it's Friday!

Amazon sent me an email letting me know that Kindle covers are on sale. They then proceeded to link me to the ones that are on sale and the first row of them are all designer covers and they are on sale for $85.00.

LOL

sorry but who has/spends $85 on a kindle cover? even if it IS some kind of uber trendy sparkly animal print cover?(which by the way, i kinda think are getting overrated...animal print has seriously lost it's appeal to me)

here, look:



and hahah omg this one is even MORE expensive:


$165.00?? for a kindle cover? That's more than my kindle cost! ahh! hahah

so yea, that was amusing.

another thing that I found funny was this little gem from thebump.com....

so every Friday they send me an email announcing what week I am in my pregnancy. Typically i delete those emails because, as you know, I do my own little weekly thing and find all the information that way and whatever.

this time i clicked the email and it took me to my checklist of stuff that has to be done before the baby gets here. I don't know which of you guys are familiar with thebump but it's just like theknot but for baby stuff. So anyway, they have a whole countdown/checklist for me to go by and typically the stuff is pretty helpful overall i would say.

But then today I was looking through the upcoming things for this checklist and i saw the following item and i just had to LOL



Get an easy to maintain haircut?? like that is SO important that it is one of three things on the checklist for week 32? hahaha and i enjoy the assumption that we can't figure out how we want our hair on our own or that we can't come to the conclusion that we might want to change our hair or something without this list telling us to? it's so funny/bizarre to me!

like who was the editor writing this that thought, "okay, so in week 31 we'll discuss the signs of preterm labor and then in week 32 we MUST remember to remind these moms to get an easy to maintain haircut. Who knows what chaos and mayhem might ensue if we leave that off the list!"

lol so funny and SO WEIRD to me!

also, as a note while we're on the subject, i am not planning to get an easy to maintain haircut. I am super obsessed with my hair being long and it's a big part of how i identify as myself, i think it's important for me to still feel like ME once the baby is here and not completely give myself over to this role that i made up of "mom" that includes a haircut and Lee jeans or whatever. I really want to let the mom thing just organically become a part of me, not something that i try to put upon myself.

And not only that but i LIKE having long me hair. I like how it looks when i actually take the time to do it. I know that the odds are that typically my hair will be a scraggly mess for a while (like how it often is now) but that's fine. I'm sure once a month i will be able to pull out the straightener and still feel like myself. And to me, feeling like myself means having hair at least to my shoulders or longer.

so there annoying checklist, i will not follow you!

okay, i'm gonna go. I want to finish writing a few more thousand words and then i have things to do (including making my 29 week update! Emma has already reminded me haha) aaaaand tonight is super exciting because me and Ryan are going on an ice cream and movie date tonight!!! it doesn't get much better than that, i don't think! YAY! We hardly ever have the time or money to go out together on dates so I'm reallllllly excited and looking forward to it! hooray!

what are you guys doing tonight/this weekend?

we're baaaack!

I enjoy referring to myself in the plural. I think that it's more accurate right now anyway since there really ARE two people in my one body at the moment.

Anyway, like my subject suggests, I'm (we're) back. I've been on quite the hiatus from blogging but I'm back and full of spit and vigor and whatever other weird things there are sayings about that imply that I'm here with enthusiasm.

First i have to point out that I have an AWESOME and amazing and incredible new layout thanks to Becca from Jumping Jax Designs. Seriously, that girl is incredible. I threw a bunch of adjectives and ideas at her and she came up with the absolute most perfect layout of all time. I am swooning with love for my blog and I wish I could hire her to come work her magic on my house and wardrobe as well. She is that good.

I also thought i'd take a moment to explain my new blog title since it's cute and important to me.

Back when my husband and I were getting married, we thought long and hard about disregarding both of our last names and instead making up or finding a new one that would represent us and the life we wanted to lead together from our wedding day forward. We went back and forth a lot and couldn't come up with anything that was the perfect fit.

Finally one afternoon, while sitting in the car outside of our apartment at the time, our discussion really focused in on what mattered: we just really wanted to represent what our new life together truly MEANS to us and we couldn't find one single word that did that to our satisfaction.

So our solution? Instead of changing our name, we would just change the MEANING of our last name.

We decided to go forward and keep with the tradition of me taking my husband's last name as my own. The reason for this was purely logistics...it's much easier for a woman in this culture/society to change her last name than it is for a man. For me, it required one form and about five phone calls and a trip to the DMV. For him it would have required a lot more and a lawyer (which, okay, there are no shortage of in my family but still) and a lot more time and money. It just was a headache. Also, i kind of like the tradition.

We wanted to make sure, though, that this next step was instituted. The priority for us was to create a family that was unique to us, that was our own, that meant something really REAL to us.

And so we invented a new meaning for our last name. And it belongs only to us and it's really very real. because the truth is that things in life truly only have the meaning that we assign to them anyway, so why not give our name it's own meaning? So we did.

