27 Weeks

Last week in the second trimester, how has that happened?!  I really can't believe that we are 3 months out from my due date. I have some questions for my OB about whether or not he will come earlier based on when I delivered Charlotte, but I have a feeling he'll tell me he has no idea, ha!

 

Last week I had my 26 week appointment. My OB decided to start me on biweekly appointments, which is earlier than last time. I am guessing it has to do with the TDAP vaccine that I'm getting at 28 weeks, but I'm not sure. I ended up gaining 9 pounds in a month. This happened to me when I was pregnant with Charlotte, except it was 8 pounds. I freaked, wanted to cry, and felt like a whale, but ultimately my weight gain is under control and I decided to step up my workouts and cut back on sweets. I didn't gain anything this past week, so there's that.

 

We had a busy week. We moved Charlotte into her big girl room on Friday night. She woke up twice that night, but has slept well ever since (jinx...). She really seems to love it, so that's a win in my book.

 

 

 

How far along?: 27 weeks

Weight gained?: 18 pounds
Showing yet?: Yep!

Clothes?: Maternity

Cravings?: Peanut butter toast, strawberries, grapes, blueberries, salad

Aversions?: Nothing

Sleep?: Feeling good

Boy or Girl?: Boy!

Movement?: Yes, getting stronger and more frequent

Symptoms?: Stuffy nose, tired...

Looking forward to?: Painting his nursery and sorting through his clothes!

 

Charlotte at 20 Months

As much as I want to update on Charlotte in my current bumpdates, I want to give her her own space to shine. 19 months was really tough for us. Sleep regression and separation anxiety are a rough combination, especially with a 6 month pregnant mama.

 

After we rang in the new year and got our routines back on track, we seemed to get to a better place.

 

To start, here are her stats:

Weight: 23 pounds

Height: Thinking 32 inches

18 month clothes

Size 5 shoe

 

Loves to: pick out her socks, shoes and shirt/dress. Mom gets to struggle to coordinate the above with some tights or pants

 

Toys: Her pop-up fire truck tent is a huge hit. She likes to sit inside and color, eat a snack, or just roll around. Coloring, markers, stickers and stampers are some other favorites. She became obsessed with her baby doll but that was short lived. She also likes to "cook" with me. I got a step stole at Ikea that she uses to stand at the counter with me. I LOVE this time with her, since I remember doing the same thing with my mom.

 

Here's our "normal" daily routine:

 

6:30-7 Wake up, get dressed, have breakfast

7:30-8 Head to day care (Tuesday-Friday)

5:00 Pick up from day care

6:00 Dinner

6:45 Bath

7:30 Bedtime

 

On the weekends/Mondays when I am off with her, we take our time and have breakfast together, play in her fire truck and color or put stickers on all of the things.

 

Breakfast Favorites:

 

Waffles with powdered sugar (used to be "dipped", aka syrup", but I prefer a light dusting of sugar over sticky syrup!)

Yogurt

Pancakes

Chicken sausage

Hashbrowns

 

I always offer her some sort of fruit, but she normally eats that at lunch.

 

After breakfast, we play some more, or I might turn on Olaf if she seems fiesty or disinterested in all her toys.

 

She normally has a snack an hour or so after breakfast. If she didn't eat a lot, I offer breakfast again, or she'll go for raisins, O's, applesauce (aka saucy), cheese, or yogurt if she didn't have that for breakfast.

 

If we're out and about running any errands, I always stock the diaper bag with the above: raisins, O's, a pouch or two, and maybe some goldfish. If I bring her milk, she wants her water, or vice versa. You can never win with toddlers!

 

Lunch is normally hit or miss, depending on if she had a big snack or has been picking at food all day. She eats really well at day care; I think she's a social eater!

 

Lunch Favorites:

 

Edamame, Peas, Corn or Green Beans

Yogurt

Chicken sausage, Rotisserie Chicken

PB&J

Milk

 

After lunch we normally head up for nap. We've cut back to simplify our routine, as we're not going to be able to have a long one once baby arrives.

 

Right now, we read two books of her choosing, then I sit in the glider and rock with her, humming a few songs and then putting her in her crib awake.

 

Naps at home have averaged about 1.5 hours, while at day care her normal is 2-3 hours.

