Sleep Solution Step Three: Create Your Sleep Logs

I did our sleep log yesterday. It was a pretty average day, we didn't do anything out of the ordinary. Grocery shopping in the morning, didn't go anywhere at night. His naps were pretty normal, his nighttime sleep was pretty normal (we get this kind of sleep 3-4 times a week). So I think yesterday was a good day for doing the sleep log.

Sleep log for March 11, 2011. Age: 3 months, 2 weeks
NAP LOG

time baby fell asleep	how baby fell asleep	where baby fell asleep	where baby slept	how long?
7:46am	bottle fed (10 minutes)	in my arms	crib	1 hr 15 min
11:52	in beco (out)	in beco	in beco	30 min
2:15pm	on bottle	in my arms	crib	45 min

HTML Tables

According to table on page 48:
1. How many naps should baby be getting? 3
2. How many naps is baby getting now? 3
3. How many hours should baby be napping? 5-6
4. How many hours is baby napping now? 2 1/2
5. Do you have a formal nap routine? No
6. Are your baby's naptimes/lengths consistent every day? For the most part, yes, but he's so young his naps change a lot. It's mostly consistent, though.

PREBEDTIME ROUTINE LOG

Time	what we did	activity level	noise level	light level
5:00pm	watch tv (sesame street)	moderate	moderatel	dim
5:20pm	make dinner	moderate	moderate	bright
5:40pm	bath	moderate	moderate	bright
5:55pm	lotion/sleeper/sleepsack	calm	quiet	bright
6:05pm	stories	calm	moderate	dim
6:17pm	bottle	calm	quiet	dim
6:28pm	sleep	-	-	-

HTML Tables

1. Do you have a formal, consistent bedtime routine? Yes
2. Is the hour prior to bedtime mostly peaceful, quiet and dimly lit? yes
3. Does your bedtime routine help both you and your baby relax and get sleepy? Yes
4. Any other observations about your current bedtime routine? with daylight savings, we're hoping his current bedtime routine will continue and we can have him going to bed at 7:30 or 8pm instead of 6:30 or 7pm.

NIGHT WAKING LOG

time	how baby woke me up	how long awake; what we did	time baby fell back to sleep	how baby fell back to sleep	how long of a sleep stretch since fell asleep
6:55pm	fussing	5 min (rock/bounce/soother)	6:58pm	soother (released gas)	30 min
2:24am	grunting/moving	14 min (bottle fed)	2:38am	bottle	7hrs 30min
5:08am	crying	22min (bottle fed)	5:30am	bottle	2hrs 30min
*5:35am	spit up/fuss	-	-	-	-

HTML Tables

*He woke up because he had spit up, and didn't go back to sleep. I brought him into bed with me, fed him a bit and we relaxed and were quiet (snuggled, looked at the baby faces app on my ipod) until 6am when he seemed more awake and was chatting. His first nap was at 8am.

Asleep time: 10 1/2 hours
Awake time: 41 minutes
Total number of awakenings: 2 (or 3? I'm not really sure how to count the spit up wake up
Longest sleep span: 7 1/2 hours
Total hours of sleep: 13

Then there are some questions on his sleep, an overall review. I'm not dissatisfied with his sleep, even though he "should" be getting 15 hours a day, I think he's a pretty happy and content baby while awake (though he did wake up grumpy from nap #3, so I'm wondering if he needed a longer nap). He sleeps great at night. I would, however, like to pay attention to our nighttime routine and see if there's something I'm doing differently on the nights he has more than 2 wakeups. I know he's still just a young baby and his sleep patterns will change a lot in the coming months, but I think we've got a good thing going on here.

The next step is "review and choose sleep solutions", which is a chapter dedicated to finding solutions for sleep problems, or making steps toward improving sleep routine and sleep habits. There are two sections, one is for newborns (0-3 months) and one is for older babies (4 months-2 years). I'll be reading both, as Ty is very much in between the two categories. I'll be trying a few of the solutions and seeing how things go. I'll make notes of the solutions and my results, and post about it in a few days!