And even better, my husband came up with the specific wording of that meaning and that fact alone makes me smile whenever i think of it.

So what was the meaning we gave? Our last name officially (to us) means: Together (for always).

the parentheses are an important part. We clarified that they were there back when we first came up with the name in the car on that autumn afternoon. I don't even really know why they're so important but they are. They truly capture the whole essence of it.

And so when i was trying to come up with a new name for my blog, I wanted it to be something that really captured the essence of what i want this space to represent. i didn't want it to just be a pregnancy blog or just a baby blog or anything like that, i wanted it to be more than that because I wanted it to be about us, and about our lives together...and about our future.

and i realized that these things will always be what i want to blog about and that no matter where life takes us: through highs and lows in life, i will always be me and there will always be this part of my heart that belongs in this life and this family that we have made. and importantly, no matter what happens, i will always be a mommy to the little boy i have in me and Ryan and I will always therefore be united, as a family. No matter what happens, disasters befall us or luck smiles upon us, it will always be and we will always be Together (for always) because of the things that have taken place so far in our lives and in our hearts.


So that is why i named the blog {for always} because it can be that little place in the internet world where i represent that and where i discuss our lives and share the experiences of our hearts and the things we do.

At our wedding my father wished for us a Great Adventure and I know that so far we have been on one. i can't wait to share that adventure here with everyone and I know that there are beautiful and wonderful things to come. There always are in life and there always will be.

So for anyone reading this who still follows me, thank you so much for sticking it out and still being here. I promise not to disappear again and I am truly looking forward to the journey ahead!

22 week update!

Here's my 22 Week Update! Brought to you slightly later in the day than usual because I've been hella busy getting ready to go on vacation tomorrow and doing errands! now i'm "recovering" because apparently normal errands are exhausting at this point so i figured i'd update you all on the progress! Hooray1

ANYWAY here we go! 22 Weeks! Party it up!



This week the baby is the size of....





...a papaya! (don't worry, i had no idea wtf that was either when i first saw it). Meanwhile, my source for weekly baby-to-produce-comparisons has flaked out on me and is from now on doing a MONTHLY comparison. NO BUENO PRODUCE WEBSITE. So i've diligently found another source for this crucial element to our weekly updates. According to the new site, this week the baby is the size of a...


spaghetti squash! Weird but i'll take it.

So from now on we'll be using that site until my months change...which is another confusing game all on it's own (if pregnancy lasts for 40 weeks but is 9 months long, how many months pregnant am I at 22 weeks? i don't freakin' know. I found a chart:


which tells me that i'm now in my six month which i guess means i'm officially 5 months pregnant and working on my 6th month. So we'll just say i'm 5 months. Works for me.

ANYWAY.

What's the baby doing?

The baby's hands are growing and the nerve endings in his fingertips are working so now he can touch things and feel things! He's testing this new development by touching his face, grabbing his umbilical cord and other cool stuff! (hitting mommy in the stomach :) hehe)

here's the creepy cartoon monkey baby photo for this week:



oh oh and THIS is cool: the baby's hair is WHITE. No matter what color hair he'll have, all babies have white hair at this point because they are lacking pigment! WOW! His irises are also lacking in pigment too but his eyelids are still shut in there so we don't know what that looks like (which is kinda good cause that sorta freaks me out...does he have white eyes? whoa!).

the baby can now have visible reactions to things that are happening...so for example, since he has tastebuds AND facial muscles now, he can make facial expressions at the things i eat! so if he doesn't like broccoli he can grimace when i eat it lol isn't that cute??

oh and he weighs almost a pound now! That's amazing!


(check out the WHITE eyebrows!)

The baby's brain has started to rapidly grow now. It will continue to grow at this rapid pace until he is FIVE YEARS OLD! He's a genius already!

his organs are also doing cool thing and creating blood cells (fetal bloodcells have a shorter lifespan than adult bloodcells so he's making a lot in there) and his pancreas is creating lots of important hormones. He's getting stuff done!

In the next few weeks he's going to grow a few more inches and gain some more weight!

as for me, my uterus is now supposed to be 2 centimeters above my belly button. I should look and feel pregnant (duh). It should still be pretty easy for me to bend over and sit comfortably (it is thank god) and I have a big increase in blood flow right now...specifically in the plasma (the liquid part) which makes it easier for me to get a positive test for anemia because there's more liquid yet the same amount of iron (does that make sense?). My breathing might start to bother me (GOD is that one true) because everything is getting squished (seriously guys i like cannot breathe, it is really disturbing...i just can't take deep breaths!)

so yea there we go

here's my

Weekly Survey

What symptoms are you experiencing? difficulty breathing. total exhaustion.

How are you feeling? i feel good, a little stressed when i can't breathe but otherwise good. I spend time talking to the baby each day and he hopefully likes that. He hasn't been kicking as much recently which of course makes me nervous but They say that's normal at this stage so hopefully that's true.

