Pregnancy Journal: 34 weeks

So here I am on vacation in Key West at 34 weeks! Surprisingly it wasn't as hot as I anticipated it being, but then we spent a lot more time inside this year. I definitely felt like I was waddling everywhere, lugging this belly around! The drive wasn't the most comfortable experience either, but I'm pretty sure I would have been just as uncomfortable at home so all things considered it wasn't too bad. 

The hardest thing I've had to deal with aside from being uncomfortable and not being able to sleep well, has been a lot of emotional meltdowns. It could be all hormones or a combination of hormones and being away from home but I am definitely not myself. I have been crying so much! I am not a crier at all and it seems like every little thing starts me bawling. For example, James dropped his sippy cup on my toe and it hurt really bad. Normally I would shake it off, but I almost started sobbing! 

The worst part is that while I am feeling that way, I know it is irrational but I can't snap out of it. So frustrating. I remember feeling the same way right after I had James, so I think it is mostly hormonal. One night after a really rough day during our vacation, I turned to Anthony in bed and told him I was sorry for being so cranky with him. He said, "oh, it's okay honey". Then I said, "I think it is just my hormones..." and he immediately replied, "oh yeah, I know!" :) Just thinking about that conversation makes me want to start crying! I don't even know why!

On a happier note, I don't have much longer to go. It is crazy to me that at this point with James I was 2 weeks away from delivery. I am trying to mentally prepare myself to go overdue this time so I'm not spending my last month anxiously waiting for each day to be the day. 

This Saturday is my baby shower and I am excited to spend some time celebrating this little guy. I feel like I am constantly thinking about how having him will affect James, or me, or our family in general but I never really sit back and think about him! It is going to be a combined shower with a good friend who's due date is only a few days after mine and is also having a little boy. I love that I get to shop for cute baby stuff for her, since I can't justify it for myself (we already have everything from James).  Now I need to find a cute outfit to wear that actually fits :)

Monopoly night

I sign up for a bunch of different things and programs through the coupon blogs I follow. I almost never get selected so I just apply as much as I can. I recently applied to host a monopoly party for the new monopoly game and I actually got selected! All I had to do was have people over to play monopoly and they would send me a monopoly game, connect four, and candy land to use and keep! I have been wanting to build up our board game stash, so it was perfect timing!

Since everyone would be getting there late, we played with James on our own first. Here he is getting a monopoly tattoo on his hand. The new game has a cat game piece so he got to choose between a dog or a cat tattoo. He choose a cat! He was a little upset that the tattoo didn't rub off once I put it on, but after a few minutes he was happy about it and showing it to us over and over.

I don't know why but he decided he needed to lick it :)

Then we pulled out connect four. He loved filling it up with "pennies" and pulling the slider to let them all fall out.

After James went to bed, my mom and Anthony's parents came over to play with us. It was so much fun! I couldn't remember the last time I played monopoly, it had to have been when I was a kid.

Once we refreshed ourselves on the rules we got down to business and played the game. I got to use the new cat game piece, which I think brought me good luck. Of course, everyone else said I was cheating but they were just being sore losers! :)

Anthony's mom ended up with both get out of jail free cards!

After quite a few rounds, I ended up with two different monopolies, one of which was boardwalk and park place! Once I started building houses it was all over :) Anthony's dad landed on boardwalk and owed me $1500, which bankrupted him. After that we all agreed to declare me the winner :) My mom said she has a hard time playing monopoly because she hates to be the bad guy that takes everyone's money. I had no problem with that!!!

See all my houses? :)

We had such a great time, we need to have game nights more often! And I'm not just saying that because I won...well, maybe a little :)

Sanford Zoo

Last week James and I met some friends at a nearby zoo for an impromptu play date! We have been to this zoo once before, but haven't thought of going back since it is pretty small and we have annual passes to a much bigger one about the same distance away. Going with friends made all the difference, it was so much fun! I don't think any of the kids cared that we were at a zoo. We spent almost all of our time going to the different kid play areas. Every once in awhile we would see an animal or two :)

Our first stop was at the splash pad. James just ran around the perimeter at first but when he saw the other kids walking in the water he decided to give it a try. 

He decided that he was done with the splash pad before any of the other kids, so once I got him changed back into regular clothes he wasn't happy about having to wait. He kept crying, "go see animals!" over and over. He was making such a fuss, I had to get a picture of it. He hated that I was taking a picture :) He kept saying "mommy no!" and reaching his hand out to push the phone away.

I was trying to distract him with his new favorite toy: a leap pad alphabet writing/learning thingy that he calls his "iPad". It was a no go.

