Dr visit and first birth class

Our OB said:
1.  that I'm measuring perfectly on schedule
2.  she expects me to go full term
3.  the baby's heartbeat is great
4.  my blood pressure's great
5.  even though my weight is high, I'm still ok
6.  that my belly looks so much larger than most because I'm so short. 
7.  and most importantly:  THERE IS NO POSSIBLE WAY I'M CARRYING MULTIPLES!

We had a good visit, although I was heartbroken that I gained 8 pounds since the last visit and now weigh 166. 

After our appointment, we met up with the Olexia's for dinner.  Molly looks gorgeous!  She's 25 weeks along and looks fantastic!  It was great to see them and catch up!  Ryan seems to be having some cravings too...so he must be having sympathy cravings.  :)

Afterwards, we went to our first birthing class.  It was very informative, but different than we had expected.  It was more of an information class.  We have 3 more that will follow the same pattern.  We talked a lot about preterm labor and real labor and all that entails.  Most of the information I already knew, but some of it was new and very helpful.  It was neat to see the other mom-to-be's...our due dates are all within 4 weeks of each other,  It was neat to see how my size compared to others. 

Alright...next update will be week 32!

31 weeks

We are in the single digits!!!!  Only 9 more weeks to go!!!  :)  Although....neither Mama or Papa Nodi think I'm going to make it til May 30...

This was the last week of playing piano and I can't wait to see what difference that makes on my hands.  My hands are just so swollen and painful!  I'm pretty low-moderate with my sodium and drink LOTS of water, so I can only think that it's the excessive amount of piano playing that has inflamed this.  I've spent a couple nights and afternoons in tears because it hurts so much.  Thursday, choir festival, was a pretty long day-but all 6 of my groups sang well!  Friday morning, however-I woke up in tears because my hands were so swollen and hurt so bad.  I hope that this will subside a little now that I'm done playing piano until after delivery.

Friday night, I learned 4 really important things:
1.  I am a bad baker
2.  While it seemed like a good idea in the beginning....blue cake actually looks pretty darn gross.
3.  I wish I had paid more attention in art class...because when you mix yellow cake mix and blue food coloring-you DEFINITELY get green.  And then when you add green food coloring to help make it darker...it definitely turns into a very weird color.
4.  Despite how gross the cake looks....I still ate it...and it was good. 

Saturday night I learned ONE IMPORTANT THING:  I must make a cake like this for the Final Four and the National Championships because OBVIOUSLY my cake inspired WVU to spank Kentucky!!!!  And BTW, @#$)(*@#@!( you referees, Cousins, and Wall!   

Heartburn reared its ugly head this week.  I'm SURE it wasn't the enormous amount of horseradish sauce I ate with my pork chops, right?  The Tums with calcium did very little to help...so I"m trying to avoid some of the foods that made it worse.  And to eat foods that help more.  Would anyone call me a liar if I said that cake, cupcakes, cookies, brownies, and ice cream are foods that help you avoid heartburn and help soothe it?  ...anyone?  ....going once.....twice.....

Well, this little one is definitely on more of a schedule these days.  She naps at relatively the same time every day, wakes up about the same time.  And...is the most active at the same times each day.  I love anticipating her movements...although some of them are wicked painful.  I've also started experiencing the Braxton-Hicks contractions.  They don't hurt, but the first few really freaked me out.  We start our birthing classes on Monday so I hope to learn more! 

Nursery Update:  Here's a picture of Kris' blueprint of the closet design and then a picture of what the closet will sorta look like when done:

Mama and Papa Nodi came to visit this weekend!  Kris and Papa Nodi spent their time working on the closet construction.  Click HERE to see more pictures of the closet construction.  We are up to Phase 11 and 12.  Teri and I went to Babies R Us and ordered the furniture and will be moving it into the nursery in 3 weeks.  So...Kris has 3 weeks to finish the closet, install the fan, put a door in the room, and steam clean the carpets.  No pressure, eh?  Kevin and Bridget surprised us with a visit!  They came up after the VICTORIOUS WVU VICTORY!  Kev helped John and Kris with the closet...and even gave Kris an opportunity to use his new 3 ton jack to change Kev's tire! 

Gram and Pap had to take some time to talk to the baby during all the construction!

