26 Weeks

Today I am 26 weeks pregnant!

Pregnancy Highlights:

Size of Baby: Baby H now weighs about 1 2/3  pounds and measures 14 inches long from head to heels about the size of an English hothouse cucumber! Don't ask what that is because I have no idea, but it's a long skinny cucumber. Here's a pic, it's hard to believe my baby can be that long!

 

Total Weight Gain/Loss: +6 since my last doctors visit putting me about +11 pounds all together.

Baby's heartbeat at last visit: 146 BPM

Maternity Clothes: YES and now my regular T-shirts are starting to get tight and ride up my belly, I don't like that feeling at all!

Gender: We are having a BOY!

Movement: Finally I can say yes. It's the most amazing thing. I'll be sitting at work and all of a sudden I'm like "wow that was the baby" and it puts a big smile on my face.

Sleep: Great! I'm finally getting the side sleeping down so it's not too bad. Tom's home all week so I have a snorer sleeping next to me, but it really hasn't bothered me, I've been sleeping just fine, except for that darn scanner he insist on having on!

What I miss: Still my energy and being able to do things I used to. Like cleaning the house for X-mas I was exhausted and my back really started to bother me so I just rested and sat in the hang over chair with the heat on my back and my feet elevated. I sure do love that chair!

Cravings: Chocolate milk shakes. Last night I wanted one and Tom and Micayla went out for me, we ended up with Cold Stone, but that was just as good. And of course mashed potatoes we had those at moms on  Christmas!

Symptoms: I've been having some back issues, hopefully its not what I keep reading about - sciatica! I get this pain in the my lower right back area. I went to Jazzercise Saturday in hopes I would stretch it out and it really seemed to help so I think if I keep exercising a little it will help.

Best Moment This Week: Christmas! It was great being with family and spending the holidays with them. We had some great food, which is the best part of being pregnant! Our neighbor had there baby early Tuesday morning, a baby boy! We are so excited and hopefully our son and theirs will be best buddies. Oh and he was 11 pounds - ouch! That scares the crap out of me. LOL Another best moment was lying in the bed the other night and Tom rolled over and put his hand on my belly, it was like 3 in the morning, but it was so sweet, I'm not sure if he felt anything but I loved it!

Christmas Day 2011

What another busy day, well to be honest it wasn't that busy. We got up for 10:00 mass, it was so nice to go as a family. I know the kids weren't too excited about going but I didn't hear one peep out of them about going. It was actually the quickest mass we've been to. There wasn't a whole lot of people which helped and no kids, so that seemed to speed things up. LOL I'm sounding like my Grandma right now, her and Nikki like to find the quickest masses, it's so funny.

After church we went home to let the dog our for a little bit and get our stuff to take to mom and dads. We didn't have to be there until 3:00 or so, so we all stopped at Tom and Linda's for a while, they were busy getting the prime rib all ready to go.

Doesn't that look yummy! I hope they saved us a couple of pieces, because we usually don't get down there for prime rib because we are up at mom and dad's.

And just a few random pictures of all of us up at mom and dad's we are opening gifts here. I got a Willow Tree "HOME" figuring from mom and I absolutely love it! I have it on my sofa table at home. It's so beautiful.

 

Mom, Andy and Grandma all sitting in there "spots" every year they sit here, usually Nikki's with them but I'm not sure where she's at. LOL

 

 It was so nice to see Ben, Kristin and Inara, we haven't seem them since we went through IVF and stayed at there house. Inara is getting so big and she is the best baby. She was just so happy and content with everybody holding her. I hope my baby is as happy as she is.

Dad, Inara and Abby!Dad loved holding little Inara.

Grandma and Inara

Taylor making silly faces. 

And Bill and Chuck sitting at the bar. 

We did our first ever White Elephant gift exchange with the whole clan. 12 of us got in it and it was so much fun, between Me and Bill we opened almost all of the gifts because people kept stealing from us. I ended up with a pedicure from #1 Nail and Tom ended up with a nice set of tools. It was so much fun! Can't wait for next year, plus we will have a little monster on our hands. It's so amazing to think how much everything will change next year - all for the better and I can't wait.

Overall it was a great night with some great food. Mom made "mock turkey legs" I don't know where the name came from but it looked like beef on a stick to me, it was delicious. Plus she made my favorite mashed potatoes and gravy, yummy! Everything was so good.