Baby Talk- 21 Weeks

21 Weeks

I am wearing all regular clothes in this picture. I am pretty excited about that. It makes me feel a little better, when I haven't felt too well the past several days. My face is a little swollen from all the sinus problems. Brady insisted he be in the picture. He loves to touch the baby. I am not sure what is up with his face. Ha!



Pregnancy Highlights:

How Far Along: 21 weeks

Size of baby: length of a carrot

Total Weight Gain/Loss: about 6 lbs on my scale.

Clothes: It is about 1/2 regular and 1/2 maternity.

Gender: Girl! Presley Lynn Barrett

Movement:  I feel her throughout the day, but especially at night. When she moves, she moves big and kicks hard!

Sleep: as good as to be expected. I have had severe sinus and allergy problems which have interrupted my sleep more than anything this week.

What I miss: being able to take sinus/allergy medicine that actually helps.

Cravings: Nothing really specific. My appetite is down from all the drainage and sinus issues. I have been drinking a lot of liquids.

Symptoms: same as always, nothing new

Best Moment this week: I got a lot of  look at your cute belly comments this week. At this point it is a good thing, at least people know I am not just getting fat. Ha Ha! In a few weeks, I will probably hate these comments. Ha!

What am I looking forward to: enjoying time with Brady and planning for our new baby.

Baby Names

Choosing a name for a child is hard. It is with them forever, it is part of their identity, and it is a huge responsibility to the person naming. People can be just plain mean when it comes to the name you chose for your sweet baby. Between pregnancy hormones and the insane amount of time and thought that goes into naming a baby, you would think people would be a little more respectful.

I know not everyone will not love or even like the name I(or anyone) chooses. However, it isn't their baby and they can name their babies whatever they like. It would just be nice for people to be a little  more kind in the matter.

Stepping off my soap box now....

I didn't have a lot of mean or disrespectful comments about Brady's name, but a lot of "you must be a fan of Days of Our Lives" comments. I am not, by the way. In case you don't know, Brady is Caleb's middle name and was his grandmother's maiden name.  I wrote about his name here way back when I first started blogging.

Shortly after Brady was born, I began thinking of future names for any future kiddos. I would casually run them by Caleb and 9 times out of 10 he vetoed them. The 1 out of 10, he didn't love, but didn't turn down immediately. When we starting thinking about trying to grow our family, the name game, became more and more of a conversation piece.

We still rarely agreed on names.

I had came across some names I liked, but would hesitate to share with Caleb, because he never liked them. I was at a Christmas party with a couple of new moms and expectant moms, when names came up. A name was brought up, by my sister for another couple, that I had seen recently and I really liked it. One member of the couple it was suggested for didn't care for it, and I had never shared it with Caleb. He wasn't at the party so my sister text it to him and Caleb loved it. He was done. If baby was a girl that was the name he wanted.

I was hesitant to confirm for certain, because I still had a couple names floating around in my head that I had grown attached to. The week of the ultrasound, we agreed to this particular name if baby was a girl. We didn't have the first boy name. We could not agree on anything for a boy.

We have always had a middle name for a girl, Lynn. The middle name is my middle name, which was also my aunt's middle name. It just so happens Caleb's dads name is Lindrell, which fits well with Lynn.

Baby girl's name will be...

Presley Lynn

We are pretty excited about our baby girl and her sweet name. We both love it! I really love it when Brady says it, Pweswee! So sweet. He is not as devastated as I thought about his baby sister not being named Spider. ; ) Ha!

Baby Talk- 20 weeks

20 Weeks

I am halfway there to meeting our sweet baby girl!

She weighed 12 ounces at the ultrasound last week.

We are all so excited about a little girl. I think it has taken the entire week to really set in.

Yesterday was a rough day. I felt terrible, sinus congestion, headache, extremely tired, and nausea. I felt like I slipped back into the first trimester for a bit. I am not sure what all that was about. Hopefully, it was just a one time thing.




Pregnancy Highlights:


How Far Along: 20 weeks


Size of baby:  length of a banana


Total Weight Gain/Loss: about 6 lbs

Clothes: I can still mostly wear regular clothes, but am pulling out the maternity more and more.