I had an emotional moment while we were in Babies R Us getting the furniture.  I know I'm pregnant...I see that I'm pregnant...but it all seems kinda surreal.  When we were buying the furniture and looking around at clothes it hit me that I was going to be a mom.  I was going to have a baby.  It was really happening....I started crying.  I'm just so excited and happy. 

OK...so we also had a funny moment at Babies R Us.  I was sitting down ordering the furniture when I realized I was really thirsty.  Teri went to the front of the store and bought me a bottle of water. When she came back, she gave me the water....and handed me a gift receipt just in case someone questioned me about the water.  Did you catch that?  THEY GAVE HER A GIFT RECEIPT FOR A BOTTLE OF WATER.  We laughed about that for a while!  Do you think the would let me exchange it for a better looking bottle?  Or, how about a bottle in a different size?  Perhaps a different color? 

Here is a week 31 picture.

 

30 weeks

~Fat fingers, painful joints, and leg cramps.  That's what this week brought.  :)  My hands and finers are wicked swollen, making playing piano quite a challenge.  My knuckles actually hurt and are very swollen...this just stinks all the time.  And, I'm starting to get more frequent leg cramps.  I know these are normal things...and I know I'm fortunate because I've had a relatively "easy" pregnancy....but it still stinks.  :(
~This week, I had to take the 3 hour glucose test which was nasty.  The aftermath of the blood draws can be shown below.  But, at least the results came back normal...that's GREAT news!

~While reading my Parent's magazine, I was introduced to the wubanub pacifier.  These look really neat!  We got one for Kellan and it's sooo cute!  :)
~The nursery is still in progress.  Kris has cut the wood for the closet and is going to be putting polyurethane on them so he can start assembling the closet! 

~Here are some fun 30 week pictures:

One of my favorite people, Aly, gave me the bib at Solo and Ensemble.  She told me her dad picked it out!  So...thanks Mr. Engle!!!  :)  And...as you see, my shirt won't go over my belly...

10 more weeks to go!

NORMAL!

The 3 hour glucose test came back normal.  :) 

YAY!!!

3 hour Glucose screening test today...

So...I left a little before 8 this morning and was very happy to see that the morning "rush hour" wasn't too bad to Annapolis!  I got there, driving the speed limit, in under an hour!  I went to the office well equipped!  I brought my new book "Not Without Hope", a bag full of two full water bottles (20 ouncers), banana, roll of wheat crackers, and a Kudos bar.  I knew I was going to need to eat as soon as the last blood draw took place.

• At 8:58, She drew my blood to get a baseline reading...that wasn't too bad at all. 
• She gave me the glucola drink.  That was simply nasty.  It was double the concentrate/sugar as the one I took last week AND she timed me.  I had to chug it in under 5 minutes.  The whole time I thought I was going to throw it up!  
• I waited an hour in the lobby.  I realized about 10 minutes in that my feet didn't touch the ground if I sat correctly in the chair so I was VERY uncomfortable.  At 10:02 I went back for my second blood draw.  This one came out of my right arm.  Well....this was evil.  This is the arm I'm having trouble with (carpal tunnel and swelling).  Somehow the skin was tougher, or something, on that arm.  The needle hurt so bad going that I, involuntarily, screamed.  Horrid....
• At 11:02 I went back for my third blood draw.  This went into my left arm.  Apparently, I was getting so dehydrated that my veins weren't working properly?  She got the needle into the crook of my arm and couldn't get any blood.  She started twisting and turning the needle WHILE IN MY VEIN trying to get some blood.  That didn't work.  So...she had to discard that needle.  She then went into the vein in my forearm.  Oh My Gosh...that hurt.  I thought I was going to cry....seriously though, I've really built up a tolerance to needles after all the IVF stuff...so you can imagine how much that must've hurt.  I almost passed out and had to stay seated in her chair for about 10 minutes before I could move.
• At 12:02 I went back for my final draw.  By this time. I was pretty faint.  A couple nurses had to check on me before this final draw.  She had to use the vein on top of my left hand....which wasn't pleasant but hurt way less than the previous two.  
• I went back to the lobby, drank an entire 20 oz water bottle and ate a banana.
• I headed over to the mall and got a coffee and a blueberry muffin.  I also ate half the sleeve of wheat crackers and headed home.  I was feeling pretty yucky from the nausea and the faintness and knew I needed a BIG feast to return me to normal!  Soooo......
• Alli and Kellan met me for brunch at IHOP.  I have never eaten so much in my entire life.  I ate:
• 3 scrambled eggs
• 3 pieces of toast
• 3 pieces of sausage
• 3 pancakes
• breakfast fruit bowl
• tall glass of OJ
• Now I'm home and in desperate need of a nap.  The lab butcher...oops I meant the lab tech said I should get the results tomorrow so I hope that everything is fine.