 

After nap, we'll get a snack and have some milk, then head out for another errand or get the fire truck back out and play "boo" or "tunnel". She has a lot of energy to burn, and I've found that taking her out and about and sticking her in a cart doesn't work. She wants to walk on her own, but not hold my hand....you see the concerns, right?!

Dinner is normally a variation of what we're eating. I rarely offer her something she's already had that day, unless she's being super picky and it's a matter of just getting some food in her belly.

 

Dinner Favorites:

 

Soup

PB&J

Brown Rice

Fries or Roasted Potatoes

Green Beans

Chicken or Pork

 

She loves any chicken that is cooked in the crock pot. If I cook something while she's at day care, she'll come home wanting it straight from the pot. I try not to make anything spicy, so she normally does okay with whatever it is.

 

After dinner it's bathtime, which Hubs is in charge of. I clean up dinner, put away dishes, clean up her toys, and get her room ready for bed. Our bedtime routine is the same as nap; two books, her choice, then we hum in the glider for a little before putting her in her crib.

 

 

26 Weeks

After Charlotte had gone to bed for the night, Hubs & I were sitting on the couch. I had a moment of panic thinking I was going to be 27 weeks, meaning the third trimester was right around the corner! 26 weeks isn't much further away, but I can't believe we're heading toward finish line.

I always said I'd cherish this pregnancy like my first, and while in my heart I love this little boy more than I ever thought possible, it's just so much harder to enjoy and embrace it. You know, toddlers will do that to you.

 

At night when I'm laying in bed, I like to just hold my belly and feel him move. It's often the only quiet in my day, aside from when I'm working, where I can just enjoy the movements and think about who he'll be. It might be wishful thinking, but I think he'll be a sweet, gentle soul. I don't think he'll be as nosy as his sister was, although I'm sure that'll come with time. I imagine a head full of hair like Charlotte's, squinty blue eyes and fair skin. At this point, I don't think he'll be much bigger than she was (6 lbs, 8 oz), but maybe a little longer. I'm anxious to meet him, name him, and love him deeply.

 

How far along?: 26 weeks

Weight gained?:  15 pounds
Showing yet?: Yep!

Clothes?: Maternity

Cravings?: Peanut butter toast, fruit, and sweets 

Aversions?: Nothing

Sleep?: Much better this week! We invested in a humidifer which helps with the stuffiness that I experience.

Boy or Girl?: Boy!

Movement?: Yes and I love it!

Symptoms?: Stuffy nose, tired, and pelvic pressure.

Looking forward to?: Finishing up his furniture and getting it moved into the nursery.

I'm excited to post some pictures of his finished furniture! We took two dressers and refinished them with chalk paint. We have some spots that need touched up, but overall I'm excited with how it looks!

 

Separation Anxiety

As a mom, you read up on certain developmental milestones so you get a feel for what to expect. I read a lot during Charlotte's first year of life, and the one thing we seemed to breeze by was separation anxiety and object permanence. Separation anxiety is self-explanatory, but object permanence is basically when your child realizes that you or any other object exists outside of when they see you or it. Charlotte certainly understood the concept as she'd play peek-a-boo, hide her toys and then go find them again, but she never did this with Hubs or I, which we attributed to our consistent drop-off and pick-up schedule at day care.

A week before Christmas, I took Charlotte to day care and experienced our first drop-off meltdown. It through me for a loop but I attributed it to us spending the weekend together and it being hard for her to let go. All of a sudden, "Mommy hold you" became the repeated phrase of the month. Carrying another child and physically feeling tired all of the time didn't make it any easier to feel like I was needed so much.

Bedtime became mommy only as "No Daddy" also became a new favorite phrase. Hubs and I decided to give her what she wanted, assuming it was a phase and hoping that settling in to a new routine would help.

Two weeks later, she decided to stop napping all together, unless it was on me. We've never been a co-sleeping family, mostly because as an infant, Charlotte was very noisy and we were way too paranoid about SIDS to risk having her in our bed. We battled her for 4 days trying to get her to nap on her own, but it was a wash.

Last week, as we all got back into our routines after the holiday break, we hoped she was going to get back on track, too. On Sunday night, she started waking in the middle of the night again, which hasn't happened since we weaned her bink.

We have always done a modified cry-it-out sleep training, and this followed our past tactics. She would wake screaming "Mommy hold you!" and would stand in her crib until we came to get her. Some nights she would wake once, and go back down after seeing one of us, other nights it took a good two hours to get her back down.

