Nesting has begun!

I have found myself in the same place I was during my 1st pregnancy - at Autobarn purchasing things for the car and baking cakes!

I have been tossing up options for car seating for the growing family. I have been weighing up the options of hiring or purchasing a capsule (depending on what worked out cheaper) for 6 months and when Baby is big enough to change into a front facing car seat, Morri could upgrade into a booster seat and Baby would use Morri's convertable car seat. I consulted my Step-Mother-in-law and my Brother-in-law (Simon) on this issue. I asked my B.I.N.L if his God-son who is 1 year older than Morri, if he is still in his original car seat or in a booster seat. My B.I.L told me that his God-son is still in his original car seat and that he himself remembers changing into a booster seat when he was 3 or 4 years old! Wow B.I.L has a good memory! S.M.I.L thought it wise to get a 2nd-hand car seat for Morri and let Baby use Morri's existing seat (as it a newer model and comes with all the infant padding). S.M.I.L suggested a good website to go to that sells pre-loved baby goods. Round n Round The owner of the business is a young mum and her shop is her garage. And conveniently in Nunawading. I mentioned this website to my Mum too as she was looking for a 2nd-hand car seat for her car (we stole her original one for our 2nd car as hubby picks up Morri from his Grandparents once a week on his way home from work.) So my Mum went to check out the car seats in Nunawading and came back with 2 great 2nd-hand car seats. My mum purchased the Mother's Choice brand for $39.99 and we purchased the Safe n Sound brand for $79.99 and we even got a $10 discount for buying 2 car seats!
So on Thursday, as soon as Morri went for his nap, I took out Morri's existing car seat, took off the seat covers, washed them, and installed the new 2nd-hand car seat in the car for Morri. And while I there, I decided to vacuum and clean out the inside of the car. On Friday, as soon as Morri went for his nap again, I went Autobarn (hubby took the day off - due to being sick, yeah some freedom) purchased a couple of harness attachments bolts for the 2nd car seat; one for our car and one for my mum's car, a new set of Window Sox (our existing ones have faded and the UV protection no longer 'protects' - a problem due to not having a carport or garage, the sun just bleached them), and a new set of windscreen wipers because the rubber had worn - bad driving hazard when it rains - can't see the bloody road, and plus one of the rubber wipers kept coming loose and scratching the window - very annoying when driving! I put all the nice and clean seat covers and infant padding back in our 1st car seat, attached the harness bolt to the rear roof of the car, installed it back in the car in the rear facing position, put the new window sox on, and attempted to install the windscreen wipers - but had trouble detaching them from the arms so I had to ask hubby to help - which he wasn't too rapped about... thats another story...won't go into details...
Now Morri sits behind the drivers seat and Baby will be behind the passenger seat. The other day Morri pointed to his car seat which will now be Baby's car seat. I said,"Yes that is for the Baby to sit in." I asked him today when we were in the car, where is the Baby? Morri: pointed to my tummy and said 'Baby, Mummy' I said, "Yes, the Baby is in Mummy's tummy, soon the baby will be born and it will sit in the car seat next to you." He looked at me and nodded. So I guess he understands. But we shall see how he reacts when the Baby arrives!!
Tomorrow Morri will be going to his Grandad & Granny's place for the day - so I have plans to organise what to pack for my bag and Baby's bag for hospital! Hmmmmmmmm!

Pregnant brain!

The baby's head ocassionally grinds down into my cervix - ouch - its not pleasent - but this tells me that D-day is approaching very soon! And I am writing lists of things to do and get and organise and plan before he/she arrives! My brain is not functioning at it's optimum potential. So making lists and writing everything down seems to help me remember to get things done. I should have written down on my list to wrap Mike's birthday present and write in the card I got for his 31st birthday which is today! We had family lunch at my folks for his (and my) birthday yesterday and he got most of his presents yesterday and he wanted to have something to open on his birthday so I kept our present for him today to open - but I forgot to wrap it and write in the card! Our usual birthday tradition is to present each other with their gift first thing in the morning, but this time I completely forgot and Mike asked for his present! Oops! So he got his present unwrapped and an empty card! I will have to do it when I am done blogging. He got what he wanted - I bought him some leggings!! - no - not those types of leggings! Ionix - special ionised leggings for running in. They are like the suits athletes and swimmers wear in competitive sport. They are great for keeping the muscles warm before, during and after exercise - important for muscle fatigue repair and overall performance. He modelled them for me this morning! He has great legs and he looked hot in them too! He turned he back to me and said, 'Does my bum look big in this?' I laughed and told him, 'ha, MY bum would look huge in it! - no babe, you have a nice set of tight buns - u look hot!'

