23 weeks!

23 weeks today! Time sure if flying by. I meant to post pictures last week but never got around to it, life has been pretty busy around here. Work wore me out last week, so I spent a lot of the weekend relaxing in bed. I like this excuse! As you can see, I am showing more and more each week. I'm not getting to the point where my pre-pregnancy shirts still are wide enough but not really long enough and I end up with the bottom of my tummy hanging out at work sometimes! Oh well. Guess that means it's time to go shopping!


Shhhhhhhhhhh......... don't tell Wanda that I'm still wearing my heels! (Yes Wanda, I had Jeff take this picture just for you) My lower back actually hurts less when I wear heels, and I sit almost all day at work anyway. And what can I say, I LOVE my heels! Anyone who came to the wedding can note that these are the same shoes I wore with my wedding dress!

Gotta show the bare belly. I'm getting the line on my belly already, at first I thought it was hair but it is actually my skin. I read about it and they say it is supposed to go from your navel to your pelvis, but mine starts close to my rib cage and goes all the way down! I think my skin may be splitting at the seams!

Things are going well, I feel good and am not too tired these days. I definitely have the pregnancy brain though, I say silly things and forget things and have problems focusing at work, and by the end of most days my brain is just fried. I guess that is just normal and to be expected, but it doesn't help me much in handling the complex claims now. I just do the best I can, what else can I do?

The wife of Jeff's commander, Nikki, threw us a baby shower last weekend, it was so nice of her! It was a few of the other military wives as well as some of the female Air Force people Jeff works with. We had a good time, and with the presents sitting on my table, I feel like we are finally starting to prepare for the baby! The theme was "practical baby" so we got lots of very useful things. My favorite piece of clothing is the ducky bath robe his First Sergent bought us. It has a ducky head on the hood! SO cute. Here is a picture of it:

And here is a picture of all the baby goodies hanging out on our dining room table (driving Jeff nuts I'm sure).

I am trying not to buy too much baby stuff before the shower at home in April :-) However, I have bought a few of the bigger things when I find them on major discount. I found this swing below at BabiesRUS on clearance with an extra 20% off, normally $140, I got it for a whole $70, yes half price! Yeh, I'm good :-)

And I got myself a glider, I love it! I got it from Target on sole with free shipping, normally $170 + $60 for shipping, I got it for $130. Another good deal for me! I love bargain shopping. Here is my glider, Jeff put it together for me already, I like to sit in it and rock which watching tv.

Speaking of good deals, today I found a new favorite place, a used clothing store here in Tucson right down the road. I took all my old clothes that didn't sell at the yard sale in to this store and sold some of them, used the store credit plus a 10% military discount and a "buy one blue tag get 2 blue tag items free" sale and I got all the clothes below for $1 out of my pocket! Pretty good, huh? Two pair of nice brand-name maternity pants, 3 shirts, a brand-name dress, and 4 baby onesies. For $1. Ha! This is my new favorite place. They sell tons of cute good quality kids clothes for cheap, the baby onesies were $.99 - $2.99, I think I will definitely be shopping there once the baby is born. They also sell used baby equipment like bassinets as well as shoes and blankets. After the shower, I'm going to work on checking out the other stores in Tucson along with yard sales.

Jeff convinced me to bowl with him last Sunday, below is a picture. Notice that the ball is about to go into the gutter in this picture. I have somehow gotten WORSE at bowling, I blame my changing center of gravity :-) I bowled an 85, 57 and 52. Humph.

Below is a picture of my little cubicle area at GEICO. I actually have a large cubicle now due to my new job, the desk continues to the left then I have a huge set of shelves behind me holding all my paper files and reference material. This is my home away from home! I love my job. My company is the only auto insurance company that is doing well right now, because of our hard work to keep costs low and because a ton of people are switching to us now because we really do save most people a lot of money. Our growth is double what was projected right now, at a time when other insurance companies are laying off workers. I am so grateful to be with this wonderful company and to have such a great job!!! I am truly very lucky to have landed here.

20 Week Ultrasound Pictures!

We had our 20 wek ultrasound on Tuesday. Everything looks great! There are no problems seen, all the parts looked good. The baby is the right size, already 12 ounces! The arms and legs look abnormally long, not sure which family that comes from. It wiggled arond but was pretty sleepy at the time so we were able to get all the measurements without much problem. The only problem was that the baby wouldn't turn it's head so we could get a profile picture!

In these pictures, in all but the last body shot, the head is on the right side of the screen.

Here the baby appears to be kicking itself in the head!

Healthy looking spine.

A foot!

Both feet.

