Pop, Pop, Pop!

Whoa, guess who woke up today with a real life baby bump... me! Honestly, the little guy or gal kinda shrunk inward over the course of the day and it wasn't as "bumpy" by the end of the day but it was a really wonderful surprise this morning.

It's not that it wasn't real before, but there was something about seeing that bump this morning that really made it feel real. I also decided that tomorrow will be my first day at work in my maternity pants- comfy all day, here I come!

Baby's First Oscars

Sorry- this post is late :( ...

We are gearing up to celebrate the baby's first viewing of the Academy Awards tomorrow night, through my belly of course. It couldn't be more perfectly timed- baby is starting to hear sounds this week!

So far no feelings from the babe yet on who should win, but we'll see if s/he makes itself known when the time is right.

UPDATE: Mini Mid was lucky for daddy as he guessed the most correct winners tonight!!!

Today's Trip to the Doc

Today was a quick, relatively short trip to the doctor for a check up. She listened to the heartbeat (150s still) and pressed on my belly and announced, "yep, there's definitely something in there!" Blood pressure was great. I was not as thrilled with the increasing number on the scale but Dr. Linda didn't say anything so I, of course, held my tongue too :)

What is exciting is that we scheduled our 20 week ultra sound where we find out if it's going to be a little prince or princess. Monday March 26 at 11:00am is when we learn the news. This is the hard part- watching the days on the calendar slowly tick by...

Glad to have a healthy momma and a healthy baby!

Butterfly Kisses

I think I felt the baby move this week! All of the books and blogs and message boards are telling me that there's no way I did (usually first time moms don't feel it until around 18 weeks) but I really think I did.

It truly felt like there was a butterfly in my belly and the wings brushed up against the inside of my stomach. Not nearly as frightening as I expected and way quicker than I would have hoped, but still very cool!

Every night since I have laid in bed on my back with my eyes closed, concentrating to try and feel it again. Still haven't felt it again but it's really hard for me to not fall asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow.

Tomorrow (Friday the 17th) I have another doctor's appointment. I'm going to take this one solo because she told me apart from the 20 week sonogram to determine if it's a he or she, appointments are going to be pretty quick and routine. I should get to hear the heartbeat again so I'll let you know where we're at in terms of beats per minute this weekend.

Mini Babymoon

James and I took a mini babymoon to Chicago this past weekend. It was great, except, it was one of coldest weekends of the whole season which made it kind of a crummy time to be walking around Chi-town. We made the best of it, bundled up tight and headed for the big city!

Well, let me start at the beginning...

I am the lucky lady who's been very rarely sick at all during this pregnancy. Sadly, Friday night before our trip to Chicago- this mama bear was sick! I blame it on our local Chinese which I will not be revisiting any time soon. Needless to say, I didn't get myself prepared on Friday night and just kept telling myself, "it's fine. Get up early and get ready on Saturday." We got up at 7:30 with the intention to leave the house at 9am and we did okay but it was a real whirlwind for 90 minutes :)

Whirlwind is a great way to characterize it because we had to come back to the house twice because I forgot something that we absolutely needed to make the trip happen. One being- leave the door open for my mom who was en route. Out of habit I locked up like normal and as we're driving out of town realized what I'd done. We started off again and just like the first time, hit the edge of town and I remembered that the hotel had given me specific instructions when I booked the room, "Bring the print out of your Groupon voucher. We cannot redeem it from your phone". So back we went...

50 minutes later, yes 5-0, we were en route. We had allowed ourselves a total of 40 minutes to travel almost 100 miles to pick up the Metra. Not gonna happen. So thankfully we could drive a little further and catch a train just a hour later than planned. It felt great to board the train and know that we were finally on our way. It was then that the anxiety started to hit, "did I lock the car? Did we park in an appropriate spot? Did I leave the lights on? Will our tires be missing when we return?" For those of you who know me- you know I'm a worrier, but I think this baby brain has kicked my anxiety into turbo drive. We kept going though, and I just resigned myself to the fact that we'd deal with whatever we needed to on Sunday.

