happy holidays

Christmas Day has come and gone and so has the 22 week milestone. Coming up on 23 now. Sometimes it seems time is moving slower and this baby is going to take forever to arrive and then sometimes it speeds up and I feel like there's no time at all! I'm not panicking yet though. Still in the second trimester. Feelings may be different once the third hits!

The holidays have been lovely! I finished up the Christmas shopping with time to spare and found a great gift for everyone and put together a pretty awesome stocking for Brandon. We got a Crock Pot which I'm super excited to use! We also got a ton of gift cards and a few baby presents. Brandon got me an amazing Nikon camera which I'm loving! It's definitely going to be better to have a real quality camera for this new life chapter, the iphone one just doesn't always cut it. He, of course, loved the hockey tickets! Hopefully I'll still be good enough in April to go to the game...

I've had to keep it under wraps due to us not telling Brandon's mom until Christmas but we found out some exciting news from the ultrasound...it's a BOY! Once the initial surprise wore off I began to actually get very excited picturing a little son walking around. My family so far is pretty much all girls so a boy will be a fun new experience for everyone. My mom has no grandsons and my sisters have no nephews so it will be exciting! Brandon is obviously happy as well, he's definitely got sports dreams in the future for this little one. Lately he's been so active in there I'm thinking he's definitely a soccer star in the making, those kicks are getting quite frequent! Of course, there's always ballet instead.

I've been all over the malls and internet finding adorable baby boy things. Now that I've found out I pretty much want everything. We've decided on a Dumbo theme for the nursery and I've ordered him some adorable Dumbo outfits to accompany the stuffy I got him a while back. We also registered for a crib bedding set from Sears that has an adorable Dumbo pattern. I can't wait until everything comes together. It's going to be too cute. Also found a sweet deal on a crib mattress on boxing day and Best Buy had a sale on aden + anais things so I got him some muslins as well. Things are definitely slowly coming together.

I hope everyone's Christmas was as full of love as mine was!

 

halfway

This week I reached 20 weeks of being pregnant. That's halfway. It feels like I've been pregnant for a very long time though so if the second half lasts as long as the first half there's still plenty of time until this little one arrives. However, with Christmas and New Years and countless birthdays approaching this second half could go significantly faster. I guess we'll see.

Excitingly the 20 week mark means you get a significantly longer and more detailed ultrasound. We went on Friday and it was very interesting. The technician spend a good 20 minutes measuring and who knows what else and then she let us see. Baby was curled up and very person-shaped. The technician pointed out the happy news that Baby has two eyes, two arms, two legs, two hands, two feet and a beating heart. We also saw the very solid spine. It is still a mystery as to whether we have a he or a she on our hands and it was moving around so much in there we couldn't get a good look between the legs. The technician may have seen something in the 20 minutes she was looking around but she's not allowed to tell us anything so we have to wait until we see the doctor to find out if she noted a gender on our file. Next prenatal appointment is January 6 so for now we'll just be happy that all the parts are there and all the organs are working properly.

Also this week I managed to whittle my christmas shopping list down quite a bit. I only have 7 things left to purchase and they are all chosen already so it's simply a matter of getting to the stores to pick them up. So some definite progress from the last time and good considering christmas is only 12 days away.

On Wednesday we attended the aquarium members christmas party which helped boost the christmas spirit. It was nice to get dressed up and get out of the house for a bit. Usually in the evenings we're in the house for the night by 6. There was an adorable Polar Express 4D movie, free christmas cookies and an extra discount in the gift shop. I used the discount to pick up some nice aquarium ornaments for our tree (with seals & sharks of course) and purchased a dolphin stuffy that they were selling to donate to children who are in need. We also went outside to visit my favorite exhibit, the harbor seals & stellar sea lions, and they were sleeping on the beach! We've never been to the aquarium when the sun has been down so I've never seen them sleeping before. It was adorable. It was all I could do to stop myself from jumping the fence and going to rub their little bellies. I seriously couldn't get over how sweet they were. Definitely one of my favorite parts of the party! The wet lab was open again for members to touch some of the safer animals. I held a strange sea urchin and we poked at some anemones & sponges. Brandon held a hermit crab which was creepy but it's still so interesting to see them so up close and personal.

Needless to say after the week I've had I'm feeling much more exhausted than usual. After the aquarium, the mall trips and my little sisters choir concert I'm ready for next week to be a little slower. We'll see if that happens.

tis the season

It's December 8th. I've somehow been ignoring the fact that Christmas is creeping up. It's actually pretty easy to do when you mostly hide in your apartment pretending it's still November. The main distraction of growing a person has also helped a ton. However, it's only 16 days away and I have yet to even make it halfway through my shopping list. In fact, I haven't even made a list. I do have presents for a few people. I'm not one of those crazies who does all of their shopping on the 24th. I definitely am behind though. I just can't seem to focus on the spending aspect of the season. I'm a bit wrapped up in the magic of snowflakes and christmas lights. Let's blame the pregnancy brain. I just keep thinking about babies and love and family and it's all very lovely and beautiful and distracting.

Anyways, I really wanted to post the Taylor Swift song that is on repeat on my playlist right now

Taylor Swift - Never Grow Up

Your little hand's wrapped around my finger
And it's so quiet in the world tonight
Your little eyelids flutter cause you're dreaming
So I tuck you in, turn on your favorite night light
To you everything's funny, you got nothing to regret
I'd give all I have, honey
If you could stay like that

Oh darling, don't you ever grow up
Don't you ever grow up, just stay this little
Oh darling, don't you ever grow up
Don't you ever grow up, it could stay this simple
I won't let nobody hurt you, won't let no one break your heart
And no one will desert you
Just try to never grow up, never grow up

You're in the car on the way to the movies
And you're mortified your mom's dropping you off
At 14 there's just so much you can't do
And you can't wait to move out someday and call your own shots
But don't make her drop you off around the block
Remember that she's getting older too
And don't lose the way that you dance around in your pj's getting ready for school

Oh darling, don't you ever grow up
Don't you ever grow up, just stay this little
Oh darling, don't you ever grow up
Don't you ever grow up, it could stay this simple
No one's ever burned you, nothing's ever left you scarred
And even though you want to, just try to never grow up

Take pictures in your mind of your childhood room
Memorize what it sounded like when your dad gets home
Remember the footsteps, remember the words said
And all your little brother's favorite songs
I just realized everything I have is someday gonna be gone

So here I am in my new apartment
In a big city, they just dropped me off
It's so much colder than I thought it would be
So I tuck myself in and turn my night light on

Wish I'd never grown up
I wish I'd never grown up

Oh I don't wanna grow up, wish I'd never grown up
I could still be little
Oh I don't wanna grow up, wish I'd never grown up
It could still be simple
Oh darling, don't you ever grow up
Don't you ever grow up, just stay this little
Oh darling, don't you ever grow up
Don't you ever grow up, it could stay this simple
Won't let nobody hurt you
Won't let no one break your heart
And even though you want to, please try to never grow up
Oh, don't you ever grow up
Oh, never grow up, just never grow up

Browsing the internet for affordable gifts while listening to Taylor Swift has become my daily exercise. It's ok though. I'm making a dent in the non-existent list. I'll get it done.  

Wish me luck...