Halfway There!!

I feel like it’s been forever since I have written a post!  Mainly because Christian is the one that wrote the last one. Isn’t it great hearing from him?  He is wonderful and probably gave me way more credit than I deserve.  Also, I wrote this one a few days ago but due to our wonderful weather here in Houston, our internet service was down for a little bit.

So guess what?!  I have reached the halfway point!!  20 weeks!!! Woot woot!!  I just can’t believe it.  In just 20 more weeks we are going to meet little Aria and put her in a bubble so she never gets hurt.  That’s how it works right? J

Last Friday, I had my ultrasound and Aria was measuring right on track.  Except for her legs.  Her long legs were measuring over a week ahead.  This must mean she is going to be tall which totally comes from her Dad and NOT me.  I am a shorty.  She is currently weighing 11oz. and had a strong heartbeat at 144bpm. She was SUPER active during the ultrasound and was very open about being a girl. Lol.  Carrie, the ultrasound tech, tried once again to get a cute profile pic, but of course Aria as usual was looking right at the camera.  She did turn her head one time and Carrie caught a quick picture but it’s a little blurry.  Here it is.  Isn’t she cute?  Always has a hand by her face or in her mouth.

 

And here are her cute little feet.  She was literally doing flips in there.  Perhaps we have a little gymnast on our hands.

As she continues to grow, her kicks are getting harder, more noticeable and more frequent.  Christian and Axel have tried to feel her, but still nothing.  I’m not really sure when they will start being able to feel her, but we will keep trying until they can.  Both of these guys are already in love with her.  They kiss my belly and talk to her every day. <3  Here is a my growing bump at the halfway point.

 

There are only two symptoms that are bothering me a bit right now and they are: crazy hormones and pregnancy brain.  I seem to get grumpy and moody so easily which is a bit frustrating.  Noticing it and being aware of it only seems to make me even grumpier.  Ugh.  I try to push through it and not bite anyone’s head off.  I am not always successful in that area so I have learned to apologize… a lot.  Now let’s talk about pregnancy brain.  First, if you don’t know me super well, allow me to share some insight…  I am over the top organized and very on top of things.  I do forget things sometimes, but for the most part I do things way ahead of time and have charts and lists for it all.   In the past few weeks I have become beyond frustrated with my newly developed spaciness and forgetfulness.  Let me give you some examples of these…

I was late to work a couple weeks ago because I couldn’t find my phone anywhere!  I mean anywhere!  And I am not usually misplacing things.  I am frequently reminding Christian where his things are because he is the forgetful one.  After 15mins of looking, I finally gave up and out of frustration began to text Christian that I just couldn’t find my phone and he would have to call me at work if he needed me.  Now take a second and re-read that last sentence.  Yes, I was mid-text when I realized the phone was in my hand the entire time! 

Monday, I was working on the mailing envelopes for the upcoming baby shower (see! I told you I do things way ahead of time) and thought, I should go get labels so I can go ahead and get them printed.  By the time I made it from the living room to the extra room where we keep our printer paper and labels, I had completely forgotten what I was doing.  Came back to the living room and a few minutes later remembered.  I slowly got up and walked back… except I walked into my bedroom and sat in there for a few minutes trying to remember what I had just remembered I was going to do.  Seriously!?  It finally came to me and I was able to get to the correct room and grab the labels before forgetting again.  My goodness!  This is like a real thing.  I used to think women just made up “pregnancy brain” as an excuse… I totally get it now.

The last story I was going to share with you… I completely forgot so there you have it!  The forgetfulness at its finest. Ha!

Speaking of the baby shower, we were able to get our registrations complete!  Another thing done super early but hey it was way more fun than I thought.  It was all going smooth and we were doing so good scanning all the needed items… until… Christian got a hold of the scanner.  He got a little scanner happy and we had to go back and take some things out. LOL.  I did; however, leave his favorite item that he found.  I will let you guys guess what that is.  If you know Christian well you will know it when you see it.  If you want to check out the registries, have a look at BuyBuy Baby, Target and www.babyeagleston.mydagsite.com.  Hopefully you guys will have as much fun looking at these things as we had scanning them. 

