18 Weeks

Me at 16 weeks

 

I am now 18 weeks, almost halfway through!  Baby Shepherd is the size of a baked potato this week; about 5.5 inches and 7 ounces.  I have started feeling actually pregnant now, and I caved and bought some maternity pants.  They are pretty awesomely comfortable compared to my normal jeans, which technically still fit, but dig into me all day.  They also smooth out my belly, making me look pregnant rather than just chubby, so that's a bonus.

I still haven't felt any movement that I can definitively say was baby, though I probably have felt flutters and not realized that's what it was.  On the doppler though the baby's heart is strong and he/she moves around, so I will probably feel it soon.

Baby has been giving me some unpleasant symptoms recently including shortness of breath and heart palpitations (all normal), but the worst is round ligament pain.  I had to call the nurse to see what it was because I thought I injured myself.  It feels like a pulled muscle on my left side and hurts every time I sit down, stand up, walk, or even breathe deeply.  It is very uncomfortable and makes me feel like I'm 80 years old hobbling around, but it's a very common pregnancy complaint and can happen throughout the second and third trimester...oh boy!  Apparently the ligaments holding my uterus in place don't like all the stretching that is required as baby grows.  But all in all, I'm doing great and enjoying the miracle of growing a life.

James and I are very excited to find out the gender coming up in a couple of weeks!  We bought a nice crib tonight off Craigslist for a good deal, so I am excited about that.  And we have signed up for a Bradley childbirth class that starts later this month.  There are so many things to do in the next 22 weeks so I'm glad to be checking a few off the list.  I can't wait for baby to get here, but I am thankful for the 9 months to prepare.

Lent

Ash Wednesday was a couple of weeks ago, and I had a hard time this year figuring out how to observe Lent.  I didn't grow up following the church calendar, so Lent is something that I choose to observe because I think it is a good way to ready my heart for Easter. In fasting from something in my life that is important to me, I am forced to have moments of discomfort, and in those moments I can stop and thank God for His ultimate sacrifice for my sins, and pray for those around the world who are in need.  Then when Easter comes, it is time to rejoice, because the sacrifice was paid, and Christ is risen!

This year I started reading a book called A Place At the Table by Chris Seay. This book encourages Christians to fast from actual food.  Not completely of course, but he suggests choosing the main foods of a third world country and only eating that for the 40 days of Lent.  His book also has 40 days of readings featuring people in poor areas of the world and the struggles they go through.  

I'm not following the book completely because I didn't think it was a good idea for me to eat only beans, rice, tortillas, etc., for 6 weeks.  Baby needs more diverse nutrients.  So instead I decided that I will make beans and rice once a week for dinner, and I will save any money that I normally would spend on myself for fun stuff and give it to a charity.  It's not much, but just a little bit helps me to remember what Christ did for me.

15 week update

I had my second midwife appointment last week.  It was fun because I got to hear the heartbeat! It was hovering around 160, which is a good number.  If you go by the old wives tale, that means I'm having a girl, but we'll see.  I don't put much stock in those...they are always 50/50! I still think I'm having a boy. We'll get to find out sometime in March.

I like my midwife so far.  She's natural birth/low intervention oriented, but still delivers in a hospital, which I think is the best of both worlds.  Hopefully it turns out that way.

Big news!



Our little blessing, so cute already!

So I haven't been very good at updating the blog this year, but I have a good excuse.  I'm pregnant!! I found out December 1st, but wanted to keep it a secret until 12 weeks, and since that was pretty much all I thought about for two months, the blog suffered.  But now I can talk about it!

We are so thrilled to welcome baby Shepherd (yes, just one in there!) this August! I'm 14 weeks now and past the ugly first trimester.  Actually, I didn't have it too bad, I was mostly just exhausted and nauseous if I didn't eat something every hour or so.  I had about a month of feeling pretty gross, but it definitely could have been worse, so I am thankful. I started to feel a little more normal around 11 weeks.

This week the baby is the size of a peach!  I am feeling good for the most part.  I am still tired a lot, and I seem to be always hungry.  I still fit in most of my clothes, although I had to retire my tightest pair of jeans today.  In about a month or so we get to find out if its a boy or a girl and I can't wait!  I have lots of ideas for the nursery.

Well it's time for me to go to bed, but I'll leave you with a couple of pictures.  And hopefully I'll have time/energy to post more often.

10 weeks

13 weeks

14 weeks, getting harder to hide the bump.

Snow!

 

We've been having sub-freezing temperatures lately, and it finally cooperated and gave us some snow!  4-6 inches is the most we've gotten since we moved here, it's so pretty! This makes the 14 degree weather a little more bearable.  And on the plus side, it's supposed to be in the 50s next week, yay! 

What I'm Thankful For

I know this is super late, but I wanted to post what we are thankful for this year!  Every year James and I like to write down things we are thankful for and put them in a jar.  Then on Thanksgiving we read together all the things we are thankful for this year.

This year we are thankful for:

Our house
Kari
My wonderful husband
My job (James)
Kari's sense of humor
My health
A great church body and lots of good friends
The freedom to vote
God's sovereignty
Potatoes, garlic bread, pasta, chocolate, fruit, queso, and ice cream (all my favorite foods! haha)
The ease by which I can obtain information: i.e., the internet
Clean water, plumbing, healthcare, AC/heat
Safety and security

We have a lot to be thankful for!

My girls

Some of you may know that I co-lead a youth girls group with my church.  Every Monday, 6 or so girls ages 14-18 come to my house.  We eat loads of snacks, we chat and giggle wildly like only girls can do, and then we dive into Bible study.  We just finished up studying the book of James, and boy is it relevant!  We discuss things like what the Bible says about showing favoritism, controlling your tongue,  mercy and judgment, the relationship between works and faith.  And the girls ask us and each other real questions, hard questions, about what it looks like to be a Christian in their world.  I only get them for an hour and a half a week, but boy do I love them!

And I still can't believe I'm doing this leadership thing.  I've never been drawn toward teaching, it's just not my thing.  I'm not good with words.  Plus, I was homeschooled through highschool, so what do I know about what my girls experience every day?  But for some reason, God nudged me to do it.  I knew it was from Him because the desire to teach could not be coming from me!  I feel incredibly blessed to get to know these sweet girls, and incredibly intimidated because I am a role model for them, and I do not want to lead them astray.  They are not afraid to discuss the hard stuff and Nicole and I have to be ready to speak truth in areas where the world speaks lies.  They keep me on my toes and I find that I am so glad that I was taught the Bible growing up and that I have that Christian foundation to draw from.

Next year we are doing So Long, Insecurity by Beth Moore and I'm looking forward to it!