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2006-04-26 - 8.48pm��previous entry��next entry
34 weeks pregnant!!!
Wow, I'm 34 weeks! It's weird of me probably, but all the even-numbered weeks feel like a much bigger deal than the odd-numbered ones! I remember that from last pregnancy too. Like, 30 weeks was HUGE and then 31 was no big deal. Then 32 weeks felt like a milestone again, and 33 weeks was just "the week after 32 weeks". Now I'm 34 weeks! Six weeks today until my due date! And it's May on Monday!! Wow. I'm supposed to have an antenatal appointment at 34 weeks, but it will be the day before I turn 35 weeks instead, because that's the day they'll have the Anti-D injections prepared, and I need another of those.
I'll have the 34 week belly pic (another belly pic already!) to add later, and I'll probably have to finish this entry later anyway - Neil and Arthur are out at the supermarket at the moment so I have a window to start my diary entry! Neil is off work today because he had to go and pick up our NEW CAR!! Yay! We have a big second-hand family car that will be plenty big enough for three children, let alone two tiny boys, and the boot is easily big enough to hold the tandem pushchair in a month or so when we start using it! I am eager to start using that actually! I feel eager to go places with my two lovely boys in their gorgeous tandem pushchair! I am really pleased with it, and just hope it performs as well as the reviews say it will! I still need to figure out some sort of sunshade for it though, because it will be the middle of summer while we're using it at first, and we'll definitely need something that will completely shade the boys while they're in it.
I am also looking for sun hats for them at the moment. You never need to think of that kind of thing for 9 months of the year in England, and 9 months is AGES in terms of a toddler's head circumference growth! I bought a ton of baby and toddler high factor sun protection lotion in an out-of-season deal recently too :) I think I have enough summery clothes for Matthew now. I won quite a lot of summer things on eBay over the last couple of months, for very little money. I just watched out for nice things and stuff I would want if I saw it in the shop, and bid carefully. I still have to go through all the newborn and 0-3 month clothes yet to be sure of exactly what we have, but I know we have quite a lot of soft romper suits with short sleeves and short legs. I have a few short dungaree outfits, and some rompers with short sleeves and long legs (no feet) as well, for when it's not hot but not very cool either. If it gets colder than that, Arthur's newborn clothes will be fine as he was a winter baby, and if it's too HOT for the clothes we have, Matthew would just wear a vest or even just a nappy if it was hot enough, like Arthur did last summer. So I think we have our bases covered!
I am still gradually sewing tiny nappies with my Very Baby pattern for Matthew! I made one out of all stretch fabrics yesterday and I'm reeeally pleased with it. It's much softer and trimmer than the ones made from flannels like the pattern suggests. I'm halfway through making another stretch fabric one. They are soooo tiny. I'm sure he won't be in them for long, but I believe he will fit them for a couple of weeks at least, even if he's big like we are expecting! When I have finished sewing all the newborn nappies, I'll take a photo of them all together and post it here. I still have a couple of wraps to make too.
Last time, I made cloth postpartum pads as well, for me. I bought a ton of disposable ones in case I didn't go for the cloth ones, and ended up using both. In the hospital, for the first few days, the ONLY thing I would have considered if I'd had the choice would have been disposable pads! I didn't have cloth ones there anyway so that was that. But I hate the first couple of days of blood loss. For some reason it makes me feel so squeamish and it's so heavy and yeurghy! I never get squeamish about stuff like that normally, but then I never use pads for periods so maybe the lack of discrete sanitary protection made the difference for me?! Once I was home, my lochia was already lighter and more manageable, and I used a mixture of cloth and disposable. My cloth pads were pretty basic and not the most comfy things, as I'd just used scraps of any old fabric - some of it quite thick like old towelling, etc. But now that I have some reeeally luxurious and soft absorbent fabrics, I'm wondering about throwing the old batch away and making a whole new lot of postpartum pads? I have plenty of PUL and microfleece so I could probably be quite comfy if I sewed them right! Anyway if I have time, or a good idea for HOW to make them, then I think I might do that. I will still buy plenty of disposables though. And I still have 3 packs of disposable knickers, unopened from last time - I asked my parents to buy LOADS for me when Arthur was 2 days old, and they really did buy loads! And I didn't even use 3 of the packs. But I will use them this time for sure.