Other than shower planning, I would say there is nothing else going on, but that is just false.  I have been keeping busy with a few other tasks and some days I just want to cry cause I feel so overwhelmed, but somehow I survive.  The good part about that is time seems to go a little faster getting me closer to meeting this little girl.  My next appointment will be in a month.  I will definitely try to post something between now and then so hopefully something exciting and good happens so I can share.

The Dad's Perspective (written by Christian)

Before getting into my experiences and thoughts and feelings throughout this process, I just want to say that reading Melissa’s posts are so great.  Even though I am living through much of this at the same time, it is fun to hear her perspective.  By the way, it is true that she writes exactly how she talks and when I am reading the posts I can actually hear her voice, which is so fun.

Melissa asked that I write a post to give everyone my perspective on our journey through this exciting new experience of having a little girl, and since she has gotten to share more frequent updates, this post may be a bit longer than some of the previous ones.  Full disclosure, Melissa shares her articles before posting for suggestions and edits, but I make a concerted effort to not interject my own perspective in them unless she asks.  Hopefully this will be a nice break for her.

In looking back at previous posts, I noticed that a little more context with what has been going on in our lives through all this might be helpful for everyone.  In the very first post, Melissa said that we found out about her being pregnant February 6^th.  Let me set the stage in a little more detail.  Of course, we had been trying to have a baby for a while, and everything else in our lives was moving forward, so this was something we had really been praying about and for.  I had been at my job for almost a year when, on January 31^st, I was informed that I was being laid off and would have a two week severance, “thank you very much for your service”. Six days later Melissa tells me she is pregnant and we are having a baby.  Two weeks after that, I get a letter in the mail informing me that the Master’s program I had been drooling over and trying to get into for over a year had accepted my application and that I would start in the Fall Semester.  As elated as I am for all of this news, this layoff just took a really bad turn in its severity. It was a very difficult and stressful time, to say the least.  Fortunately, one more blessing was in store and I found my current job, which I absolutely LOVE and which has removed all those terrible stresses from earlier. 

Throughout all of that, I am trying to wrap my mind around the idea that I am about to be a new father and the nerves that go with that.  I was overly concerned and protective on Melissa’s behalf because, as you may have read in her first post, she had a miscarriage prior to this. But it was all starting to get more and more real, with each doctor visit, and each ultrasound, the excitement grew: WE WERE HAVING A BABY! You have seen some of that journey through Melissa’s posts so I will try not to be duplicative, but every milestone added to the excitement.  Each week, we read about our baby’s progress and what was happening.  Melissa struggled with all-day sickness (why it is called morning sickness makes no sense to me), and all I could do was find ways to show my love and support through all of it.  It has been an enlightening journey.

When we knew we were having Aria, I was elated.  My dad had three boys and had always wanted a girl. A grand daughter was the perfect news for him (and you may have seen his reaction in a previous post). I got asked a lot, and still get asked occasionally, if I wanted a boy, and I can genuinely say that if I did it was a 50.1% preference for a boy.  I wanted a child.  The best news I have gotten was, in order: 1. Melissa was pregnant, 2) the baby was, and continues to be, healthy.  Learning that our child was a girl was just a way for me to better prepare (as much as one can prepare of course).  Up to that point, every decision Melissa and I were making were “gender neutral” and ultimately, having a boy or girl would only add the final pieces of the puzzle we have been creating when it comes to décor, names, etc.

There is one special note on the decision making process with Melissa that needs to be made.  Many women who are having a baby completely take over every decision related to “baby” and do not allow their partner to have any input whatsoever.  Whether it is the brands that are used, nursery color schemes, or even how long to breastfeed, husbands are completely left out of the process and are at the mercy of their wives’ dictates.  Melissa is not one of those women, and I could not be more grateful. She truly counsels with me on all of the decisions that will affect our child.  She brings me her opinions and asks that I do research and develop my own opinions.  In this, I can say that I often defer to her judgment in many things, but she doesn’t take it for granted and doesn’t believe that my input should be disregarded or brushed off.  Perhaps most men are uninterested in many of those decisions.  Perhaps their opinions are disregarded and they decide not to bother.  I am not one of those men, and I truly value Melissa asking my advice on things, sharing her thoughts and opinions and preferences, and seeking out my judgment.  We look online and go to stores and research what we need versus what we want.  She is truly a partner in every sense of the word and I am the luckiest man I know. 

