We made it! 37 weeks!

How far along? 36w6d
Total weight gain/loss: +60. My weight gain has really slowed in the past 4 weeks. I've only gained about a lb per week. Looks like I should be able to keep it under my goal!
Stretch marks? Yes, 2 small fine sets that I described last week
Sleep: OMG no - I've been sleeping awful!
Best moment this week: See Labor Signs
Movement: Yes and it really hurts!
Food cravings: No, not really
Labor Signs: Had an internal today - we're at 2 cm dilated, 50% effaced and Emilia is at-2 station. I may have just lost a little bit of my mucus plug post internal.
Belly Button in or out? In
What I miss: I'm echoing last week's sentiment-->comfortable sleep
What I am looking forward to:  Emilia's birth and non pregnant sleep
Milestones: FULL TERM!

Today I saw the OB that delivered Gabriella. Love that man, he is seriously so nice. I find it slightly funny that out of a 6 person practice, the 3 women of the practice have the WORST bedside manner I have ever seen. They are so awkward and cold - here's hoping I don't catch one of them on call when I go into labor. So, as you can see from above, I am making progress. I could still walk around like this till 40 weeks, but I'll personally take it as good news that we're moving in the right direction (at 37 weeks no less) and that I have 2 less cm that I have to labor for, lol.

The past 2 days I have been crampy accompanied with some lower back pain. Some days I noticed a lot more BH, others not so much, but as a whole they are getting more frequent. I also have some very sporadic real contractions, but again, nothing even really to think twice about just yet. I'm just overall starting to feel really poopy and I know that if I make it far past 38 weeks I'm going to be so cranky given how early Gabriella came (37w5d).

On a good note, my BP has behaved this entire pregnancy. No NST debacles like last time. I'm SO super thankful for that.

36 weeks - full term in ONE week!

How far along? 35w6d
Total weight gain/loss: +58/59. I should be able to keep it close to 65 total, I hope!
Stretch marks? Yes, it seems that my Emilia has managed to give me 2 small sets of stretch marks on the bottom sides of my stomach. They're very fine and in a cluster, so its kinda hard to decipher if they are spider veins or stretch marks, but I'm fairly certain they are stretch marks
Sleep: No not really. Gabriella is sick AGAIN and well lets just say Chris isn't the one taking care of her.
Best moment this week: I've got nothing.
Movement: Yes and holy effing hell she's starting to really hurt me. I don't know what she's doing to my cervix at the moment, but my God, it hurts!
Food cravings: Nothing, I actually have been eating less in general (this the slowed weight gain). I have pretty bad indigestion in the evenings and that's when I used to snack a bunch
Labor Signs: No, which is odd given my history of cramping this pregnancy. I have random contractions when switching positions overnight, but they are not happening that often
Belly Button in or out? Still in, I don't think its anatomically the kind that would ever.
What I miss: comfortable sleep
What I am looking forward to: not being at work (soon enough) and having this baby. I'm definitely ready to not be pregnant anymore. This last week to 10 days have been really rough physically.
Milestones: Getting so close now!

Her clothes are washed and we should be relatively "ready" for her arrival by the end of the weekend! I have an OB appt tomorrow. Don't know if they'll check me or not. Last week my OB did not since he wouldn't stop me from going to labor at that point. I see a different OB tomorrow so who knows what they'll decide. We already know I'm GBS+ from a urine culture early in my pregnancy so antibiotics during labor have already been established. She definitely has not dropped yet, that I can tell, but I know that 2nd+ births you often don't until right before labor. I've been posting belly pics in the event anyone is curious. I.am.huge.

34 weeks - aka the week of exhaustion

Total weight gain/loss: +55ish
Stretch marks? Not on my stomach, I have some small new ones on my hips.
Sleep: OMG, I'll elaborate below
Best moment this week: Sleeping for 4 hours straight
Movement: Yes
Food cravings: None at the moment, I've had a return of queasiness the past few days
Labor Signs: No
Belly Button in or out? In, but getting pretty flat
What I miss: lots of things
What I am looking forward to: going to bed tonight....is there a theme here?
Milestones: 34 weeks! Holy effing hell!

So here we are at 34 weeks. Seems like it took no time and forever to get here. I've been feeling...you guessed it, EXHAUSTED. Its amazing how lack of sleep is really making me feel really blah. Let me elaborate: Getting up to pee 2 times, picking Leo up on the bed after he drinks water/pees/etc., shooing Gabriella back into bed after waking up at 5.30. Some nights I'm being woken up every hour, other nights I can get a decent stretch of time in. In any case, I'm so so so worn out. If I could just get 6 hours of sleep straight I'd feel much better.

Where is Chris you ask? On the couch, for the rest of my pregnancy.

I have my 34 week appt tomorrow. Doc will either start having me coming every week or tell me to come back at 36 weeks at which point we'll do every week. Either way, I'm in the home stretch. What's weird is that very soon I'll be hoping that my cervix is making progress versus hoping that things are nice and sealed up all there, as I have been this whole pregnancy.