And, because this seemed fitting for this post:

Nap time with his lovey.

Sleep Solution Step Two

Firstly, I went over the co-sleeping safety check, and decided that it's not really the best idea for us to co-sleep right now, even part time. We're always good about making sure there are no blankets or pillows near where Ty is, but he's always laying tummy-to-tummy with me, my arm around him and between Doug and I. The book explains the safety precautions necessary in co-sleeping, and says that the baby should be between the wall and his mom, and if there is no wall, there should be a mesh safety rail. If we were co-sleeping full time, I would just sidecar the crib against the bed, but we only co-sleep part time (a couple hours a night, maybe 3-5 times a week). I'll likely pick up a mesh safety rail to keep on my side of the bed so that we are able to safely co-sleep (as I really do like those few hours of snuggles, and I would want Ty to be safe whenever he wants/needs to sleep with us).

So last night Ty did not sleep with us, and I only brought him into our bed for feeding and for a half hour of pre-wake up snuggles. There were no issues with him not sleeping with us last night.

Anyway, on to Step Two: Learn Basic Sleep Facts. This step is really helpful in learning why babies sleep the way they do. I think any changes taking place right now are in my mentality and the way I view Ty's sleeping habits. He is not a "problem sleeper", and we're not doing Sleep Solution to make him a better sleeper, but to make us better at understanding his basic sleep needs. Maybe we'll find some improvements along the way, but improving his sleep is not my ultimate goal here.

One thing I found interesting was the sleep cycle patterns of a typical baby. It looks something like this (over an 11-12 hour period):
Drowsy; falling asleep
light sleep
deep sleep (for about an hour)
brief awakening
deep sleep (for 1-2 hours)
light sleep
brief awakening
REM/dreaming sleep
brief awakening
light sleep
brief awakening
REM sleep
brief awakening
Toward morning: deep sleep
brief awakening
REM sleep
brief awakening
light sleep
awake for the day

Seeing how frequently babies fall in and out of light or deep sleep and have brief awakenings, it's no wonder we have such frequent wake ups. Adults also have similar sleep patterns, but we are able to fall back to sleep without fully waking up or registering our awakenings. When we adjust pillows, change positions or any of the other numerous things we do at night, we barely even realize we are awake. Babies who wake frequently but are not hungry, generally just don't know HOW to fall back asleep. We put Ty to sleep on a bottle or soother, in our arms. So when he wakes up, he feels he needs the same routine in order to fall asleep again. To put it into an adult context, that would be like us waking up in a different room with no pillow. We couldn't just fall back to sleep on the kitchen floor with no pillow, we'd need to go back to our bed and go back to sleep the way we FIRST fell asleep.

It makes sense, now, that a baby who fell asleep in my arms with a soother (or bottle) in his mouth, would struggle to fall asleep on his own all alone. So he cries out to me to help him fall back to sleep. Generally he's pretty easy, and I can get up and pat him on the back and he'll fall asleep again, but hopefully this book will help us figure out how to give Ty the tools he needs to fall asleep on his own. He's not terrible at it now, and we've introduced his lovey, which he grabs on to and sucks on and can fall asleep that way most times.

Another interesting thing I learned was about how much sleep babies actually need (as always, this is about typical babies... like Ty. There are those babies who don't fall into any sort of category). Since Ty is 3 1/2 months, he is right on the verge of hitting a change in sleep (babies' sleep matures a lot from newborn to young child ages, and 4 months is one of those times. This is what people call the "sleep regression", but it's really just a baby's sleep maturing and them sorting out how to deal with it. Since Ty is so close to this new sleep stage, I'm reading both the "newborn" and the "4 months +" sections of this book.

A typical 3 month old baby needs 3 naps (totaling 5-6 hours) and 10-11 hours of nighttime sleep for a total of about 15 hours of sleep in a day.

A typical 6 month old baby needs 2 naps (totaling 3-4 hours) and 10-11 hours of nighttime sleep for a total of 14-15 hours of sleep a day.