This next bit will come as a shock to all of you…we disagree, plenty in fact.  Here is an example: we discussed color schemes for the nursery and being interested in keeping it neutral, we decided on grey with yellow accents.  We would lightly accent with blue or pink too depending on gender.  I found a grey crib and dresser that I thought was perfect, and Melissa had her mind set on a nice looking wood piece.  Upon seeing the grey set I showed her, she fell in love and we immediately agreed that we liked it.  I couldn’t stop myself though…I kept looking and searching, and I found another that I absolutely loved even a touch more than the other crib set we agreed upon.  It was more modern and perhaps a little more masculine.  Melissa wasn’t as sold on my preferred crib.  They were both grey and very high quality, but we weren’t quite seeing eye to eye on it.  We decided however, that because my preference was a little more “masculine” that if we were having a boy we would go with mine and if our baby were a girl, Melissa’s preferred crib (our formerly agreed upon one…I am such a pain) would be the one.  We all know how that decision turned out J and I am 100% ok with it.  Fortunately, we are in agreement on so much more, and especially on the important things.

Other interesting notes…hormones and moodiness: they are real and it cannot be helped, only navigated, like a ship near the shore on a foggy night: carefully, sending and receiving signals to see where everyone is.  Can I just say here that Melissa knows when she can’t help her moodiness and that it frustrates her?  She is so wonderful and apologizes for those times when she was a little sharper with me than she wanted to be; she doesn’t just blame pregnancy and say ‘deal with it’ which I see a lot of.  In other words, she doesn’t use her pregnancy as an excuse to behave poorly.  Pregnancy brain: its legit people!  Melissa is my backup memory on everything, kind of like The Cloud, and right now, it is very unreliable.  It does make for some very funny times though.  Cravings: meh…haven’t had to deal with many.  Pickles and lemonade during the first trimester, but that wasn’t a craving so much as a remedy for nausea.  Shrimp fajitas, cinnamon rolls, and the weirdest one just recently, Jack-in-the-Box eggrolls (which has not yet been indulged) with dipping sauce have been the only actual “cravings” she has had.  On food in general:  I was fully prepared to witness a complete loss of control around food and indeed looking forward to it, as it would mean my own reckless abandon could be overlooked.  Sadly, this has not been the case.  Melissa has done so well with staying and eating healthy that I look more pregnant than she does. 

What is probably most surprising is how time has flown by! We are almost halfway through this journey and looking forward to our 20 week ultrasound next week…I know! It is crazy!  Side note, they say that the most common mistake in gender determination is the doctor saying the baby is a girl when in fact you are having a boy, so look forward to the post from Melissa after our ultrasound, it could change everything, hahahaha.

This whole experience has been and continues to be priceless.  Nothing can prepare you for, and few things are more precious than, having a child.  I am so grateful and lucky to have Melissa as my wife and partner through this.

Flutters and Bumps

One of the greatest things about this blog is I feel like all those who read it are VIPs and learn things faster than everyone else.  I think I have had about 12 people ask me what her name is going to be… clearly they don’t read this.  Just in case you didn’t read the last post and don’t really want to, her name is Aria. J  I absolutely love the name and love the meaning.  Here is a cute little picture Christian has put together that will be going up in her room somewhere.

A few things have happened over the past week or so.  Not many are super eventful, but I will share them with you anyway.  Last week I had my doctor appointment and got to see her little heart again.  He said everything looks good so far.  Woohoo!  Getting reassurance from the doctor is always great.  I felt a few flutters and pokes a bit last week too.  This week, I am feeling her throughout the day, every day.  Probably because in a week’s time, she grew half an inch!  Isn’t that crazy!?  I just can’t get over the rapid development these babies go through in such a short amount of time.  Feeling her move, kick, dance or whatever she is doing when I feel the pokes and flutters is UH-Mazing!!  I’m a little sad that Christian and Axel can’t feel them yet, but I know that it’s just a matter of time.  For now, I will soak it up and enjoy this time her and I get to share privately.

