28 weeks

How big is baby: Hmmm...according to baby center, he is: two and a quarter pounds (like a Chinese cabbage) and measures 14.8 inches from the top of his head to his heels. He was over 2lbs 5oz last week, so this is off a bit. I hope we'll get an estimate of his size during Monday's ultrasound.

Weight gain/loss: +13lbs

Stretch marks: No

Sleep: If Chase sleeps through the night, then I sleep through the night.

Diet/Cravings/Aversions: I'm trying to eat healthier in advance of the gestational diabetes test on Monday, although I'm (we're) still eating Easter candy after dinner.

Exercise: Err...I'm walking more on my commute since the contractions have subsided some. It's actually about 3 miles a day. I think that counts!

The belly: Huge. See (coming) pictures above and below. Please ignore my terrible hair.

Symptoms: I'm having some lower back pain and have difficulty getting comfortable at night. I've been sleeping with a pillow between my legs, which helps. But I'm only really comfortable sleeping on my left side...for a while. I don't want to ALWAYS sleep that way, but after I flip to my right I'm not comfortable.

Movement: He has very active days (like last Friday and Monday) and then normal days. My uterus is already up to my ribs and the other day I was sitting in a meeting and Baby 2.0 was stretching his foot out right next to my rib. I loved it! There's nothing like worrying that your baby isn't moving enough (like last week) to make you appreciate all of this movement.

What's different this time: I am as big as a house and I feel like it. My belly is in the way. Last night I painted my own toes--it's the last time that will happen. I already have under-belly shirt cleavage. I feel like Homer Simpson!

What I'm looking forward to: Getting our house back together this weekend! We had almost every room painted last weekend (many thanks to Veronica and Josh who graciously let us stay at their house). The painters are coming this weekend to finish Chase's new room and the bathroom, where they took down the wallpaper. I also do not like the color that we picked out for the nursery, so they are repainting that room as well. While all of that is happening, we need to get the downstairs back together- secure bookshelves to the walls and put everything back on them, hang pictures, and decorate. We love how it looks so far and I'll post pictures when everything is back together.

Pregnancy-wise, I'm looking forward to seeing Baby 2.0 on the ultrasound on Monday morning.

Best moment of the week: Work-wise, it was Wednesday's release of this: http://aspe.hhs.gov/daltcp/napa/#DraftNatlPlan . It's the result of months of hard work with a lot of colleagues. I would put the experience up there with writing a dissertation, although far more people were involved, and this will have a much greater impact. Although it still needs to be finalized, the release of the draft was a big accomplishment.

Pregnancy-wise, the best moment was Wednesday afternoon when I felt Baby 2.0's hiccups for the 1st time! They were down by my pelvic bone which means he's no longer in the breech position (although they continue turning until like 35 weeks). Chase used to have the hiccups all the time, both when he was an inside baby and right after he was born. It's such a funny sensation.

27 weeks

Have I mentioned how fast this pregnancy is going? Maybe it's all the distractions I have (Chase, being sick, work, long to-do list)? This week is the start of the 3rd trimester already. Baby Boy will be here in 3 months!!

Even before I got sick, I was having contractions during the walking part of my commute to work. Nothing major, but I called the OB's office and they said to stop walking so much and to call back if the contractions continued or became regular or lasted a long time. I stopped walking on one leg of the trip and had fewer contractions.

When I was home sick, though, I was having some random contractions. Once it was in the middle of the night when I got up to use the bathroom. Another time the contraction lasted the entire time I was in the shower after sleeping until 10am. What concerned me about these contractions was that they were occuring while I was rested. And (warning: potential TMI ahead), I was leaking fluid. Of course I couldn't tell what fluid it was, but my last similar experience was when my water sprung a leak the day I gave birth to Chase. Add to that decreased fetal movement and I was worried.

So I called the doctor's office and got a referral for an ultrasound on Tuesday morning. Luckily, everything was fine. My fluid level was fine, cervix was long and strong, and the baby was good.  And of course I haven't had any contractions since then. I feel kind of silly for getting checked out for nothing, but I am reassured that everything is good.

Total weight gain: ?? 

Maternity clothes? Yes!

Belly button in or out? In and stretched.   

Sleep: Pretty good. Things were not good when Chase was sick or the following week when he was waking in the middle of the night and only wanted Mommy, but the last two night he slept through and so did I.

Best moment this week: Best pregnancy-related moment was seeing Baby L2 and hearing that everything is fine. Best non-pregnancy moment was my Valentine's dinner with Stephen on Monday. Carol babysat Chase (who was thrilled to see Carol) and we got dressed up and went out to a yummy French dinner.

Food cravings:  Nothing special, although I've been eating a lot of Valentine's Day chocolate...

Movement:Not that much, as I mentioned. The ultrasound showed that the baby is breech and facing my back so that's probably why I'm not feeling his kicks or jabs. He was moving during the ultrasound and I didn't feel it. (but on Friday--technically after this should have been posted-- he was kicking and jabbing all over the place. Go figure) 

Fitness: What's that?

Upcoming Pregnancy milestones: Gestational diabetes test (gross), ultrasound, and doctor's appointment on February 27. 

What I miss: Moving like a normal person. I've already started lumbering around. My boss even heard me grunting the other day while reaching under my desk for a pair of shoes.

Chase at 21 months!

Wow, I can't believe how fast Chase is growing up. I look back at old blog posts and can hardly believe this is the same little guy who was in my belly 2 years ago.

At 21 months, Chase is:

-On the mend--Finally! The antibiotics the doctor prescribed on Thursday for the ear infection and the nebulizer treatments have made a big difference. Chase is now eating normally again and acting like himself. I had almost forgotten how active he is! He still has bouts of coughing that sometimes make him gag, but they are fewer and further between. The coughing is still waking him up in the very early morning (5:40am today), but it is getting progressively later. His mama is feeling better too, although I still have a cold.

-Talking a lot- I know I say this every month, but he's really talking to us all the time. He's got two word phrases for everything. Chase pretty regularly says 4 or 5 word sentences. He is naming almost every animal, including "newt" and "rhino," counts to 12 or 13 (but often skips 9), and sings his ABCs. He even tried using a pronoun the other day ("me"), but we didn't know what he was talking about because he always calls himself "Chasey". While Stephen and I can understand almost everything he says, he is still pretty difficult to understand. But he's willing to try and say almost anything, which is great!

Some of Chase's funny lines:
               -"No, no squirrels" (yelling at the squirrels to get off the bird feeder)
              -"I don't want that."
              -"Mama, a'doin?" (this is still hilarious...and annoying)
              -"Mama come!" or "Abu come!"
              -"Abu eat da bone"

-Tilting his head to add emphasis to what he is saying- He cocks his head to the side and says "Daddy come?" to look innocent.

-Remembering- Chase names people based on pictures, even if he hasn't seen them in a while. He names all of his friends in school, as well as the teachers. He can even fill in lines from books that we commonly read.

-Thinks his baby brother should be named Noah...after one of his best friends at daycare. I actually like the name Noah, but Stephen does not. There's another problem: Our baby will not look like Noah because Noah's dad is African American. So Chase might be sorely disappointed (and confused) if he has a baby brother named Noah who doesn't look like his friend Noah.

-Still peeing on the potty...once a day. Chase goes potty after his bath. It's sort of a ritual now. Then he gets up (naked), laughs hysterically, runs into our room, and jumps on Mueller's bed. Just what you want on a just-washed naked toddler- dog hair. Now we know to chase him down as fast as possible and intervene before he can get in there. It's really funny.

-Into playing "bounce pass" with his Daddy. Chase and Daddy play a fun game where they bounce pass the ball to each other while Chase sits in his chair. This greatly improves his catch rate! Nowadays he is less interested in "shoot ball" and more interested in "bounce pass". Chase has been watching basketball on television with us as well and even cheers when the ball goes in the hoop!

Here are some of the other things Chase is into these days:

And Happy Valentine's Day!

Addendum

Chase now has an ear infection and bronchitis.

And he's on the nebulizer. Thank goodness for his favorite show (and app), Monkey See Monkey Do.

Sick sick sick

I had a cute post all ready to go (sans pictures) about the fun we had with Chase last week when he had pink eye...

...But  the daycare germs have struck again, knocking us all down for the count. That's right- RSV and croup/laryngitis. That translates to runny/stuffy noses, lots of coughing, very sore throats, fevers, difficulty breathing, and general lethargy. Ugh. Chase and I are on our 4th day and barely seeing any signs of improvement.

So send us your best get-well-soon wishes and stay tuned for more posts.

Christmas #3

Finally!

A few days after Christmas, we celebrated with the Zayacs. As you might expect, most of the day was focused on Chase and Addy. They were so cute together.

Who is that coming down the stairs???

Santa!

Addy was very interested in Santa.

(so was Mueller)

Maybe Addy wasn't a huge fan, but she was content in Santa's arms.

Chase was not so excited about Santa...

Oooh, presents!

Ut oh--Mueller took off Santa's eyebrow!

(Okay, not really. but this picture is hilarious)

Can you blame Chase for not wanting to sit with one eye-browed Santa?

 (at this point Meg and I were laughing so hard that I could barely take pictures)

 (phew, that's better!)

Chase did NOT want to sit with Santa...

 ...but he got more comfortable after a few minutes.

And he was obviously interested in the presents in Santa's sack!

After the fun with Santa, I started using my new camera lens. I caught some great shots:

Addy!

Chase cleaning

And Chase busy at work on the computer:

Unfortunately these pictures do not do justice to all of the fun we had, our delicious dinner, and all the wonderful gifts.

Merry Christmas!