Thursday, October 27, 2011

Pregnancy: 6 Weeks

What's going on with the baby right now?
-He/She has tripled or even quadrupled in size and is now three or four millimeters long!
-He/She is working on growing a nose, some ears and a mouth.
-He/She is also growing flappy little leg and arm buds.
-He/She has a heartbeat that can be seen on an ultrasound — 100 to 160 beats (although we havent heard it yet)

What's going in with me?
-Definitely peeing more often!
-Nausea set in at the end of the week....yuck! I was really hoping this pregnancy wouldn't be as bad as the first, but after just 2 days of nausea, I can tell it's going to be a rough one as well!
-I've actually lost 2 pounds this week, which is my favorite way to start a pregnancy!

I had my first obgyn appointment today. They did my yearly pap since I was due for it anyway. While they were doing that they found some new blood on my cervix, scary!! The midwife didn't think it was anything to be worried about, as she said that during pregnancy your cervix is just extra sensitive, but it was definitely a little worrisome to me. I have yet to see any blood myself, so that is good! Praying that everything is progressing well! I will find out my blood levels tomorrow so we can be sure my progesterone is high enough.

I am continuously giving this baby's life over to the Lord and surrendering my fears to Him. I know that He is in complete control!

Someone is going to be a BIG Sister!

That's right, I am expecting #2!! We were pleasantly surprised to find out that I am pregnant a few weeks ago. As of now, the due date is June 22, 2012. After trying for 2 years to conceive Hannah and having to use fertility drugs, we never thought we would be surprised by a pregnancy. We just assumed it would be a long road again and had planned on waiting a little while longer to start the fertility treatments once again. But after realizing my period as a few days late, I decided to take a test. I almost didn't take it because I was just so convinced that it would be negative. But the second I took it, it was clearly positive! Oh my! I knew that this time around I really wanted to get Brian's reaction on video, so I had to wait to tell him. I climbed back in bed, heart pounding and faked going back to sleep. Then Brian asked me if I had taken a pregnancy test (found out later that he had heard me messing around with the box), I lied and said "no". He got up to get ready for work and when he went downstairs to eat breakfast, I came down a few minutes later with the video camera on and the pregnancy test in my hand. I handed it to him and said, "what do you think about this?". He was shocked, but excited! We waited a few hours (since it was so early in the morning) to tell anyone else.

We are so thankful for the Lord's timing with this pregnancy and His perfect plan!

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

19 Months

Dear Hannah,

Apparently a 19 month old is designed to be a parrot. You are repeating everything we say these days. One example is with our dog, Bubbles. I am often saying "no bubbles" for one reason or another so now you like to yell at her too saying, "no, no buh buh". Then today when I was talking to daddy and said something was driving me nuts, you were suddenly yelling, "nuts, nuts"...yikes! Guess I need to watch what I say even more closely! Your vocabulary has simply exploded. One I'd my favorite things you have been saying lately is "happy" while you give a great big smile. Adorable! You also constantly list all of your friends, asking where they are - "haddah" (Hannah), "Anne", "Will", "Dodi" (Dominic), "Carly". Your greatest achievement this past month is learning to count to ten! You can do it all by yourself...amazing! And each number actually sounds almost right. So smart!

As you approach 2 years old, we are beginning to expose you to the potty and the concept of peeing and pooping on the potty. Every night before bed we have you sick in the potty and normally you sit for a second and then pop up saying, "almos" (which in your language means all done). But the other night you actually peed! It wasn't much, but you did it and we were so proud of you! Then the following night you almost pooped on the potty, but missed and ended up pooping right on top of the clean diaper I had laid out to put on you. Good try! The funniest part is when you sit down and start grunting like your really trying to go. Haha. Not sure where you learned that.

You are still eating a ton of food throughout the day and thankfully you are still eating some a lot of healthy foods! We have managed to keep you from drinking any juice (water only), eating any fast food, or anything fried. Hoping to keep your palate very pure for as long as possible. A typical day of eating looks like this:
-Breakfast - tons of fruit and a carb (waffle, pancake, cheerios, toast, kashi cereal bar, etc.) and sometimes yogurt or an egg
-Snack - dried fruit (raisins, apricots, cranberries, prunes, etc) and a carb (dry cereal or crackers)
-Lunch - veggies (broccoli, carrots, peas, etc.), sandwich (almond butter and jelly or deli meat and cheese or hummus) or leftovers, fruit, cheese
-Snack - veggie and carb
-Dinner - usually whatever we are having or leftovers (always lots of veggies, a protein, a carb, a fruit, and some dairy

You continue to wake up every morning between 6am and 7am, but I leave you in your crib until 7am, no matter what. Amazingly, your nap has started extending a bit, to an hour or an hour and a half on a good day! Such a difference from your typical 45 minutes! I've stuck to my one hour rule (in the crib for a full hour, no matter what). You are usually in bed by 7 or 7:30pm, after we finish your bedtime routine - bath (as needed), potty time, new diaper, pjs, brush teeth and hair, story time, prayers, hugs and kisses, "good night sweetheart" song, in bed. You have to have your blankie ("bankie") and two lovies ("ludie") every time you are in your crib and sometimes even when you are out. Thankfully you are flexible with which lovies

You have become a tooting machine! You are so incredibly gassy (must be a Vaccaro gene) and it's hard not to laugh when you toot. So when you toot now, you smirk and giggle. We are trying to work on getting you to say, "excuse me", which sounds like "skoos ee". I think we are going to have to stop the giggling and just work in the manners. But man is it funny!

Other 19 month stats:
- Wearing a size 5 diaper day and night
- Wearing 18 month, 24 month and 2T clothes
- Wearing a size 6 or 7 shoe

I love you precious girl...toots and all! ;)