Remember last week when I said one day you wake up looking like you swallowed a watermelon?  Well… I didn’t swallow one but there is an official bump!  My co-worker was nice enough to take a couple pics of me at work so I could show you.  Not huge, but it’s starting to round out helping me look pregnant.  Hooray! Another exciting pregnancy moment I can check off my list.  Come summer time, I may not be as excited about being bigger but maybe I can walk around with a portable AC unit blowing on me all day.  People around here know how hot it gets, they will understand.

 

We have decided to have a baby shower a littler earlier than usual so we have enough time to make sure we have everything covered.  The date has been set for August 1^st and my wonderful mom has taken on the task of getting it all organized all the way from Massachusetts.  If any of you living far away are planning on taking a vacation, Houston would be a great place in August or October. *hint hint* lol!

Besides the baby shower date, the other decision we have made is nursery décor!  How fun!  So I bet you are thinking one of two things… 1.  I want a Harry Potter nursery OR 2. It’s a girl so I want a pink room full of ruffles and bows.  Nope!  Although I am a Harry Potter fanatic and wish I could do my own bedroom in that theme, I am not going that route.  Why?  I get bored easily with decorations and love to change things up.  If I have a theme, I am more likely to get tired of it sooner.  As far as pink, ruffles and bows… I am staying away from that.  I am definitely a girly girl but I am surprisingly not a fan of pink.  Also, I feel like the more you girlify things, the more high maintenance they become.  Totally not based on any facts there… just a feeling I have. Lol.  We decided to go with a neutral color scheme of gray, yellow and white…. With small pink accents.  If you look back at the name picture, those are the colors.  Simple.  Just how I like things.  Now my mom is really pushing for a chandelier… but again… high maintenance.  Although it does look beautiful in pictures I have seen.  I guess we’ll see. Add that to the list of decisions to make. Ha!

This week I have been online ‘window’ shopping and researching all these cool new gadgets they have available.  Did you know they have a machine that is practically a Kuerig for baby formula?  Its nuts!  How lazy are we now that we prefer to spend $400 on a machine to add formula to water, mix it and heat it up!?  Guess we are getting closer and closer to living the Jetson’s life.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s a cool invention and very handy but if I have to formula feed, I am totally ok mixing it myself.  Guess I am a little ‘old school’. 

Speaking of baby products, if you have kids, tell me the top 5 things that you would recommend and deem important.  Not the essentials like strollers and cribs… but things like bottle warmers that aren’t necessarily needed but help a lot and may be worth the buy.  Again, there is so much to choose from it gets a little overwhelming.  With your help, I can totally narrow some of it down.  

Alright, so the next appointments will be on May 22^nd and 27^th.  I will be having my 20 week ultrasound and getting all her measurements so I can tell you just how much she has grown by then.  Also, I will be getting another confirmation that Aria is indeed a girl and we don’t really have an… Ario? Oh dear… we need to get started on that boy name just in case. Lol! Of course it is highly unlikely we will need that, but you know how the good old internet is.  It’s scared me into thinking these crazy thoughts.  Before that next appointment, I will have Christian write a post so you can hear the dad’s point of view during these past 17 weeks.  I am sure he has some funny stories.

Growing and Growing

So I have this cool app on my phone that alerts me each week letting me know what week I am on and new baby developments.  I thought I would share some of those today because she has come a long way already.

I am 16 weeks!  That means there are only 24 more to go, but who’s counting.  You know what the best part about 16 weeks is?!  This is when I can start feeling movement!!  Oh how I am looking forward to that!  Nothing big at first, just little flutters here and there but I can’t wait! She is about 4.6 inches long (like the size of an iPhone people!) and should weigh around 3.5 ounces.  She most likely weighs a lot more though because at my last appointment two weeks ago, she was already at 3 ounces when she was only supposed to be 1.5.  That worries me… only because I keep seeing people post pics of their newborns that weigh 9 & 10 pounds!!  Umm… for obvious reasons, I would like for this baby to be normal sized.  She is currently growing hair, lashes and eyebrows.  She also is forming tiny bones in her ears so she can listen to us now.  This means that I need to stop singing immediately so she doesn’t learn so early that her mom is a little tone deaf.  Christian on the other hand, needs to start singing to her so she can hopefully absorb his musical talents that we are all a huge fan of. 

