Baby Larson is 30 Weeks Old

Baby Larson is nearly 30 weeks old now!

I can tell she is putting on the pounds as I feel her bulk move around. She seems a little shy of the outside world and stays tucked in to herself most of the time. Of course there are times she gives a jut and my belly moves enough for Joel to see.

The most surprising aspect of this third trimester so far is the number of perfect strangers that want to chat when they see I am pregnant. For instance Joel and I were at the Coffee Bean with our friend a few nights ago, and this guy walked up to our table, interrupted our conversation with a tap on Joel's shoulder and said, "excuse me". We stopped our conversation, looked up, and he asked, "Are you having a boy or a girl?" When we responded that we were going to have a girl, he got this expression on his face like he had just guessed some game show question correctly, and won a thousand bucks. He said, "I knew it! I was like 97% sure!" Everywhere I go it seems I get some sort of comment, or some sort of baby conversation starts, without me having to do a thing to initiate it.

I am at least starting to show more, which I personally think is fun. It's better to look pregnant than to look, well... chubby. I've gained 25 pounds at this point, and at least people know why:-) It's fun being preggers. I like it.

Ok, so everyone talks about cravings and wonders what I crave. Honestly not really anything different than before I was pregnant. I still pretty much eat the same things and as I always have. I really enjoy "real" milk, hot cereal like steel cut oats, eggs, veggies like salad, avocado, eggplant, sweet potatoes, red peppers... fruit like apples, mango coconut smoothies, bananas, blueberries, grapefruit... yogurt with honey to sweeten, some cheese, some chocolate and ice cream here and there, Peanut butter, nuts like almonds and walnuts, Lentils, hummus, meat like lamb, beef... nothing all that different. I might crave red meat more than I used to, and I'm pretty sure I like chicken less than I did before. My second and third months were my weird craving months, and then I constantly wanted pink berry frozen yogurt, and watermelon. But things over all have been pretty normal from month four and on.

This may sound strange, but I'm kind of looking forward to giving birth like it's a marathon I'm training for. It's pretty exciting, and Joel will be right with me cheering me along. It will be something special we share, kind of like backpacking together, or a challenging hike together in Yosemite. I know I am crazy to be thinking of it as an adventurous physical challenge, but hey whatever works! To prepare for my "marathon", I walk quite a bit and do some pregnancy yoga and exercises I am learning in our Bradley method birth class. We have taken two classes so far, and have eight more to go. It's a more natural method, but doesn't snob to doctors either. A good happy medium in my opinion.

I'm finally feeling at least close to the point of having purged the house of all unwanted items, and almost done organizing everything from old photos and memories to closets! Now, I'm excitedly starting to prepare space for our little girl, thinking through what we will need, and how I want to organize it all. I even have lofty plans of making some sort of painting to put over her crib, even though I have never painted on canvas before. I just have this idea in my head that I can't find anywhere, and if I did find it, I'm sure it would not be in my price range. I'm also thinking through things like diapering and have been totally won over to the newer generation of cloth (It's nothing like even ten or fifteen years ago). I'm figuring out how to make baby food, how I will bathe her, what plastics and cleaning products are safe for our little girls and which ones to avoid... Oh my the list goes on! It's quite a learning curve for the first one! And, I know I will still never "learn it all" ;)

I'm so thankful that Joel's room mom at the school is throwing a little shower for us at the end of April. Also, two good friends who are neighbors in Pasadena, Rebecca and Prances, are going to throw us a shower that is for a broader range of friends and family. They are really wonderful women to have in my life, and have already helped me out with this whole introduction to motherhood thing in so many ways. The date, and details are still in the works for the second shower, but more than anything, it will just be exciting to celebrate that our girl is coming! Over the years of my life of course I have realized my own need for love, and community, but just more recently, I have realized I desire those things for our little girl even more than I desire them for myself. I'm eager for Baby Larson to be loved by others and welcomed into the community of family and friends we have. To me, a baby shower represents love and care extended toward her, so I just feel so grateful for friends who want to put in the effort, especially since all my family (for the most part) is back East :-)

Well that's all for the baby update for now. We have two cameras, but sadly both are broken right now :-( I hope to get some pictures going soon, I'm working on getting our camera covered with our warranty... It's a little frustrating, but hopefully soon. I feel like my preggy belly is getting bigger every day, and we are not documenting so well!