No news is good news!!

I haven't received a phone call from the hospital saying that I have gestational diabetes! Yeah! I think a lot of women find this problem when they are pregnant!

My hands are getting really puffy now, especially my right hand - which is strange. I am also finding that my right leg swells significantly more than my left too. I mentioned this to my brother in law who is studying Medicine. He thought this was interesting too. I asked him if there was any reason. He said it might be to do with placement of where the placenta is and the way the lymphatic system flows. He explained the details to me but I won't try to re-explain it even though I understand it (thanks to my Anatomy & Physiology knowledge through Remedial Massage).

Biscuits & Cake!

At 30 weeks.

I had my glucose test last week. It's where they take your blood sugar reading before you drink a glucose drink and then take your blood sugar reading again an hour later to test how well your body breaks down the sugar. Well, to my absolute suprise my sugar reading was 8.5! I was in shock! To tell you the truth, I felt quite sick after drinking the glucose drink - it's like drinking about 250mls of straight cordial! So this week I have to go and do the glucose tolerance test where I will need to fast from 10pm the night before and go into Pathology at the Mercy Hopital to take my blood sugar reading before I drink that horrible stuff again and take my reading 1 hour after and then another reading an hour after that!

Apart from being a senior lecturer at VUT my dad is a Diabetes consultant and boy was I really embarrased to tell him about my glucose test! But all is fine. My dad gave me a glucose home-test kit for me to monitor my glucose myself. And so far my readings have been normal - but thats because I have been watching the sugar intake I am eating at the moment... ok I admit, I have been eating probably 1 too many sweet biscuits and cake!! oops!! - I think I have let myself down in this department! I was so good when I was pregnant with Morri and plus I was a lot more active then - I was working and I was going to the gym at least 3-4 times a week. This time round I am not working, and I sometimes I manage to get to the gym once a week if at all! So this weekend I went to the gym twice and I will go again this Wednesday when Morri goes to his Gran & Grandads place and I will NOT be munching on biscuits and cake!! In a way I am grateful about the outcome of the test as it is a wake up call to myself that I need t0 watch what I eat - which is very disappointing to me because I have always been very mindful about maintaining a healthy diet! I guess living (still) at my folks place hasn't helped me be a bit more diligent with what I consume!

3, 2, 1 blast off...

I turned 30 on Thursday. I felt sad on the eve of my birthday and on the day of my birthday, even though Mike took me out to lunch on my birthday - it was great but I just couldn't celebrate - there was nothing to celebrate... I blame it all on my anxiety over our house renovations which the plastering should have been done this week - but the guy we hired to do it has been sick this week and hasn't started! AHHHH!! I am going to give birth in about 10 weeks and we have no home! Our hallway STILL looks like this:
and our bathroom STILL looks like this:...and we need more money from the bank to get the job done! Because everything costs more than what you anticipated! Which is putting alot of stress on Mike and I financially.

Now tell me how you would feel about turning 30, nearly 30 weeks pregnant, having a toddler who hates his Mummy at the moment (everyone else is nicer and more fun), have a house that looks like a bomb has blasted into it and can't go home to, living off the kindness of parents and invading their home for way too long now, begging the bank to lend us a few more K's just so we can afford to put carpet and blinds in the bedrooms, thus bumping up our morgage more, a birthday gift from Mike which is on hold because we can't afford it and feeling FAT and SO helpless because I can't work to contribute to our finances or even help out Mike with the odd jobs that need to be done on the house. Instead I come here and vent it out on blogspot! How productive am I!