How am I doing?  Oh! Thanks for asking. J  I am doing GREAT!! Energy is coming back more and more and I have slept through the night these last 2 nights which means I don’t look like Oscar the Grouch scowling at people all day long.  For a while, I was waking up around 2am and would be wide awake until around 4am.  I was NOT a fan.  If there is anything that people know about me is I must have food and I must have sleep.  Without one of those, I am pretty grumpy.  Speaking of food, I am not really craving anything right now.  Still eat a lot of strawberries and fruit, but not a consistent craving for something specific.  I guess that is a good thing because though I am not full on ‘bumping’ yet, my clothes are starting to get snug.  I have only gained a couple pounds so far so that means the baby is expanding her home.  We all know how a pregnancy belly works… one day you look normal… the next you swallowed a watermelon and you finally look pregnant instead of looking like you just had a big lunch.  Knowing that, Christian took me maternity pants shopping over the weekend.  Some may think that is not fun but c’mon, an excuse to wear stretchy pants for the next 6 months and not be judged?!? Sign. Me. Up!  My one and only complaint about maternity clothes: shouldn’t they be sold at half price since they are only worn for a short period of time?      

On my last post, I mentioned that I am going to have to stay away from stores and limit myself on how many outfits I can buy.  I am happy to report that I have done a good job so far!  I have only purchased a few things.   With that said, this girl’s closet is already filling up!  At this rate, by October she will need some of my closet space too.  I am so grateful for all our wonderful friends and family who have already kept this little one in mind and have made sure she will look adorable.  As for the bigger things… oh man!  There is like a million of everything to choose from and research!  Picking things for a registry will be fun and probably a little time consuming.  Since this is Christian and my first baby together and it’s also been 9 years since Axel was born, we have absolutely no baby items in our home.  Any recommendations about what we should definitely have or even not bother with, let us know. 

Alright… Alright… the moment you have all been waiting for… her name!!  We still have not nailed down her middle name but figured we could go ahead and share her first name which has been decided.  The middle name is taking us some time because we are in between 2 and they both have significant meaning to us.  Before I tell you her name (stop trying to scroll down and cheat!! LOL) I have to tell you how we picked it.  I heard this name a long time ago and it kind of stuck with me.  I ran it by Christian and he was sold.  Once we looked up the meaning and found “intelligence or wisdom of an eagle” we both knew it would be the name because… duh! We are EAGLEstons.  The second best thing about this name is it has a musical meaning too.  An Aria is an elaborate melody sung solo with accompaniment in an opera.  Since Christian is so musical it again only made sense we go with that name.  Ha! You see what I did there… I snuck in the name and you didn’t even realize it until after!  J  That’s right!  Her name is Aria.  Knowing that it’s a girl already made us feel such a connection to this little Princess but now being able to call her by name makes all of this even more real. We love her so much already and can’t believe that we are just a short time away from meeting her.  My next appointment is tomorrow so I should have some more fun updates for you soon.

It's a girl!

Many of you thought it would be a girl and guess what?!  You were right on!  How exciting!!!  How amazing is technology that we are able to find out this early?  Cuh-razy!  Finding out the sex of the baby changes things too.  The baby stops being an “it” and becomes a “she” and I feel like the connection gets a little stronger because I now know more about her.  (This of course would be the same if it were a boy.)  Seems with every ultrasound, you get to learn more, see more and build an even bigger bond and connection.

Now let’s talk about when we found out and how we decided to do our gender reveal.

