New Pics of Baby Barczak: 14weeks

I love this next one if his/her hand: You can see all the tiny fingers!

This next one... its a little hard to tell if you're not familiar with sonograms. He/she is looking at you... the head is to the left and the hand is right below the word FACE.
So, that was the little peek in today. Keep on turning in your polls. I am not telling the gender until the Expect Net poll is filled out. You get points for getting the gender correct LOL! ExpectNet tallies up all the points. The penalty points are:

incorrect gender:	400 points
date & time:	5 points per hour
weight:	5 points per ounce
length:	10 points per inch

With Porter's game, I was actually the winner. Isn't that funny? Well, Ryan and I won't be voting this time around because I think it'd be unfair.

ExpectNet Poll

I created a new game at Expect Net. We may or may not know the gender of the baby... today or within the next few weeks. Hmm... mum is the word. So, go to the poll and enter your thoughts. We'll let you know the results soon!

Baby Barczak #2 Game

Motherhood is the new 40

I just loved this post over at Playgroups are No Place for Children.... definitely what I've been thinking lately. Thought I'd share. Hope you get a good laugh.

How do you interpret this....


a) a mom with a three-headed baby
b) a mom with a baby freaking out and flailing about in the stroller
c) a mom with triplets sitting in a line, but the illustrator obviously didn't illustrate this properly

Modesty? What modesty?

I was kind of chuckling when I read Katelyn's comment about how its so funny that I'm so comfortable talking about poop. Yes, that modesty just goes right out the window when you have kids. See... poop. At least everyone DOES that, right? Every man, woman and child poops (and if you don't, well.... you're either a liar or you have issues).

See, becoming a mom... these types of things tend to strip your modesty down to the bone.

I have:

• Had a casual conversation with a nurse. As she inserted and held a catheter in me. Draining my bladder. For what seemed like an eternity (seriously.. it was like 5 minutes!)
• Laid spread eagle on a bed with medical staff and family members in full view, as I grunted and groaned and pushed out all sorts of bodily fluids.
  
• Had a doctor shoving his arm up in my uterus to retrieve any 'left behind' pieces of placenta that caused unstoppable bleeding
• Had a lactation consultant groping my breasts and nipples, attempting to get Porter to latch on
• Had nurses visit my room, ask to check my stitches- yes, THOSE stitches- and monitor "swelling and bleeding."
  

See... see the REAL glories of labor and delivery? Ahh, its a good thing those little miracles are SO worth it.

12 Week Belly Picture

What a lumpy belly! HAHAH! You can see my fat pooch bulge out to a point. So cute. pffftt!! I'm definitely not motivated enough to put up a white backdrop and do all sorts of editing to the backdrop like I was last time around. Ahh... poor second child syndrome again.

For comparison, here was my 10 week and 14 week belly pictures from Porter's pregnancy. I totally skipped out on doing a 10 week picture this time, but I'll do another at 14 weeks and try to keep at the same dates to compare. It'll be fun. I guess.

Time flies

You know what seems so crazy to me? The fact that so many people who are pregnant.... who I began reading their blogs at the beginning of their pregnancies... are already having their 20 week ultrasounds!

Michelle just found out yesterday that she's having a little boy. A little boy to join his two big sisters.

And Giselle (whose blog I just lurk on) had her ultrasound, is having a little boy to join a big brother and sister.

And Kim has her 20 week ultrasound (really at 18 weeks, right?) scheduled for December 12th... just a little over three weeks away!! Which means... we're up soon after that. Isn't that insane??

Its just crazy... I remember reading these blogs when I had JUST gotten pregnant. I felt like time was going so slow. But, here we are already 12 weeks along, over halfway there to the "big ultrasound." Of course, I hope to find out before the doctor's ultrasound- having my mom scan me. I have to keep tabs on this baby, you know... make sure he/she is doing ok in there.

12w 2d

Wow... its been a week since I've posted! Nothing new has been going on. For the past week I've been feeling SO much better... hardly any nausea at all and I have not been gagging or puking! YAY!

I've definitely got my appetite back and I'm happy about that. Although I'm sure my ass isn't going to be happy about the huge Hot Fudge Brownie and Ice Cream Sundae I ate last night. I'm a pig. What can I say.

This time That time.

• Porter: I broke out badly... face, back, chest
  This time: I broke out for about a week, and now all is fine
  
  
• Porter: Nausea on and off daily, but was manageable. I threw up only in the evening
  This time: Horrible nausea... gag reflex was going full blast- couldn't even think or talk about food/gagging without gagging. Puking numerous times a day.
  
  
• Porter: Not really all that tired even though I was student teaching full time
  This time: Exhausted. But, I do have a toddler to look after
  
  
• Porter: Craved sweets. Couldn't eat spaghetti sauces
  This time: Crave salt and pepper on foods (like mac & cheese... has to be doused in salt and pepper). Spaghetti sauces still turn me off most of the time... so maybe thats a pregnancy thing?
  