Gender: Girl! Name post should be up tomorrow.
Movement:  I feel her move every day and when she does it is strong. It is mostly when sitting or when I am in bed at night. She moves a lot in the morning around breakfast time.


Sleep: I fall asleep fine, but have still have trouble falling back to sleep if I wake up from a dream or a bathroom break. Then I feel so sleepy the next morning.

What I miss: Not sure.

Cravings: Nothing really specific. I have to eat small portions or I am miserable.


Symptoms: it varies day to day. Mostly,I am uncomfortable, random aches and growing pains, and trouble breathing well after meals. (again the small meals and lots of water help)

Best Moment this week: planning for a girl and watching how excited Caleb is about having a daughter.


What am I looking forward to: preparing a girl nursery.

Weekend Updates (a catch-up post)

Friday

My sister and Noah came and joined us at the Discovery Center. My sister also brought me a Starbucks coffee. So nice!

The boys had a great time, as always.

They had a dentist come and talk to the kids and then gave out free stuff. We love free stuff! The lip therapy is awesome!

We came to my house and had a quick lunch. The boys took a nap while Amy ran to the grocery store.

Brady was so upset they were gone when he woke up. :(

Saturday

Caleb had to work. I had a gift card left over from Christmas to Target and I have been dying to buy something girlie for baby girl. Brady and I loaded up to head to Super Target.

I love Super Target. We found a couple sweet little outfits.

I am so excited about her growing wardrobe.

We came home and Brady napped. After Caleb got home we headed to the monthly kid devo with our church.

Brady loves the kid devotionals!

The kids are so sweet. They say the prayers and lead songs. Brady always volunteers. It is so sweet.

Mommy and Daddy enjoy getting to spend time with the parents as well, while the kids play.

Sunday

We went to church, came home and had a quick lunch, then Caleb was off to work for a few hours. Brady and I took a nap.

 (Saturday night, I woke up at 4 a.m. very uncomfortable, so I moved to the recliner and never really fell back to sleep. Needless to say, I was tired on Sunday. I don't usually take naps, because they usually make me feel worse, but this one was needed.)

My mom was in KY this weekend visiting my bro and SIL. She brought back a couple of goodies for baby girl. She got both things for great prices. I promise I won't show every little thing. I am just excited right now.

Sunday night, we all three headed to church. After church we watched Courageous with any one who wanted to stay. They had childcare available. Brady had the best time.

After the movie was over, he did not want to leave. They painted, watched veggie tales, built a cardboard house, played with shaving cream, colored, ran, and so much more. He talked the whole way home about what a good time it was. :)

 



It is a...

baby girl!!!!

We had our gender reveal party last night. We had my parents, Caleb's parents, both sets of my grandparents, my sister, her husband, and Noah, and our Taylor. Then, my brother and SIL skyped in for the fun as well.

Caleb's brothers were unable to make it due to work, but we filled them in quickly after we discovered the gender along with my brother and other friends and family.

Everyone got to our house about 6. We had pizza. I decorated the house with pink and blue. Everyone guessed the gender. Caleb had to work until 7, so he brought the cake when he got off. As soon as he walked in the door we attacked him and ripped into the box with the cake. We knew the outer decorative icing would be in the color of gender.

I am certain I screamed it is pink at the top of  my lungs. I have had a feeling that this baby was a girl from early on. The differences in the pregnancy, the lower heartbeat compared to Brady's, and just my gut feeling left me feeling girl. I just knew I was going to be wrong, though. I would catch myself calling her a she and really struggled with coming up with boy names for this baby. It sounds crazy, but I just felt like this was a girl baby.

All day I doubted myself yesterday, but when it came time to vote I threw my chip in the girl cup and never looked back.  I love, love, love being a boy mom! Now I get to experience being a boy AND a girl mom. I am thrilled.

It was WILD at our house last night. After everyone else, I had a hard time winding down. It was just exciting. The whole thing. I am so glad we did this! I would highly  recommend a fun gender reveal with your loved ones. So fun!!! I loved that Caleb and I didn't know either. It was just exciting!

 Everyone is so excited. We are fairly sure we have a name picked out for her, like 99.9% sure. I will probably do a separate post on that at a later time.