So we found out on Friday.  The appointment was not rescheduled this time and I was so nervous/excited all day.  Why nervous?  I have no idea, but I was literally shaking in the waiting room.  When we started the ultrasound, this little girl was dancing, practicing acrobatics or something because she was ALL over the place. Just moving and flipping around.  (I wonder if she managed to steal some of that chocolate I was eating before the appointment. Haha.)  J  In the room we had Christian, Me and Axel.  Attending via FaceTime we had my mom, dad and little brother.  It was Axel’s first time seeing an ultrasound and I think that’s when all of this really hit him.  There was actually a baby inside mommy’s tummy!  He was able to recognize some of the things he was seeing too which was building his excitement. “Look! That’s the spine… I see its spine!  Is that a leg?  That’s so cool!”  It was fun watching his reactions.  After the baby stopped flipping around, the ultrasound tech, Carrie, was able to start looking for parts… or lack thereof.  When she found the right angle, she let everyone take a second to see if they could figure it out.  We could barely figure out what we were even looking at so she started to type…”G…I…R…” and my mom started screaming!  Hahaha!!   Carrie did some double and triple checking while we all celebrated and then let us know that she was going to try and get some cute profile pictures of our little girl.  This baby girl had different plans.  Once we saw her…uhhh…parts she clearly wanted to get confrontational with us because she was ‘looking straight at us’.  She looked like a little alien and when she started opening and closing her mouth, Christian was like “That’s creepy”.  LOL It really was.  She moved her hand up and down, to her mouth, put it on her head and wiggled around but never stopped facing us.  So much for the cute profile picture, but we got to see our active baby girl and couldn’t be happier.  Since we were able to find out, we called Christian’s dad right after the appointment and arranged a mini gender reveal party at his house the next day (Saturday).

 

 

I was given a great idea for a gender reveal by a co-worker: fill a big balloon with confetti and have someone pop it.  Sounds good to me!  So we went to a party store and was given a better idea… fill a 3ft balloon with little pink balloons and ribbon.  SOLD! I mean who doesn’t want a 3 foot balloon!?! Oh! I know… my car! I drive a Toyota Corolla and in no way did it have room to fit a 3ft balloon through any of the doors.  Christian was going to make it happen though.  He squeezed that balloon through the doorway while sending Axel and me into panic mode. Like full on panic.  Both of us hate the sound of balloons popping so we were screaming and taking cover.  The 45 minute ride was a little nerve wracking too.  Axel was in the back pressed up against his door trying to be as far from the balloon as possible, bracing himself for the ‘POP’ at any moment.  I was driving like a turtle trying not to hit any bumps causing this balloon to shift in any way.  And Christian… he was laughing the entire ride.  When we got to the Eaglestons, we set up a few decorations along with some snacks and goodies that I had baked earlier that day. We left the giant balloon in the car just in case.  After the grandparents showed up, we invited everyone outside to watch Christian take the balloon out of the car just in case it popped.  We didn’t want to waste the awesome surprise! J  Luckily, with some gentle prodding the balloon made it out! Phew!  After gathering back in the house, we took another poll.  The general vote: girl!  We had Christian’s dad be the official balloon popper.  His first attempt was a little too gentle and the balloon barely moved.  The second attempt was a full blown success…get it?? Full BLOWN? C’mon, you know you laughed a little.  The initial reaction was silence as everyone took a second to take in the many pink balloons that popped out of the big one.  Then… pure excitement!!  And that excitement just continues as we share the news with more friends and family.  Here is the video of the reveal.  (You can only see it on a computer.  If you try on a phone or tablet, it won't work.... sorry)

 

 

We have been so blessed this year and are so grateful for this baby girl coming into our family.  She is already so loved.  My goal at this point is to stay away from all stores.  I am also going to work on a limit of how many outfits I am allowing myself to buy before she is born.  I have to remind myself… it’s a baby not a baby doll to dress up and change every 5 minutes. I remember with Axel, I bought him so many clothing items that he wasn’t even able to wear some things.  I am most looking forward to the daddy/daughter bond that Christian and our baby girl will develop.  Being a daddy’s girl myself, I know it will be something special.  In the upcoming weeks I should start to feel some flutters of movement and I can’t wait!  It’s the coolest feeling to feel your baby move.  It’s also a little creepy if you think too much about it. Ha! We have a name picked out for her already but we are nailing down which middle name we want to go with so as soon as we make that decision, we will be happy to share it with all of you.

2nd Trimester begins... :)

It's official!  I have started the 2nd trimester.  Woot Woot!  That means this little guy/girl is a third of the way baked. :)  The baby is now about 3.4 inches long and weighs about 1.5 oz.  Isn't that insane?!  It's like I take miracle grow for vitamins or something.  My cravings are shrimp (yes, still want shrimp fajitas) and fruit.  I have OJ every morning and strawberries and watermelon seem to be calling my name.