For reference (since I'm far from this stage, but I'm sure others who are reading this may be parents to older babies), a 12 month old needs 1-2 naps (totaling 2-3 hours) and 11 1/2-12 hours of nighttime sleep for a total of 14 hours of sleep in a day.

A 3 year old needs 1 nap (totaling 1-1 1/2 hours) and 11 hours of nighttime sleep for a total of 12 hours of sleep in a day.

Since a newborn sleeps 16-18 hours a day distributed over 6-7 sleep periods, and a 1 month old needs 3 naps, totaling 6-7 hours plus 8 1/2-10 hours of nighttime sleep, you can see how much a baby's sleep matures over the course of a year.

Anyway, these are the most interesting sleep facts I discovered. There is a LOT to learn about sleep, though! It definitely opened my eyes to the needs of my baby.

Today we are doing Step Three: Create Your Sleep Log. I'll post all about this tomorrow, and we'll see what's next! I'm excited to learn more about how to assist my baby in getting what he needs out of sleep.

The No-Cry Sleep Solution, step one

I just started reading The No-Cry Sleep Solution, and thought I would blog about my progress if anyone was interested (also to help me see how things are going). I'm not really bothered by Ty's current sleeping habits, as they are pretty normal for a 3 month old, but any improvement is a good thing, right?


First of all, here is our starting point sleep log, with a mostly typical night, minus the 9pm wake up (this actually doesn't get discussed until step 3, but I wanted to have a starting point, so I logged his sleep last night):

6:15pm Bottle feed
6:34pm asleep in crib
9:03pm awake, soothe to sleep
9:12pm asleep in crib
12:54am awake, bottle feed
1:11am asleep in crib
3:23am awake (soaking wet, stripped clothes and changed diaper), bottle feed
3:33am asleep in our bed
5:05am awake, soothe to sleep
5:11am asleep in our bed
6:28am awake, bottle feed
6:39am awake for the day

Total wake ups: 4
Longest stretch of sleep: 3 hours 42 minutes
Total night time sleep: 11 hours, 15 minutes (roughly... I did easy math with this and rounded by quarter hours)

This is a GOOD night's sleep as far as quantity, but waking up 4 times isn't ideal (his usual is 2-4). This wasn't a super typical night, but it was the night I chose to log, so there we go.

Step One: Do a Safety Check

Okay, so the first part of this process is to make sure that your baby has a safe sleeping environment. The first part of this section talks about baby sleeping on his back. We've allowed Ty to sleep on his tummy since he was 4 weeks old, as he seemed much more comfortable this way. While reading this, I decided to commit to following the book as long as each step worked for my baby. This was the first challenge.

The other parts of this section talk about safe crib/cradle checking and safe co-sleeping, etc. I haven't gotten to the safe co-sleeping part yet, but I will read that part before we go to bed tonight, since we do a combination of crib sleeping and co-sleeping (mostly crib, though). Anyway, it says to make sure there are no toys (stuffed or otherwise), no blankets, tight fitting sheets, that bumpers are secure with no dangling strings and no gaps. I did all of this. It does allow for one "safe lovey", and Ty's security blanket from Aden and Anais is his lovey (he has 4 of them in rotation and he adores these things). Fortunately, it qualifies as a safe lovey. So, nap time came, and while feeding Ty his bottle (he bottle feeds until he's fallen asleep), I decided to put him down on his back when I put him in the crib.

MAJOR FAIL. He woke up after about 15 seconds, and then was grunting and flailing. I watched him, because he was still mostly asleep, and I didn't want him to wake up. He flailed until he was on his side, then he rolled himself onto his tummy (for the first time ever). I'm taking this (as well as the fact he can easily roll from belly to back and can push himself up onto his elbows) as a cue that he is ready to safely sleep on his tummy, and that this is he preferred sleeping position. Unfortunately, he woke himself up while rolling over, so I had to soothe him back to sleep and I put him on his tummy. He went to sleep an hour ago, and is still sleeping (though he is starting to stir).