We got to Chicago and immediately grabbed a cab to head over to Second City to see a play, "Love, Sex and the Second City". I thought this was a parody of Sex and the City but really it was making fun of repeat date offenders. It was funny! We hope to see one of the stand up shows next time we're in Chicago.

After the show we again grabbed a cab to the hotel (did I mention with wind chill it felt like -10 at times?) made our way to the 17th floor and passed out on the bed watching The Big Bang Theory on TBS. Thank God we came to Chicago to do things we could never do at home in WI!?! Ha ha, travel takes a lot out of us old folks.

We finally got up around 7 and decided to grab some dinner. We packed VERY lightly and decided after my illness the night previous that we were not in the mood for dressing up and a fancy schmancy dinner so we walked over to the Cheesecake Factory expecting a 45-60 minute wait. 1hour 45-2 hour wait!?! Yeah, mama bear couldn't wait until 9pm to feed the baby so we walked over to Water Tower Place thinking we could find something there. The concierge recommended Mity Nice.

Mity Nice is mighty nice and we had a delicious meal. It's tucked away behind what has got to be the nicest cafeteria-style mall food court I have ever seen, but it's worth the extra walk and the little bit of wait (only 20 minutes) if you're looking for a great meal and amazing customer service on Michigan Ave.

Sunday we had a chance to visit with my friend Stacey, Rob and their sweet little man Henry! We had a great afternoon visiting with them and playing with Henry (practice makes perfect, ya know) and really wish we lived closer to them. Love you guys!

So I know what you're all thinking, "Abbey, what state was the car in when you got back off the train?" Well, thank you for asking! I am pleased to report that I actually did none of the stupid things I was sure that I did when we exited the vehicle. Started up just fine. No tickets, All four tires still in place. All that worrying for nothing. Isn't that what just annoys you about worrying?

We had a great weekend and owe a huge thanks to my mom for dog sitting the pup while we were napping in Chicago. Here comes week 15 tomorrow, watch out!

Mmmmmm Ice Cream

Call me crazy, but there's a special place in my heart for a Culver's hot fudge sundae. On this day, James and I were sharing a hot fudge sundae sub FOD (FOD= Flavor Of Day which happened to be Brownie Thunder on this particular day). Although he didn't get any of the chocolatey deliciousness it didn't stop him from keeping a close watch.

Week 13 Recap

This was a relatively uneventful week, but there are a couple of interesting things to report.

1. Wore my first item of maternity clothes out of the house.
This was not really even necessary, but the dress is cute so I went for it! I really thought about breaking out the maternity jeans this weekend but for some reason I just couldn't bring myself to do it as there's still no defined bump and my regular jeans still button (although they're getting a bit snug ;)

2. Had several dreams about the baby as a girl.
I am really starting to doubt my feeling that this baby is a boy but trying not to get my hopes up either way because really we're just hoping for a healthy baby. It's funny how you think you want a boy or a girl and then once you find out you're pregnant that all fades away and you're just hoping for ten fingers and ten toes.

3. Told a four year old that we're having a baby.
So, we felt it was time to tell Bodie that we're having a baby. James did a great job! He asked him if he knew what a cousin was and he said, "Yes, I have two cousins." James asked if he'd like another one and Bodie said he had two friends who he would like to be cousins. We said, "Okay, how about a new baby cousin?" He got a big grin on his face and said, "Yeah!" James said, "Well, we're gonna have a baby!" Big smiles and then he dropped the line of the century, "So is it going to be a baby puppy?" Oh boy, we sure hope not... lol

Well, that wraps up week 13. No usual cravings, lots of really crazy dreams and still no defined baby bump. All in good time, all in good time...

Happy Groundhog Day!

Groundhog Day is one of the far less celebrated holidays on the calendar, but tonight James and I attended our first Groundhog Day party! Thanks to my friend Dawn, we engaged in all things Groundhog- groundhog trivia, quote-off of Groundhog Day the movie, and we were made official members of the Punxsatawny Phil Fan Club.

We are lucky enough to have our own local celebri-hog and thankfully he did NOT see his shadow today so that means we are in for an early spring.

So nothing baby-related for you today but everything's moving along just fine. We are halfway through our 13th week which is really hard to believe. This little gummy bear will be here before we know it :)