Here is the video if you want to watch it. It is the same video from Facebook, so if you watched it there, you may not want to watch again! :)



Baby Talk- 19 weeks

19 Weeks!!!

 

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

This is a big week because we had our ultrasound today. At this moment, I don't know what the gender of our baby is. I do know that baby is absolutely perfect! Things are devolping well. Thank you for any prayers for our baby.

Because baby was being a little stubborn and difficult, we do have to have a second ultrasound next month just get some better looks at the heart and lower spine. Baby did not like its space invaded. No concerns, they just couldn't get a clear look and would like one. : )  She assured me that she got a good, clear look at the gender!

We, along with our families, will find out the gender of our sweet baby tonight together. I am so excited. I am trying to stay busy, busy.  The anticipation is killing me. The ultrasound lady had us close our eyes and I wanted to "accidentally" open them, but I didn't!

Pregnancy Highlights:

How Far Along: 19 weeks

Size of baby:  about the size of a large heirloom tomato

Total Weight Gain/Loss: up about 5 lbs on my scale, about 6 on Dr. scale

Clothes: Mostly regular clothes. I am wearing maternity shirts or really long shirts only.

Gender: I will do a special gender post tomorrow! I am excited!

Movement:   More and more each day.

Sleep: Sleeping o'kay. It depends on the day. Still having crazy dreams

What I miss: Not sure.

Cravings: Nothing really specific

Symptoms: Just beginning to get uncomfortable at times.

Best Moment this week: Ultrasound and gender reveal party. More to come....

What am I looking forward to: planning for a specific gender

 I feel like I have so much to do to get ready for baby.

Story Time

Today was the first Story Time of Winter/Spring 2012.

Our library does "semester" type story times, meaning they do 2-3 months at a time, then break for 1-2 months.

It works out great because we get a little break and every one is excited to start back.

Brady moved up to the three year old class today.

The only difference is the books are a little longer, the songs are different, and they added a craft.

Brady was so so so excited to start back!

He loved the craft, but was a little thrown off by the new songs and different kids. He was a little more bashful than usual and clingy. He half way participated.

I forgot my camera, but here is a picture of him when we got home.

He always wants to check out a movie. Today, he picked Bob the Builder.

The theme today was about polar bears, so we all made polar bears. He loves to glue so he loved this project.

The polar bear lost an ear while I was trying corral Brady to stop running and pulling out books, while looking for a particular book to check out. I didn't find it and I accidentally bit my lip while looking. So polar bear also has some blood on his white fur. You would not believe how much it bled.

We finally made it home with Bob the Builder,  bloody lip, the one eared, bloody polar bear, 2 tummys growling,  and no book for mommy. Ha Ha!  

That is just the way it goes sometimes.

We love our library and our story time, even if we are a little crazy sometimes. We always return. It is good for Brady to learn to sit, listen, and interact. It is completely free. It gives us something to do each week that is close to home. So despite the crazy, it is worth it.

The good always outweighs the bad.

I also just found a smiley face sticker on my stomach. I am certain that was there while we were at the dollar store. Oh well.

Baby Talk- 18 weeks

18 Weeks!

Each week when Caleb takes my picture, Brady says, "my turn" after he takes mine. Here is Brady's picture this week. Silly boy.

He is still loving the baby and has decided the baby is a girl. We shall see.

Pregnancy Highlights:

How Far Along: 18 weeks

Size of baby: the length of a bell pepper

Total Weight Gain/Loss: up about 4 lbs

Clothes: Regular clothes mostly. I am wearing some maternity shirts because they are longer. The clothes fairy :) (aka my mom) bought me some new maternity clothes this weekend. They were having a BOGO sale, so we got several things for good prices.  

Gender: scheduled to find out Feb 14

Movement:  Baby is moving more and more every day. Caleb was able to feel it move the other day just a little.   It is still not regular, though.

Sleep:  Pretty good except for CRAZY dreams.

What I miss: not sure

Cravings: nothing specific just good food.

Symptoms: Crazy dreams and a little trouble breathing at times.

Best Moment this week: baby moving more.

