24 week belly shots!

These were taken after I went to my friend Kristin's baby shower, from Brian's phone, which is why they are kinda crappy in quality. The little black figure by me feet is Big City, our 9 1/2 month old dachshund. He is going through a huge "mommy" phase, as we call it, where he has to be by my side at ALL times. If I go to the bathroom, he lies outside the bathroom door, if I go downstairs, he waits at the top of the stairs by the gate. I have stepped on him close to a hundred times since I don't realize he is behind me and I can't see my feet that well anymore. It is cute, but annoying. I think I will have a hard time introducing him to the baby...he won't like having his attention time shared, ha!

Homemade stuff

Here are some pics of some of the stuff I have made. I still have plans to make more baby jackets, baby fleece pants, booties, another teddy bear or two, a snuggle animal blanket, more hats and more blankets. I love love love doing all this!! It is a great way to do baby stuff without spending tons of money! I still need to perfect my sewing technique, my lines aren't always the straightest, but oh well, the baby won't notice!
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A blanket made out of the teddy bear fabric below, and the back side is cute yellow and green and orange stripes.
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A couple winter hats, one is sweatshirt fleece and one is baby fleece. I have been playing around with the accent stitches my machine can do. The stitches on the brown and purple hat are little flowers. So cute! I have a couple different patterns for hats that I will be trying out as well.

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These two pics are of the same teddy bear I made. It is is not yet finished, I plan on making some clothes for it and I still have to finish sewing the backside where I put in the stuffing, I just need to get a better colored thread. The eyes are a little lopsided, but then again, so is my brain. I already have a different kind of fur to make a second bear out of. We call this the "Bella Bear".

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Here is the fabric that top blanket is made out of. It has a bunch of different teddy bears on it going every direction. Also out of this will be booties and a hat and possibly little pants if I have enough fabric left over.
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Here is a jacket I made. She won't be able to wear this til late winter, early spring, but it too is out of the teddy bear fabric. This was my first attempt at anything this complicated, so I have to say I was quite proud that I could read the pattern and somewhat recreate what it is supposed to look like :)

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The point of viability!!

Wohoo!! We have reached the point of viability, which means if the baby has to be born early or if I go into preterm labor, starting this week, she can survive, with the odds going in her favor each week from here on out!

Today starts the 24th week. According to my baby journal, this also marks the start of the third trimester, but I am not considering myself there until May 21st, week 27. Getting close though! Tomorrow is our monthly ultrasound, which I am very excited for!!! Hopefully I will get more pictures of the baby. Brian and I will try to get some belly pics and post those as well, since it has been about 3 weeks and we are due for some updates.

I have been sewing like a crazy woman lately. Since I am not doing anything else for baby right now, this is my nesting. Mom got me a sewing machine for channukah, and I have really just started to use it. So far I have made a few blankets, a bunch of burp clothes, a few adorable hats, a sweater/jacket, a huge teddy bear that still needs to be finished (it is stuffed, it just needs to be closed up, I just have to buy better colored thread) and snuggly blanket thing that has a lambs head up top and is made of fleece. My sewing skills need some fine tuning, but I am pretty impressed figuring I haven't had a sewing class since 7th grade. Just like I can't cut straight to save my life, I can't sew that straight either, but I am working on it!

Amanda, my sister-in-law, sent me 3 huge boxes of baby Hayden's girl clothes, so I may never need to go shopping for a wardrobe! They are amazing!! And she sent me an awesome Kate Spade diaper bag!! I have been looking for a diaper bag I like, and haven't found anything remotely cute in a decent price range, so when I opened the box and saw it, and loved the design, I was beyond thrilled!!! Thanks Amanda and Hayden!

