My Seventeenth Week

I'm eighteen weeks now!  Actually, eighteen and a half really.  We're on a trip right now so this post is a little late and the below picture was taken in a hotel room.

So, the seventeenth week was interesting.  I actually had some pretty wretched morning sickness one day this week.  Apparently the baby doesn't love pumpkin oatmeal as much as it's mama and decided to make me puke about 4-5 times til every last trace of it was gone from my tummy that day.  (Sorry, TMI!).  My husband thought that was pretty funny, because he's sort of a hater of pumpkin and rolls his eyes at me every year when I start putting pumpkin in EVERYTHING.  He said the baby must get it's pumpkin aversion from him.  I did successfully eat some pumpkin pancakes this week though, so not all is lost.  I still find it interesting how my nausea has presented itself.  I was talking with a friend who is 13 weeks pregnant and she had pretty bad all day nausea until about 11 weeks, but never really puked.  I guess I'm lucky in that I never really have long periods of actual nausea, just a strong gag reflex and urge to puke at random times, and it's still happening to me at 18 weeks.  Strange.

I was in my friend Sarah's wedding this week, which was fun, but I picked out and purchased my bridesmaid dress before I was pregnant (and actually in pretty good shape) and barely squeezed into it for the event.  Sitting, dancing, and standing were all pretty uncomfortable in the dress and by the end of the night, I couldn't wait to get that dress off.  Another week or two and I probably wouldn't have fit in it at all.  The bump is a-growin!

Ow, my dress is too tight!

I did some more maternity clothes shopping this week and ended up with a pair of pants, a pair of jeans, a sweater, and a top from Kohls.  I have to say, their maternity section is small and limited, but I LOVE their jeans and you really can't beat some the deals I've gotten there (one of the tops I got was like $6 after I used a 20% coupon and found it on sale).  I've actually been pretty disappointed with Target's selection so far.  I had one trip to Destination Maternity, but most of their stuff is crazy expensive and designer, which I don't really care about.  There's a maternity consignment shop in Charlotte on my radar that I'm going to have to check out sometime soon.  I guess one thing I'm going to have to tap into eventually is online maternity clothes shopping.  I've kind of been avoiding it, because I really like to try stuff on and have a hard time being able to tell what will fit me from a picture.  Friends with maternity clothes, if you have stuff you want to let me borrow, I'm definitely game!

Another thing I've been meaning to tell you guys is that I've been listening to some Pregtastic podcasts, which I had originally heard about on Kath's blog.  They have talk shows about almost any baby and pregnancy related topic you can think of, so it's been fun to listen to some and hear a group of pregnant women speak on different topics.  I recommend them if you are expecting and want some fun and interesting pregnancy information.  I've listened ones on registry must-haves, baby carriers, and some of the high-low ones.  I like having them in the back ground when I'm doing something else.

I'm up a solid 4 pounds now, so my weight is creeping on, but still pretty slowly.  I think the bump is fairly obvious now unless I'm wearing something pretty loose though, so it's fun to kind of have more of a real bump.  I know I still have a long way to go though!

I haven't had a lot of strong cravings this week.  My diet has been pretty normal, more like my pre-pregnancy diet, except for the day with the pumpkin oatmeal disaster.  Oh, one thing that was kind of neat, was that I had non-alcoholic wine this week!  At my friend Sarah's rehearsal dinner, the restaurant had it and offered it to the bride and I since we are preggo and unable to drink alcohol.  We split a bottle of Cabernet, and I thought it was pretty good.  Upon further research on their website, they are associated with J.Lohr, one of my favorite wineries, so that means my taste buds must not have been too off when I declare that it was pretty good.  I might have to see if I can track some bottles of this stuff down to get me through the next four and half months.

I still don't know if I've felt movement.  Sometimes I think I might feel something, but I'm still not sure.  I am excited to feel some legit kicks and hope that happens really soon.  I think it will help a lot with my confidence in the pregnancy.  I've been checking my friends old pregnancy posts and lot of them were already feeling kicks at this point.  Jealous!

I'm still researching baby purchases, because I know creating the registry is coming up.  One thing I'm kind of stuck on is strollers.  I think I want to get a BOB Revolution for running with the baby (I'm open to other suggestions though), but I think I'm also going to want some other kind of stroller for normal activities, because I don't think I'm going to want to cart the BOB in my car.  The other stroller will need to be something that unfolds/folds easily, that will fit in my car trunk (I drive a mid sized sedan), and works with a car seat initially.  I'm not sure if I should just go with the travel system combo (car seat/stroller) or something else.  I know about the snap-n-go, but maybe I might want something that will actually work beyond the car seat as well.  Confusing.  I may end up just going to the store and to see the options in person and will need my husbands help deciding.  Please let me know if you have suggestions!

Lastly, we have our anatomy scan scheduled NEXT WEEK!  We are finding out what we're having, so assuming all goes well, we will know in a week!  I'm not sure what I think we're having.  Initially, I thought it was a girl, but I've kind of migrated to the middle now and I think it could go either way.  I've had people tell me they were sure it's a boy and some tell me they're sure it's a girl.  Greg thinks boy.  I think like most people I'm pretty much split on the old wives tales, so that's not really any help.  I guess we'll just wait and see!