Thirty One

Today, I turn 31. Am I where I wanted to be at 31? Not exactly... but I do have a lot to be grateful for. This year is going to be great. I'm going to be a mom for the first time, and I get to experience that with the best husband, dog and two cats on the planet. :)

Everyone keeps asking me what I want for my birthday this year, and after thinking about it, I want a guitar. I used to have one, and I had taught myself to play a bit, but I never really got anywhere with it. The reason I want to learn how to play guitar is that I LOVE to sing. I would love to be able to sing, and be able to play along with that. I don't have the best voice in the world, but I do have a pretty good voice, and I think I'm creative enough that I could write my own songs. I don't want to be a rock star or anything, but I find singing comforting.

Well, the good news is, DH found me a guitar today for $30 that someone was selling at his work. It's just a simple acoustic guitar, but that's all I really need to learn on. I also want to take guitar lessons. There's a lot that I can learn on my own with books and internet, but would really like someone to teach me hands on, as I generally learn a lot faster that way.

So this year, I will have a baby and begin raising a family... and I will learn the guitar, and sing my freakin' heart out.

And if I ever get good enough... I would totally post songs on my blog. :)

3rd Tri!

Depending on which website you look at, I am in 3rd trimester today. I'm going to go with the one that says I am anyway. :)

I'm starting to feel like I'm in 3rd trimester, that's for sure! I'm starting to waddle because my pelvic joints hurt a lot, and sleeping at night has gone back to being a disaster because my legs ache all night long... but I know it will allllll be worth it when I get to meet this little girl in February!!

I scheduled an u/s for next week to check on the low placenta thing, and I certainly feel lucky that I get to see her again before she's born. While they're there, I'm also going to have them try to confirm once again that our baby girl is in fact a baby girl. :) I haven't really bought anything, because I've still got a bit of doubt that's she's a she.

Let's fast forward through this week, okay? :)

Update on baby

26 weeks, 3 days

I had an appointment with my OB on Monday for a regular checkup. I learned a few things. :)

For the most part, everything with baby is looking fantastic. She's measuring 2-3 weeks ahead, so my doctor said "No 6lb babies for you!" lol And I passed my GD test much to my surprise! I felt so crappy after drinking the glucose drink, I had thought "great, I'll probably fail right past the 3-hour".... but nope!

The only "wait and see" news I got was that I have a low-lying placenta. They checked the placenta at 20 weeks, and it was low, but my doctor said that 95% of the time, the problem will correct itself and move out of the way later on. I have to go back for another ultrasound at 28 weeks, and they will check then that it has moved up, and if it hasn't, then I will be scheduled in for a c-section.

All in all, it was a short, sweet, and pretty good appointment. :) Oh, and it was quick this time! Less than an hour! (I usually spend 1-2 hours in the waiting room before my 5 minute checkup with the doctor :P)

No motivation

Since finding out last week that my job term where I work (and have worked for the last 2.5 years) will not be renewed (in April), therefore leaving me with no job to go back to after mat leave... I have absolutely NO MOTIVATION to work. The only thing that keeps me going is that in order to receive employment insurance payments while I'm on maternity leave, I have to work up to the day I go on leave to qualify.

I'm sad and disappointed that I will not be able to keep this job. After this term is over, I would have been only 6 months away from becoming a permanent employee. After two and a half years of putting your hard work in to something only to have it ripped from you right at the end.. it's hard to focus on continuing to do a good job for nothing. I'm only working towards the end now. It's tough... as of last week, I really just don't give a crap about what I'm doing anymore. My boss is sad that he wasn't able to get my term renewed. He really liked me as an employee and he is pissed off at upper management for being such idiots. They are claiming they don't need my position anymore (to save $$$), yet when I'm gone, they are replacing me with a permanent employee... I find this hilarious, as they are cutting me to save money, when I make less than this person will. *eyeroll* I will be going to the union with this, because some of it is fishy.. and I'll see if there's anything I can do.. but honestly, I don't expect that anything with the union will go very far.

The good news last week (after I received my shitty news) is that DH's term was made permanent. :) With all the cut backs going on, this is amazing news! At least one of our jobs is safe, and it's the one that can sustain us, so despite being really bummed about my job, at least I don't have to have a heart attack wondering if we'll stay afloat if DH got on the chopping block too!

I don't know what this job loss will mean for my future. I'll be on maternity leave for 11 months, so I have some time to think about it, but it's scary to think that after leave, I'll have to jump back in to job searching. It's going to be tough, because I really love the job I currently have, and it's going to be hard to find something that's equally as exciting and has the same benefits and salary.

I've been trying to put this all out of my mind for now and just focus on the baby DH and I are about to bring in to the world. My boss keeps wanting me to send my CV out to people, but I just keep wondering.. What's the point? They're going to take one look at me, see that I'm clearly nearing the end of my pregnancy, and will know that I will be gone for a year on leave.... I'm not a very promising employee at the moment. I'm going to send my CV's out anyway. I don't fully expect to hear anything as no one is hiring right now anyway, and the departments within the organization that I work for are all experiencing cut backs and hiring freezes. I'm hoping that if I give out my CV now, it will likely take them a year to get back to me anyway (it took me 7 months to get this job).

I guess I can say is that another good thing is timing. At least I'm pregnant now, and will be working up until leave to get benefits. I have my job until April, which is much better than them having laid me off before my term was over, which would put me up shit creek for $$$.

Life is so frustrating sometimes. I know it could be much worse, but I'm just so sad when I think about how I was just beginning to love my career, and now I feel like I'll have to start all over again at the bottom a year from now. I'm scared, and I'm overwhelmed. It really sucks.

