32 Week Appointment!

I went to the doctor for my 32 week appointment yesterday and it is the same routine: give a urine sample (which is never a problem), take my weight (not my favorite activity), and my blood pressure. This is usually done by the nurse before I ever get into a room. They will give me information about various things--the latest about a test they will do in the next 2 weeks. Nothing huge, just a precautionary thing. Then they will give me handouts relating to something for me to keep in mind. This weeks it is all about the admissions procedure (when to come to the hospital, what to bring to the hospital, etc). After all of that I then get to go into an exam room where I wait. And wait. And wait some more.

When the doctor does come in, she asks me if I have any questions, doesn't typically ask me anything. Sometimes she will repeat the questions that the nurse asked me but that's about it. Then I lay down and she will listen to the baby's heartbeat. I have to admit that this is the coolest part for me because I can actually hear him! Well, his heartbeat anyway. I feel him all day long but I only get the experience of hearing his heartbeat when I go to the doctor and it makes all the waiting I have to do worth it. After she listens to the heartbeat, she measures my belly and I am right on track with where I should be. This is great news.

All in all, even though I am annoyed with the waiting that I have to do while at the appointment, I am grateful that all is well with Baby Boy and myself. Only 8 more weeks and I can hold him. I can't wait. For that privilege I will try to keep my complaining about the doctor visits to a minimum.

On a very exciting note, Amanda found this great gator and bought it to accessorize the nursery!! So cute! Love gators!

32 Weeks!

32 Weeks

I am officially 32 weeks as of today! Hooray! To quote some of the information given to me but the multitudes of pregnancy applications I currently have on my phone, I should be gaining a pound a week and roughly half of that goes to the baby. The baby now has toenails, fingernails, and real hair! I guess that is progress right?! I mean it seems like not that long ago, the same app was equating the size of my baby to a blueberry.
I thought it would be nice (for you to see, definitely not for me) how I have progressed since week 25. I am now slightly rounder than before and seeming to grow right on track according to the doctor. I really could not ask for more than that now can I? I go back to the doctor on Monday for my 32 week appointment and I will post an update and what the doctor has to say.

On another note, days following the baby shower I am still getting gifts in the mail. I am overwhelmed at the generosity of my friends and family. This baby was well showered with love and necessities to welcome him into the world. Yesterday I received a package my brother and family that contained present after present--all very practical and useful things that I would never have thought of. Leave it to the parents to provide the most useful of gifts. Of course, I am a sucker and full of sentimentality over some things. My favorite gift was a bib that they sent me that had "Grandma Jan loves Me" on it. I was incredibly moved by that gesture. My mom would be incredibly excited about this baby and would love him already, just as Vlad and I already do. We already knew this baby had his guardian angel in my mom, and now he has another, in Mica (Vlad's grandmother).

So that is where I am, 32 weeks and growing. The changes are becoming much more noticeable. I will make sure to take another picture in a few weeks to see further changes. I am feeling good and getting more than ready for this baby to make his appearance in the world.  Until next time...

Baby Shower

Kat, Me, Amanda, & Gina

On Saturday my good friends Gina, Kat and Amanda hosted a baby shower for me in my home. I wanted to have the shower at my house for two reasons: 1. I didn't have to go anywhere and 2. Many people had yet to see the new house and it was a good opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. That being said, the girls showed up ready to party at 9a.m. to set up everything. They are great friends who put up with what I wanted (and with what I didn't). This included the rule about games: no one was allowed to touch me. So none of those games where they have to measure me or such nonsense. Since I was not he center of the game playing, I was able to laugh at those that were!

My M-I-L Monica and S-I-L Georgi!

Gina and I

By far the biggest surprise of the entire day was that my sister flew from California to surprise me for the shower. When the doorbell rang a half hour before the shower was to start I was wondering who it could be. I wish I had a picture of the look on my face when I saw her--it must have been such a dumbfounded expression. I was completely surprised and shocked to see her. Not to mention that I had just put my makeup on and now I was crying! Apparently my hosts knew about this surprise and was able to hold it together and not tell me. Sneaky, sneaky girls. It was nice to have someone from my family attend though I understand it is a far distance to travel for a baby shower. She came in for a whopping 22 hours. I am grateful that she did that and made this day that much better.

