15 Weeks Prego & Nursery Ideas!

Photo courtesy of formatbrain

**A bonus post for this week. I'm getting anxious to get you guys caught up because the more posts I write, the more questions I have; and I'm excited to hear your feedback!**

Call me superstitious, but it's really hard for me to type this (as if it's somehow going to jinx my progress), but I do believe the nausea is over! YAY! WOO! PARTY! I'm on day five of no nausea, and oh baby, I'm so excited! But, there has been a little dark rain cloud following me around since day two of nausea-free heaven--a sore throat and runny nose. Turns out the runny nose is typical with prego women; there's even a name for it: rhinitis of pregnancy. I refuse to believe that this is going to be "the norm" for me; I'm just amused that they picked such a funny-sounding word to categorize it.

I went in for my checkup earlier this week. My midwife said she doubts that I've actually felt the baby before now. Sigh. Now I'm doubting my abilities to feel the baby; but legit or not, he/she's still precious and I'll be feeling plenty soon enough!

On the whole gender issue: since we're not finding out, I've been trying to figure out my mental game plan in preparing for the birth. Should I . . .

A) Not think about it at all?

B) Trust my intuition and plan on whatever "I'm sure I'm having"?

C) Scour Chinese calendars, heart rate charts, and everyone else's gender stories (a friend recently told me that since my appetite is so much bigger than my first, she thinks I'm having a boy) to try and figure it out? (For the record, according to these theories, I'm having a boy, girl, boy respectively :) Maybe I should get out a key, tie my ring to a string, and examine my protruding belly too. Majority wins, right?

D) Plan on a girl? Get super excited about a girl. Then, no matter what the outcome, I'll be super geeked and ready to jump in with two kiddos.

Veteran moms, what say you?

I'm also taking suggestions for baby nicknames. The rules: It's gotta be gender neutral, not too cutesy (that's just not my style), and unique. Easy, right? So far we've called our baby "our little lemon" (because the last email said it was the size of a lemon" but this week we've already graduated to an apple, and I've used baby ninja (since I thought I already felt it move).

Now that the nausea has passed, it's time to start planning and thinking about this baby. But, it's not just about baby number two, it's also about making a smooth transition for baby number one. What can I do to make her feel special and not neglected? How can I prepare her for the changes? How can I make our time alone as special as possible? How will I budget for a family of four? Etc. Again, any input is welcome!

Lastly, a quick list of differences between this pregnancy and last (in case it turns out to be a boy, I want to be able to look back and see if there were any indicators I could tag). Nausea was definitely worse this time around--especially the throwing up. My appetite is much bigger this time--and second trimester is worse than first. Not only do I have to eat every couple of hours, I have the appetite for it, and I find myself able to consume more food than usual. I also find that if I don't consume a decent amount of food, I get hungry again really quickly. I'm definitely showing a lot faster, but from all that I've read, that's completely normal. That's all I can think of for now.

I've started a bookmark folder in my browser for nursery and baby ideas. What do you think of this giraffe print (pictured above) as the theme? I love the colors, the use of trees, and, of course, the giraffes!

Oh, and for a quick read, one woman's thoughts on using her pregnancy as a motivator to become more healthy. This is very similar to my experience during my first pregnancy.

8-9 Weeks Preggo

I'd like to set the record straight for those of you who haven't been pregnant yet and are worried about crazy cravings.

To begin with, I can't think of a single person I know (and I've got lots of friends with kids) who had a desperate moment when she woke up at two in the morning, grabbed her hubby's shirt, and pled with desperate eyes and a frantic voice, "I need pickles and ice cream now!"

Now, I'm not saying this doesn't happen to anyone; but from my experience, there's a more realistic scenario to expect:

More than dealing with cravings, I've had to deal with what DOESN'T sound good. To be honest, this ends up being more of a factor because after you've eliminated everything that doesn't sound good, there's not much left to choose from. This is even more difficult if you're dealing with nausea. You need to eat every couple of hours; but there's so much that doesn't sound good that your variety is limited--and if you're eating the same things over and over, those items quickly graduate to the doesn't-sound-good list because you're sick of eating them.

As for craving something . . . I have had foods that I either see on TV or hear someone talking about that sound good, and that food just gets stuck in my head. I want to eat it, but many times I don't actually eat the food for a few days, so it's nowhere near the must-have-now syndrome.

There are a few foods that I've wanted more than once. With my first pregnancy I ate quite a few burgers (and I had been off of red meat before the pregnancy) and grapefruit. The only reoccurring craving so far with this second pregnancy has been Japanese food. I think the main reason is because it's generally more bland than other foods I regularly ate pre-pregnancy (i.e. Mexican).

It's probably important to note as far as crazy cravings (e.g. a friend of mine craved marshmallow cream--straight from the jar!), it's hard to say with me. I love cooking. I love new things. I love love love pickled things--so pickles, olives, sauerkraut, etc. are all common players in my diet. The only thing I can think of that would be "strange" for me to eat would be the stuff I'm slowly eliminating for health reasons--processed prepackaged foods, foods with high fructose corn syrup or MSG, canned food, etc. And right now, those things haven't had much appeal, so I've been doing pretty well.

As for nine weeks progress--not a lot has changed for my day-to-day living. I'm finding strategies that work for fending off nausea--crackers before I even get out of bed and waiting 20 minutes to get up; toast/rice cakes with honey; avoiding high-sugar items, fried foods, and dairy; etc. I was eating a lot of yogurt at first, but now I'm starting to think that's the reason I wasn't feeling good--I eat very little dairy usually. I also switched from my prenatal to kids' gummy vitamins. I'll switch back once my stomach settles down.

My little peanut is about an inch long, but since this is my second pregnancy, he/she's already making its presence known in the form of a small baby bump. We'll get our pregnancy-confirmation ultrasound next week. I'm still super super nervous that it's going to be twins. I think I might cry if it is. Of course, I'll be fine with it; it's just really overwhelming to think of right now.