"nature abhors a closed door"

that's what the kitty tells me when she wakes me up by pawing at the bedroom door when i'm sleeping. mommy is wandering around muttering things that sound like 'stupid cat' and 'you're a fruitcake, cleo.' i'm just sleepy. but there are too many interesting things in the world to waste time sleeping. so i scrub at my eyes some more and stay awake.

mommy has fallen asleep on the couch again, so I decided to play with the box she normally keeps all to herself. is fun. not as fun as boobies, but fun.

disturbing calculations

So I just did some calculating to figure out our diaper stash size so far. We have purchased:

10 newborn/small size diapers
8 medium size diapers
2 wool covers

Unfortunately, I then decided to continue and decipher exactly how much we'd spent on diapers so far. On the positive side, I've paid half the cost or less for almost all of them. On the negative side, how did it get up to just over $130 already?!? Oh well, I suppose it's better to know than to blithely assume that just because I'm finding good deals we're not spending that much money . . .

I still can't wait to get back access to my sewing machine, though.

Why isn't there . . .

. . . a well-known, wide-spread, brick-and-mortar store that sells a wide range of cloth diapers?

(better yet, one that also has a wide selection of children's books and audio. And in this mythical store, there should be a cafe that sells nutritious snacks and tasty decaffeinated coffee things.)

25 weeks

Whew! Between Beatrice finally making her appearance, my nephew getting married in the middle of nowhere, and the Maryland house forcibly resisting being sold, there's barely been time to post. And the craziness isn't done yet - we're leaving tonight to head to Maryland to solve some last-minute problems before closing on Monday. So in case you have wondered why I haven't posted recently, well, see above.

Our midwife's appointment went well yesterday - this time it was with the lady that is actually the director of the birth center. I was initially worried about that, afraid she'd be, I don't know, too managerial or something, but it was an incredibly positive experience. I guess anyone who's been a midwife for 25 or so years is unlikely to be too bureaucratic in nature. Apparently all my measurements are just perfect - fundal height, weight, blood pressure, that sort of thing. She did say I should work on eating an apple a day, but otherwise I was not scolded about my diet and exercise level. Finally, my glucose tolerance test was scheduled for the beginning of July, and she reassured me that as long as I was not insulin-dependent I would not be risked out of the birth center, which was my major concern with the test.

In other baby news, we've picked out and signed up for our childbirth class, which begins on the 25th and runs for eight weeks, and we're beginning to amass a (very) small stash of diapers. Twuck continues to get stronger; the other day I was resting a bowl of cereal on my tummy-turned-shelf, when he decided he'd had enough of the cold thing sitting on him and gave a direct kick to the bowl, sending milk sloshing everywhere. Already showing quite the temper - we may be in trouble here.

I can feel him move sporadically now - flips and kicks and such. He doesn't like things to be on my belly; in the past week he's tried to kick first the laptop, then the cat, off of my lap.

Halfway there

His feet are about an inch long now, according to a book we spotted at the appointment yesterday, where we were repeatedly assured that everything was going perfectly smoothly.

2 of 5

This is the second picture of the five good ones we have of Twuck. All other ultrasounds, images, etc you see on this blog are either computer generated images or someone else's baby; they are merely posted to aid visualization of current growth. We will not be having the super-fancy 4D ultrasounds - they generally involve a longer exposure time and more powerful equipment, and though no one has ever proven ultrasounds unsafe to mother or baby, I am scarred by my lab experiences where we used sound waves to break open cells. Well, the emotional scarring goes beyond that, but I digress . . . :-P Ultrasounds - fancy and otherwise - are wonderful tools for those that need them. Fortunately, it looks like this time, we won't.
I think I'm starting to look pregnant, a little. Maternity clothes are actually staying up for the whole day now. They should - the scale says I've put on four pounds since my last midwife visit. Fortunately we're getting to the time of year that swimming is an exercise option, since I'd prefer not to wear the maternity shirt that says "I'm not fat, I'm pregnant! . . . And fat."
Now that we know we're having a boy, I can start customizing the cloth diapers I've already gotten (I found 5 for $5 each; new they're $18 each!) so that the extra absorbency layer snaps a little further forward. I'll be glad when we get settled so I can have my sewing machine back!

18 and a half weeks

It's a boy!

Everything is perfect and in its proper place. From all they can tell, this little one is perfectly happy and healthy.