For the first time I wished I wasn't pregnant... because we wouldn't be in this situation and I could celebrate my 30th in big style - lots of champagne and soft cheeses!

...how horrible to think that.. I know...how selfish of me...

...but I had a good cry and a talk with dear hubby. (he's just as stressed as I am and he is juggling teaching, painting 2 commissions, painting for his exhibitions next year and entering art prizes and residency's so we have an extra income as well as trying to boost his career. And on top of all that, doing odd jobs on the house on the weekends like laying down the rest of the hallway floorboards, pulling out nails from the studs, pulling off the old doors and door jams, riping off the old cornices in the rooms, picking up our new doors, timber, and being very concerned with not being able to spend his weekends doing fun things with Morri & I.) :(

We came to the conclusion that, hey, what the F*%k can we do about it! - we've just got to hope that the house is finished in time for us to move back in and get Baby's room and Morri's room set up, and eat baked beans for a while!

29 weeks

I have been feeling really hungry lately - I read that in the 3rd trimester the nutritional needs of Baby increase as their brains develop rapidly and need more calcium for their growing bones! No wonder I feel like cheese all of a sudden!

Got the snores!

Oh no, my hubby told me last night that I have been snoring the last couple of nights! I am not a snorer and I am not a fan of others snoring too. Pregnancy does this to me.

I remember going for a lymphatic drainage massage - it was mainly for research purposes for my Remedial Massage course I was doing at the time, but I fell asleep during it as you do when you get a massage. I caught myself giving out a loud snort which woke me up! I felt quite stupid but pretended that I didn't notice I had done it.

I apologised to Mike about my snoring but he told me it didn't bother him, in fact it was quite cute! CUTE? huh? I told him that he is such a better person than me for this - because I hate it whenever he snores or breathes loudly whilst asleep next to me! I nudge him or cover his face - sorry Mike - I am so horrible to you sometimes! Is he tolerant to my snoring because he is a male and those things are frequently done by males? Like for instance farting or weeing on the toilet seat or using your towel to dry themselves rather than theres? (Mike just read this and he thinks I am bagging him out! - am I? see they are in denial again - refusing to accept their flaws! he he he) But on the whole scale of things, my husband tolerates and accepts all my insecurities, obsessions, crazy mood swings and peculiar ways of thinking that sometimes I can't even tolerate these traits myself!

Cats.

The house is quiet but our cat Leo - seems to be dreaming - he just gave out 5 loud meows in his sleep - how weird! He has been missing for 5 days. He turned up early this morning meowing out the front of my parent's bathroom window. Been a weird day today for cats... my childhood cat Pipi passed away in the middle of the night. She lived to a grand age of 23 years - thats 170 years in cat age! The last couple days her body just seemed to shut down. She couldn't manage to take her regular walk to the lawn where she would sit in the sun and do her business and drink out the fountain at the pond. Her legs could no longer carry her fraile old body. We would find her stranded in the middle of the lawn looking like she could not walk back to her bed. We had to keep bringing her back to her bed. We gave her water to drink but she didn't want to eat. We knew it was any day that should would die. She stopped looking after herself along time ago - and her fur began matting and falling out - she looked like death! But she was still strong.
Pipi was one of 3 other kittens in a litter we found trapped under our house when my sister, brother & I were young. My dad rescued them as the mother was nowhere to be found. So we adopted them. We fed them with cow's milk from a suringe and they slept at the base of our fridge as it was warm. The ginger kitten died soon after - as it seemed sick. We revived the long-haired tabby named 'Sugar'. We found her lifeless one morning so we stuck her on the ducted heating and she came back to life! We saved Pipi's life as she was the most strongest kitten out the the 3 from choking on the rubber tubing attached to the suringe while feeding her milk!

On the home stretch now!

