Ingenue Mom

Weight : I've gained 35 pounds total. Each appointment now, I'm right at that point, not really gaining anymore. I was even a pound less last week and now back up to 35 pounds total this week. I'm happy with my weight gain. It's about 5 pounds more than I gained with Isis, but it's a second baby and it's warmer outside, so I've noticed more fluid retention and a little more swelling in my feet and legs than I had with Isis. I can still fit in a few non-maternity shirts, but with pants, there are 2 pairs of maternity capri jeans that I can fit in, a pair of maternity leggings and a couple of pairs of sweatpants that I fit in. That's it. So considering the temperature dropped today, I'm hoping she comes soon because I don't really have any warm weather pants that fit me right now! Aversions : None! Yay! Cravings : Ice cream - Graeter's Black Raspberry Chip or anything from Orange Leaf. I want it all the time. Not indulging myself, th...

My friend Sara Corman of Sara Corman Photography took some beautiful pictures for us a couple of weeks ago! Isis wasn't always super thrilled about having her picture taken, but I think we got some great shots of our growing family!! If you're in the KY area and are interested in pictures, check out Sara's blog for more information! I highly recommend her!!   Side note, Sara will also be taking our birth pictures when Baby #2 arrives. So she'll be there capturing that experience for us! Sara Corman Photography

Weight: At 30 weeks, I've gained about 25 pounds. This is more than I had gained at this point with Isis, but still not bad in my opinion! I'm on track to gain about 35 this pregnancy. I'm starting to feel heavier lately. I've reached that point where I just feel bigger in general. I can only wear maternity pants, which is different than how it was with Isis. With Isis, I could wear my regular jeans with a hair band tied around the button. I used the Bella Band a lot with that pregnancy. This time, I feel like my hips & thighs are a little bigger than they were with Isis because my regular pants just don't fit at the top of my legs as well. I've got several pairs of maternity pants and shorts, so I'm wearing those! I am mainly wearing regular shirts, not maternity shirts. Most of my clothes are pretty stretchy, so that plays in my favor right now! We'll see how it goes as I continue to get bigger these last 10 weeks. Aversions: Considering t...

We are having another girl!!! I am so excited that Isis will have a little sister. That is something I never had and I always wished I had. Having a brother was fun, too, don't get me wrong, but there was always something I envied about that bond of sisters. I look forward to seeing this with my girls!! Everything looked great with the 20 week ultrasound, so we are excited and well into nursery planning and preparing as I want to have everything done and ready before I go back to school at the beginning of August. Now, second reason for this post: Potty Training   We have also decided it is time to potty train Isis. I held off during the school year because I didn't want to make my babysitter do a lot of it. Isis uses the potty occasionally as it is, usually about once a day, if not more. She just doesn't really tell us if she needs to go all the time. She also wakes up with a dry diaper some of the time both at night and almost always for naps. So we feel l...

11 weeks (almost a month ago)   I realized the other day that I have a hard time remembering all the details of my pregnancy with Isis. I looked back on my blog to see how much of it I chronicled & I just didn't keep up with much. I felt like I needed to somehow record the things I do remember and what is happening this time. Pre-pregnancy: Isis - It took us 8 months to get pregnant. I was nervous about whether or not we'd be able to get pregnant toward the end, but then it finally happened. Baby #2 - We got pregnant the 2nd month we tried. It was actually really surprising because after the experience with Isis, I had planned for it to take longer, so I was actually expecting to wait more. I'm not complaining, though! Morning Sickness: Isis - I had nausea and smell sensitivity from week 6/7 to week 11. I never threw up, but I felt nauseated pretty much the whole time. I still wanted to eat and there were plenty of things that tasted good. Baby #2 - I had nausea and ...

