Weeks 30 & 31

Sorry to disappoint, but no fun new foods!!

Rylan is about 3 lbs 5 oz right now (porker!!!) and growing fatter every day. My most recent email said he's about to hit a big growth spurt, so that should be fun. When I went in last week for my 30 week appointment, I asked how big he was. Dr. Welborne just said he should be about 3 lbs, and even if they did a sonogram there'd be no way of knowing 100%. She did mention, though, that I'm measuring perfectly, which is good news.

There wasn't anything too exciting revealed at the appointment. I asked when Rylan will turn to get ready for birth, and she said he should be turned by 35 weeks. Of course she said they'll make sure he's "ready" and have some things they can do to get him there, in the event he doesn't do it on his own.

Rusty and I get closer and closer every day with the nursery! All of our furniture finally came in, which was SOO exciting! We're working on getting everything organized and pretty enough so we can take and post some pictures. Please know that as soon as it's camera ready, pictures will be up for all to adore! :) Just to make you all a little more anxious, it really is looking good, and the furniture looks great in the room!

Well, I took a new picture. I know I'm supposed to keep growing until little man gets here, but I'm starting to get more creeped out by my own pictures. Don't ask why. I'm fortunate for the fact that about 95% of my weight gain has been in my belly, and I'm fortunate that all I look is pregnant. Still, there's something to just not feeling "cute" like everyone says I look. (Maybe you are all liars... hehe)

Here is 29 weeks:


Here is 31 weeks:

My Non Birthday

To be quite honest, I couldn't have asked for much better of a birthday.

Leading up to the event, I'll be honest and admit I wasn't in the "birthday spirit." There are 2 things I do EVERY YEAR and I couldn't do either one of them this year. I ALWAYS go shopping, usually with my mom, and I ALWAYS get a nice sangria swirl margarita from On The Border, usually with friends. Seeing as how I have this medicine ball of a baby hanging off the front of my body, shopping for cute, spring clothes was out of the question. (Shopping in general is kind of off the tables during my pregnancy - I think it's dumb to spend a lot of money on clothes that I won't wear that often.) Again, seeing as how I have this medicine ball of a baby IN my body, margaritas are out of the question.

I worked hard to come up with a few alternative selections for birthday ideas, since shopping/drinks weren't options. I thought of a movie and several books I wanted, and kindly relayed those to my sweet husband.

Friday morning started off good. I was just a little mopey, but generally accepting of the day. During the hustle and bustle of getting ready, Rusty brought me a birthday gift. I opened it to find one of the books I most wanted - The Last Song by Nicholas Sparks. I'm a huge fan of his so I was really pumped about getting this book!!

After I opened it, Rusty told me this was the first present of the day, and that more would come, but that is all he would say. First of all, I didn't want much for my birthday, so I would've been just fine with this! But then to leave me in suspense like that!!! What the hey!

I got in my car to go to work, and looked over in the passenger seat, and sure enough, there was another gift. I opened it and found two movies I wanted to get on DVD for a while now - Father of the Bride and Father of the Bride II. AWWWW! I called him to say thank you so much, and to tell him I loved the gifts, to which he said there's more later... WHAT?! I was fine with the book and movies already!!

(More to come about my birthday lunch in a later post...)

When I got home from work, I brought in the bag that had my movies, and I set them and my new book aside and left the bags just sitting on the bar. A few moments later I walked back through the living room and noticed a new bag sitting with the group of bags... A little black one that quickly caught my attention - it said "Zales" on it. I just kind of looked back at Rusty with that, "Is it really?" and "You shouldn't have!" face. I went ahead and opened it. To answer the questions, yes, it really was, and yes, he really did. I got a beautiful pair of diamond earrings!!! He did SUCH a good job!! I love them, and they really are beautiful!

We went to dinner at Grimaldi's, which is a little pizza place in Watter's Creek. I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a good pizza. It was wonderful! Our night ended there, as preggers here gets quite tired rather early in the evening, plus I had to get up early Saturday morning to head to Tyler for the day.

On Saturday evening, I'll just admit it - I was POOPED from all of the day's activities. After getting home from Tyler, I got to relax for about an hour before it was time to head back out for birthday dinner with my parents. Seafood was on the agenda, as it sounded good all week, so we went to Dodie's in Rockwall on the lake. It was SO good! Definitely satisfied my desire. Our waitress did look at me quite crazily when I ordered, though... I ordered "The Big Dodie" - over 2 lbs of boiled crab legs and shrimp. HOLY MOLY, though! I did a pretty good job at finishing it off, I'll say. I left 2 little shrimp (I think 3 were eaten by others) and of the three sets of crab legs I got, I ate 2 of them. (I donated the other one to my dad.) I was in and out of sleep the whole way home, but by the time I came to, it looked like Rusty had driven into Colorado or something with all the snow falling like it was!!