Oh! Speaking of OJ, let me brag about my wonderful husband for a minute.  So a few weeks ago, I started this routine of having a muffin and OJ every morning.  We have a little store downstairs where I work and I would run down there as soon as I got in, grab my juice and muffin and was as happy as a kid on Christmas.  But after a week.... I noticed a camera in the little store (it's an automated pay system so there aren't people in there)... and for some reason... I got SUPER embarrassed.  I called Christian and was like "these people think I am a fatty! They see me in there every single day and I am never going back."  Christian as level headed as always reassured me "Babe, you are giving them business.  They could care less".  This didn't work for me.  I said I wasn't going down there again even though I really really wanted my OJ and muffin.  (Side note:  I had been a bit on the over reactive, moody, emotional side due to my awesome hormones.  I am happy to report that it is starting to balance out. I am so happy about that because there is nothing worse than knowing you are acting irrationally and not being able to control it very well.)  So after work, I go home, hang out with my family and go to bed.  The next morning, I woke up, got ready and went to go pack my lunch.  When I opened the fridge... there was OJ galore.  All handy for me to grab and go!  And when I looked at the counter... muffins!!  My sweet, patient and loving husband had gone to the grocery store after I went to bed and stocked up on these things for me!  He knew that I was stubborn enough not to go into that store again. Ha!  it made my morning... week... month!  He is just the best and I am so lucky that he is mine. <3

 

So last week, I mentioned that I had an appointment on Friday to find out if we were having a girl or boy.  Well... that morning, I received a call saying the ultrasound tech was really sick and needed to reschedule her appointments for the day. WHAT?!  Sick?! Doctors and people who work in hospitals don't get sick!! HA! just kidding.  Of course they do!  Which is why I was totally ok with rescheduling to this Friday.  Let's just hope this little one cooperates and let's us see.  :)   While we wait to find out officially, I thought it would be fun to share some results to old wives tales I found.  I don't really believe that any of these actually work but I still like doing it.

Looks like we are pretty even here! With girl being slightly in the lead.  Any predictions?  Let us know, would love to hear them!

From the beginning...

Like most newlyweds, I had every intention on starting this blog to post fun stories about Christian and my new adventures and experiences.  Of course 3 and a half years later you can see just how good I got at making it actually happen.  HA!

By now you have heard the great news though… we are having our first baby together!! Woo Hoo!! I figured since this baby will be “Newly Eagleston” as well and we have a lot of family that lives so far, we could attempt to start this blog thing again.  This way, we can give our friends and family updates without making everyone on Facebook suffer through a million posts they really could probably care less about.  So let’s get it started!  Let me first say that I write how I talk so please excuse any random babbling.

I will start from the beginning which will probably make this a super long post.  I promise not all of them will be like this, but we have 13 weeks to cover.

We found out I was pregnant on Feb 6^th and it’s been a so hard to keep this secret!  The reason we decided to wait had a lot to do with Axel.  He had been praying for a brother or sister every night.  So I had a realistic talk with him (as I usually do) and told him “ok, there is a time in pregnancy where it’s possible that a baby could not make it.  When we get pregnant do you want me to tell you as soon as I know and if something happens we get through it together OR do you want me to wait until the ‘safe zone’ to tell you?”  His response was a classic Axel response.  He said “No, wait until everything is ok.  It would hurt my heart too bad if I knew something happened.”  (I know… sweetest kid ever!)  So his request was granted.  It wouldn’t make sense to tell everyone except him so we opted to tell just my parents and Christian’s parents.  (Side note: I am SO proud of my mom for keeping it to herself.  She was going to explode at any moment!) 