Into my final trimester now, I feel like this pregnancy has flown by... Baby has turned itself around and is now head down - I anticipated this as I could feel the baby feeling uncomfortable having is bum pointing down. Anatomically - the space closest to the exit point for this newborn is alot narrower than the top of the uterus - it would make sense to lodge one's head in a smaller space than the rest of the body!! Then again there are the minute unborn bubs who choose keep their bottoms face down!! Knowing that baby is in the head down position puts my mind at ease - I was anxious about this with Morri and I was anxious with this Baby too! phewh! Now my next worry is that Baby's face is facing the right way when its time to birth- facing my anus!!

I remember the time when Morri was still growing inside me I felt him turn into the head down position. It was the middle of the night and I was half asleep and I could feel him 'scampering' with all his might to turn upside down.
The movements of Baby are so strong now - this morning while in the car Baby decided to stretch out one of its limbs into my right side just under my ribcage - WOW it gave me a good jolt! I am very ticklish and I get the giggles whenever this happens - I even catch myself laughing in the middle of the night if Baby starts moving about! Baby is tickling me at this moment while typing this. he he he!

22 weeks

I had my antenatal check up last week. All is going well and smoothly - baby's heart beat is of a good healthy beat!! My blood pressure is good, I feel good, despite feeling a little uncomfortable by the end of the day - achy legs & feet and tummy full of dinner! I wish I could do more exercise though - can only seem to fit in one session a week at the gym at the moment!! It's hard with a toddler and being so busy with our bathroom renovations. You can only fit in so much in a day!

I have been getting waves of Braxtons Hick's contractions lately. Mainly at night or when I do anything strenuous!... :)
I really should get someone else to take the photos!!...

19 weeks - ultrasound scan

This is baby number 2!!


And this is Morri when he was scanned at 19 weeks!!

The 'sonographer' was happy with what he saw; said baby's meaurements are all perfect!
This baby was very very quiet and very very still, the Sonographer had to try and make baby move so he could get better views of everything. He pressed the scanner really firmly on my belly - which made me want to pee and shook the scanner around to wake baby up!! Baby looked so peaceful on the screen!! Mike and I laughed because when we had Morri scanned, the Sonographer had to keep chasing him around as he wouldn't keep still, - and we are STILL chasing him around!!
BOY or a GIRL?

4 out of 6

We had Mother's Group this morning. We 'hung out' at Greensborough Shopping centre. They have a children's play area next to the food court- it's FREE not like those play centre's that cost nearly $10 per child!! So we will return there for next weeks Mother's Group. We are finding it hard to find a playgroup that suits us all so we are trying to come up with venues every week as our homes are getting too small for our busy toddlers!!

It's now safe to say that 4 out of 6 Mothers in our Mothers group are pregnant!! The first mum is due any day now; the next mum is due in June and then I am due in October and the last one - for this year is due in November. So we are all sharing ideas and suggestions on whether to toilet train; take our toddlers out of their cots and teach them the to sleep in a normal bed so we don't have to buy another cot or use a bassinet for the first 3 months for the newborn; considering a double pram or adding toddler seats or boards to their existing ones; purchasing a 2nd car seat and the list goes on!! 3 families including ourselves are renovating or extending their exisiting homes to accomodate the 2nd baby - and we all considered moving but it was going to be too costly for our single income families!!

2nd Trimester

I can feel the baby moving about now - only if I am lying down and quiet! Aparently baby is the size of an advocado. It's about 11.6cm from crown to rump and weighs about 100gms. Baby aparently has also discovered it's umbillical cord and likes to play with it!! In the next 3 weeks Baby should also have a growth spurt which will make my belly suddenly 'pop' out!! Got to start making some adjustments to my wardrobe soon...

I had my 2nd Antenatal appointment today at the Birthing Centre at Mercy Hospital. I took Morri with me. He is always a little scared when the midwifes take my blood pressure and even when I go to lie down on the table to have my uterus measured. He gives me this look of fear as if they were going to hurt me!!

All is good. I have no complaints, aches, pains or nausea! This is the nice part of the pregnancy where I am still not showing, I have energy to go to the gym and do 'other things', my boobs are big and perky again (yeah!), and I can still wear most of my normal clothes!!