So, that's that. I'll write more on this as I see fit, with a detailed night time sleep schedule every ten days.

It's been a long time...

I wish I had time to sit here and write about everything that has happened since my last post. I can't, but I will say: I had my baby! :) My birthing experience was amazing. It was scary at one point, but mostly it was amazing. It was hard and it was painful, but it was wonderful. My husband was a wonderful support, my midwife was perfect, and my baby was so worth all the tears, all the waiting, and all the pain. I'd do it over and over and over again (and I probably will)!

Tyron Douglas was born on November 24th, 2010 at 4:23am after 9 hours of active labor including 23 minutes of pushing. He weighed 8lbs 9oz and was 23inches long.

And now, 5 weeks later, he weighs over 13lbs and is 25inches long. He's got big blue eyes and is making his mommy and daddy so proud, so filled with love, so amazed at God's miracles and blessings every day.

I love being a mommy. It is tough, especially after nights like last night, with very little sleep. It has been tough to make decisions that affect my baby greatly. I had to make the decision to give up breastfeeding in favor of formula feeding. It saved my sanity and we are all much happier now, but it was a really heartbreaking decision. We've already packed up the newborn clothes (and the 0-3 month clothes) and are watching our baby boy grow right before our eyes. He's beautiful and perfect, and I feel so blessed that God chose me to be his mother. What I did to deserve a precious gift like Tyron, I will never know. I strive to be the best mother I can be, even in my mistakes and imperfections. I love Tyron fully and honestly, and my goal is to raise him to be loving, caring, gentle, patient and strong like his daddy. But most of all, I want him to grow up loving God.

This whole "motherhood" thing is a lot more than I expected it to be. It's more fulfilling, more rewarding, more difficult, more exhausting, more responsibility, more time consuming, more amazing than I ever imagined.

39 weeks, come on baby!

So, I guess it's time for another weekly update! I'm actually really hoping this is my last one, but obviously only Tyron knows when he's going to be born.

He's basically done cooking. I don't know what he's doing in there now other than getting fatter. Maybe he's practicing a big dance for his debut. Sometimes it sure feels like he is! Okay, here we go:

Weight Change: gained a pound this week. Haha.

Symptoms/Feelings: Lots of "practice" contractions. LOTS. Like, every day they come and go all day long. Totally normal and annoying. This morning at like 5am they were really bad and woke me up. I walked around and they got worse, and I thought maybe it was heading toward the real thing. I decided to try to sleep, but woke up every time another contraction came. They ended up tapering off at lie 8am (right in time to wake up for the day!).

My midwife said that I can take 2 tylenol and 2 gravol to help me sleep when these things happen. I wish I did that this morning. I'm exhausted.

Also been feeling really nauseous and sick to my stomach several times a day. Apparently this is another "almost done" sign. I hope it is almost done, because I hate feeling sick and hungry at the same time.

Cravings: Chips and salsa! If I'm still pregnant this weekend, we're having a "fat movie weekend" and watching LOST seasons 1 and 2, so

Appointments: Had my appointment at 11am. All is well, really. Heart beat good, weight good, measuring good. She did a cervical check and I am 1cm dilated (she said MORE than 1cm, but not quite 2), partially effaced (she didn't specify how much) and my cervix is tilted forward. She wrote something else on my chart about my membranes, but I can't read her writing. She said she could feel his head, which I guess is a good thing. Next week we will possibly do a stretch and sweep to get things moving, but I haven't 100% decided.

Anything Big Happening? I finished Christmas shopping! I just need to get wrapping paper and stuff on Thursday.

Preparing for Baby: We're prepared. Just get here, Tyron!

Belly Pics: Kind of a crappy picture this week.

38 Weeks

Oh, hi. I am 38 weeks pregnant!

Not really much to say about Ty, as he's pretty much cooked, and we're just waiting for him to be all big and strong and ready to come meet us out here. :)

Weight Change: NADA. My weight was the same as last week (and the week before that). No loss, no gain. So weird, considering I feel gigantic, and considering I eat whatever I want, really. No complaints, though. My midwife didn't seem concerned, so I'm not going to worry about it.

