Baby Floris #2: Weeks 23 + 28

Can you tell it’s cross country season? I always seem to get in a good blogging groove between seasons at work and then everything is put on hold when the 6am practices and weekend trips pick up again. Luckily, we are less than a week away from the end of the season already! How did that happen??

Today’s post is a long one since it covers the last month + a half of my pregnancy but right off the bat I’ll let you know about the 2 most important developments.

Since my last bumpdate….

• we finally had our anatomy scan and everything looked great!
• we found out that we didn’t get approved for a home birth so we are officially prepping for our second birth center birth. We are planning to have Lavinia there with us so if any of you have experience with that please send all your tips my way!

WHAT’S BABY FLORIS UP TO?

At 28 weeks Baby Floris is the size of an eggplant! She is gaining fat and she is practicing breathing so that she’ll be able to do it on her own once she is born..

WEIGHT GAINED

So far (at the 28 week mark) I’ve gained about 24 lbs. During my first pregnancy I kind of stopped paying attention to how much I was gaining because I didn’t like seeing the number continue to increase but now that I’ve gone through the cycle of giving birth and getting back in shape I’m not as anxious about the weight gain this time around. It feels like such a relief to be able to let go of that worry but at the same time it’s crazy to look at the scale and see a number that is more closely in line with what your husband weighs that what you usually weigh! 

WORKING OUT/RUNNING

Running has still been going really well this past month and a half. I’m not experiencing any pain or discomfort and I’m still enjoying getting out for my runs 5-6 days a week. I generally go 3-5 miles depending on how much time I have and I’m just running based on feel – typically I’m in the 8:30-9 minute range unless I’m really tired or pushing Liv in the BOB and then we’re usually going closer to 10 minute pace.

In the past 6 weeks I’ve run 104.25 miles – that brings my total pregnancy miles so far to 733.

Week 23 – 6 runs – 21.75 miles

Week 24 – 5 runs – 17 miles

Week 25 – 4 runs – 12 miles

Week 26  – 5 runs – 18 miles 

Week 27 – 5 runs – 17.5 miles 

Week 28 – 6 runs – 18 miles 

This most recent weekend I ran the Ventura 5K and finished in 22:11 and came in 3rd place overall female. It was a really fun race/day and I’ll have a complete recap up later this week. 

SYMPTOMS

I’m still experiencing relatively few symptoms, which I am extremely thankful for. I have had a “cold” for a few weeks that I’m starting to think is more just general stuffiness and congestion from being pregnant, especially since it’s lingered for so long. I’m still having acid reflux on a regular basis but the severity has decreased which is nice. I do get nauseated from time to time when I’m at work but getting out into the fresh air for a quick walk generally helps and makes me feel significantly better. The varicose vein on my left calf continues to grow/spread but it’s still not painful so I often forget about it. These are all things that I would happily endure in order to bring our baby into the world. 

PREPARATION FOR BABY’S ARRIVAL

Now that we have successfully transitioned Lavinia into her big girl room we’ve finally started making progress on the nursery. I painted the wall behind the crib a deep navy, hung up baby’s prints above the crib, moved my office chair into the nursery (will have to replace my office chair) and got curtains. Henri also converted the toddler bed back into the crib so it’s all ready for sister’s arrival (even though who knows how often she’ll actually be sleeping in it at the beginning. 

The only things we really have to get done in the nursery between now and January are 1) build the closet because right now it doesn’t have rods/shelves/doors 2) repaint the dresser – it’s currently pink 3) find something to hang above the dresser/changing table 4) buy a lamp, baby monitor and a pillow for the chair.

In general, I feel like I’m in a very “nest-y” mood and have been purging/cleaning/organizing the house incessantly the past few weeks. It doesn’t help that this urge has coincided with an upswing in work and me being exhausted but there are just so many projects around the house that I’d like to get checked off of my list before little miss arrives so there have been quite a few nights recently that I’ve been cleaning and organizing rather than our regularly scheduled programming of Netflix on the couch. 

HOW LAVINIA IS DOING

I think Liv is finally starting to grasp the idea that she is about to get a baby sister. We’ve been talking about it a lot, I try to show her when the baby is moving in my belly and have her feel sister’s kicks. She knows sister’s name and talks to her every once in a while and even brings her up out of the blue like pointing to baby toys we have out for friends and saying they are for sister or going into the nursery and saying sister’s room. 

We are also starting to prepare her to be at the birth (if it all works out) and have been showing her pictures from when she was born and showing her some appropriate birth videos. She is very interested and looks at the pictures with a lot of concentration. I think she is going to do very well if she ends up being able to be at the birth with us, she’s been to nearly all of my appointments at the birth center and is very comfortable there and so far has loved all of the ladies and midwives that work there.

FAVORITE MOMENTS FROM THE PAST 6 WEEKS

• Our family apple picking day!
• Running the Ventura 5K as a family – already looking forward to going back next year!
• Seeing baby sis on the ultrasound and Henri finally being able to make it to an appointment (this is the first one this pregnancy!)

• Lavinia deciding she was ready to be potty trained! I was hoping that this would happen before baby’s arrival and with a little bit of a cushion so that it wasn’t soooo new when things changed again but I didn’t want to push her at all. She told us she was ready and basically did it overnight! We are still working on #2 but she hasn’t had a #1 accident since the second day she was in undies. 

THINGS I’M LOOKING FORWARD TO

• Getting a little more sleep once the cross country season is over and getting to spend a little bit of time with Henri and Lavinia in the mornings before work. 
• Our family photos in a few weeks – I’m just so excited to capture this special time for our family and am looking forward to some sweet pictures with the 3 of us and the bump.
• MATERNITY LEAVE!!!
• The progress we (mostly Henri and his dad) are making on our master bathroom!!! Almost done with the major house renovations!

Can’t believe we have less than 3 months until this little one is here!