On an AWESOME note....I think I have figured out what had caused the major weight gain!  I weighed myself at the office today and I weighed EXACTLY the same thing I had a week ago!  That's pretty awesome since before I had been averaging 10-15 pounds every 4 weeks!  So I'm hoping that I'll be gaining weight more healthily from this point to the end. 

I'll post the results when I get them....now it's nap time for me and Oreo!

 

29 weeks

Can you believe we are just 11 weeks away???  AAAAHHH!!!! 

Nursery update:
Kris finished the baseboards and the trim.  They look AAAAWWWWEEESOME!  Here are a couple pictures...but click HERE to see more.  We are up to phase 10!  I think next weekend he is building that cool storage thing in the closet!  We are still looking like we are on track to be able to start moving in furniture at the beginning of April!!!!

Me update:
Baby's kicking up a storm!  She's been moving around constantly and I can see her moving all the time!  My favorite thing is when she starts to "dance" and I can feel flutters and kicks and punches all over my belly!  It's amazing to know that's our baby in there!  I was watching a baby show they showed a delivery of a baby at 7 months (where we are now)...and it blew my mind that our baby was that size right now!!!!  My carpal tunnel still stinks and my fingers and hands are really swelling and hurt.  So far...my feet just hurt but haven't started swelling.  The biggest problem for me lately is that I'm so tired.  I can't sleep at night because I'm so uncomfortable.  I've tried different positions, pillows, etc...and still haven't found much relief.  So..during the day I'm just exhausted and need a nap.  As you may have read in my previous post, I did not "pass" my glucose tolerance test.  So, on Wednesday I'm going to go back and take the longer test.  I guess about 20% of women end up having to take the longer test, and of them only 2-4% are actually diagnosed with gestational diabetes...so I'm still hopeful that I'm fine.  I'm just not looking forward to sitting up there in that office for 3+ hours. 

Well, here is a week 29 picture!   Kris made me smile REAL big...I feel like my face is about to explode!

Bad glucose test

Well....our OB just called to tell me that I did not "pass" my glucose test.  She said my levels were elevated and that I needed to come in next week and take the extended glucose test.  So...I'm going in on Tuesday or Wednesday for the test.  Bummer....

Good week 28 doctors visit

Today I had my 28th week check up.  My mom and dad picked me up and took me there!  I had to time out my meals today and drink my glucola drink for that glucose test.  We got up there in great time and I was able to get my bloodwork done on time!  I just have to wait for those results.  The other parts of the check up were GREAT!  I only gained 5 pounds this month!  :)  That's my smallest amount of weight gain this whole pregnancy!  I was pretty happy with that, especially since I've been more careful with my food intake.  :)  We got to hear the baby's heartbeat...and it was awesome to watch my mom's face when she heard it!  It's truly amazing to be able to hear your baby's heartbeat!  It is very strong!! 

Then, afterwards we headed back to the 'Dorf and met Kris for dinner! 

My parents brought us some yummy Korean food for us to enjoy this week!  :)  Yummmmm......

28 weeks

On Tuesday, I was sitting at a rehearsal and our little one started kicking (no real surprise there).  But...I looked down at my tummy and I saw it MOVING!  She was kicking so hard she was making my shirt jump!  I wasn't sure I was seeing it correctly so I asked a student to look at my tummy (from maybe 6 feet away) and she saw it too!  AMAZING!  Then later that night, Kris got to see her kicking up a storm!  We were both awe struck with how strong those movements were!   

On Wednesday, I wore my maternity support belt for the first time.  I had done my volunteer time at World Hope and was walking around and on my feet for most of those 4 hours...the brace was amazing!  It really helped out! 