Symptoms/Feelings: Feeling less pronounced movement. Now it's more of a stretching, bumping feeling than kicking and wiggling. Still feeling the movements frequently throughout the day, though. Having a lot more pelvic pain/pressure, and having a really hard time sleeping at night. Also having a lot more frequent waves of cramping (which my midwife said is contractions). They do feel a lot different from braxton hicks contractions, and they come in waves where the cramping starts of mild and then gets more painful, then tapers off.

Cravings: Really craving sushi today, and was craving pringles, but nothing really outrageous.

Appointments: Had my midwife appointment today. Things of note:
-My GBS swab results came back and I am GBS negative! Yay! This means I won't need to have antibiotics during labor. I was actually really nervous about this because I do have allergies to certain antibiotics, and it was going to be a bit more complicated than if I could take penicilin during labor.

-No weight change.

-Blood pressure slightly elevated (likely due to not having breakfast and having just made a trip to Starbucks, lol), but not high (I believe it was 130/72).

-My fundal measurement (when they measure from the top of my pelvic bone to the top of my uterus) was the same as last week- generally it grows 1cm per week. My midwife said it is likely because Ty's head has dropped into my pelvis, and when she checked, sure enough, it had! This is a good sign.

-I scheduled my induction. If I go past my due date, I'll be induced at 41 weeks, 3 days (which is November 25th). I'll have to have an NST if I go overdue, and that was scheduled as well. The NST (non-stress test) is an ultrasound where they check fluid levels and stuff to make sure everything is okay and that there's no reason to induce before the 25th.

Anything Big Happening? Going on a date this weekend with Doug! Going to have some spicy Indian food, and walk around. :)

Preparing For Baby: Not much preparing left. Just starting to do more walking and bouncing on my exercise ball and hope that things start happening soon.

Belly Pics:

Yay!

Mmmm, that's all!

37 Weeks: We're officially full term!

I'm full term! Hooray! This doesn't mean a whole lot in terms of when this kiddo will make his grand entrance, but it does mean that it could be any day now, and he would be just fine. I'm feeling in denial about actually giving birth, but I've had quite a few people tell me they think I'll have him early. We'll see!

Now, on to our last fruit comparison!


A watermelon! We're officially in the 9th month of pregnancy. I've completed 8 whole months! Wow. There's not much to say as far as development and growth go, because Ty is pretty much done. Just getting fatter and longer, and practicing all those natural reflexes that he's been working on for a while now.

Weight Change: I dunno. Last week I had lost 2lbs, even though I feel huge and thought I'd gained weight. Whatever, the baby is growing, my belly is growing, everything is growing at a normal and healthy rate. I'm so done with worrying about my weight.

Symptoms/Feelings: The newest thing has been cramping. It's not painful or anything, but I have been cramping, and experiencing more back pain with the cramps. Just for the past 4 days or so. Also losing bits of my mucous plug, and experiencing a lot of pelvic discomfort. All good things that point us in the direction of baby time.

Cravings: EVERYTHING. I seriously want to eat everything I can get my hands on. I had to purposely not buy anything "extra" at the grocery store this week, as I would have eaten it all in one day. No joke. I want real food, especially those yummy comfort foods. Chicken noodle soup, chicken pot pies, chili, stew, mashed potatoes. I am good with whatever, I just want to EAT. I've been eating a lot lately, and I have heard that right before going into labor a lot of women get suddenly hungry. Something about your body's way of storing up food as energy for birth? I can't remember. I don't really put a lot of hope in that, though. I don't feel like I'll be having this baby any time soon.

Appointments: Midwife appointment tomorrow at 10am. I will get my GBS swab, and we'll probably start discussing labor and what will happen if I go past due.

Anything big happening? Nope. Not doing anything big for the remainder of the pregnancy.