What am I looking forward to: The ultrasound on Valentines Day. It is exactly one week away! Yippee!!!

If you get a chance this week, please pray for a healthy, growing baby!

Take it Easy Mondays

Mondays are pretty lazy around here. We spend a lot of time resting, cleaning, and playing at home. The weekends are rough on Brady. He rarely gets a nap on Saturdays. Between church, playing with other kids, going to my parents, and playing with Noah, he is usually wired on Sundays and doesn't always take a decent nap. Weekends are so fun and we love them, but we need a little while to catch up. Yesterday, he had a great nap at my parents!! Still, Mondays are kind of our days to refresh and get things done at home.

Keeping with the easy Monday theme. I have been loving watching these "stuff" ____ say videos. The original is "stuff" girls say. It is funny and oh so true. I stumbled across this one today made by baby center.

Despite the title, it is clean. You will notice I changed the title on the blog to be a little more appropriate. :)





I am fairly certain I have said most of these things. My favorite part is when she pulls the entire bunch of bananas out of her diaper bag.  So true. I once pulled some big boy underwear  (clean, of course) out of my lunch box at work! Ha! Not kidding! I accidentally put them in there instead of my purse. Yes, I keep a spare pair of little boy underwear in my purse!

Happy Monday!

Big Brother Love

Now that I am home all day and Caleb works really long hours, Caleb has pretty much taken over the bedtime routine. Occasionally, I still join in, but most nights it is just the boys. It is a sweet time for them and I feel like they need a few minutes without me each day. It also gives me a few minutes to myself before spending time with Caleb.

Before the bedtime routine begins, Brady comes to me to tell me good night and get a hug and kiss. Over the past week or so, Brady has added a kiss to my belly and the sweet words, "I love you, baby!"

It is so sweet. No one told him to do this. He just started on his own.

Since he has began doing it, he never forgets to do it. I often forget and am confused when he leans in to kiss my belly. Then I quickly remember what he is doing.

It melts my heart how much he adores this baby already. He hasn't seen the baby and I am not even sure how much he understands. He knows there is a baby in my belly and he loves it. That is all he needs to know. There is question, no concern, or doubt, just love.

Around the same time, he started adding the baby to his bedtime prayer. Although, I don't participate much in the bedtime routine each night, I do overhear his prayer and memory work each night. Again, no one told him to add the baby to his prayer. Caleb includes the health of me and the baby in his prayer, but has never specifically told Brady to pray for the baby.

The pure, simple love and excitement of a 3 year old is remarkable. It is infectious.

I am posting this so I can remember how excited and how much he loves this unborn baby. It is that simple. He loves our baby. period.

I may be digging this out when the kids are 13 and 16 and at each others throat. Ha! Hopefully he will always love our baby as much as he does right now.

Baby Talk- 17 weeks

17 Weeks

I am really closer 18 weeks. I roll over to the next week on Saturdays. Oh well, at least I am getting them posted during the actual week.  

 

 

 

Pregnancy Highlights:

How Far Along: 17 weeks

Size of baby: about the size/weight of a turnip

Total Weight Gain/Loss: up 3 lbs per Dr. office, I haven't stepped on my scale since. :o

Clothes: Regular clothes. I am having to wear longer shirts and my pants are starting to get more and more uncomfortable, so it won't be long. I did pull out a couple maternity shirts the other day.

Gender: scheduled to find out Feb 14

Movement: A little this week when laying down. Nothing regular or consistent, just a little here and there. 

Sleep:  I am sleeping pretty good. I wake up several times, but usually go right back to sleep.

What I miss: energy. I keep expecting my energy to come back, but it hasn't. I am not exhausted, but just don't have as much energy as I expected to by this point.

Cravings: nothing really 

Symptoms: sinus headaches, some heartburn and reflux after eating, and a little fatigue. I have a few other symptoms if I don't drink enough water, so I am trying to keep that under control.

Best Moment this week: Brady's birthday party and spending a lot of sweet time with Brady. He has been really sweet the past few weeks. I have this overwhelming desire to just sit and snuggle with him as much as possible.

Also, feeling baby move for sure.

What am I looking forward to: The ultrasound on Valentines Day. It will be here before I know it!