Another aspect I wanted to make sure to acknowledge was the fact that both Vlad and I lost someone we love very much this year. Two weeks ago he lost his grandmother and we know that she was very excited to see her great grandson. The last time we spoke with her we discussed our potential name choices for the baby and she was able to rub my stomach. I wanted to make sure that we recognized these women in our lives and even though they are no longer with us we know that they are watching over this baby. Baby is very fortunate to have two guardian angels watching over him.

There was lots of fun to be had...Jill and Inbal volunteered (unbeknownst to them) for a baby food eating contest that consisted of eating bananas.

My sister and sister-in-law took to the bottle for their battle. Gina won by sucking the life out of that bottle! Georgi gave it her best effort! I give them credit for being able to drink that juice!

There was amazing food to be had: my grandmother's recipe for meatballs, the Spinach Dip of one Brian Wanta, multiple salads courtesy of Asaf Mizrahi, pasta salad, cupcakes, cannolis, etc. There was sooooooo much good food.

The food was even in cute little shapes!
The cupcakes were in the shape of adorable little monkeys and alligators! So creative are my friends!

I am very fortunate to have had them there to do all the work that they did. There are more pictures that were taken, but these just happen to be the ones that I took on my camera. As soon as I have the rest I will post them to the blog.

Thank you to everyone that came and showered this baby with love. I love you all and appreciate every one of you!

Projects Galore Part 2

I think that I mentioned prior to this that my "nesting" has come in the form of creative projects for the nursery. I see something that I like after scouring the internet and I walk about with a cute idea that I can do myself--one, because it is cheaper and two, I can customize it that way I want it. This has happened with quite a few things, so lets look at a few of the projects I am currently working on:

This was the beginning. I had seen a mobile that I really liked and thought, "Wouldn't that be cool if I could find that with alligators?" However, finding anything with cute little alligators is next to impossible (if you do happen to find things, let me know!). So...me being me, I decided to make it happen.

This was step two. I took colored ribbon and made the hoop part of the mobile. My dear friend Gina cut out alligators and circles for the actual hanging part. Another dear friend, Kat, helped me understand fishing line and know which to buy to construct this thing. Me + Fish = Yeah Right.

While this is not the best picture of the final product, it is enough to give you an idea of what I did here. I will post another picture once I have it hanging above the crib. The crib...right....about that...

Here it is!! Our great friends Adam and Amanda brought the furniture over last night and we immediately put the crib and bedding together. We have really amazing friends who have all contributed in some way to this baby's room and have provided much support. Thank you to you all and YOU KNOW who you are.

The next project includes a series of wall art that I did the layout work on. I plan to have them printed and framed to go above the crib (unless I change my mind and put it elsewhere). I did see these elsewhere and I did rip the idea, but I did the design and colors that I wanted. Please note: the information used on the "birth announcement" is purely fictitious and serves only as placeholders. Please do not think that we have settled on a name (though this is a contender).

I think that brings us to the end of my "projects" for now. So you may be asking "What does Vlad think of all this?" Well, he pretty much lets me do my thing. He provides input when asked (sometimes even without being asked) and I take that into consideration as well. If he didn't like something he would let me know. He is vocal enough.

Tomorrow is the baby shower for little man. I am very excited about it and more than anything I am looking forward to seeing friends that I have not seen in a while due to life getting in the way. I will definitely have more to post after that. Until then....after while crocodile.

30 Week Appointment

I had my 30 week appointment yesterday and all is well. My blood pressure is great and I have even lost a pound. How that is happening when I feel like a walking whale is beyond me! I am not complaining though--as long as baby is healthy (and I am too) I am going to count myself fortunate that all is well and just focus on that part of it.

I will have another ultrasound at my 37 or 38 week appointment to gauge baby's size and see where we are that point. More to come later...