Sunday evening, we had dinner planned with Rusty's mom and sister's family. On the way to dinner, MIL (mother-in-law) texted Rusty saying we had a reservation for 20. WHAT?!? In about 3 or 4 hours notice, 18 other people were able to make plans to join us for my birthday dinner. How awesome is that! It was such a pleasant surprise! (And thank you to everyone that could make it out! I really appreciated it!)

As you can see, I have no reason to be mopey for this year's non-birthday - it turned out to be a wonderful event! I will say this though... next year I'll just have to shop and drink twice as much to make up for what I missed this year. Sound like a plan???

TTFN!

Roxie's Tail - Pillow Talk

Roxie and Belle (my parents' dog) get to see each other quite a bit. After a stay several months back, I think Roxie got a hint of how spoiled Belle is, so we of course had to live up to the new expectations. Belle has a pillow in her kennel, and gets covered up each night. Ridiculous, I know.

Well, before we started letting Roxie sleep out at nights, we decided to put a pillow in her kennel, to make things a little more cozy. It lasted for quite a while. We soon discovered nights aren't her problem. On nasty, rainy days, she has to stay inside locked up. (I know, it makes me sad, too, but it's for the best...) Well, apparently she got really bored one day, because we got home from work to find the pillow no longer in tact.

We let a week or two go by, and decided to try one more time with the whole pillow idea. Yeah, that didn't work. A couple of days later, after yet another cold, nasty day, we came home to this:

Squatternut Baush

A few of you might actually get this right away... For those of you that do, you rock. For those of you that don't, here you go...



We're in the middle of week 29 this week. According to my weekly email, little man is approximately 2.5 pounds and a little over 15 inches long. It compares him to a butternut squash, thus squatternut baush. :) Hopefully you all appreciated that as much as I did when I read it.

Last week, at 28 weeks, I had my last 4 week appointment. From now until 36 weeks I go every two weeks, and then at 36 weeks, I'll start going every week until Rylan graces us with his arrival.

I was a little apprehensive of my 28 week appointment, but over all, I did a good job, if I do say so myself. I rewarded myself with 2 pieces of chocolate that day. First of all, it was the much feared glucose screening. I'd heard horror stories about how terrible the fluid was I had to drink. Let me say this - it was NOT that bad at all. I was expecting to drink something along the lines of battery acid, so I was very pleasantly surprised with the nice orange drink. The worst part was the hour after the drink. I don't think I've ever had such a sugar high. It was terrible! On the way in to the Doc's office, Rusty asked me a question, and I actually was stuttering over my words because I couldn't talk fast enough to answer him. Then, once we were in the office, I couldn't sit still. Of course all of the sugar made Rylan just go crazy in my tummy, too. Glad to know it wasn't just me struggling.

I knew that I would be getting a RHogam shot at my appointment, also. I was a little nervous about it, as well, because I'd heard several different things. Some people had it in their arms, others in their rears. Everyone, though, said the worst part was how cold the fluid was when it was injected, so you could actually feel it spreading. I reallllly don't like needles and shots. To be honest, I can't remember the last shot I had - that's how much I dislike needles. So we go into one of the rooms for my shot to be administered. The assistant walks in and immediately says, "So this goes in your backside." I looked at Rusty and said, "Nooo!!" To make it worse, I was wearing a dress and just kind of had to hike it up and bend over. (Sorry for any terrible mental image you might've just had.) Of course I freaked out the whole time, but in the end, it really wasn't bad at all. The needle was small enough that I barely felt it, and I didn't feel a single drop of the fluid going in. When we walked out of the room, I kindly asked the nurse to not talk about me or laugh at me until I was well out of the office. :)

Well, I go back next week, already, so maybe I'll have some more fun stories after that visit. Hopefully none of them are bad enough to provide gruesome mental images again... HA! No promises to be made.

I missed a few weeks on pictures. Anyway, here is my growth since the last picture at 24 weeks. I had to go for the official wardrobe change. To make myself feel better, I find it necessary to tell you that the other clothes technically still fit, but since they aren't maternity, they don't hug my shape the right way, showing you how big I actually am.

Here is 24 weeks:


Here is 29 weeks: