So Wednesday was our “ABC’s of Babycare” class. Unfortunately this also coincided with Jeff’s work softball league playoff game #1. I normally would have insisted he come to the class, but given that the other class I took at Phelps (breastfeeding) was fairly useless and also that he’s captain of the softball team I didn’t push the issue.

My mom offered to come with instead, so I didn’t have to feel like such a loser going in there alone. The class was supposed to only be from 7-9pm, but because there was this one know it all dad to be that interrupted to correct the instructor and add his 2 cents in every second, it ended up going until almost 10pm!

Overall, it was a complete waste of time.

I was hoping there would be a doll per “couple” and they’d show us stuff like diaper changing (yes, I’m totally clueless!) and swaddling etc.

Instead, they covered 90% stuff I already knew or have done already, such as how to pick a pediatrician, how to pick a car seat etc. I guess maybe it’s not such a good idea to wait until 4 days before your due date to take any class (If only because you’ll be the only one who has to get up to pee every 10 minutes!)

There were a few good tips that I didn’t know that I am going to share with you here:

1) Babies are so unable to regulate their own temperature, that if they are too hot they will actually get a fever! (Unlike adults who would just sweat and be uncomfortable). For that reason it is much more dangerous to over dress than under dress a baby, not that you should do either, but you know what I mean.

2) When your baby is older and eating solids, you should NEVER leave them unattended with access to food because of the danger of them choking and you not being there to help. So if the doorbell rings and junior is eating some cheerios in their highchair, take all the cheerios off the high chair tray before going to answer the door. Seems pretty obvious when you hear it, but I don’t know if I would have thought of doing that.

The other thing we spent a bit of time on was she showed us the baby Heimlich maneuver which was by far the most useful thing about the class. Unfortunately it’s one of those things like CPR that I probably would forget how to do when the situation arose where I needed it… but I’m still glad that both my mom and I now know how to do it!

So that’s the report from the field… No news on the Jasper Watch front. I’m obviously still here and still pregnant! 2 days and counting until D-day…

Filed under: 3rd trimester by ariana
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With Japser’s (hopefully) imminent arrival, I’ve been thinking a lot about what he will look like. Jeff and I both have greenish eyes and brown curly hair, so that seems to be a given, but other than that I am just so impatient and curious to know who he will take after!

Of course I think Jeff is gorgeous and want little Jasper to look just like him.

We pulled out some baby pictures of the two of us to see what we might be in store for. One thing is for sure, if he looks like baby Jeff:

He will have really big droopy cheeks at first and a fuzz of black hair…

He may look a little bit like a potato head a few months later (with even bigger cheeks!)…

But will a few months after that become the cutest and happiest looking baby boy in the world…

Or, if he looks like his mommy, he will:
Have A LOT of spiky black hair when born:

Have big round eyes and long curls by the time he’s crawling..

And really long eyelashes and a tiny little space between his mouth and his nose by the time he’s 1 years old..

Or, he could be a combination of all of these traits or none of them at all. Which is I guess why it’s so exciting, you just never can tell!

This may be too long and boring for you to be interested in watching, but digging up all these baby pictures made me think of the love story montage our awesome wedding videographer put together for us, it has a ton more growing up pictures and then a brief section of after we met. We showed it at our rehearsal dinner outside on Lincoln Road in Miami Beach on a big projection screen. There were tons of strangers that stopped to watch too, it was one of the many fond memories I have of our amazing wedding weekend:

3 days and counting until Due Day!!!!

Filed under: 3rd trimester, random musings by ariana
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For most, when the “nesting instinct” kicks in they start deep cleaning or organizing closets. My nesting instinct seems to have a different meaning : Buy everything you think you might possibly need ahead of time!

For example, my wonderful friend Tracy got me a peanut shell baby carrier for my shower which I can’t wait to try it out. Its a sling style carrier, and I’ve read those are great for really small babies and for quick errands into the store when you don’t want to take the time to tie a moby wrap etc.

We also got a (totally rockin’) baby Bjorn carrier at our shower.

But were two styles of baby carriers enough? Of course not, I had to get one of these super cute Moby style wraps I blogged about a few weeks ago because so many nestie moms raved about them on the 0-6 month boards.

I think I have some sort of irrational fear that I’ll be home alone with baby and realize I needs something I don’t have and it will be an apocalyptic event!

Despite the fact that I may not have NEEDED it, I think I’m slightly in LOVE with my new wrap that arrived yesterday:

Moby Style Wrap from etsy seller Lovey Duds

I was a little worried how it would turn out because I picked the blue and orange paisley fabric as the accent fabric I wanted, but she only had a picture on her etsy site of it with a white wrap. I love white, but I was pretty sure that all that white fabric would get filthy within minutes. So I emailed her to ask if she had any other colors that would go well. She emailed me back a picture of the blue and orange paisley on top of another lightish blue looking material. It wasn’t the identical blue to the blue in the paisley but I thought it would probably look ok so I just ordered it.

I was so happy when it came, the blues match perfectly! I guess the seller liked the combo too because she took a picture of it and put it up on her site as one of her stock items.

She also includes an instructional DVD on how use the wrap. It’s actually quite easy to get the fabric tied the right way, the problem is she refers several times to wrapping the fabric around your “waist”. Yeah, I really dont’ have one of those these days, so it was kind of hard to get it to stay on properly.

I’m looking forward to trying it once my waist returns and I have an “outside” baby to put in there :)

Filed under: 3rd trimester, baby products, gear by ariana
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Excuse me while I take a few deep breaths.. I am still traumatized by my appointment yesterday.

It all started out innocently enough, I met the only midwife in the practice that I hadn’t seen before and she was as great as all the others. I weighed in at 160, a 2lb gain from last week. (I sure hope some of that is water weight!)

Then I asked for the internal. Big mistake!

First she put her fingers up there and said my cervix was still pretty posterior. At this point it was like all the other internals I’d had, mildly uncomfortable but nothing unmanageable. Then she started moving them around trying to do something, I didn’t know what but it was SO painful! Then she said “take a few deep breaths and I won’t move my fingers,” so I did, and that was ok. But then she SHOVED them in my cervix and it felt like she was digging around for something!

At one point I actually screamed “Please stop!” but she kinda kept going.. it was really weird and It still makes my cervix shrivel when I think about it. I don’t think I’m going to ask for any more internals, Jeff will just have to wait until I go into labor.

Turns out that the external opening (OS) to my cervix is a fingertip dilated, so she was trying to see if she could get her finger in there to get through to the uterus and if she could, she would have swept my membranes. But because I am only 50% effaced, she couldn’t. The back of the cervix is still pretty closed.

She said that by doing whatever the hell it was she did that she actually moved the cervix from posterior to anterior (which is good I guess) and maybe dilated me a bit more.

Jasper’s head is at -2 station, which is good progress because he was still at -4 last time they checked.

So the official stats: fingertip dilated, 50% effaced, -2 station. I really don’t think that knowing these numbers was worth the unpleasantness of the whole experience!

I also asked her at what point they start monitoring and talking induction. Their policy is to allow you to go all the way to 42 weeks so long as the BPP and NST tests don’t show any reason not to.

Jasper, this is your mother talking. It is NOT OK to stay in there another 3 weeks!! If you do, you will never hear the end of it. I will lay a Jewish mother guilt trip on you for the rest of your life - don’t say I didn’t warn you!

Filed under: 3rd trimester, state of the uterus, weight gain by ariana
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I didn’t think I wanted to do maternity pictures, but with my due date less than a week away (yowza!) I was afraid I might regret not having any that I didn’t take of myself in the bathroom mirror. I also used it as en excuse to teach Jeff how to use the new camera. He didn’t quite grasp the concept of the autofocus button and therefore many of the best shots were a bit blurry, but overall there were enough nice shots to make it worth it:

In a HIGHLY disturbing new development, my stretchmarks finally arrived.. and promptly took residence just around my belly button. They waited until 38.5 weeks, JUST when I thought I had evaded them altogether. SO not cool.

In other news, this afternoon I have my 39 week appointment. Stay tuned for the 39 week state of the uterus address tomorrow morning!

Filed under: 3rd trimester, galleries, ultrasounds by ariana
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Thursday I got an unexpected call from my friend Allison. Allison was my best friend from college but we haven’t spoken in a really long time. So long in fact, that when she called and I asked her if she even knew I was pregnant she responded by asking if I knew she had a baby two months ago!

So yes, we’ve been a little out of touch. I was thrilled to hear that she and her husband Daniel were in NY visiting her parents so we could get together and I could meet her adorable daughter Sophie Maya.

Not only was it fun to catch up with them after so long, but having a newborn in the house now that we have everything all set up for Jasper was like having a dress rehearsal! Thanks to little Sophie for being Jasper’s stand-in and trying out all of the fun toys we haven’t used yet.

I was able to practice my portrait photography:

Sophie sleeping on Dad’s shoulder

Sophie sleeping in Dad’s hands.

And then when she started fussing, we but her in the bouncy seat.. which she’ didn’t like so much.

Then, we put her in the swing, which she seemed to love! Allison changed her on Jasper’s changing pad and nursed her in the glider. Allison gave the glider rave reviews and I got a short real time lesson in breast feeding. We even pulled out the My Breast Friend Pillow!

It seems that on the “gear” front we are quite prepared for Jasper’s arrival, all we need now is the little leading man himself.

PS, I now have only 9 days until D day… that’s single digits baby!!!

Filed under: 3rd trimester, friends, gear by ariana
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I never posted about my 38 week appointment on Monday. Probably because it was totally uneventful..

Midwife Judy (who was the one who took care of me during my first preterm labor episode) didn’t offer me an internal and I didn’t ask for one figuring that I’d get one at my next 39 week appointment.

This made Jeff very unhappy!

At his office they have a pool going on, and I guess everyone wanted to know if I’d made any “progress.”

I never would have believed you if you’d told me years ago that there would be people I’ve never met wanting to know how many centimeters dilated my cervix is!

The only other news of note is that I weighed in again at 158 lbs, the same that I was at 36 & 37 weeks. I was irrationally happy at that news. Does that make me a terrible person??

I should probably be worried that it means the baby isn’t growing as he is supposed to be gaining almost half a lb a week at this point.. but I have read several places that your weight gain may slow or even stop in the last month. Of course, I haven’t followed any of the “typical” patterns of weight gain this whole pregnancy so I was sure that wouldn’t apply to me. But I didn’t realize how happy I’d be when it did.

Now if I could just have this baby before any stretch marks or additional pounds show up!

Speaking of which, he is now so low in my pelvis that I am in constant pain down there. Even when I walk I feel like I am walking around his head. Sleeping has become particularly torturous. Well, not sleeping so much as turning over and getting out of bed (which I do several times a night to pee of course.)

I hope all that pressure is doing SOMETHING to soften/open my cervix. Wish me progress luck at my 39 week appointment Monday!

Filed under: 3rd trimester, state of the uterus, weight gain by ariana
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The nursery is finally finished! Here is a little gallery of images, I couldn’t get the captions working so here is a list of where everything came from. If I missed anything you have a question about, just post a comment and I’ll answer to the best of my ability.

Enjoy!

Crib: Baby Mod Park Lane from Walmart
Crib Bedding: Orchard Park from Walmart
Monkey Mural: DIY
Safari Mobile above Crib: DIY
Glider: Bought at a consignment sale, but its a dutalier sleigh back
Dresser: Ikea Hemnes 8 drawer Dresser
Drawer Organizers: Ikea Kompliment
Basket with Diapers Etc: Wendy Belissimo from BRU
Mobile above changing table: A shower gift
Art Above the Changing Table: Creative Thursday
Frames for Art: Ikea Ribba in Natural
Rug: Target Dwell Studio Zebra Rug
Nightstand: Ikea Hemnes
Lamp: MiGi Splash Lamp: Available at BRU
Shades: Savannah Roman Shades from JC Penney in Soft Lime

Filed under: 3rd trimester, Uncategorized, decorating, nursery by ariana
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Wednesday Jeff called me from work. Turns out his co-workers threw him a surprise baby shower!!

So incredibly sweet and unexpected. He said he was totally embarrassed and was sweating the whole time while opening gifts. We got some really nice useful things, including a bunch of organic swaddlers and the like because Jeff is the resident “Green” expert at his company.

The best thing about it is that they all chipped in and gave us a $500 gift card to BRU! It is so generous I can’t even wrap my mind around it. Too bad we have already bought ALL of the big expensive items we needed that we didn’t get at my shower.  I was tempted to return some of them and repurchase them, but I figure since I’ll be on maternity leave soon and only being paid for 6 of the 12 weeks that gift card will REALLY come in handy for supplies like diapers etc.  Plus, I’m sure there are a few things we will realize we need later and it will definitely take the pressure off to have this card.

So thank you Jeff’s coworkers, you made my week!

Other exciting happenings this week include the fact that Tuesday marked the beginning of the sign Leo, which is the sign that Jasper will be born under.

Nothing against Cancers, but I am happy we made it to Leo because there is a lot of Leo energy in my family.

My dad and grandmother are both Leos, my mom and sister have Leo moons and Jeff has Leo rising.  I am all air signs (Libra with Gemini Moon and Aquarius rising) and am just more compatible with fire signs like Leo than water signs like Cancer.

Obviously by now you must know I’m a big believer in astrology. If you ever care to have your child’s chart read by a real astrologer, you must know the exact birth time.. so make sure someone looks and writes it down right away!

Filed under: 3rd trimester, shower by ariana
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It’s been a very long time since I posted a belly shot. Mostly because I can barely stand to look at myself these days, why would anyone else want to??

But in honor of the much anticipated arrival of my brand new Canon Digital Rebel yesterday I took a few pics of the only subject around - me!

Here I am in all my bellyliciousness:

Front View

Side view.

BTW, those are veins not stretchmarks.. I have that sort of pale skin that is actually translucent! I’m sure the stretchmarks aren’t far behind though.

So what do you think, have I “dropped”?

Filed under: 3rd trimester, belly shots by ariana
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