Preparing for Baby: I had a nice pedicure today and told her to hit all the labor inducing pressure points, haha. It probably won't do anything, but man that was a nice pedicure! I got a cute aqua color for my baby boy. I love it. :)



I've been trying to go for walks every day, but some days I just don't want to! I know walking will help my body prepare for labor, so I use that as motivation. The dogs enjoy the time with me, though I'm trying not to get them too used to our current schedule, as I know they won't get out as frequently once baby gets here. I also take lots of naps, as sleep is difficult at night. And I have been in SUPER CLEANING LADY mode. Tomorrow the kitchen gets SUPER CLEANED. :)

Belly Pics:

37 weeks! My belly seems a lot bigger than it was, even compared to last week (See?).

That's all! Only 3 weeks until my due date!!!

36 Weeks!

I can hardly believe we're already at 36 weeks. At the end of this week I'll be full term! It's so amazing how fast this time has flown by. Getting to see my little Ty-Guy this morning just made it all that much more real. He's so big in there! His arms and legs are all scrunched up, and his face is so much more defined (I got to see a really cool head-on shot of his face that was pretty cool!). It was so cute to see his little feet. They are so much bigger than they were 17 weeks ago!

-Ty is now around 19 inches long and weighs about 6lbs.
-At this point he gains about an ounce every day!
-He is shedding that hair that was all over his body (and that waxy stuff on his skin that was protecting him from the amniotic fluid). Now he's pretty much exactly how he is going to be when he's born!
-My uterus is as high up as it will ever get, and right now it feels like it rubs against my ribs.
-My amniotic fluid is at it's highest as well, and Ty has much less room to move around now. I've noticed his movements have decreased, but that's normal. As long as I feel him moving a little bit every day, there's no need for me to worry.

Weight Change: I'll find out tomorrow. I am pretty sure I did gain weight, though. I feel heavier and bigger! Average for 36 weeks is about 30lbs. I haven't gained that much, though. I'm still under my pre-pregnancy weight. At this point, I don't even care about the number on the scale. I'll worry about that after the baby is born.

Symptoms/Feelings: Starting to feel a lot of cramping throughout the day. Over the weekend I experienced quite a few moderately painful contractions. I think it was due to dehydration, so I've been making sure I drink lots of water and trying not to do too much. My feet also feel like they are swelling a bit. My normal shoes are getting a little snug. I'm not really sure what I'm going to do about that! Fortunately, my feet are the only things that are swelling so far.

Cravings: Junk food! I've been craving fast food a lot, but resisting. I did go to Taco Bell last week, but felt sick after. go figure. I've been craving frozen mango, and that is a craving I will indulge!

Appointments: Had an ultrasound this morning, as you can see by the picture at the top! Tyron is head down, and his back is up against my left side. No idea if he's anterior or posterior (anterior being facing my back- which is optimal for birth. Posterior or "sunny side up" which means he is facing my belly), but from the contractions I had over the weekend, I'd guess he is posterior. It's not ideal for birth, but he can still spin toward my back between now and birthing time. I didn't get a whole lot of information at the ultrasound, other than that he is head down and his heart looks good. Hopefully my midwife has the results at my next appointment.

My next midwife appointment is tomorrow morning. From now on I'll be going in every week!

Anything big happening? Nope! Just, you know, having a baby soon-ish. :-P

Preparing for baby: Like I mentioned last week, we're pretty set. Now we're just trying to spend as much time as possible together before we're a family of three. We've planned a few date nights, and are making the most of the next few weeks!

Belly Pics:


I don't really see too much difference from last week, but Doug thinks my belly has gotten bigger. It sure FEELS huge! :) My belly DOES look a bit lower, though!

35 Weeks!

35 Weeks!

-Ty is about 5 1/4 lbs and over 18 inches long.
-He's pretty much done developing, and not much will change other than his weight and length.
-He's preparing for life on the outside, and his lungs are getting stronger and preparing for his first breath. He's also producing waste for his first poop (joy!).
-We're 2 weeks from being full-term, 5 weeks from our due date and 6 weeks, 3 days from eviction date. Kind of crazy to think we will definitely have a baby within the next 6 1/2 weeks!