Due date: October 17   Looks like Isis will become a big sister in October!! I've been waiting 4 weeks to share & I'm so excited to finally let everybody know! As this blog serves as a sort of virtual scrapbook or journal of my pregnancy/baby stuff, I feel like I want to remember some of the stuff from the last few weeks! First of all, after trying for 8 months to conceive Isis, it was a SHOCK, to say the least, when it happened right away! I don't think I really believed it until we went to the midwife's office for blood work the week after I got a positive test. I have to say one of my absolute favorite things about my midwife is the fact that she's just very proactive about staying on top of things. She said to come on in to check blood work and hormone levels and everything. She also said that since you can see a heartbeat at 7-8 weeks, that I didn't need to wait until 10 weeks or more for my first ultrasound. That means that yesterday af...

There are so many pregnant people right now!! It is absolutely crazy!! I'm about to start a long term sub for a teacher who is due on the 18th. My best friend, Diana , is pregnant with her 3rd! Due towards the end of August. My baby guru, Laurel, is pregnant with her 3rd! Due in April. One of my good friends, Ciaara, is pregnant with her 1st! Due end of July. A friend from high school, Allison, is pregnant with her 2nd! Due in August. A friend of mine, Lauren, whose husband works with Lewis is pregnant with her 1st! Due in May. Melissa from Dear Baby is pregnant with her 2nd! Due in May. Adriel from The Mommyhood Memos just announced that she is pregnant with her 2nd! Due in the fall. That is a lot of babies in 2011!! Not to mention all the celebrities! Here's my current list of celebrities due in 2011: Mariah Carey, Pink, Jennifer Connelly, Emma Bunton, Toni Collette, Rachel Zoe, Marion Cotillard, Alicia Silverstone, Natalie Portman, Jewel, Victoria Beckham, Kate Hudson,...

Melissa at Dear Baby posted a link to this blog & the first post when I clicked was this one about " Dressing the Bump ." I have to say, this girl is absolutely beautiful & her style is so great!! I am all about some tunics & cardigans & she just got me so excited about getting pregnant again!! I've bookmarked this link so that when that day comes, I've got some inspiration! Also, preggo moms, there's a 30% off sale in the Old Navy Maternity clothes !! So go check it out!

As many of you probably already know, I'm a big believer in educating & supporting pregnant women in their experience. I used a nurse-midwife & because of that, I heard a lot about doulas. I didn't choose to use one this time, but I was informed on what they did and how to find them in my area, but I know that many women don't know what doulas do or what options they have. When Heather Green contacted me about the possibility of doing a guest post about what doulas can offer a new mom, I was happy to have the opportunity to share with all of you what was available from someone much more informed than I! When I found out I was pregnant, there was no doubt in my mind that I wanted a doula. Not only for me, but for my husband and my family. These amazing women are basically your guardian angels who guide you through the most difficult and painful time of your life. What most people don't know is that doulas do almost everything! From massage and hypnotherapy to ...

Isis is excited to have new baby friends! There are 5 pregnant ladies in my life right now! And one possibly soon-to-be pregnant one! It is crazy!! That doesn't even include my lovely blog friend Amy , who is also due soon! I absolutely loved being pregnant & while I know that not everyone feels the same - the experience can be so different for all of us - I still think it's just a wonderful thing when I find out friends are expecting! Isis will be so lucky to have more little friends in the world!  I shared my new mom tips last week & then I have 5 blog friends help me out by sharing their new mom tips ! I hope that some of you who are or will soon be new moms found some things helpful! Adriel at The Mommyhood Memos is starting her Moms Who Work series this week! I think it'll be really helpful for any of you who are or will be working moms! I've been staying home the last 8 months, but now am a working mom. It is really hard, but has also been so wonderful...

After my wonderful experience with my guest bloggers last week, I have decided I would like to highlight some other bloggers through guest posts on my blog from time to time. I'll always try to post these on Friday with my Weekend Reading posts! This week, I'm kicking this off with Gretchen from That Mama Gretchen . She is currently pregnant with her first child & is planning to have a waterbirth at Andaluz Waterbirth Center . I asked her to share her story of how she came to choose a waterbirth. Please visit her blog for more posts & follow her on Twitter ! It isn’t every day you hear of someone giving birth naturally, let alone in the water. It kind of makes you think of something a sea creature does while wondering how exactly the baby avoids drowning. These are all common questions, even similar to the ones I had before deciding that a waterbirth was the best choice for my family. Today, the bun is in the oven and my husband, Dominic, and I are just 2 mon...

