Baby's buddies in the making

One of the really fun things about being pregnant is finding out that a friend of yours is pregnant too!  Somehow being pregnant seems to attract other pregos-the lady who did my hair today even happened to be pregnant.
Right now it seems to be a major trend to get knocked up, which means our baby will have plenty of friends all born right around the same time.  We love to start counting these baby friends, and I love to have friends who I can share prego hopes/miseries with as we experience it together.  Many of these friends are also first-time mamas like me!

As far as I know right now, I have 7 first-time mama friends pregnant with me (1 w/ twins!) and 2 others that are on their 2nd/3rd.

Also, the girls seem to be ruling the crowd!  There's 2 baby girls on the way in that group and 1 boy, with the rest TBD.  Doesn't hurt that there's about an 80% chance we're also having a girl, according to our 12 week ultrasound.

Our friends the Thompsons just revealed they're having a girl!

Me with mamas of my babies' friends:

Lifelong friend Katie Hanchinamani is due with TWINS and just 1 day ahead of me in her pregnancy

Mama Karen, due with baby girl Thompson in April

Mama Taryn, due with baby Lombardo #2 in June and Jen due with Kingston James Crowell in January

Trying to grow that baby bump

Well, it's week 14, and it's getting close to the time where baby's growth could/should start showing soon!
I have found myself googling pictures of baby bellies and looking up pictures on facebook posted by friends through their pregnancy to try to predict what is to come.  So far, I have just enough of a pooch that I can tell the difference, but it's not yet noticeable.  Excited for when the baby bump really comes, not as excited for the in-between stage where I just look bloated.

This is me at 14 weeks-starting to show a little bump!

Luckily, the holidays are coming up, so as long as my appetite stays up and my nausea stays down, I should have much more to show after all of those events!

We already started out holiday feasting with a pre-Thanksgiving dinner with great friends last weekend.

Jacob carving his first turkey.

The joys of 2nd trimester

At the absolute last day of my first trimester, my world changed.  I had an entire day without the urge to throw up.  What's more, I had an entire day when I was productive, energetic, and felt capable!  This was such a joy after over a month of misery.  I felt like there was light at the end of the tunnel.  For anyone who's never experienced a rough first trimester, I'm sure I sound overly dramatic.  For anyone who has, you know exactly what I'm talking about.  I still don't feel as good as I did pre-pregnancy, but I feel SO much better than I had about a week prior. 

Let me be clear for the record-I've heard many times that pregnancy can be tough, and first trimester is the toughest, but I had NO idea how hard it can be!! I have such a deeper respect for moms across the world.  In the end, I dealt with a little over 4 weeks of complete misery, but in those moments of misery, it felt like it was an eternity.

The other joy of second trimester is the peace knowing that your baby is exponentially more safe and your risk of miscarriage has dropped dramatically.  This peace of mind is so amazing.

Lastly, second trimester means it's time for your 12 week ultrasound.  It was so fun to see our baby, now with arms and legs moving about!  We were able to see all 10 fingers and a few toes.  Also, the nurse tech we saw is skilled in early prediction of gender.  So, while she insisted that she's definitely not 100% right, she was pretty quick to say it looks like a girl!  We'll find out for sure at 20 weeks.

Here's a few of our first photos of the baby from our first 3 ultrasounds:

Here's our baby at 6 weeks...just a little tadpole

Here's the baby at 8 weeks (much worse quality as it was on the portable ultrasound machine)

Here's the baby at 12 weeks, over 10X as big as the first picture at 6 weeks!

Here's our little baby legs, all stretched out.  No doubt these will grow into some long baby legs.

Baby's first gifts

Our baby is so blessed!  Even before I finished the 1st trimester, baby already had a collection of gifts from family & friends.
Below are the first presents our baby ever received.
In order of when we got them....there was an adorable outfit from our friend Alicia, a cute little pacifier from Ali that she bought when we were in New Orleans (little did we know that Sienna Overfield and Jantzen Putnam have the same one in different colors!), a super soft soothing sounds lamb from Kristina & Peter Beckerman all the way from Boston, the 'magic rattle' from our Auntie Julie Becklund (she brought it the day we announced my pregnancy to the Tobiason because she had a hunch the announcement was coming), a picture of me as a baby from Grandma Lois so we can have it to compare my looks when the baby comes, and a super cute book of baby names from my friend Lauren.
Can't wait for baby to enjoy all these gifts!

Traveling with extra baggage

During the first 3 months of my pregnancy, I traveled on 3 big trips!  All of these trips were, of course, booked before I was pregnant so once they came, I had to deal with whatever state I was in at the time and go for it.

Italy was obviously the biggest and the first, in which pregnancy hadn't yet affected my ability to travel and I was feeling great-able to do pretty much everything I could do pre-pregnancy.  This was during weeks 4-6 of pregnancy.

The next trip was a work trip to New Orleans for the Community Food Securities Coalition Conference.  This trip was during my 9th week of pregnancy, and it was a whole different experience than traveling to Italy.  The day after traveling cross-country, I felt so worn out and beat up that I spent the whole day in the hotel room feeling miserable (luckily the conference sessions hadn't yet started and I had a project I needed to work on).  This was officially the worst I had felt in my pregnancy.
My good friends Ali & Joel Broom arrived the following day and helped me so much through the next few days.  I got the "waves" of nausea during this time and they were so patient and helpful!  Somehow I made it through the conference too and managed to learn a lot of new things as well.

Fun times despite feeling yucky with the Brooms

The one night I felt good enough to go out for dinner; on Canal Street

How could you not feel better hanging out with these two?? :)

The last trip was another work trip to Florida for the Grant Professional Association Conference.  Boy, if I thought I felt sick in New Orleans, I had no idea how bad it could get!  This was now on week 12, and the gentle waves of nausea had progressed into sprints for the toilet.  I actually ran out of a conference event at one point for fear I was about to throw up in the middle of the luncheon.  Luckily, Jacob met me in Florida at the end of the conference and worked his 'magic' on me.  Strangely enough, even though by that point I had thrown up MANY times, it had never happened when I was with Jacob (he teased that I was making it all up).  And, sure enough, once he arrived, my morning toilet-hugging rituals subsided.  There was one day when he left to go pick up our rental car and I threw up while he was gone...after this I started to fear him being away at all!
Thankfully, despite it all, we were able to take a slower pace but still enjoy our mini-vacay in Florida with time at the beach, visiting Disney World, an Orlando Magic game, and lots of good time together.

On the beach in Florida at 12 weeks

At the Orlando Magic game-fun to be a part of an NBA game for the first time in years!

Driving at the Tomorrowland Speedway-somehow I managed not to get carsick

Best part of being pregnant at Disney World? If you go to Guest Services and tell them, they give you a Guest Assistance Card.  Flash that bad boy and it basically gets you to the front of every line!!

Enjoying all the Christmas decorations and lights at the Magic Kingdom in Disney World

Getting our last bit of Florida sun at the Hawaiian mini golf course

Moral of the story: traveling cross-country in the peak of your 1st trimester, is a rough road to take (at least if you're me)