Once everyone was ready we made our way to the petting zoo that had llamas, baby goats, and even a camel! You want to guess where James was the entire time we were there? He was right here:

He discovered a coin operated jeep that moves back and forth and has a steering wheel! I don't think he even noticed that there were animals around to pet and feed. He just sat there happily and played, while also shamelessly asking anyone who walked by for more "pennies" for the machine. 

After the petting zoo we walked through a few animal exhibits until we came across a playground! James loves playgrounds so much more when there are other kids to watch and follow around. He even went down the slide, which usually takes him a few times at a new playground before he is comfortable enough to try it.

After the playground we saw some otters (which James glanced at and then proceeded to try to play with a stranger's stroller) and we visited the air conditioned building that houses all the snakes. While I cooled off and rested a bit, James ignored most of the snakes and ran around the room barking like a dog. At this point we had been at the zoo for about three hours and I couldn't believe how much energy he still had! 

The reptile area was close to the front of the zoo, so we spent some more time at a row of coin operated vehicles like the one at the petting area. There were 4 or 5 different ones and all the kids were going back and forth between them, with different moms taking turns putting quarters in. When the other moms decided to head back to the splash pad, we decided to call it a day and make our way home (it is a good 45 minute drive back to our house). I was able to lure James away from the play cars with promises of a train and a carousel ride :) of course, the train was his favorite.

For a few days after this, every time we got in the car James would declare, "going to the zoo!". I think he is ready to go back soon! :)

July Activities

This summer I have had a list of things I've wanted to do and try with James, both to get him out of the house and to make sure we do a lot of active things before the new baby comes and (I'm sure) we will need to have a lot more days at home. With the heat I've especially been looking for places that are indoor and air conditioned. I found this bouncy house place about 45 minutes from our house and we finally got to try it out! James had a blast!

Here he is shooting nerf balls across the room:

And playing basketball:

There were a lot of older kids there (9-11 range) who were really rough and energetic so I was a little worried about James. He didn't seem to mind the big kids and mostly stayed out of their way. As long as he had a ball to hold and a corner to bounce in, he was happy! He wasn't brave enough for any of the slides but he was really curious about them so maybe sometime soon he will be ready to try them out.

One night James decided to give himself a new hairdo with his yogurt from dinner. Surprisingly it didn't look too bad!

Last week we took another trip to the marine science center to see the sea turtles and the sting rays. They have other things to look at, great aquariums and a bird sanctuary, but we usually just spend most of our time with the turtles and the sting rays. James loved petting the sting rays but I didn't get any pictures  since I was monitoring his "petting" :) he did get to touch a snake though!

There was a guy in scuba gear cleaning one of the big tanks and James kept going up to him and calling him daddy! I think I said something about daddy's fish tanks and he took that to mean that ALL fish tanks are daddy's so therefore he must be the one cleaning it.

Here is one of the sea turtles they had in the rehab center. It is a loggerhead and one of the biggest ones I've seen there! They just had a turtle release a few weeks ago and I missed it, so it is still on my list to go see one be released back onto the beach. How cool would that be to see that! (Just for perspective that is a full size above ground pool that the turtle is swimming in)

James loves to help me open boxes, when he sees a package at our door he goes "Ooooooo" and asks for scissors so he can help open it. 

This package had some party supplies that I am reviewing, including a themed dog bowl, so James had to give it a test run :)

Next week we are going to the keys so I am getting kind of nervous about all the work that goes into a vacation. Plus I am nervous about being 33/34 weeks pregnant in a strange location far from home. Ahh the pregnancy hormones have really done a number on my anxiety!! The worrying never stops :) 

Pregnancy journal: 30 weeks

Oh my word am I big and uncomfortable! I know that it is only going to get worse, but there are times when I can't believe that I still have 10 weeks left. I feel like I am ready to pop!

I did my glucose screening and blood work right after the 4th of July and I found out this week that I passed! No yucky three hour test for me! Everything looked good except I had a really low vitamin d level, so the midwife put me on supplements. It is so surprising that we live in the sunshine state and I don't get enough vitamin d, but I am really good about wearing hats and sunscreen so maybe that has something to do with it. Anthony says he sees it all the time in his patients and that it is actually pretty common. Strange. Another funny thing about our midwife appointment: the midwife scolded me for reaching to pick James up! She told me that I absolutely can't be lifting him at all ever unless I want to end up in the hospital....ummm yeah. So there is no way that is possible. I pick him up to get in and out of his crib, his carseat, etc... I don't have any risk factors that she is concerned about, I guess it is what she tells all her patients but I just don't buy it! Mothers all over the world have young children while they are pregnant and I guarantee they are picking them up as needed. Of course, be careful and cautious about it but come on! I went home and researched it and couldn't find any real medical reason not to pick up children while pregnant (which I consider to be totally different from dead lifting a 25 lb box or something). Has anyone ever been told this? It has really thrown me for a loop!