I'm sure this isn't hard to believe, but having a baby really changed a lot of things for me. Amazing, right? One of the things that changed which I never expected was that suddenly I had a strong passion to educate & empower women in their pregnancies - specifically first-time moms. I've been really thinking a lot about getting my childbirth educator certification. I was emailing Queenie at The Planet Pink the other day & she got me really excited about this!  I feel so blessed to have had a really wonderful nurse-midwife who introduced a Centering Class in her practice. Through this class, I was given extensive information with an air of grace. We were informed on all our options. We were taught natural labor techniques & what to expect in that experience. We were also taught about all our options for medication ranging from IV-administered medication to epidurals. We were taught everything about c-sections & what to expect both in emergency & sched...

1. Drink tons of water. This helps with so many things when you're pregnant. It's great for the baby, it helps alleviate a lot of the side effects of pregnancy . It keeps you from being dehydrated (which, during pregnancy, leads to headaches, nausea, cramps & dizziness). It can relieve some morning sickness, heartburn & indigestion. It helps prevent UTIs, which are common during pregnancy. It also helps ease constipation, hemorrhoids & swelling. 2. Have your man (or someone) rub your legs every night. I swear by this one. Leg cramps are so common during pregnancy, possibly because of lactic acid buildup among other things. If you get your legs rubbed each night, it releases the lactic acid buildup & can help keep you from having leg cramps. Plus it feels great & helps to relax you! I only got 2 leg cramps through my entire pregnancy & they both happened in the middle of the night on nights when my husband didn't rub my legs. 3. Don't eat just...

First, let's look at my beautiful pregnancy hair ... Oh  my gosh, how awesome was that? I am someone who has really thin hair to begin with & the fact that my hair got lovely & a little thicker during pregnancy was just a barrel of fun for me! Well, this is a picture that was taken 4 months after having Isis & it was the first time I started to realize that all my hair around the front part of my forehead had fallen out. My forehead looks huge-mongous. Let's compare... Not my favorite picture of myself. But anyway, now it's all starting to grow back in a little & it sticks up real bad. It's like half an inch long. I tried to take a picture with my phone, but it didn't come out great - because it's a phone . Still, here it is... So at least it's growing back, but it's not awesome.  Couple that with the stretch marks... and post-partum body stuff is just not nearly as fun as pregnancy body stuff. Although, there were plenty of aspe...

This is not a post that I looked forward to writing, but after my experience, I thought it would be important to share. I have found through conversation & just searching around online that I am definitely not the only one with this problem. I also want to say that my blog is not a place where I feel the need to discuss or debate political issues. This is not a post endorsing or contesting the new health care plan, but, I do believe there is a problem with some (many?) aspects of our health care system. I do not offer a solution to that problem, but I will offer some tips as to how we were able to lower our prenatal & delivery costs during pregnancy with no maternity coverage. I do have health insurance through a popular company and have held it on my own - not through an employer - for almost 5 years. When I applied for the plan, I requested the plan with maternity coverage & received an approval letter. I never received any letter stating that the plan I w...

I forgot to post about our Centering class reunion the other day!! It was so great to see everyone!! There were two baby boys and four baby girls! The boys were Malachi and Zion! The girls were Isis, Olivia, Tilda and Shelby! All the moms & dads seemed to be doing well after their deliveries! There were two cesarean section deliveries, one delivery with an epidural and forceps and three natural deliveries with no medication. Everyone had fun sharing their different experiences! It is so interesting to see how the experience is for each individual person. I now have so much respect for the female body. It's incredible! Here are some pictures from the night! I'm not going to post names with the pictures to protect their privacy on the internet!