Ok, here is the update on little BellaReese, mommy's favorite jumping bean:

How your baby's growing:

Head to heels, your baby now measures about 13 1/2 inches. Her weight — a pound and a half — isn't much more than an average rutabaga or roughly the length of one of those recorders you played in elementary school music class or the length of a half gallon of milk!, but she's beginning to exchange her long, lean look for some baby fat. As she does, her wrinkled skin will begin to smooth out and she'll start to look more and more like a newborn. She's also growing more hair — and if you could see it, you'd now be able to discern its color and texture.

Get ready for pat-a-cake! Baby's hands are now fully developed and she spends most of her awake time groping around in the darkness of your uterus. Brain and nerve endings are developed enough now so that your baby can feel the sensation of touch. That doesn't mean she can feel it when her father pokes your stomach, however, so tell him to knock it off. Other highlights include: Your baby's arms and legs have grown to almost the proportions they will be at birth, which is still sort of short. So don't be alarmed when your newborn's arms barely clear his waist. Baby's nostrils, which have been plugged up until now, clear out (like she's taken a super-dose of Sudafed) and she can practice breathing through the nose. The structures of your baby's spine are now made up of 150 joints, 33 rings and some 1,000 ligaments. Can you believe you're growing something that complicated inside of you? The capillaries, the teeniest blood vessels, are now forming in your baby's body, giving her formerly translucent skin a pink glow. The blood vessels in the lungs also develop this week. You'll see how well that worked out when your baby gives those lungs a workout while you're on line at the bank in a few months.

Your Body:

Pregnancy leg cramps are not your ordinary run-of-the-mill leg cramps. Nope, a pregnancy leg cramp will often have you leaping out of bed screaming at the top of your lungs (this happens all the time now, not only during the night...in the middle of sewing or lying on the couch...fun times). Leg cramps can be caused by a calcium deficiency, so be sure to get enough calcium. Believe it or not, there's calcium in almonds, fish, broccoli and tofu. While they come with the territory of pregnancy, there are ways to avoid leg cramps, like warm soaks and massages. Sometime between Weeks 24 and 28, you'll get your glucose screening test to check for gestational diabetes (we have ours on may 27th, when I will be 27.5 weeks along). You'll have to drink this really syrupy, sugary soda drink, wait an hour, and then have your blood sugar levels tested to see how your body handles the sugar rush.

Dr. Appt Wednesday

Bella and I went to the Doc on Wednesday morning, and everything is looking good! Baby is growing well, heartbeat sounds strong, and I am doing well on the weight gain side of things. Next appointment, we have to do the glucose test to test for Gestational Diabetes and I have to get some blood drawn to see if the baby has a Negative or Positive blood type, other than that...not much to report from the visit!

Last night was probably the worst of the of pregnancy. Starting around 7pm, I realized I hadn't felt the baby kick in the last hour or so, nor had I really felt her all day, so I tried all the tricks I knew to get her to show me some sign of life, like drinking something with sugar, lying on each side, pushing where her legs are, etc... but nothing!! I went to bed around 9, tried all the tricks again, and no movement or anything. I tried controlling my breathing and meditating and calming down, but she was motionless and my tummy was oddly still. I considered going to the ER, but I decided to wait til morning. I tried to sleep, and occasionally fell into a weak sleep, but a few hours later, no movement still. It was a really rough night, to say the least. Brian tried to tell me not to freak out, but I couldn't help it...she has never not moved when I poke or prod at her for extended periods of time. Finally, after a sleepless night, I was lying in bed with Brian before having to get ready for work, about to tell him if I don't feel her by the end of work, I was going to the doctor, and lo and behold, after hearing the threat of the Doc, she gave me a big ole kick to the belly button and made my whole stomach ripple and hasn't been still since!! It was the greatest kick I have ever received!!! I almost cried! If I wasn't so tired, I probably would have! Now that the crisis is over, I am just looking forward to the Ultrasound on Monday so we can make sure she is getting all the blood flow/air she needs to put all my fears aside again :)

23 weeks, 17 to go!