I am leaking more colostrum this week! Yay! I am getting little leaky patches on my clothes at last, especially if I have leaned on something and put my breast under pressure, hehe! My colostrum is STILL clear or slightly cloudy, without colour, but I did notice the centre of one of my leaky patches was a golden colour :) I also did another taste test and the clear/cloudy stuff still doesn't taste of anything at all, but any that is even a tiny bit golden is sweet :) If I squeeze to try and express any, I get a lot all at once, so I know Arthur must be getting a fair amount now. His poo hasn't changed though (it's meant to have a laxative effect), so maybe it's just the golden colostrum that is the real power stuff?! My breasts have been sore this week for the first time in a while. Usually that means growth. And I'm a bit bummed about the fact that I'm sure I will have to put away ALL the lovely and expensive nursing bras that I bought for feeding Arthur, and get re-fitted at the end of my pregnancy for a whole new lot of nursing bras, as I am already filling the old ones, and my milk isn't even here yet! So I'm obviously going to be too big for them. Which is CRAZY!!!! Before my pregnancy with Arthur, I was a B cup. By the end of my pregnancy with Arthur I was a DD or E cup! The fitter said I would need an F cup when my milk came in, so I bought my bras in the size she suggested and she was right. For a few months at the beginning, they even felt a little tight actually. I know I got a lot smaller by the time I was pregnant with Matthew, but I didn't check what my size was because I still needed to wear the nursing bras to feed Arthur and they were still comfy and supportive, so I kept wearing them. Now I fit them again, and I know I'm still growing. And then my milk coming in will give me an extra cup size! So hmmm! I LOVE my Elle Macpherson Maternelle bras, they are the comfiest bras (out of all the nursing bras I tried - Emma Jane, Mothercare, Bravado, Royce, NCT, etc) by FAR that I have ever worn. I have an Emma Jane one too but it's not as comfy. Plus they are so pretty! But I think I am in the maximum cup size for that particular bra :( So I'm not sure what I'll have to buy/wear this time round. I'm a bit bummed about it! I'll wait till I'm 38 weeks and then go and get fitted and see what kind of bras are the comfiest in the shop. I did go out on a limb and bid on an Emma Jane bra exactly like the one I have, but in the next cup size up. It might end up being the wrong size, but they are �25 new and it was a SUPER bargain at eBay, so I figured it was worth the risk! I can always re-sell it if I don't fit it.
I had a nosebleed this week! Only a little one, but completely unprovoked, and from the ex-noggin side too, so it freaked me out slightly. But it stopped quickly and I haven't had any more trouble from it. And I can't find any evidence of a noggin in there so it's probably just a freak nosebleed of pregnancy! By this time last pregnancy my noggin was just awful. I had surgery to remove it 2 weeks after this stage of pregnancy. Urgh. Soooooooo glad I don't have that to deal with this time!
I am so so so uncomfortable these days. I feel like I have grown enormous in just the last week! I feel like my bump has had a growth spurt but I'll wait to see what the photo shows, as sometimes it's not as big a difference to the last one as I think it will be. But I feel huge. My uterus reaches my ribs almost, and measured 36cm just now when I lay down and measured it with the tape measure. I think I'm doing it accurately. I got 35cm the first time I measured, but then I double checked exactly where my pubic bone was (it seems lost these days and is very hard to find!) and the exact top of my uterus, and got exactly 36cm. So, still the same amount ahead as usual. My pelvis hurts such a lot and walking is painful sometimes, uncomfortable at other times. Night times are the worst because I can't get comfy at all, even with pillows. There just feels like there's too much weight resting on the inside of my pelvis in whichever direction I'm lying, and if I shift my position it hurts like crazy to make my pelvis move and then the original area gets some relief but the new area I'm lying on soon gets painful. But I guess it's all pretty normal at the end of pregnancy!
I wake up a lot at night, and if I have to get up to pee my pelvis clicks and grinds, and my pubic bone hurts like craaaazy. I can barely walk for the first minute or so that I'm up from bed, but it eases up as I keep walking. I am finding it way less painful if I walk without bringing my legs together at all - how dignified, hehe! So I am waddling like never before! I do walk more normally out of the house, but it's easier on my pelvis to walk ridiculously when nobody else can see me, so I do that in the house! ;)
Today I have found it hard to get up from the sofa and start walking. It's just propelling myself forwards that seems hard work and feels uncomfortable. My pelvis complains like it is angry with me for disturbing its restful stillness! Twice I have been stopped by a bad shooting pain while I've been walking in the house today - once in my side above my hip and the other time in the back of my pelvis. I think my hips are just being stressed by the weight they're carrying. Which, incidentally, is really increasing at the moment! I was right about me having a growth spurt last entry - I have gained another 4lbs since then!!!! Yikes! It did not feel great to see 11 stone on the scales for the first time this week, but it was the wrong time of day to weigh myself and I had eaten, so when I weighed myself the next morning before breakfast, I was 10 stone 13lbs (1lb lighter). Anyway that puts my total weight gain at about 34lbs - a lb for each week of pregnancy! Exactly 20lbs less than my total weight gain from last pregnancy, but I know I still have a way to go yet. I just feel sooooooooo heavy.
Okay the boys are home so I'll finish this later.
Back, and Arthur is in bed again :) Neil took my belly pic and it's in the gallery - it's the first time I wore that top since the 20 week belly picture, and BOY do I fill it out more these days, hehe! I also seem to fill my SKIN out more these days, it's really obvious that I'm putting on lots of weight! I have my old friend The Second Chin back with me this week ;) Still need to smile more for the photos, but I am sooooooo tired this evening, that was all I could muster.
Matthew was jabbing and punching me like CRAZY this afternoon! I was sitting on the sofa trying to stir up some energy and my tummy was jolting this way and that, visibly! Normally he squirms so that my whole tummy shifts about weirdly, or kicks and sweeps his feet a few inches across, but this time it was all little fists and hands, and he was punching with all his strength, from how it felt! He kept it up for at least 5 minutes, which is ages for Matthew! He's quite a bit quieter than Arthur, who could go on thumping about vigorously for like an hour or more!
