35 weeks

Today marks 35 weeks, I absolutely cannot believe that I only have 5 weeks left until my due date. My last post on 32 weeks sat in draft until today so I still have a lot to cover that I didn't get posted there.

Symptom wise I have been really tired lately and sleeping like crap most nights. My feet (or maybe I should say foot since its mostly my right foot) have been swelling a lot more lately. I've been trying to make sure I get plenty of protein to make sure this baby is gaining good healthy weight and to help combat the swelling a little. I've also been trying to drink plenty of water. Baby constantly has some part of its body pushing out against my belly now and sometimes if I push on it just a little I can feel it move on the opposite side from where I'm pushing.

We are 5 weeks into our 10 week childbirth class. Yes, this means it will be finishing August 27th, 4 days before my official due date, but I'm not too worried about it. We are finishing so late because when we decided to switch to a home birth we also decided to switch to a more natural childbirth class than the one offered at the hospital. We are really enjoying the class so far. I think we have already learned a lot. Monday at class we had to do 6 practice contractions. As women we didn't have to do too much other than pick a comfort position to try, relax our bodies and breathe from our bellies. The guys on the other hand had to time the contractions (we were practicing 1 minute long), make sure we were comfortable and relaxed, make sure we were breathing correctly, massage our backs, talk us through relaxing further, and encourage us all at the same time. Daron did a pretty darn good job, and unlike a few of the husbands he succeeded at calling out the timing every 15 seconds.

We are still on track for our home birth and I ordered our birth kit this week. Baby was confirmed to be head down at our appointment 2 weeks ago. It was hiding a bit though so our midwife had to do a vaginal exam in order to confirm. We have another appointment today and I should also be getting my GBS swab done.

Our nursery is almost done and is really starting to look like a nursery now. We got the new window installed a few weeks ago and it looks great, we just need to get the trim up around it now. Then all we have left to do is actually hang our pictures and such on the walls and put the door back on the room. I do have some pictures but I think I am going to do a picture post or two after this one since I have so many to catch up on.

Moving backwards about a month, my baby shower was great and I am so thankful to the family and friends that helped make it a good day. We got a lot of good stuff and the way they decorated for it was very cute! I think my favorite is that they used petri dishes full of m&m's as a decoration/favor. They also had sheets to fill out with wishes for the baby and wrote inspiring messages/things to make mom smile on some newborn diapers.

After gifts, hand me downs and garage sales, the only major things we have left to get are a crib mattress and a breast pump. My mom and I had an awesome find last weekend in the form of a bunch of cloth pocket diapers at a garage sale for $3 each and a ton of inserts for them all of which look great. I still have a few that I want to get but I found a place I can get gently used ones for a decent discount!

Last week my mom and I spent 6 days cleaning/organizing/reorganizing my house. We washed/scrubbed walls and cleaned floors and moved furniture and yet with 3 dogs a bird and a rabbit in the house a stranger would probably walk in and ask what the heck we did for 6 days. Of course Daron and I did take Monday afternoon off and go swimming at his parents house. I am so happy that we can use their pool whenever we want. It is great exercise and it has the added benefit of taking baby's weight off of my back while I am in. We are supposed to have a home visit from the nurse assistant for the midwives sometime around 37 weeks and should be getting our birth pool around that time as well. We are planning on it going in our bedroom and have the room reorganized to make sure there will be plenty of room for it. My mom will be getting our 3 dogs, and possibly our bird for at least a few days when I go into labor (she already has her own dog and a bird) so wish her luck!

In other news the storm on Tuesday caused half of our neighbors big dead willow tree to fall in our yard/mostly in my garden. The major area of my garden is squished, and we have a huge tree to clean up. Luckily it missed the chain link property fence. I am hoping part of the garden can still be salvaged once we get the tree cleaned up but we will see. It is looking like the universe is telling me I'm not meant to have such a large garden this year.

That's all I have for now, hopefully I can update this a little more often!