Now let’s get into the excitement… the symptoms.  So at about 5 weeks the dreaded morning sickness hit me.  Fun fact about me: I HATE and I mean HATE throwing up and will do anything and everything in my power to avoid it.  The nausea came in waves but I managed to survive it since I found a few things that cured it for me… pickles, pink lemonade and mint gum.  When one wouldn’t work, I would move on to the next.  If the three of those didn’t work, I immediately put myself to sleep.  A trip to the toilet just wasn’t going to happen if I could help it at all.  Christian was my rock during this time.  I was more of a ‘suffer silently’ type.  No one wants to hear someone complain all the time and since no one knew, I kept it to myself…. Except for Christian.  I would let him know when I felt bad and BAM… a bowl of pickles showed up next me.  And I think he bought every pink lemonade in existence to figure out which one I liked best.  He’s amazing!  Even though I did get sick often, it was WAY and I mean WAY better than my pregnancy with Axel (which I was constantly going to the hospital for dehydration because I couldn’t even keep water down).  Throughout the entire process of morning sickness I just kept reminding myself… sickness equals a good sign… there is still a baby in there (more about this shortly).  I think the hardest part about it all was having to work through the sickness and exhaustion.  I mean c’mon, we should get 2 leaves, one to get through the first trimester in the comfort of our own home, and then after we have the baby of course.

Around 11 weeks, my symptoms started to really subside.  Instead of getting happy about that… I got ridiculously paranoid.  Why am I not sick?  Why do I feel like I have a little more energy today?  Is something wrong?  UGH!  This paranoia is 100% due to the fact that back in September I had a miscarriage.  I know… I know… you just sighed and felt sad because you didn’t know.  It was something I didn’t feel like I wanted to share.  For the most part, I am a pretty private person when it comes to things like that.  I realize now that I should be more open about it.  So many women go through it and they too keep it to themselves and suffer silently.  We shouldn’t have to.  We should be able to have full support because it is SO NOT easy!  It’s one of the hardest losses I have ever had to deal with actually.  We were sad but in the end I prayed the hardest I have ever prayed for help to get through it.  I also turned the faith switch on and thought ‘Heavenly Father has a plan and a baby couldn’t happen for us right now so I just need to have faith that it will happen again and that He knows what’s best for me’.  Funny how when I turned it over to Him, all got better.  I started to look at things differently.  Christian and I had been trying to have a baby for 2 years with no success… BUT this was a sign that it could and would happen for us.  Anyway, back to the paranoia.  So when the symptoms started fading, I immediately thought everything was wrong again.  I was soooo anxious for my 12 week appointment and it was a week away!!  Ugh!

So we finally get to our 2^nd ultrasound at 12 weeks.    And guess what?!  There was the sweetest little heart beating on the screen letting me know “I’m ok mom!”  I was so happy and got to enjoy the rest of the ultrasound.  One thing we noticed is that the baby is STUBBORN already and it’s only 2.5 inches big.  Sucking on its thumb/hand already and didn’t stop no matter how many times the ultrasound tech poked and pushed.  She even had me cough hard and wiggle around.  Baby would move but never took the hand away from its mouth enough for the tech to get the picture she wanted.  I thought the picture still turned out cute.

 

So after that appointment, we were given the green light and decided it was time to tell Axel.  On April 2^nd we gave him an Easter egg from us with a little note inside saying “Baby Eagleston hatching October 2015”.  It went right over his head.  He was like “ok… great… thanks?”  We had to explain what it meant and then he was excited.  Now he can’t wait! He took pics with the ultrasound pic and off went the announcements to our closest friends and family members that live far away.  We wanted all of them to know first before making a general announcement.  Family members and friends in TX received an egg like Axel’s but of course they were able to understand it when they read it.  Haha!

This brings us to today!  I am 13 weeks which is the last week in the first trimester.  Baby is about the size of a peach at this point (2.9inches and .5oz).  My morning sickness is almost non-existence… woo hoo!!  My current symptoms right now are more exhaustion and acne! ß I mean I look like a 12 year old all over again.  I am craving shrimp fajitas… like ALL THE TIME!  And watermelon too.  But shrimp fajitas… mmmm!!  Not showing yet.  Let’s be honest, I am a little overweight so it’s going to take a little longer for me to show.  We are looking forward to finding out if it’s a girl or boy on Friday!  The ultrasound tech said it may be a little early still but we will try and look.  If we find out, we will definitely be following the same pattern and letting family and friends know first before making an announcement about it.  Love you all!!