BellaReese is so fantastic, she is letting Brian feel her kick and punch all the time now. I am having fun smooshing my belly and figuring out what makes her move. She prefers it when I don' have a full bladder and does not like taking a bath and being submerged in warm water....Both of those actions make her as still as a statue. I am starting to try to figure out what makes her happy and what makes her sleep, etc... Things are progressing really well (knock on wood) and we are very excited that we are getting closer to meeting her. I started washing all the little clothes that Erin has sent us as well as the few pieces I picked up from the big consignment sale I went to back in March. Brian and I registered at BabiesRUs the other day and had so much fun just looking at all the small things our little girl will need. It was tiring and overwhelming, but we found some great stuff. Dad, for you we put on some old fashioned radio-flyer airplane/car thing that she can be pushed around in! Brian is very excited about that one! Let's see...any other big news???? We have an OB appointment on Wednesday AM and an ultrasound a week from Monday.

I started using my sewing machine again and made some little burp rags and blankets and a little hat; I will keep doing stuff like that since I am on a strict "no-buy anything for baby" rule. I can't wait til we get some colors on the walls of her nursery and get the room all ready for her homecoming!!! I have some mad nesting cravings going on!

Next week starts the point of "viability" meaning that if, god forbid, she has to be born early, she has a greater chance of surviving outside of the womb with each passing week. We are holding out for a full term baby, of course, but there is a little relief in knowing that she could survive if she had to come out!

Oh, and we found out that babies can CRY in the womb!! If I get scared or anxious or if I cry or have a fight with Brian, she can sense the tension and cry too!! The thought of my little girl crying and me not being able to stop it or me being the cause of it makes me want to cry!!! But I can't cuz then she will!! Poor baby!!!!

OK, so here is what's new with little Isabeau this week:

How your baby's growing:

Your baby's growing steadily, having gained about 4 ounces since last week (That is an exact image of how she is in the womb right now, except she is facing the right, but her feet are down on my cervix and she is headbanging into my ribs). That puts her at just over a pound. Since she's almost a foot long (picture an ear of corn), she cuts a pretty lean figure at this point, but her body is filling out proportionally and she'll soon start to plump up. Her brain is also growing quickly now, and her taste buds are continuing to develop. Her lungs are developing "branches" of the respiratory "tree" as well as cells that produce surfactant, a substance that will help her air sacs inflate once she hits the outside world. Her skin is still thin and translucent, but that will start to change soon.

She'll gain a ½ pound this week alone (holy huge baby!). Other highlights this week: Things are starting to get a little crowded inside the old womb as baby grows bigger and bigger. Your ribs are probably pining away for the good old days when they didn't have a head or an elbow permanently lodged between them (I have been having awful rib pain these last few days, every time I lie down on my side which is every night since I have to sleep that way permanently, I feel like my rib cage is going to crack...She LOVES to play the xylophone with my ribs already!!!). Hate to break it to you, but it's going to get worse before it gets better (Great!! Can't wait!). Your baby's ears are fully functional now. And since they are, you may notice that loud noises and sudden movements can startle the little bugger. (We just bought a little Einstein's classical music CD that we are playing for her...there is no real proof that making her listen to music makes her smarter, but as Brian says, anything that might help, lets do it!) She's getting used to the everyday sounds inside the womb: the sound of your heart beating, your lungs inhaling and exhaling air, the growling of your stomach because your partner promised he'd be right back with that Arby's Chicken sandwich and he's taking forever! She'll even be able to hear your voice when your partner finally arrives and you ask him where the bleep he's been! So talk nice (hahahaaha! That would be how our conversation would start!) Baby's got a fully developed inner ear now. This means her sense of balance is working and she can tell whether she's hanging upside down or right side up. She can also feel you moving, so go ahead, pop in your favorite tunes and boogie (Just the image of me and my preggo belly dancing around makes me laugh!!). Your little Wiener schnitzel is about the length of a foot-long Chicago hot dog and weighs about 1 1/3 pounds.