Today was also the first time that I seem to have had a moment to talk to Matthew and tickle his feet and stuff while he was moving about in there, without Arthur or Neil around. It felt like my first one-to-one bonding time with Matthew, even though I have had plenty of bonding moments so far this pregnancy. It just felt special that I was talking to him as though he was my one and only, like I used to when it was Arthur in my tummy. I had no busy little boy around to distract me and it was just me and Matthew. He happened to be awake and pushing at me gently with his little feet, and I rubbed his hard little heels and stroked my belly and talked to him in a soothing "Mummy" voice. It was lovely, because it was the first time I have talked to Matthew as "Mummy" really (if that makes sense) without also being "Arthur's Mummy" at the same time. I hope I get enough opportunities when Matthew is here to get some one-on-one time with him like that. I almost never thought I would say it, loving Arthur as fiercely as I do, but I do hope that I will get some time with Matthew that ISN'T with Arthur. I don't want Arthur around me any LESS, but I am realising more and more that Matthew is going to be just as precious and "mine" to me as Arthur is, and I am going to want to jealously guard my special time with him just as much as I would want to with Arthur. I hope everything falls into place and things go okay! I know it's going to be hard with two such little children when they are young, but I hope it won't feel overwhelming all the time.
Ooh, I haven't mentioned Matthew's stats for this week! He should be heading for 18 inches long now! Lots of newborns are born that length, so he wouldn't look toooo tiny in the length department if he was born now! But the average is still 2 inches away :) Weight-wise, if he is measuring 2 weeks ahead as expected, he should be weighing about 5lbs 9oz by now, or somewhere around or over thee 5 and a half pound mark! Wow! I was 5lbs 10oz at birth (at 39w4d) so it seems crazy to me that Matthew is that size already! He must look so newborn like now. He is still working on putting on his white body fat, and will still be fairly scrawny at the moment, but definitely filling out! Two sets of twins have been born in the last week or so at my June due dates group, and all the babies weighed around the 5lb mark. The photos so far are amazing, as they look really well filled-out and chubby, and like completely full-term newborns! Just a little on the small size. So I know that's probably what Matthew looks like too. So amazing to think of it!
Thank you SO much Lana for reminding me about thebabywearer.com!!! I had been there months and months ago and signed up, when I was hunting for patterns to sew a Mei-Tai type of carrier for Arthur. I did sew one in the end and it works great, but not quite what I am looking for, for Matthew when he's tiny. I forgot all about that place, and I had no idea they had a "for sale or trade" forum!!! Woohoo! I hovered there for a bit and now I have bought a second hand Kozy!!!! Yaaaaaaay! I am so excited! It's even from someone in the UK so it is really quite cheap for me to get it posted, etc. So now I have a Kozy carrier (Mei-Tai), a homemade Mei-Tai (which, by the way, I sewed from this pattern - check out the gallery there! Arthur and I are the first photo!), a gorgeous hug-a-bub, a Wilkinet, and a Baby Bjorn. I have also found some patterns for making a woven pouch-type sling that will be ideal for carrying a newborn in, and yet not too hot to wear, I hope! I have the perfect fabric for it sitting in my fabric collection, so now I just need to narrow the patterns down and pick the one I want to make! And then find time to make it :) I hope it will work. So I'm getting there on the slings/carriers! I can't wait till my Kozy arrives! I am half tempted to try it out with Arthur in it when it arrives, but I probably shouldn't since I'm like 8 months pregnant! Although it CAN be used during pregnancy. Maybe I'll make Neil try it out, hehe! He is a great baby-wearing Daddy. He wore Arthur in the hug-a-bub and Baby Bjorn WAY more than I ever did, sometimes for hours and hours and hours around the house to soothe him and help him nap, only taking him out so I could breastfeed him. Neil is such a wonderful Daddy! My little boys are so lucky :)
I am sure there were other things I had to say, but I can't think of them at all now! How annoying. But I have written lots anyway, and now I can use the rest of the evening to sewwww!!! I just can't think of anything else but sewing nappies at the moment. I feel itchy to get the newborn nappies all finished so that it's all ready for Matthew, and then move onto the ones I meant to make for Arthur so that he has got plenty as well. I'm sure that once Matthew is here, it will be a long long time before I get chance to sew again. I love sewing their nappies soooooo much, I feel disappointed and sad when a day goes by and I haven't had the chance to sew! Which is crazy, because it's not realistic at the moment that I'll get to sew every day or anything! But it's on my mind so much that it still feels disappointing that I haven't had time or energy. And on that note I'm going to waste no more time and get sewing before the evening is all gone! :) Thank you for the lovely messages again! I'll try to update sooner than 35 weeks, especially since I'll have my next antenatal appt just before then.
I can't believe there's only 6 weeks (42 days!!!) to go till my due date! Only 3 weeks now till I reach full term! Craaaazy.
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