13 weeks

I had gastro a few of days ago. I was sick for entire 24 hours. YUK!!

I had gastro when I was about 34 weeks pregnant with Morri. I remember I was still at work and I was throwing up in the ladies toilets all morning. I ended up going to the doctors after lunch and then I just made it to the chemist to get myself some rehydration salts when I threw up again in the car!! Luckily I took a big tupperware container from work with me!! I just hoped no one saw me in the parking lot phewking up my guts that day. Throwing up in the car is hard enough but with a 34 week old pregnant stomach - it was damn hard to bend over!!

Mike has returned from his adventure in Central Australia! And his welcome home present from me was gastro!! Poor thing was so fit and healthy while he was away, and when he returned home I had to give him gastro!! Sorry honey!! Men are much worse at being sick than women!! - Lots of moaning, groaning and cursing!!

12 weeks

This photo was taken at the end of 12 weeks. A slight belly!! (I had to take the photo myself - so it is me - that's as far as my arm would reach, so I couldn't get my head in the shot!)

11 weeks

I am feeling less tired during the day now and the nausea has almost gone - although it comes on in the late afternoon and stays until bedtime. THANK YOU GOD!! I thought it was never going to end...

Mike has been away this week - he's on 'Centre Trip' for work - every year the Year 10 students at his school take a road trip for 3 weeks up to the Northern Territory. Mike won't be back for another couple of weeks. Our plan was for Morri & I to stay with my parents for a bit for some R & R and to also be close while my mum as goes into hospital. But that plan soon ended as Morri has been missing his Daddy like crazy and has been very unsettled at night and really insecure during the day. Which is very unlike him. So we've had to go back home and we just come and play and hangout with my parents during the day. Morri was refusing to sleep in his cot - crying in histerics and even vomiting in result of the stress. He has been sleeping with me in my bed for security - he's afraid I will leave him too. What's worse was that being pregnant I have to take frequent trips to the toilet in the middle of the night. When I wake up to go, Morri wakes up crying thinking I was leaving him so I would have to take him to the toilet with me half asleep - tricky!!...
Mike usually puts Morri to bed at night and he likes to play and cuddle on the couch with his Daddy before he goes to sleep - so Morri is definately missing it. And you know babies, they need their routine and if it is altered in someway - it becomes a nightmare. How do you explain to a 1 year old that his Daddy is away in the middle of Australia and will be back in a couple of weeks? I just tell him that his Daddy is on the BUS! which he is - travelling all around Central Australia. Morri understands that we can talk to Daddy on the phone, so often during the day he asks to use the phone to call Daddy. I have also stuck big A4 size photos of Mike on Morri's bedroom wall - which he loves to look at point. He even gives the photos of his Daddy a kiss goodnight - how sweet.
So this week has been challenging, but last night was the first time he slept in his own room without me having to get up to comfort him in the middle of the night! Yeah! - only I couldn't sleep becuase I think I had too much chinese tea in the evening :( So things are getting better.

10 weeks

I went for my antenatal appointment today at the Family Birthing Centre at Mercy Hospital - it felt like I was there just yesterday!! The Midwife who saw me was very impressed that we mangaged to fall pregnant at the exactly the same time we did with Morri!! I told her we didn't plan for it that way!!
I was very happy with the care I was given throughout my pregnancy, during and after labour the first time round I thought I'd stick to it again this time round. Plus I liked the double bed birthing suites - Mike could stay the night too!! I

9 weeks

...this little one is just sucking all my energy...

8 Weeks

Today has been the first day that I haven't woken up feeling sick!! Yeah!! And for most of the day - I wasn't so nauseas! Still don't have much of an appetite - although I was craving McDonald's hamburgers - but only for a second and talked myself out of wanting it!!

7 Weeks.

By the end of this week, the bubs should be looking like this. How amazing!
...I am still feeling sick & tired...
I have discovered something...if I am horizontal (that is lying down) the nausea goes away!!