Yawn

image courtesy about.com/pregnancy

We go for our ultrasound tomorrow. I can't decide whether I'm more excited or anxious. Yes, we are going to find out the gender, assuming baby cooperates. The only gender dream I've had the baby was a boy; we'll see if that was prophetic or not.

If you have the time and inclination, say a little prayer for the three of us tomorrow . . .

Pocket Diapers

Like my AIOs list, only the products with the best/most reviews are listed here. Not that number of reviews was a problem - it seems everyone and their mother has an opinion on pocket diapers!

-Green Acre Designs (~$16) mostly rave reviews, some leaking reported (especially of breastfed poo?)
-DryBees Pocket AIO ($15) good at containing blowouts, solid colors better than prints, fit issues w/ some babies, especially good w/ hemp inserts, runs large
-Snap Ez Pocket ($16) just as good as the AIOs, fit issues w/ some babies, most use other brands of inserts, many size options

So to me, Snap Ez Pockets > Snap EZ AIO. With a ~$10-12 drop in price, I can stomach the extra annoyance of using inserts. DryBees sounds like a good option as well, particularly with hemp inserts. Bum-Ware AIOs remain a reasonably priced option, as they are only a little more expensive than the pockets, and I'm a fan of the AIO concept.

There. That wasn't as hard as I was afraid it would be. :-P

argh

So I was thinking that I was starting to get a handle on this whole cloth diapering thing; I was pinning down brands, types, and amounts needed - until I realize that some (if not all) pocket diapers have PUL outer layers. In my mind, this makes them an AIO. Apparently not to anyone else though. So now I have to slog through the wilderness that is pocket diapers (which previously I had categorically ruled out) and figure out which of those are the best, and whether they are better than the AIOs I'd already picked out.

Not like I don't have plenty of time, though.

very little is more beautiful

. . . than the sound of a baby's heartbeat. Thankfully, we got to hear it yesterday, strong and clear, despite all the wiggling about the little seemed to find necessary.

one week

. . . until our next appointment. I keep telling myself I've gone three weeks without hearing the heartbeat, I can surely wait one week more. But if you hear that a clinic has been broken into and nothing taken, nothing disturbed except the doppler, well, perhaps you should find out where I was that night.

paranoia strikes again

Some bleeding/spotting today, which left me sufficiently freaked out to call the midwives, who assured me that unless I started cramping (which I'm not) then I shouldn't worry. Also, I have been telling myself that either the baby is fine, or it's not, and there's nothing to be done either way. Neither of these reassurances are actually all that comforting.

aha!

So I'd been feeling crampy off and on over the past week or so, and it was worrying me a little. I'd figured out that more water seemed to make the sensation go away, but it felt so much like veryveryvery mild contractions that I didn't know what to make of it. Turns out that they're probably Braxton Hicks. I thought that that was something you only got in your last month or so, but apparently they start at six weeks and are noticeable for some women starting in the late first trimester.

Guess I need to start trying to drink even more water . . .

a (grateful) rant

I feel so fortunate that I have the education, intelligence, and (perhaps most of all) the good luck to be able to think for myself, even in situations - such as birth - where it is actively discouraged. If I hadn't been seated next to a girl at graduation, I wouldn't have reconnected with her, and I wouldn't have found the left-of-mainstream community that has been such an eye-opener to me. If my experiences in graduate school hadn't taught me cynicism toward the scientific establishment, and if I hadn't taught several classes' worth of pre-med students, and if I hadn't landed in a hospital brimming with incompetence, I might never have abandoned my blind faith in science and technology.

This all comes up because of this study and the fact that leaving the cord unclamped until it stops pulsing is already policy at the birth center. It frustrates me that not everyone has the information or opportunity to choose (what I believe is) a higher standard of care. I can understand just going with the flow, and I can even understand choosing that alternative care (other than following precisely what the doctor tells you) is not for you; I just wish everyone had the opportunity to make an informed decision.

13 weeks

I've decided the baby is going through a growth spurt because I've been ridiculously emotional the past two days, and what is pregnancy for if not to blame everything on hormones?

Also I've had pretty bad back pain over the past week - bad enough that I called the midwives on Monday to make sure I shouldn't be worried. She suggested heat packs and massage, and that maybe a visit to a chiropractor would be in order if that doesn't fix it. It seems to be better today, and I've been following her advice with the heat packs and yesterday sat in a super-massagey chair while we were in bed-bath-and-beyond. The pain and stiffness aren't all gone, but hopefully it will be better enough that I will actually be of some use while we are in Maryland this weekend.

picture courtesy about.com/pregnancy.