A pound a week!

Weight gain. It's so strange and a bit unnerving. I feel like the pounds are just packing on me like metal to Magneto. It just suddenly gets sucked onto my body somewhere and the scale goes up a notch.

According to the books, I'm right on track (I should have gained between 12-15 lbs at this point) but I swear, every time I step on that scale I'm a pound heavier. How is that possible? The baby only weighs 1 lb at this point...that's a lot of pounds of NOT baby.

I know, I know, it's good that I'm gaining weight. But it better stay at just a pound a week. Any more than that I will be over my allotted goal, officially turning into fatty bobatty.

But um...those mini burgers look good. So do those strawberries...pass them my way, wouldya?

23 weeks

I think the belly is plateauing a bit...


20 weeks



23 weeks

david beckam in the making!

Brian may be disappointed. This little guy may just forgo baseball and head straight to soccer. If the crazy kicks I'm feeling is any indication, we may have a future DBeck on our hands!

I love feeling the baby kick. It's hard enough now that Brian (and others!) can feel him too. I feel him throughout the day but he's especially active at night, around 10pm. We're a bit worried that he's a night owl which could make for unhappy, sleep deprived parents. We shall see.

Whenever the baby kicks a lot, I tell him, "Good job!" For some reason, that seems like an appropriate response. He likes to kick mostly on the right side. Recently, I've started to feel him kick the middle of my belly (like first thing this morning) but rarely does he kick on the left.

I think this is my favorite part of pregnancy so far. :)

baby's first hike

On Mother's Day, daddy, mommy, aunty Coco and uncle Casey took baby on his first hike. ;) Admittedly, I was a little worried about how "easy" this hike would be. But I was assured that it wasn't difficult and I felt better when I saw little 5-year-old girls on the trail with their parents. They didn't necessarily seem to be happy about hiking but hey, if they could do it, I could pull this off.

Luckily the Kamikakus were prepared for anything and their kick-ass gear got me through the trek.

Hiking poles were clutch. It took the strain off of my legs and especially my groin since the damn round ligament pain is here to stay. Toward the top of the 2 mile hike, there was some snow so Coco gave me these contraptions for my shoes -- like tire chains for your car but for your feet. Love them!!

Granted, I felt like a broken down car through most of the hike, but the weather was nice and the end of the the trail made for great photos.







All in all, two very enthusiastic thumbs up, fine family fun! ;)

baby planner creepiness

Yes, it is a real thing. Like wedding planning but for babies. Why do I know this? Because on Saturday Brian and I went to Babies R Us to try and register. We were there for 3 hours and only registered for 30 things. Apparently, this is an ongoing process. Luckily, I can edit/delete/add things to my registry online. Thank goodness!! I need to work on that over the next month or so. But I digress...

After our overwhelming trip to the circus that is this baby superstore, I solidified my desire for someone to just TELL ME WHAT TO BUY. Not a list of "suggested" items, but literally tell me exactly what to get -- the best brand, the most useful items for new moms -- stuff that I really need, not just stuff you want to sell me. That led me to wonder if there is such a thing as a baby planner. Google to the rescue and indeed, this is an actual industry. I found as my first few hits:

http://www.thebabyplanners.com/

http://www.sweetpeababyplanners.com/

http://www.seattlebabyplanners.com/index.php

There's even a National Baby Planner Association!
http://www.nationalbabyplannerassociation.com/

Clearly, I'm not alone. For a whopping $595 you can get the "essential" baby package at Seattle Baby Planners. There are also "deluxe" and "premier" packages with prices that are "negotiable."

Translation: These packages will cost more than the delivery of your child.

I would never hire a baby planner. It just seems creepy to me. But I suppose I can understand why women do it. One trip to Babies R Us is all it takes to push any woman over the edge.

and the hits just keep on coming...

Went for a walk yesterday and mid-way through noticed my groin was starting to hurt a little. Well, that's new. Luckily, there are benches all along the route I walk so I sat down a couple times to rest. Sitting seemed to make the pain go away.

I slowed down my pace for the last half of my walk and that seemed to help some. Got back to my car, stretched and went to pick up a few things at the grocery store. In the time it took for me to drive the short distance to the store, my muscles apparently clenched up -- or that's what it felt like, anyway. I got out of the car and, ouch. My groin hurt. Walking around the store to pick up 3 items was not fun. The more I walked though, the better it seemed to get. Kinda like I was warming myself up or something.

Got home and sat my butt down on the couch. Must. rest. legs. I still wasn't sure if it was my legs that was causing the pain or what. I wasn't too worried though cause it wasn't a sharp pain, more like a throbbing. And the pain was sort of where my legs meet my body so I figured it was some kind of weird rush of blood or a muscle ache. But when Brian came home and told him what was going on, he got a little concerned so I looked it up.

Yet ANOTHER common pregnancy symptom. It's called round ligament pain. There are these bands, "round ligaments," that are connected to your uterus. As your uterus grows, these stretch and can either cause sharp pains when you move suddenly or dull achy pains. Mine are the dull achy pains. It's common to feel it in your groin, especially after walking or physical activity. Lovely.

Check that off my list of pregnancy symptoms to plague me. But I'm glad to know it isn't anything serious. Plus, I don't feel it at all today so that's a good sign. I'm going to just have to slow down my walking pace a bit.

On a side note, I wonder what pregnant women did before google?

dry eyes. really?

A couple days ago I wore my contact lenses. I don't wear them that often so that night when my right eye felt really dry and irritated, I thought it was due to my contacts. But yesterday and now at this very moment, both of my eyes are extremely dry so I started to wonder if this was some kind of weird pregnancy symptom. Apparently, it is! Google tells me that there is a condition called "dry eye syndrome" that's caused by changes in hormone levels. Really? Hormones are becoming the bane of my existence.

I literally feel like scratching my eyes out or rubbing them constantly but I'm showing restraint because my mom always told me rubbing my eyes will give me wrinkles. We don't need to be compounding the problem.

So, I must endure it. I've put eye drops in but I suck at doing it and miss my eye all the time. What's next? "Can't hear syndrome?"