We keep having discussions with James about having a baby brother and it seems like he is starting to get it. He knows that I have baby brother in my belly (although sometimes he forgets that it is just me and talks about the baby brother in his and Anthony's belly :) and whenever we mention baby brother he wants to pull my shirt up and pat my belly. He usually says something like "come out!" and we tell him that one day he will come out and we will have a baby in our house. Today when he was looking at my belly and talking about baby brother he said, "I (want to) see it!!" and he leaned over me and put his eye to my belly button like it was a peephole. So funny!!!

I have started having midwife appointments every two weeks and it feels like I have an appointment all the time! I realized that I was spoiled with James because they let me go four weeks between appointments right up to the day I had him. Usually we all go together and Anthony has to control James while we wait and wait and wait. Since we are going so frequently now I am considering just starting to go by myself. However, I love that James is a part of it and gets to hear the heartbeat when we do. It makes me feel like we are including him as much as we can. I guess we will have to see how it goes.

We are still stumped on a name! Does anyone have any boy names they aren't going to use?? We need suggestions!

Phone pictures

Our computer mysteriously died earlier this week so I am trying out blogging from my phone for the very first time. Did you know there is an iPhone app for blogger?? Who knew?? This is a good chance to get caught up with some pictures from my phone!

A few weeks ago I was organizing James' dresser in his room to make room for baby clothes and James was running around the room chasing Bitsy. He tripped next to his crib and planted his face into the corner of it, managing to get two separate gashes on his head from the same fall! This is the picture I sent Anthony that night:

Last week we got to watch our friends' little girl for a few hours and James was so excited to play with her! They watched her favorite show together since she was a little sad about her family leaving. It was so cute to see him bring her toys, he was really kind. 

It is so interesting to see James start to like being around other kids and playing with them! Up until recently he would get overwhelmed and shy and would just play around other kids, not with them. Now he gets so excited to see someone to play with! Today at the park we played by ourselves for a good while, but when too little girls came, James jumped up, yelled "kids!" and ran over to them to follow them around :)

I got this picture one night while I was cooking dinner. Almost every evening Anthony gets down on the ground and gets rowdy with James. Sometimes James rides him like a horse and other times they run around the house making motor boat sounds, pretending to be speed boats. Anthony is such a great dad, I love watching them play together!

James is still loving reading books all the time!! It is amazing how long he will sit and read with me, especially since he never sits still at other times. Even the librarian that does story time has noticed a difference in how much he listens and pays attention to the stories now. Last week after she read a story he actually said "More!!" when it was done (which is what he says to me at home when he wants to keep reading). He seems to never get tired of being read to and will say "more" after every single book for so long! Usually I have to be the one that decides reading time is over.

We go through an enormous amount of library books each week and I have started just letting James pick out the books and put them in our library bag instead of trying pick out ones I think he will like. That just takes too much time! So usually I sit there and hold the bag open while James pulls a bunch of books off the shelf indiscriminately. It has definitely made for some interesting story times! I read this one to him the other night and I couldn't stop laughing!!!

Isn't that hilarious!!! Diarrhea happens, why not talk about it right :)

James saw this ad on the back of a magazine and kept pointing to the man and saying "picture Daddy". I tried to see if he thought the girl looked like mommy, but he wouldn't say it and kept giving me this look like, "you crazy, lady!" :) I sent a text to Anthony with the picture telling him what James said and instead of being flattered like I thought he would be he was like, "what are you trying to say? You don't think I look like that?" (Teasingly of course) 

Anthony's schedule is going to change slightly starting next week and he is going to be working a few more hours during the week and have Saturday afternoons off, which will be nice. There always seems to be fun things going on on Saturdays and they will be so much more fun if we can all do them together!

I am feeling pretty good, just tired and hot and hungry and uncomfortable a lot of the time :) I will have to do a 30 week update with pictures and info tomorrow. I started making a list of things I need to get done and taken care of before my due date and it is crazy to me how quickly the end of September is coming up! 

4th of July Weekend

We had a great 4th of July weekend!! It started Wednesday afternoon when we drove to Orlando to pick up my mom from the airport. She had been in Ohio visiting my sister since our Myrtle Beach vacation and was going to stay with us for the weekend before heading home. I was excited for James to experience the airport for the first time! He loved the escalators and the elevators and seeing the planes take off. Fun fact: he calls the gates that go up and down at parking garages and railroad tracks, "Do-ti-do's". We have no idea why, but it is so funny to hear him say it!!