All in all, I can say that I'm ready to not be pregnant anymore. I'm not ready logistically for Emilia to be here yet, there is still work to be done. But yeah, I'm definitely over being pregnant at this point. I would love more than anything for Emilia to be born full term, of course, but man, I already know I will be a bitter bitch if she doesn't come as early as Gabriella did. I can't help but have that in my mind.

32 weeks, T-8 weeks till EDD!

Total weight gain/loss: I think I'm about +50/51. Aside from the weekend in DC, I've been really good about watching my cals
Stretch marks? Nope
Sleep: I've been starting to pee 2 times a night standard, so that's getting annoying.
Best moment this week: Any time Gabriella says something really funny. She seriously has me rolling on a daily basis
Movement: Yes
Food cravings: PIZZA
Labor Signs: Nope, we're all good in this department
Belly Button in or out? In
What I miss: regular clothes. I'm definitely at that point where I'm sick to death of maternity clothes
What I am looking forward to: the weekend, continuing work on Gabriella's new room and starting to get the nursery ready
Milestones: 32 weeks tomorrow - she'll be here in less than 8 weeks!

Went to DC last weekend and had a lovely time with my BFF and little Miss Dalia who is just as precious as can be. To say there was eating over the weekend would be an understatement. It was just so nice to be able to spend some quality time with my bestie. Its been a really long time since we've been able to do that as most of the time we don't see each other for long and its usually just a quick catch up.

Aside from some really annoying things that Chris did while I was gone, he did manage to put G's new furniture together (dresser and nightstand). They look awesome. I haven't been able to find a bookcase that I like so the plan is to buy the Ikea one that we like the size of, then paint it! That way it can be the exact color I want. I'll be ordering all the decals for her room soon since we'll be at the point that we can put them on the walls within the month and I want to be able to do that ASAP (since that the fun part).

Once we get rid of extra furniture parts in the nursery (from the guest bed set that was in G's room) I can start cleaning up the nursery and getting it ready. I already have my list of things to buy, which seemingly grows even though I check stuff off.

I forgot to take a belly pic last week, but need to take one tonight. I gotta go see how I compare to 32 weeks with G!

31 week update/survey

Total weight gain/loss: +48/49. At my OB appt today my doc advised me to stick to a 1800 cal diet versus 2K. Ok, you got it boss. We'll see how the pounds keep packing on anyways!
Stretch marks? Nope
Sleep: I made Chris sleep on the couch all night last night. Nuff said.
Best moment this week: Gabriella transitioning well to her big girl bed!
Movement: Yes
Food cravings: Chocolate and cookies
Labor Signs: No, but see week 30 update
Belly Button in or out? In
What I miss: Nothing in particular
What I am looking forward to: DC this weekend!
Milestones: in the 30s now! Craziness!

1st night success!

So proud of my little monkey. She did GREAT in her big girl bed!

30 week update

Its been rather eventful 'round these parts since my last update. I think the most monumental event of note is that tonight is Gabriella's 1st night in her new room! It took a little longer to get her settled down and after one rogue wake-up 30 min in to take her to go pee (this was insanely humorous - we haven't done anything with potty training yet, but she really did have to pee, and she did a little in her diaper and a little on the potty, I was shocked!). After we put her diaper back on we said our good nights, snuggles again and she went right back to sleep with no problem. I'm really keeping my fingers crossed for a wake-free night. I hope she makes it through ok till morning. I feel like tonight will be the hardest night and then it'll hopefully be easier moving forward since she'll only get more comfortable. The room is only 2 weeks freshly painted so we haven't gotten all her decals up. It'll be a work in progress for a few more weekends, but I will definitely take pics and post soon.

Second super important thing, we have a name for baby girl. As I've written before, Emilia was my fave name and Chris finally came to the conclusion that Emilia was the best name for our little girl. Soooo we shall call her Emilia! Gabriella and Emilia. I love it!

Third, I ended up in L&D last Sunday. Not fun, but everything is ok. For maybe about a month now, I've been experiencing very sporadic lower back cramping. It comes in waves, almost contraction-like. It happens for like 15-30 seconds, then dissipates. It might happen 3-4 times in a row and then its gone. I was experiencing this maybe once a day, once, every other day. It never caused me any worry since I have regular cervical checks and everything was always checking out ok. So, last weekend (Friday) I was noticing that they were becoming more persistent, coupled with some occasional front cramping. I made note to keep an eye on it and call the doc if needed. By the time Sunday rolled around they were still around with no signs of leaving so I called the on-call OB. This was my doc during my pg with Gabriella so he knew my LEEP history (he actually did it). He advised I come in and get checked. They ran a gamut of tests: standard blood tests, checked cervix, fetal fibronectin, u/s, CM culture. Everything was ok, but they did find out that I had the start of a yeast infection and that while not dehydrated, my daily water intake was too low.

The conclusion of the hospital stay was a 7-day course of monistat and at least 64oz of water per day. Since on this regimen I can say that my back cramping has decreased a ton. I still have it on occasion, but nothing like last weekend and with no frequency whatsoever. I see my regular OB on Wednesday and given the good progress I'm hoping I'll still be ok to go to DC next weekend.

Since I've written a novel, I'll skip the check list update and wait till Wednesday when I go to the doc. Until then :)