Luckily, day care seemed to help get her back into her napping routine, so we were hopeful for what the weekend would bring.

On Friday, I found an Aden + Anais security blanket that I had picked up for her when she was much younger but never really took to. I thought I'd offer it to her to see if it helped her sleep. Friday night came, and she went down without much fuss, and snuggled the blanket, along with a pair of my socks.

I'm not sure where the sock thing came from, but she's hugged the same pair of (clean) reindeer socks since that night, for both nap and bedtime, and hasn't had an issue since (knock on wood...)

I think the need to have something of Mommy's while she slept has given her a sense of security that she really needed and wanted. Every morning when we go in to get her, she has my socks under her arm.

The sock thing sounds SO weird to me, but apparently giving your little ones something of yours can really help with separation anxiety. It's worked for us so far, and we're hoping the phase of needing to sleep with my socks is just that: A phase!

25 Weeks

Nesting has come in full force this weekend! Charlotte is moving to our spare bedroom so she can have a little more room than her current living quarters (AKA she's getting the boot!) so we moved out the queen bed and started purging things that we don't need.

 

 

Can't do an update without including a picture of this little lady!

 

Hubs and I both went through our closets and we were able to donate about 4 bags of clothes and extras that we no longer need. Our plans were to get started on painting that room while Charlotte was napping, but her naps have been more miss than hit, so we didn't want to risk waking her.

 

 

Early birthday celebration, she couldn't keep her hands out of the icing (cool whip!)

 

 Sunday night, Hubs decided to start priming the lower half of the room (the room was previously painted brown and cream). After she went to bed, I grabbed my mask and we got it all primed in about an hour or so.

 

Yesterday, instead of napping while she did, I trimmed the entire room (baseboards, chair rail, windows, doors, and ceiling). I think my need to have her room finished trumped my exhaustion, haha! All that's left is to roll the paint and finish up the trim.

 

 

Paint samples for baby boy's room

 

Since Charlotte's nursery was just done, we're pretty much moving all of her current furniture and decor into the bigger room. I'm thinking about getting her a white rug and some white/gold curtains and calling it a day. Once we have her moved in, we can start on little mans room!

 

How far along?: 25 weeks

Weight gained?: 13 pounds
Showing yet?: Yep!

Clothes?: Maternity

Cravings?: Loving salads again...
Aversions?: Nothing

Sleep?: After getting Charlotte's sleep back on track, I'm feeling good. I think my body is just more tired lately (duh!) so I've been coming to terms with listening to it say "go to bed!"

Boy or Girl?: Boy!

Movement?: Yes! Very active at night, right before I go to bed. He's also very low in comparison to Charlotte. I can feel him kick and squirm like he's trying to escape.

Symptoms?: Stuffy nose is back! We invested in a new humidifer for our room that's been helping.

Looking forward to?: Moving Charlotte to her big girl room so we can get started on his room!

 

24 Weeks!

Ah 2014, you were good to us! Our first full year of Charlotte, another blessing on the way, and lots of craziness in between, we are excited to see what 2015 has in store for us!

 

We had a long 2 week vacation between Christmas Eve and today, and we are really ready to get back to our new routine.

 

 

 

Charlotte's been going through a really hard separation anxiety phase, and has been super clingy to mommy. We're going on 3 weeks, and to be honest, it's been much harder for me than I expected. I'm not sure if it's the hormones or the physical and emotional exhaustion that it's causing, but I'm drained. I am hoping she returns to "normal" now that she's back in day care, as I'm not sure how much longer we can keep this up.

 

On New Years Even we went to the wedding of one of my dear friends. It was nice to dress up and go out with Hubs, something we rarely get to do!

 

 

 

How far along?: 24 weeks

Weight gained?: 12 pounds
Showing yet?: Yep!

Clothes?: Maternity

Cravings?: Nothing
Aversions?: Nothing

Sleep?: Finally started feeling better, and now Charlotte has decided to quit naps and sleeping through the night!

Boy or Girl?: Little mister!

Movement?: Yes!  He loves going crazy at night, so I hope he can keep his nights/days straight!

Symptoms?: Tired legs after a long day.

Looking forward to?: Clearing out our spare bedroom so we can get working on Charlotte's big girl room/his nursery!