  
• Porter: Didn't start gaining weight rapidly until second trimester
  This time: Have already gained 10lbs and not even out of the first trimester

11 week appointment

All is well so far. The midwife found the baby's heartbeat... 175bpm. I have gained 4lbs (ok.. so does that make a total of 10lbs so far? GET OUT!) Looks like I'm going to go for a new record of weight gain. At this point with Porter I had only gained 2lbs. (Hmm... I think I'm going to do a post on how different these pregnancies have been... definitely different).

This poor baby already suffers from the second child syndrome. It kind of makes me sad how "not as exciting" the second pregnancy is. I mean, I am SO excited to meet him/her, but the pregnancy... just seems... like... "here we go again... been there, done that". As I was scheduling my next appointment, the midwife was fumbling through my files and said "Nicole, I can't seem to find your labwork from your last appointment. Did you have that done?"

My jaw dropped. I said "THAT'S what that paperwork was for! I got home and couldn't remember why I had it! Oops!" Now, when I was pregnant with Porter I would have been listening intently to every direction she had given me about getting that bloodwork done. I'd probably have ran right to the lab after my appointment. This baby? I tuned her out, got home and had no clue what the paperwork was for so I tossed it. Anyhow, I headed right to the lab after my appointment and got a ton of blood drawn and gave another urine sample. Why do they need so much of my pee???

Anyhow, thats what's new. I'm going to start scoping in on the baby's heartbeat with my dopplar here at home since we found it at the doctor's office. Maybe I can record it and put it on here. I know you're all dying to hear it HAHA!

More peeks at Baby Barczak

Thank goodness everything looked a-okay.

Oh and he/she is sooo cute! He/She was pretty still (maybe sleeping?) for the first part, and then Porter whacked my stomach and said "BELLY!" and baby woke up and was moving all around. I have lots of neat pictures to share. It amazes me that he/she looks so much like a baby already but is only 4.59cm long (about 2 inches!).

Side view: his/her legs are stretched out and arm is up in the air.

This pictures is from the angle of looking down on his/her head/shoulders.

This is the feet: I believe they are side by side, similar to the following photograph:

(These are Preston Eash's cute little toesies, by the way!)

This next picture... the round thing is actually his/her stomach (imagine decapitated LOL!). So, kind of like a sliced through view? And those are the two arms and hands sticking up in the air.

The Name Game

I was surprised that we've made it nearly 11 weeks and Ryan and I have not so much as mentioned baby names. When I was pregnant with Porter, we discussed it all the time. By the time we had our "big" ultrasound, we were pretty set on two names: Porter (no middle name) and Ava Rylee. Ava (while I still love it) is just way too popular, so it won't be making the cut this time.

I thought I'd do a little post with some names *I* like (which, of course, Ryan doesn't really care for any of the girl names I like).

Boys:

• Hudson Cole (This was #2 on our list for Porter, so we're pretty sure we love it this time)
• Pierce
• Declan (Deck-lin)

Girls: The harder list. The "pretty" names are all so popular. I don't want popular.

• Brynn (but is Brynn Barczak too many "b" sounds??)
  
• Ruby
• Scarlett
• Stella
• Mira (Meer-a)
• Selah Brooke (See-la, and one of my favs)
• Charlotte
• Ellery
• Rowan
• Kendall
  
• Molly

Hmm... I guess that's all I can think of for now. Anyone have any other suggestons? Anyone have any they think sound best with Porter Evan?

Update:

I think everything is a-okay for now, I think. Spotting has stopped. I think it was just because of an overzealous attempt to... ahem...poop. (HAHA.... pick yourself up off the floor now... stop laughing!) Sorry if I freaked anyone out. I freaked myself out.

Kim has demanded I go buy some prunes. EWW.

Anyhow, I might try to get my mom to scan me this weekend. Check up on the little dude/dudette.

Shit please nooooo

I went to the bathroom... spotting. Bright red. No cramping, yet. I'm hoping this is not what I think it is. I can't do this again.

Please pray. I'll keep this updated. I'm going to call ER in a bit if things get worse.

Shortness of breath

(ok, for those of you with bloglines... yes... I'm adding these a few days late. Changing the post date. I didn't "journal" this and I wanted to have it journaled so I'm adding it now)

Last night I got on the phone with Denise and was feeling like I couldn't catch my breath. I'm sure she thought I sounded like a dingbat. I felt like I'd run a mile or something. I got off the phone and just walking up the stairs and folding laundry was difficult and tiring. I decided to lay in bed and watch some 'Without A Trace' episodes I had DVR'd. I still, even lying down, felt weak and like my heart was overworked. I seriously thought I was going to die in my sleep, and crap we still don't have a life insurance policy.

Well, this morning I called the doctor to see if it could be the meds making me feel that way. The midwife said since I wasn't a 'big girl' (HAHA!) that I could try just taking half a pill. I guess the meds constrict your blood vessels or something and can make your diaphragm weaker and give you that "arms and legs are heavy, so so weak" feeling. So, I took half a pill today and so far so good.