Things are going great with the pregnancy so far, I still feel great, not as tired as I was. I have still only gained about 12-13 pounds, but the doctor said that as long as the baby is growing fine, then not to worry. I can stil run! I ran a mile tonight, it felt great. It definitely helps take away the stress of the day at work.

Here are belly pictures from today:

I'm finally really showing! Yay!


In other news, last week I was driving around with the ac on in the car, and this week it SNOWED! Yes, it snowed a slight bit, over a foot up in the mountains and even some down here in the city. Here are sme pictures from our house:

Half Way There!

Here are my 20 week 1 day pictures. I certainly don't look 5 months pregnant, huh?!?! I guess I shouldn't complain, because I can still get around really well and exercise without problems, and I still wear all my pre-pregnancy shirts. But geez, is there really a baby in there??? We have our 20 week ultrasound on Tuesday and we will find out then if it is the right size and if my stomach is growing enough. I'm sure it is fine, just strange to me, I thought I would be much bigger by now. And since I am saying this, I will probably double in size over the next week! Ha!

Doctor Appointment

We went to our half-way doctor appointment today! Today, I am 19 weeks 5 days, so just at half way through the pregnancy, very exciting.

I'm so happy that we switched doctor offices, I met the male doctor today and he is AWESOME. The office is a husband and wife team, both obgyns, and you see which one is available the day of your appointment and the day you go into labor. He did a great job of answering my questions and making me feel a lot better. And we got to hear the heartbeat again, going nice and strong. And thankfully, today it was up closer to my belly button, not down on my bladder where it was last time. This was the first time Jeff got to hear the heartbeat too. It was nice having him there!

The doctor reassured me that it is perfectly fine that I haven't gained much weight yet since my uterus is big enough and the baby seems to be fine. I have no idea how I only gained about a pound or two over the past month, my belly has doubled in size I think! So far I have gained about 12-13 pounds, not bad, especially considering I am half way there and it is ok for me to gain a total of 25-35 pounds so I still have plenty of room to grow before it becomes a problem. He also reassured me that my baby will not come out a mutant because I'm not eating very many veggies (cooked veggies kinda make me want to gag, still). I am concerned about this, but he said I should be fine, espcially since the rest of my eating is pretty healthy (no I didn't mention my obsession with the Valentine's day cookies mentioned in the post below).

We also talked about labor stuff. I haven't decided if I want to go natural or have an epidural, and I was figuring that I would just wait to see what it feels like and make my decision then. He said that is the best way to do it, and that they are fine with whatever I decide. That made me happy!!! I think he is definitely a good doctor match for me. So I think I will give the natural route a shot, see what it is like, try out the tub and shower and walking and those goodies, then if I can't take it just get the epidural :-) The hospital has an anesthesiologist on call at ALL TIMES, which is comforting. We will be having the baby at St Joseph's Hospital here in Tucson, which has a brand new maternity ward which just opened less than a year ago!!! Here is the link: http://www.carondelet.org/WomensCare/cb_intro.aspx . I need to start looking into getting us signed up for the classes, I'm really excited for that.

We have our big ultrasound on Tuesday morning, so we are really excited for that as well! We are both looking forwards to seeing the baby again and making sure that everything is ok. We COULD find out the gender... but we won't :-) I'm sure everything is fine, because I can feel it kicking a LOT more now, and the kicks are stronger and more frequent. It has definitely grown! I even felt a kick from the outside of my belly for the first time last weekend!!! That was wild. Jeff hasn't felt it yet, but he will soon enough. I love feeling the baby moving around inside of me, it reminds me that everything is ok, and it makes me smile in the middle of a busy day at work.

On a fun note, 2 people today said that I am "so cute" pregnant. Haha, strangers too! I love it that people can finally tell that I am pregnant and not just eating too much. I also love it that when I go to the gym, it is obvious that I'm pregnant and yes, pregnant women can still run and lift weights! It makes me feel so good and strong and healthy to be doing that. Even though I don't make it to the gym as often as I would like, I'm very proud of myself for still exercising as much as I do. And I'm amazed by the fact that my belly doesn't bounce when I run (the enormous alien things in my bra are a whole other story).

I started our registries last weekend, you can check them out at babiesrus.com and target.com. But they aren't done and I will probably take a lot off, so please don't buy anything yet! But if anyone has any ideas for us, please let me know! My favorite thing, though, is the stroller/carseat combo. It is RED! Here is a link: http://www.chiccousa.com/gear/travel-systems/cortina-30lb-systems/travel-systems-30-race.aspx . I'm super excited.

On a random note, apparently the base in Kyrgystan where Jeff was deployed, Manas Air Force Base, is closing. The country is falling under the pressure of Russia and kicking the US out. Here is a news story: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/06/world/asia/06kstan.html?_r=1 .

I will try to get some pictures up this weekend, I promise!