David, from BarkBusters, came on Thursday to help us get Oreo ready for the baby and to help us with a couple things we were concerned with.  It was a great session!  David was very happy with how well Oreo was doing!  Oreo was very loving with him, letting him pet him, giving him kisses and sitting next to him!  I got a few new things we're going to work on-but he told us we were doing all the right things!!!!  It's just so unbelievable to see how far Oreo's come!  For anyone needing a good training program, I highly recommend this company.  They are located all over the country. 

I've totally been spoiled this week! 
~On Saturday, Alli brought over some Costco goodies...we sometimes split some groceries.  AND...she brought the cutest little butterfly outfit for our little girl!!  I just can't believe that in just a little while she'll be here and IN those clothes!!!!
~Then on Sunday...Alli rocked my world.  She made this Kit Kat Cake.  It was a chocolate cake, with chocolate icing, with berries on top, apricot preserve over the fruit, and kit kat bars on the side of the cake.  OMGOSH....she is my baking goddess!  I now dream in chocolate!
~On Tuesday, Evie called me and asked me to Skype with her!  That was sooooo special for me!  We Skype fairly regularly, but SHE initiated it!  I LOVED it!
~On Tuesday, (one of my previous North Point students) Aly and her mom Dana came over.  I'm helping Aly get ready for a vocal competition.  It was sooo great to see them and chat!  AND...they brought me some treats: Chocolate Chip Cookies (OMGOSH...yummmm), and two cute maternity shirts!  I wore one of them on Wednesday and the other for a concert on Friday!  They are awesome!  And...some hair bows for our little girl! 
~Wednesday, I received a card and a package in the mail!  A card from Mama and Papa Nodi!  They are sending me on a shopping spree for new clothes!  ...I think they might be bothered with my belly shirt that I had to cut the sleeves off of.  :)  AND, the Markowski's sent us a sweet package!  They sent us lots of stuff...but one of the gifts that hit us like a ton of bricks was the pink WVU onesie!  It still hits us pretty hard that we are actually having a baby!  Our little girl is going to be wearing that onesie!  Amazing...

Nursery update:
Kris has been really busy with the baseboards...He's got so much to do and has been working really hard!  Friday night he found a little trick with his saw that has made cutting the angles in the baseboards easier!  He cut some amazing angles!  On Saturday, Kevin came over to help out!  They were able to cut the rest of the baseboards and get them fitted together! ...and they caused the normal amount of Nodi ruckus in the process.  :) Today, Kris painted the baseboards and got them nailed in!  YAY!!!!  Click HERE to see more nursery pictures.  We are up to phase 9.

Baby news:
She's been kicking a TON!  She's on a more regular waking/sleeping schedule.  This morning, I put my belly up to Kris' back and he felt her kicking him!  :)  Tomorrow I'm going in for my 28 week check up, which will include my glucose test. 

Here are week 28 pictures!

The toilets in this house hate me

This may be "too much information" for some...but I'm going to share anyway.

The toilets in this house hate me.

You think I'm kidding...but I'm not. In my ENTIRE 32 years of life, I can remember clogging the toilet maybe a dozen times. Since I've been pregnant I've clogged the toilet at least that many times. Today, however....was a special clog. I had used the bathroom downstairs...the one RIGHT BY the front door. I flushed and closed the door....all of a sudden I hear a splash! I open the bathroom to see water pouring and shooting out of the bowl. I turned off the water and called Kris...who laughed. This all happened less than 5 minutes before our piano technician arrived to tune the piano (and would come through the FRONT door)....the water was all over the bathroom floor and had made its way into the foyer. I had just minutes to try and find Kris' garage towels to cover and sop up the water. Well....that didn't happen before our technician arrived. You might ask Why?

Well...since you asked....not only do the toilets hate me....Kris likes to remind me how short I am by putting things too high for me to reach...

I searched and searched for those dang garage towels. I thought they might be in his new workbench drawers...nope...looked around the base of the garage...nope...as I was turning around I happened to look up. Yup...the towels are on an upper shelf in the garage...too high for me to reach. @#$)(*@ I can hear Kris laughing right now! So..needless to say....I didn't get the towels down before our technician arrived...

So....he is currently tuning the piano in the room RIGHT ACROSS from the bathroom that had the volcanic eruption.  What a day....