Valentine's Day

Okay, so fair warning--I am feeling a bit on the sappy side. Not necessarily because it is Valentine's Day. I do not subscribe to the commercialization of buying flowers at three times their price or chocolate that is somehow more special today than any other day of the year. It also does not mean that I have to go out of my way to shower my significant other with love and attention--I like to think that we do that for each other year round, which makes Valentine's Day insignificant. Granted, we did say "Happy Valentine's Day" to each other when we woke up and I will probably tell him again tonight. However, I see Valentine's Day as more of a time to reflect.

I have shared the last ten V Day's with the same person and I feel very fortunate that every day when I wake up with him, I feel happier than the last. He is pretty amazing--he loves me at my best, worst and every point in between. He knows that I have a mouth like a sailor and doesn't tell me to act like a lady. We can watch and enjoy football together, but he knows that I will not go near a basketball game. It's the squeaky sneakers--they get to me every time! We love to watch movies together though he is much more cultured when it comes to choosing a movie, but I do not require him to watch chick flicks and I do not have to suffer through old black and white films. These compromises have been smoothed out through these ten years and works pretty well, I must say. I love to read and he likes to choose that moment to want to talk to me. The same way that he loves to play his computer games and THAT happens to be the time when I just HAVE to talk to him. :) It truly never fails.

...and as we celebrate our 10th Valentine's Day together we have something else that we can celebrate--welcoming our baby boy in a little over two months. We are getting very excited to see him, hold him and love him but I am selfish enough to say that I am really trying to enjoy the remaining "just us" time that the hubby and I have. Time with my best friend to relax, talk, and not have to worry about anything else. Our lives are about to change drastically, but it will be a change that enhances our life rather than hinders it. I already love this baby very much and I can't wait until we get to hold him for the first time. Next Valentine's Day I may have to get into the commercialization just a bit because I am sure that my sappiness will have runneth over!

Projects Galore!

As soon as I realized I was pregnant and processed what that meant my mind then went to--Nursery! Second only to a girl's wedding, planning your first baby's nursery is something I have thought about before. I will not say I thought about it more than my wedding, but in the sequence of life events once you are married then comes baby....at some point. For us, it is almost 4 years later. Since I had an inkling that we were going to have a boy I also knew that I wanted to incorporate the gator theme into the nursery--it all started with the Facebook announcement (at right). We didn't even know if we were having a boy or girl, but the announcement had to have a gator. For the nursery itself I knew I did not want the UF Gator, but cute little cartoon gators. Easy enough, right? Well, you would be wrong! It has been very difficult to find ANYTHING that is only alligators. I can find jungles, safari, etc, but no alligators. So after scouring the many patterns that include, but are not limited to alligators, I finally decided upon this bedding set. It has the gator, but it also has a monkey, frog, and a turtle. I find it very cute and I do adore it.

That was the beginning. Now that we had the bedding and the colors, I could move forward. This meant all kinds of little projects thanks to Pinterest. The first project was completed by my wonderful hubby--painting the closet doors. In the grand scheme of things, this was not an important project, but I have to say it did make me happy and as they say..."a happy wife, a happy life." It is hard to tell from the pictures, but the walls are a light beige color and the closet doors are a chocolate brown. It will go very well with the nursery furniture once its all in place. Currently, the only thing actually inside of the room is a full-sized bed that I will be using a lot of I'm sure so I am not traipsing back and forth between rooms. This weekend we will be adding the crib, dresser, and a gliding rocker.

The next project I took on was to create a plaque sign with one of my favorite quotes from a book that I loved reading to my preschool kiddos--"5 Little Monkey's Swingin From the Tree". I had to embrace the monkey in the theme. So here are the before and after pictures. I got the idea from visiting a children's consignment shop where they were selling these for $25! I made mine for under $10!

I think it turned out well aside from a bit of a spacing issue at the bottom. Oh well, adds character right? That is what I am telling myself. Last night as I watched the Super Bowl, I embarked on my next project...making a mobile. The mobile will have alligators and I am hoping the finished product will look as good as it does in my head--I am off to a good start thanks to Gina and Kat for their scissor mastery! There will be pictures to come soon I'm sure! Is this what they call nesting?? Michael's has become my new favorite place!