My mom's flight arrived right as we were pulling into the parking garage and she even had a celebrity on her flight! She met Abby Lee from the reality show "Dance Moms"! My mom asked her for a picture and she told my mom that she would do it after the flight once she had her makeup on. After they arrived and got off the plane, my mom didn't see her and assumed that she had left, but then she tracked my mom down so that she could get a picture. How nice is that?

 Since Anthony had off of work for the holiday on Thursday, Wednesday night his dad came to spend the night so that they could go fishing at 5am! James was in heaven having Grandma and Papa come visit him, although he still calls both of them Papa :) Anthony hasn't had a lot of luck lately on his fishing trips, so I was worried that he wouldn't catch anything. Luckily, they did well! They caught a total of 4 fish between the two of them and they had a great time out on the water. They left around 5am and didn't get home until the mid afternoon.

My mom, James, and I spent the morning playing with trains and made a visit to the produce stand so that we could make fruit salad to bring to dinner. Our landlords (a really sweet older couple) invited us over for a barbeque and I wanted to bring something yummy! Everyone was really impressed that I actually cut up a pineapple for the fruit salad and it was a big hit :) James loved exploring their house, although the amount of breakables they had did make me a little concerned. They kept assuring us that "he couldn't hurt anything!", and I was thinking, "Oh buddy, you haven't spent time around this kid! He can do way more damage than you would think!". We had a great time talking with them and their friends, even though there is a big age gap between us and everyone else. I think they think of us as surrogate grandkids :)

After dinner we came home and put James down for a late nap, hoping that he would sleep a little bit before the fireworks. This was our first year braving our town's fireworks and I was worried about how James would act since they are so late. He napped for a little bit and then was up at 8pm ready to go! For a few days I had been showing him videos on youtube of fireworks and talking to him about how fun they were and telling him that they were loud. I didn't know if it would work, but the preparation seemed to pay off because he loved them!! He seemed a little scared at first, but it quickly passed. We had such a great time, I was really glad that we decided to go.

He started out in Anthony's lap to watch. Our spot was perfect, right in front of where they were setting them off:

 About halfway through, he wanted to get a little bit closer, but not too close so he moved to right behind my mom. He kept his hand on her shoulder almost the whole time, it was so sweet!

Friday morning Anthony went off to work and we stayed home to get ready for my brother Daniel to come and visit! It is hard to tell if James likes his grandparents or my brother Daniel more, it is a close call. He loves his Uncle Daniel! Sometimes when he is playing with a toy phone and chatting away we will ask him who he is talking to and most of the time he says, "Naniel, abunchofgobblygookwedon'tunderstand....boat". James was so excited when Daniel arrived with his bassett hound Henry! He would laugh and giggle and call him "Henry dog". We had a great time hanging out, watching TV, and catching up Friday night.

For even more fun, as part of the weekend festivities we got to celebrate Daniel's birthday on Saturday! While everyone else slept in Saturday morning, James came up to me in the morning right after breakfast and brought me a book. When he wants to read something, he usually gets a book and brings it to me and says, "read it!". Of course, I can never say no to that!! He started out wanting to read "If you give a pig a pancake", and after each book he would say, "more" and would go get another one for us to read. We ended up reading 13 books in a row for about 45 minutes! Here are all the books we read:

I had to finally tell him that we couldn't read anymore, my voice was giving out!

Saturday night my brother requested a local Mexican restaurant for his birthday dinner. It is a really yummy place and whenever he visits we usually get takeout from there. James did great in the restaurant, Anthony and I both got to eat our food at the same time!! My mom took this picture of us sitting at the table. It seems like James does the best in restaurants when he can sit next to us instead of in a separate highchair. (As a side note, do you see my shirt? It says "Does this baby make me look fat? :)

We told our waiter that it was Daniel's birthday in case they did anything special for birthdays. He kind of shook his head apologetically and said that they didn't...he lied!! After we finished our food, the entire staff came out of the kitchen with sombreros for everyone, singing a song (something in Spanish, I am assuming birthday related), and gave us free ice cream. It was such a fun surprise!

James loved the hats and didn't want to give his back when it was time to go. He dug right into the ice cream with his spoon, but didn't seem to care for it. He sure liked the whipped cream though!

Sunday morning we all went to church and after we got home, my mom and Daniel left for home. It was so sad!!! I told James that Grandma and Daniel were going home to their house and he yelled out, "No!!!!". That's the way I felt :) We had such a good time, we will have to do it again soon!