Timing is everything though. I will need a break from thinking about job crap soon, and it will come when Ash gets here, so I'll focus on being a good mommy for a while, and worry about my own personal career future later.

Portfolio :)

It's been a while since I put up any of my knitting on here, and I've just taken a ton of pics of all the stuff I have for a craft show that I'll be doing in my hometown in a couple of weeks, so I figured I'd share them here. It's mostly baby stuff. :)

Baby longies in pink with white stripes

Baby soaker

Blue and grey baby longies

Child's blue cabley hat

3 month hat and thumbless mitt set

1 year + baby striped cable hat

3 month baby stripey hat and mitt set

Baby earflap hat - "Swirl" - 1 year +

Baby earflap hat - "Bright Stripes" - 1 year +

Thrummed mittens - Fleece lined - Extra toasty :)

Simple grey hat

Large loops knit cowl

Leg warmers - 6 years

Child's pink cabley hat

Adult Cabled Hat

Adult Button Tab Hat

Thumbless Toddler mitts - 1 year

Cabled Earflap hat - 1 year +

Cabled earflap hat and mitts - 1 year +

Stripey gloves - Adult

Baby thumbless mitts - 3 months

Baby booties - newborn

Christmas wine bottle cozy

Baby doll - newborn

Baby doll - newborn

Baby leg warmers - 6 mos +

Christmas wine bottle cozy

Wow.

It's a good thing that I didn't get my blood pressure tested today, because I'm certain that it would have shot right through the roof!

Are they sure that the leading cause of heart attacks isn't car dealerships? Because I'm pretty sure if I can't find a way to control my outrage at the screw job that our car dealership has given us today than I may just have one, or two.

25 weeks, 1 day. :)

24 weeks, 3 days!

Just a Thursday thought.....

~~*~~

Some people say that a pregnancy just flies by.... I don't know about that. Maybe it's different for someone who had trouble trying to get pregnant, and a scary start to their pregnancy. You don't want to miss out on the fun parts of being pregnant, but you also just want to get to the end of it all so that you can have that little baby safe in your arms, and start being the mom that you've waited so long to become!

~~*~~

Though I've been enjoying certain parts of being pregnant, I can't wait until February gets here. Truth be told, I have been so cautious with this pregnancy that I haven't done nearly as much exercise as I should have for fear of knocking my baby loose or something. I realize how stupid that sounds... but you do worry, whether you want to or not.

I'm really looking forward to having little Ashley, and recovering just in time for spring. I am CRAVING getting back in to jogging again, and I'm going to get a baby jogger so that Ash and I can spend time outdoors getting fit again. :) I know it's going to be hard at first, so I'm thinking of joining a running group to get me started again. I want to be a fit mom. 

Before I was pregnant, I was at the heaviest that I've ever been in my life, which was about 40lbs over my ideal weight. I was always really athletic and slender in my twenties, and in the last few years before becoming pregnant, I'd just ballooned... kind of like my metabolism just gave up! I want to get back to my ideal weight, and be the healthiest mom I can be. :)

I do have to give myself a little lovin' though, because I think that I'm doing fairly well with weight gain over this pregnancy so far. At 24 weeks, I have gained 10lbs overall, and I'm pretty happy with that. I'm expecting that if I continue the way I have, then I'll likely gain another 10-15lbs by the time Ashley makes her arrival, and I'm very comfortable with that. I could gain more, and honestly... whatever happens happens, but I'm hoping that I can keep it minimal so that it's easier to get back in to jogging and exercising once the baby gets here. :)

Unexpected anger

I've been pretty happy with myself for not being a pregzilla for the first half of this pregnancy. And by pregzilla, I mean a hormonal bitch. Even DH had commented on how he had half expected that I'd be like Lois from family guy.... all crying one minute and tearing someone's head off the next. Well, the crying did happen, but the tearing off of heads had so far not come in to play.

Well, fast forward to this week.

A co-worker was crumpling paper today... I wanted to rip his head off.

I passed a sign on the way to work that said $2/15 minutes for parking (Ludicrous!)... I wanted to rip someone's head off.

My boss so much as looks at me to assign me another project... I want to rip heads off!!

I feel bad, because I know it's only a matter of time before DH does something that I'll want to rip his head off for. :(

This pregnant lady should come with a warning label.

I have heard that hormones can make women more grumpy in later pregnancy.. hopefully I'm not a psychopath by the time I hit 3rd tri!

V-day!

I've been waiting to reach the v-day milestone (viability day), and I'm so glad it's here. :) It seems like a morbid thing to think about, but when you worry as much as I do, it's a nice little reassuring milestone to hit.

Ashley is celebrating v-day by having a dance party on my bladder.... awwwwww.... :) lol

What a week!

Thank god it's almost over.

Last weekend was less than desirable when I took a trip to labour and delivery at the hospital on Sunday. It all turned out to be okay, but it was a scary day. I had been cleaning out my bedroom closet, putting away all the plethora of clothing that no longer fits this pregnant body and lifting heavy baskets of clothes. All of a sudden I get a gush of fluid down below, and it scared the crap right out of me. I didn't know if it was just normal discharge, pee, or water.. so instead of freaking out, I called the triage line... AND THEN I freaked out, when they told me to go to L&D to make sure it wasn't amniotic fluid.

I waited 6 hours to find out that everything looked okay. Dr. checked the area, and cervix was closed, and I hadn't had any more fluid, so they sent me on my way. I'm happy to report that I've fortunately been okay since then, and Ashley reassures me she's okay in there each day that passes as she kicks and punches my big belly.

And speaking of big bellies... here's me, 23 weeks and 3 day pregnant. :) I am beginning to refer to myself as preggasaurus.