Anything big happening in your personal life? We are going on vacation tomorrow!! Down the shore for a week! YAY!

Any food cravings? Sweets. It's bad, i know. I've been trying not to indulge in this though and have decided to combat it by getting bags of gumballs and eating gumballs when i'm craving something sweet. gumballs are much healthier for me and baby than bags of cookies lol (and there's no aspartame in gumballs, the ONLY GUM left on earth without aspartame in it! score!) so yea that's what i've been doing lol

okay let's do some comparison photos because I am so huge compared to the beginning!


here i am at 5 weeks. sigh! lol

and here's today at 22 weeks (only 17 weeks later):


wow lol big difference


please notice my blue nailpolish for the baby!


yay Zoey got in on the photoshoot today too lol :)



so HOORAY! that was a good one, right? lol

22 weeks! cannot believe it! Now i'm DEFINITELY crossed over the halfway point (the longest he can stay in there is 42 weeks) so we're definitely at 20 weeks or less until my little man is here in my arms!

so weird and so amazing at the same time lol

20 Weeks!

So here we are! 20 Weeks! We're halfway there (livin' on a prayer!) and honestly it feels like this pregnancy is flying by...that's both wonderful and SCARY AS HELL lol

so let's see what our little boy is up to this week...



This week the baby is the size of...



holy hell he's the size of a cantaloupe!! omg that's insane lol

He's about 6 and a half inches from head to bottom and 10 and a half inches from head to toe. And he weighs about ten and a half ounces! He's getting big!



at this point he is developing his own sleep patterns and has a favorite position to sleep in in there! that;s so cute :) If i pay attention to when he's moving I can figure out if he's a morning person (like his daddy) or a night owl (like me). We'll see!

his digestive system is making meconium which is a fancy word for in-utero baby poop. Gross, i know. It is made up of swallowed amniotic fluid and skin cells and stuff like that and hopefully will stay in his body until after he is born.

His boy bits are fully formed now (as we saw) and his sex is able to be determined on an ultrasound (as we know!). We go back on Tuesday for another ultrasound where it will be reconfirmed for us that he is, in fact, a he :)


here's what a baby at 20 weeks looks like - he's big!

he is developing additional layers of skin now and has about 4 layers total. The vernix (the waxy coating on his skin to protect him from the amniotic fluid) is covering his skin still and will stay there until he is born.

From now on the big thing the baby will be working on is gaining weight. His organs are all developed and in place and everything is working. He's just gonna grow and get bigger.

Also from now on his measurements will be from head to toe instead of from head to foot because it's easier to get an accurate idea of his head to foot measurements now that he's more stretched out.

As for me, my uterus is at or just below my bellybutton (it's just below, they checked today at the doctor) and it will continue to move up and that is when my belly button will either flatten or become an outtie.

I will really start to gain weight now (i'm up 7 pounds total) and so will the baby. Things like stretchmarks will become possible as well as maybe breakouts on my skin etc. So far i've been lucky in regard to both.

So that's about it!

And since there's not going to be a ton more developmental information, i thought i would fill out a little survey each week and we'll see how that goes...here it is:

Weekly Survey

this week...
What symptoms are you experiencing? I'm exhausted and also having trouble with sleep. I wake up for at least an hour every night (last night it was three hours) and yet during the day i'm completely tired.

How are you feeling? Overall i feel great! I really don't have much to complain about at all. I had some trouble breathing earlier in the week but it seems to be getting better and I'm just feeling good and happy :)

Anything big happening in your personal life? Not really at the moment, just continuing to get unpacked and get organized. And we got our baby's crib this week because it was being discontinued! it's so awesome:


check out the stars! and it's a lifetime crib so it turns into a toddler bed and then a twin bed for when he's older :) YAY

Any food cravings? I've been craving ice cream, chocolate, pop-tarts and orange juice. I've been resisting the pop-tart craving because honesty, they are just terrible and have no nutritional value at all. I've been very in moderation with the ice cream and chocolate and have been good to go with the OJ :)

Anything else to add?
we completed our registry this week! yay! it was lots of fun :)

picture post!

I thought I'd show off cute pictures of our baby :)

So on Wednesday, as you know, we went and had our anatomy scan done. She couldn't get everything measured cause our little baby wasn't being especially cooperative and he moved away from the ultrasound device a lot. I get to go back next week sometime to complete everything :)

but we DID get a few good photos and I thought it would be cute to post them!

here he is waving at the camera! So pleasant already! and posing! lol :)

here he is again! :)

he's so cute in there :)

I am really excited to have gotten such cute photos!

And i'll post one more of me..yesterday I wore blue to celebrate my baby being a boy:

I definitely am starting to show now!

I would write more but blogger is frustrating me at the moment. I'll be back later.