partially because I was lazy and partially because I was embarrassed of how messy their dresser/closet was! I WILL take pictures of the finished product though:) We're planning on throwing some blue paint on the walls as well to make it a 'boys' room (they have lovely white walls now).

Ahhhh nesting. Please stick around...I only crossed a few things off my massive list!

34 weeks!

How Far Along: 34 weeks! Didn't I just do my 33 week post? Like I always say....time is flying!

Size of baby: Your baby now weighs about 4 3/4 pounds (like your average cantaloupe) and is almost 18 inches long. (thanks, BabyCenter.com!)

Milestones: His fat layers — which will help regulate his body temperature once he's born — are filling him out, making him rounder. His skin is also smoother than ever. His central nervous system is maturing and his lungs are continuing to mature as well. (Thanks again, BabyCenter.com!)

Total Weight Gain/Loss: I would guess 20...I don't have a scale but I know I'm getting bigger!

Maternity Clothes: Yep:) Maternity for anything other than lounge/workout clothes. I wore a non-maternity top today (shown in the pic above) and it was fine in the morning but by the evening it was riding up and my belly was making an appearance:) *Hence my hands under my belly hiding the skin!*

Gender: BOY:)

Movement: Yep! He gets REALLY crazy right around the time I'm exhausted and want to go to sleep...gee thanks bud:) It's kinda hard to get comfortable and sleep when you have an active baby in you.

Sleep: Piggy-backing off the 'movement' thing - I love to sleep but my babe likes to play when it's bedtime:) It takes a while to fall asleep and I'm up once (sometimes twice) a night to visit the potty. Thankfully I am still able to take naps almost daily - there are a few days a week were my schedule won't allow it.

What I miss: Lately I've been missing sleeping on my back - it's hard to find a comfortable position on my side but I freak out about laying on my back...it's only temporary though! Soon enough I'll be laying on my back with my cute baby next to me!

Cravings: I've been eating a lot of grapes and clementines lately and guzzling water...currently chocolate chip cookies sound good to me!

Symptoms: big ole belly, swollen fingers, my little waddle, starting to get some sharp pain around my tail-bone, lots of braxton hicks. The end is in sight - no time for complaining:)

Best Moment This Week: I've been able to work out 3-times/week though my whole pregnancy (dance-cardio-class) and last Friday our normal instructor was out of town and her sub didn't show up.....so yours truly taught the class! (background: I've been in 'training' to teach for a while now so I know all the choreography) I gave myself a pat on the back for teaching an hour class (obviously showing the lower impact option) at 33.5 weeks! p.s. it was a blast:)

What I'm Looking Forward To: Two things...
#1: my birthday is next Tuesday! I don't have anything extraordinary planned yet but I always enjoy my 'special' day and I wanted to make it past my birthday with this babe and all is looking well for that!
#2: my appointment in 2 weeks (36 weeks) and to see how things are 'progressing', I've been having lots of braxton hicks and hoping they're all doing something!

33 weeks!

Me with my 3 boys! I figure I should have some pictures of my prego belly with my adorable kids - glad I did:) Aren't their little bellies so cute?? yes they are.

Onto my weekly updates:
*like our new walls? I do!*
How Far Along: 33 weeks! It's flying by!

Size of baby: This week your baby weighs a little over 4 pounds (like a pineapple) and has passed the 17-inch mark. (thanks, BabyCenter.com!)

Milestones: He's rapidly losing that wrinkled, alien look and his skeleton is hardening. (Thanks again, BabyCenter.com!)

Total Weight Gain/Loss: 19 pounds

Maternity Clothes: Yep:) Maternity for anything other than lounge/workout clothes.

Gender: BOY:)

Movement: All the time! He lets me know he's in there:)

Sleep: Once I find a comfortable position (key word: once) then I'm good to go! It does take me a while to get comfortable...

What I miss: I recently started getting (I think it's called) acid reflux - I remember having it with Judah near the end...not so fun revisiting what I recently ate...ick. It's worse when I'm laying flat - which makes falling asleep a little more difficult too! Enough with this complaining. I am so excited to meet this little man! All the discomfort is SO worth it:)

Cravings: I just ate a HUGE bowl of grapes and then followed it with a HUGE bowl of watermelon. All within 20 minutes. I guess I'm craving fresh fruit!

Symptoms: Typical 3rd trimester symptoms: big belly, tired, swollen fingers, hard to move, etc...

Best Moment This Week: Ethan's been asking when the baby's coming and I respond with "September" - I then explain that September is the month after August that we're in....that makes me so excited! I think the boys (Ethan especially) are getting anxious to meet their baby brother.

What I'm Looking Forward To: I don't want to say the end quite yet..I enjoy being pregnant and never want to take it for granted! I am looking forward to enjoying my mid-30's weeks before the end:) Bring it!