Kickball for CASA

Miles was part of a kickball team this Saturday that played in a tournament in Denver to benefit the non profit organization CASA. My parents are actually volunteers for CASA and this event raised a lot of money for the program. Miles and our friend Lee were the only guys on a team of lovely ladies and I went along to be a cheerleader. Our friend Sara insisted on painting my belly so I thought I would share some pics below. I look very large and very white :) The team name was Sure Kix A Lot!

The Team:


The Cheerleaders:


The Girls Worshipping the Belly :

Week 24

Hi everyone,
not too too much to report. We have been feeling (and seeing) the baby move now more than ever before. His kicks and punches get quite strong in the evening and especially at bed time it seems. Elody and I officially setup our baby registry at Babies R Us too, it's amazing just how much stuff they recommend you buy. After researching infant car seats online we decided it best to actually see and feel our top choices in person, so we hit up Babies R Us last night. It definitely helped to get a first hand look at some of this baby gear. The best part was that we could add items to our online baby registry in-store. So needless to say, we ended up running around with "gun" in hand zapping everything in sight for the next hour or so. :) Baby's closet is ever growing with the addition of new oh-so-cute clothes every week. And baby's nursery should be getting painted sometime in the next week too!

How your baby's growing:

Your baby's growing steadily, having gained about 4 ounces since last week. That puts him at just over a pound. Since he's almost a foot long (picture an ear of corn), he cuts a pretty lean figure at this point, but his body is filling out proportionally and he'll soon start to plump up. His brain is also growing quickly now, and his taste buds are continuing to develop. His lungs are developing "branches" of the respiratory "tree" as well as cells that produce surfactant, a substance that will help his air sacs inflate once he hits the outside world. His skin is still thin and translucent, but that will start to change soon.

Week 23

Not a whole lot to add this week. Baby is doing good! We're feeling him move a lot at different intervals, and since last night we can actually see him moving in my belly which is really weird but neat. My sleeping hasn't been that great lately. My hips start hurting which wakes me up, and the side of my leg will be asleep, so there's lots of tossing and turning. I still have my RL pain, but have been continuing to teach my Zumba classes twice a week. Not sure how long that will last. As of my last Dr's appt, I was up 10 lbs total so far. I still think it looks like I have a beer gut instead of a proper preggo belly :)

Miles and I will be scheduling our first pregnancy classes next week. It will be four weeks long and will start in October. We decided instead of focusing on one method, we would take a class that goes over everything. If I'm not happy with it, then perhaps we will look into another one. I am also very interested in taking some breast feeding classes to give me the most chance at success.

How your baby's growing:

Turn on the radio and sway to the music. With her sense of movement well developed by now, your baby can feel you dance. And now that she's more than 11 inches long and weighs just over a pound (about as much as a large mango), you may be able to see her squirm underneath your clothes. Blood vessels in her lungs are developing to prepare for breathing, and the sounds that your baby's increasingly keen ears pick up are preparing her for entry into the outside world. Loud noises that become familiar now — such as your dog barking or the roar of the vacuum cleaner — probably won't faze her when she hears them outside the womb.

Hey Jude

Note to self:
Acquire toddler sized guitar immediately.

Week 22

We got the crib which Miles put together this week and it looks great! We're going to start decorating the nursery soon which is exciting. The baby's wardrobe is slowly but steadily growing :) He recently received some clothes and stuffed animals all the way from Australia which are adorable, thanks to my Australian student Danae .

Nane Muhl was able to feel the baby move last night for the first time, so she was really excited about that. We read the babies Eastern/Western horoscope from one of Nane's books. He is a Sagittarius/Ox sign and from what we read, he will definitly lead a very exciting and impactful life. Let's just say it's written in the stars that he will be a great man :)

I'm still feeling about the same. The only frustrating times is when I get RL pain, which is really uncomfortable. I'm more off balance than usual. It's not uncommon for me to run into walls several times a day.

Hope everyone is doing great and we will give updates next week!

How your baby's growing:

At 11 inches (the length of a spaghetti squash) and almost 1 pound, your baby is starting to look like a miniature newborn. His lips, eyelids, and eyebrows are becoming more distinct, and he's even developing tiny tooth buds beneath his gums. His eyes have formed, but his irises (the colored part of the eye) still lack pigment. If you could see inside your womb, you'd be able to spot the fine hair (lanugo) that covers his body and the deep wrinkles on his skin, which he'll sport until he adds a padding of fat to fill them in. Inside his belly, his pancreas — essential for the production of some important hormones — is developing steadily.

Week 21

I am consistently feeling the baby move every day now. It's exciting because Miles has been able to feel him several times now :) Other than that, things are pretty much the same. No cravings, no real increased appetite, no change in diet...although I have been enjoying some ice cream here and there.

Swimming has been wonderful. Zumba on the other hand is getting tougher. After Saturdays class, I felt like I pulled a muscle in my nether regions that stretched up to my abdomen, although this could have been RL pain. I'm going to play it by ear this next week to see if I can continue or not.

My belly is getting bigger by the day, although I don't think I have "popped" yet. Weight gain to date is 8 lbs. Our changing table was delivered this week and Miles put it together, it looks great! Our crib should be here in a couple of days. Grandma (Nane) Muhl found some great baby gear for us at a garage sale. We have a video monitor that we can hook up to the crib to not only audibly monitor the baby, but we can visually monitor him as well. She also got a really cool little pop up tent that we can use for the baby when we go on picnics and what not. And she bought a car seat that is only 2 years old, top of the line, that I think they will be using to cart the baby around in.

I guess I have to think about registering soon. There are a couple of baby showers in my future so I'll need to figure out what I need.

Hope everyone is doing well!

How your baby's growing:

Your baby now weighs about three-quarters of a pound and is approximately 10 1/2 inches long — the length of a carrot. You may soon feel like she's practicing martial arts as her initial fluttering movements turn into full-fledged kicks and nudges. You may also discover a pattern to her activity as you get to know her better. In other developments, your baby's eyebrows and lids are present now, and if you're having a girl, her vagina has begun to form as well.

Week 20

We have reached the halfway mark!!! I'm starting to feel the baby move off and on everyday, although I still can't feel him move from the outside. Still no cravings and I haven't noticed much of a difference in my eating habits. We've started swimming on Monday nights which I love, it feels great on my body. Zumba has been a bit more difficult lately as too much jiggling or jumping around really makes me want to go pee.

We went to Carters yesterday since they were having a huge sale and bought a lot of clothes ranging from newborn to 6 months, that was a blast! Who knew boy clothes could be so cute :) We also got our baby mattress in the mail. We ordered it from Costco as it was on sale. It's all organic and is double sided, so one side is for infants and the other is for toddlers. We are hoping to get several years use out of it.

I added a belly pic at the bottom of this post. I'm starting to round out a bit more.

How your baby's growing:

Your baby weighs about 10 1/2 ounces now. He's also around 6 1/2 inches long from head to bottom and about 10 inches from head to heel — the length of a banana. (For the first 20 weeks, when a baby's legs are curled up against his torso and hard to measure, measurements are taken from the top of his head to his bottom — the "crown to rump" measurement. After 20 weeks, he's measured from head to toe.)

He's swallowing more these days, which is good practice for his digestive system. He's also producing meconium, a black, sticky by-product of digestion. This gooey substance will accumulate in his bowels, and you'll see it in his first soiled diaper (some babies pass meconium in the womb or during delivery)