Here's a little diagram thing I found on spinningbabies.com. It's basically supposed to show you the position of the baby by feeling around a little and paying attention to where you feel things moving. It's backwards, with my left side on the right side of the page (like if I were looking in a mirror). So this is how you'd see the baby if you were looking straight on at my belly from in front of me!

So, the squiggles in the top are where I feel kicks most often. That would be where baby's feet are. The little curved line at the top is where I feel a bump/buldge, and that's the baby's bum. That line down the side is the hard part where I feel the baby's back. The heart is where I hear the heartbeat loudest, and the curved line is where I can feel a round bulge of the head. Pretty interesting, though I'm not 100% sure I'm right on all of this.

Weight Change: Will find out next week.

Symptoms/Feelings: LOTS of braxton hicks contractions. I get them numerous times a day, throughout the day. Also, I feel like I could eat all day long. I'm always hungry! I wake up in the middle of the night and want to eat! I also get REALLY grumpy if I need to eat. I'm assuming my blood sugar is changing, which is normal at this stage in pregnancy, and that the grumpiness comes from low blood sugar. Heartburn hasn't been horrible, but I have been having difficulty sleeping. I have lots of aches and pains, but so far everything is normal and tolerable. No swelling in my ankles yet, and i'm still wearing my wedding rings very comfortably, so I'm pretty happy about that.

Cravings: Nothing really specific. I have been in the mood to bake, but it's not really a craving. I mostly just want to be eating all the time.

Appointments: Nothing until next week. Next Tuesday I have an ultrasound to check the baby's position, so we'll see if my intuition is right! Then next Wednesday is my 36 week appointment, and from there I go to appointments every week.

Anything big happening? Nope! Just getting ready for the baby's arrival. We're trying not to do too much lately, though I want to go on a date night soon!

Preparing for baby: Still doing hypnobabies. I've also been planning meals to freeze, and getting things ready for the big day. It's exciting! I'm making lists with phone numbers, keeping emergency taxi money in both mine and Doug's wallets. I still haven't packed my hospital bag, but I don't imagine I'll need it for a while yet, so I'm not worried.

Belly Pics:

I barely look pregnant when you look at me from the front! I can't decide if that's good or bad.


I really don't feel that big. I often wonder how much bigger I will get in the next 5 weeks. I do feel uncomfortable, and the belly feels quite heavy, but I don't actually feel HUGE. I'm quite grateful for my wide frame, as I feel it carries the baby quite easily! My naturally wide hips and long torso have been beneficial in pregnancy.

Doug says pregnancy suits me. It's nice to hear your husband say that when you're 8 months pregnant and feeling quite unattractive. :) He says he can tell I am healthy just by looking at me. Something about my complexion, haha. It was a nice compliment, though, and I think Doug would be the best judge of how healthy I look, because he's seen me in various stages of health (or un-health).

Unplugged

Doug and I were talking today about how dependent we all seem to be on being "plugged in" these days. It is not uncommon to see people at dinner with their cell phones out, texting or receiving phone calls or e-mails. The portability of laptops means people carry them everywhere, and go online wherever there is free wi-fi (and the list of places offering free wi-fi is constantly expanding). It is not unusual for the pair of us to be found spending evenings and weekends with the TV on, both of us on a couch with a computer on our laps.

We're not happy with this.

Sure, we get out of the house, we have conversations, we do things other than sit in front of a screen. However, our "at home" time is more frequently spent in front of the TV or the computer (or both!) than it is spent doing anything else.

We used to have a regular night during the week that we would stay away from the TV and computers. We also did this one day of the weekend. For whatever reason, we dropped that, but both of us are realizing that, even though we spend all our free time together, we're not really making good use of that time. We're plugged in, but not connecting to one another.

So we're doing it again. Unplugging on Sundays unless Doug has to do some work. No TV, no movies, NO COMPUTERS.

I know once Ty arrives we won't have much choice in the matter, but it's a good habit to start now.