Week 13 - July 5, 2012

Happy 5th of July!  Hope everyone had a wonderful Independence Day!

[caption id="attachment_135" align="aligncenter" width="225"] 13 weeks[/caption]

Nick and I spent the day in true American fashion - inside,  in air conditioning.  We decided to go low-key this year for the holiday - for a variety of reasons, but chief among them that we had a small pregnancy scare earlier this week where we thought something might be wrong.  Luckily, for us we had the fetal heart rate monitor that had brought two of my co-workers great luck, so we were able to reassure ourselves with hearing the heartbeats while we waited for a doctor's appointment.  All was fine - both are measuring where they should, great heartbeats, etc, etc.  And as I said on Facebook earlier this week, we got a little fist pump/hand wave from Baby A.  Of course, as soon as the sonographer went to take pictures, both babies flopped over into very unphotogenic positions.  Harumph.

The doctor suggested I take it easy which ended up coinciding with plans I already had to be off work.  Unfortunately, Nick only had the actual 4th of July off (stupid mid-week holiday) so we had a lazy morning at home and then my met good friend from Chicago, Jessica (of white jacket fame) and her friend Tony for lunch at Jack Stack.   After a nap, we saw a movie (Ted, which was moderately funny) and then came home, made dinner, and watched John Adams on HBO.  We are so wild and crazy, you guys.

As you can see from the picture above, I am quite uh...bump-y.  Which I am embracing.   I actually rather enjoy it.   And yet I have only gained one pound, which I say not out of concern or bragging, but more so - admiration for the human body and what it is capable of.  The doctor says my uterus is still measuring six weeks ahead which accounts for my very pregnant appearance.  I am at the point where brave strangers are asking me when I'm due and then looking quite confused when I say January.  It's sort of fun to watch them squirm and then finally admit that there's more than one baby on the way and see their visible relief.  My mom pointed out to me that I will get much more wear out of my maternity clothes than the average pregnant woman, which...yes.  I will.  And am.

Speaking of which, my sweet mom took me out maternity clothes shopping last weekend after we spent some time with my Grandma (mom's mom) having lunch and running errands.  My mother was quite patient as I am kind of picky about clothes right now...particularly fabrics.  Apparently my precious, precious pregnancy skin abhors anything but natural fabrics, dahling.  And a lot of maternity clothes are polyester.  Which makes for a grumpy Sarah.  But we ended up finding several cute things including one dress which I only tried on because my mom asked me to and had a flashback to being thirteen years old (Gawwwwd, Mom - this is so ugggggly), but miraculously, it was one of those dresses that looks horrendous on the rack, but great on.  Thank you, momma.  Also of note was that my grandmother told me repeatedly how lucky I was to be 'tall'.  So, yeah if you know me, tall I am not.  I mean, I suppose to my grandmother and mother (5' and 5'2" respectively), I might be tall, but apparently, despite the growing belly, I am willowy.  (Suppresses laugh)

Um, let's see - what else has been going on...oh, like most of the women in my age demographic, I saw Magic Mike with girlfriends.  It had a surprisingly good plot and well, let's face it, the eye candy wasn't bad.  What was scary, though - was seeing it on opening night with hordes of drunken, sweaty women.  Seriously, we brought cupcakes into the movie and I'm pretty sure one woman would have shivved us for one.  There was hooting, hollering and general carrying-on.  I wondered if perhaps everyone was confused and thought that there were going to be actual live strippers performing.  We managed to survive, though. :)

How Far Along: 13 1/2 weeks (P.S. Yes, I incorrectly said that I was in the third trimester in my last post...I would go back and change it, but I want to document it for posterity)

Size of Babies: lemons

What I'm Doing: taking pictures of Ernie the cat being adorable and sending them to Nick at work

[caption id="attachment_143" align="aligncenter" width="300"] The evidence.[/caption]

Cravings: Nothing in particular, although I have to admit I had a total (and I promise, unintentional) pregnancy cliché moment the other night.   The night that we were stressed about the pregnancy, I couldn't really eat other than some cereal that Nick basically forced me to eat.  Later on, I did eventually get hungry and ended up standing in the kitchen having a snack.  In one hand - pickle slices...and the other, a popsicle.  I was so embarrassed when I realized I what I was doing, but that didn't stop me from finishing.

Sleep:  I am trying to rest more, nap more which is generally awesome, except that the cats get all excited every time I lay down and I end up with a cat on my head and a cat on my feet, which makes for less than awesome sleep.

Sex of Babies:  Still unknown, but we will know in about six weeks.

Symptoms: I still feel generally good but I have noticed that my stomach gets full faster and that I pretty much have a non-stop stuffed up nose, which is mostly because I can't take my normal allergy meds.  A small price to pay, though.

Fetal Movement:  Still not feeling anything.  I've read some articles that say women with twins feel the movement sooner and others that say it takes longer.  Who knows.

What I'm Looking Forward To Next Week: We have a bit of down time in the next week or so before a bunch of various activities, parties, etc start so mostly I'm just looking forward to puttering around.  I excel at puttering around the house.

Best Moment Of The Week: Getting the wave from Baby A at this week's ultrasound...it's hard to put into words how amazing that is/was.

Special Thanks To: My co-workers, who are always checking in with me and asking how the babies are.  They are a wonderful group and I feel so lucky to have them in my life.  And I'm also so pleased that they've all agreed to be babysitters, right?  Right?!  ;)