52 Project

The 52 Project is a photo project to take a portrait of your child(ren) once a week, every week during a calendar year. Obviously we won't be able to do so until our baby arrives, but we plan to join the project in July and continue on with it throughout the rest of the year, and hopefully in coming years as well. (We did discuss starting this in January and just taking baby-related photos until July, but eventually decided that we'd rather just start it when there's actually a baby around to take photos of.)

The 52 Project is hosted by Jodi of Practising Simplicity.

32 weeks

I guess I'm going to go ahead and post a photo every two weeks now instead of once a month. There should be enough change and enough to talk about to warrant a post each fortnight during the third trimester, right?

The photo for week 30 was taken in the hotel room that we were staying in while looking for an apartment, but this week the photo was taken in our new apartment! We're excited to have found a place, and on Sunday Jonathan pretty much single-handedly moved our things into the apartment (with a tiny bit of help from me carrying anything small and light). We are so relieved and happy to have found a place to live and to have our things with us again! Now begins the monumental task of unpacking and finding places for everything. How do we still have so much stuff?! We got rid of tons before we packed up in Maine, but somehow we still have quite a bunch of boxes. Once we have most of the necessary items unpacked, we'll start working on acquiring the basic baby gear. If any of you have suggestions and/or recommendations, definitely let us know. We love advice!

Baby G is still moving and grooving, and of course still enjoys the nighttime hours best to do his or her exercises. I had quite a sore back for the most-of-the-week that we were in our apartment before our things arrived, since the only place we could sit during most of that time was on the floor, and we were sleeping on camping Therm-a-Rest mattresses on the floor, so I am thrilled that we have our bed now. We're just sleeping on the mattress on the floor at the moment, but it's one of our first priorities to set up the bed frame and get up off the floor. We did also buy a kitchen table and chairs midway through last week, so at least we have had some chairs since Wednesday, which was a huge improvement over sitting on the floor all the time. The only other pregnancy symptom I'm feeling right now is a bit of reflux every now and then, mostly when I lie down to go to bed at night. Propping my head up with two flat pillows (instead of my usual one flat pillow) seems to work fairly well to get rid of the reflux. All in all, I still feel pretty good for the vast majority of the time, for which I am extremely thankful!

During the first week of May (the week we first arrived in the Folsom area), we met with a few different midwife teams and it didn't take us long to make a decision about which team to go with for the remainder of our prenatal care and for our birth experience and postpartum care. We felt at ease and very comfortable with the team right from the start and think it will be a great fit for all of us. We had our first appointment with our new midwife team on Wednesday, May 13 and it went well. The day before, Tuesday, May 12, we also started a childbirth class with the same team that is taught by one of the student midwives, and it has been a great experience so far. There is only one other couple in the class, which means we have lots of time for discussion and questions and practicing various things that we're learning. So, all in all the past two weeks have been pretty full and busy, but we've made good progress with finding caregivers here in this area, and starting with appointments and classes. Only 8 weeks (plus or minus) left to go before we meet Baby G in person!

Finally in Folsom!

We made it! We drove into Folsom, CA just after noon on Monday. We stopped in at Intel to drive around their parking lot and check out the large buildings and surplus of parked cars.

Obligatory picture by the Intel sign

Next we started finding some of the housing options we had already picked out to drive by and look at. We spent several hours looking at apartments, then took a break to find a hotel to spend the night, as well as relax in during the hottest afternoon hours (you'll find out why this is important later). Once we settled in, we spent the time looking for some more apartments, and when things started to cool down outside, we headed back out to check them out.

Last night and this morning we contacted the property managers of some of the places we liked, and then went out to tour them. There are a lot of places to look at, but also many things to consider while making the choice of where we want to live for the next year or so. To add to this, we want to choose a place as soon as possible so we can have a few days to get settled before I start work.

And to wrap up this post, here are a few facts about our road trip west.

• We drove through or into seventeen states (some of them new states for me).
• We visited two national parks and one monument (Arches NP, Grand Canyon NP, and Four Corners Monument).
• We visited six different sets of relatives during the past week.
• I saw a buffalo for the first time (in a corral with a bunch of cows).
• Our A/C, which was recharged the week before our trip, died sometime between driving over the Rockies in Colorado and arriving at Arches National Park in Utah. The rest of the drive through Utah, Arizona, and California was less than pleasant. It has also made driving around in CA each day a bit warm as well, though the mornings in Folsom this time of year are actually quite cool, it just heats up in the late afternoon mostly.

30 weeks

I know I usually post a picture every four weeks, but I didn't want to skip week 30 since it seems like a fairly major milestone. I'm not sure if I'll continue posting each month after this or switch to posting a photo every two weeks instead. I guess it might depend on the amount of belly growth that may or may not take place during this final trimester.

I'm well into the third trimester now. I know I say this every time I post a picture, but I still have no idea how this pregnancy is going by so fast. Only two and a half months left (plus or minus some days or weeks, of course) until we meet this little bundle! Yikes, we'd better get going on actually figuring out some viable names! And now that we've arrived in Folsom, we'll probably start working on finally getting some baby gear, but first we have to find a place to live where we can store that gear. It's a tough job to decide on the place where you'll bring your baby home and where he or she will spend the first months or years of his/her life.

In travel news, as many of you know, week 29 was spent in transit driving from Maine to Northern California. We managed to take a route that, happily, was filled with relatives. Over our drive we stayed with or visited Jonathan's brother as well as four different families or individuals from Jonathan's mom's side and one family from Jonathan's dad's side, which was great. Baby G also prenatally visited an impressive seventeen states (including Maine), two National Parks, and the Four Corners Monument. Not too shabby for just a week of traveling!

In actual baby news, Baby G is seeming to be doing well. There is a lot of kicking going on and I can see many of the kicks if I happen to be looking at my belly at the time of the kick (or punch or jab), which makes me grin and also amazes me. How can a thing that strong be living inside of me?! This past week it seems like my belly has gotten quite a bit bigger, but it may just appear to be bigger from my perspective now that I've traded my regular wardrobe from pants, long-sleeved shirts, and sweatshirts to shorts and T-shirts. My belly button is getting closer to popping, too, which is an interesting process to watch. I wonder when it will actually become a full-fledged temporary outie?

Before we left Maine I had contacted several prenatal caregivers in this area, and now that we're here we'll be meeting with them and hope to decide on one soon to get back into our regular schedule of prenatal visits, which should be happening every two weeks now that I'm in the third trimester.

That about wraps up the news for this update.