Tag Archives: third trimester

Vegan Mofo 2016 Day 28: Pregnancy – Weeks 38-39

December 8, 2016

weeks3839

Nursery

Okay, still now official photos of the nursery yet! Maybe soon. I have a feeling technically it won’t be “finished” until the baby gets in there. Part of the reason was that painting the bookshelf took longer than what Jon anticipated. It has a lot of nooks and crannies and it really hurt his back, and as I sized it up with my eyes, I really wasn’t sure if my body was going to be flexible enough to paint it myself.

All there is left to do is still just to let the bookshelf cure, then put crap on it. Then hang a few things. Then that’s it. Part of the problem is that we kind-of don’t want to hang stuff up late at night and bother our neighbors. But who knows, maybe we will be impatient about it and I can share photos before going into labor.

Anytime Now

So I went in for my check up Monday morning. Almost al my visits are super fast and quick. I am low risk, I didn’t have too many symptoms that I found disruptive. Sleeping has been mostly awesome, heartburn is there but never persistent, I get decent exercise just by standing all day at work, and I never got sick to my stomach. Well, the nurse told me to undress from the waist down for the midwife. Sure enough when the midwife came in she went through the normal checks, and was about to finish up, then noticed you know, I had no pants on.

“Did you want me to check your cervix?”

“I was just listening to the nurse before hand… if you think it is unnecessary then we can skip it”

I guess she figured might as well, and I am a little glad she did. Apparently I am already starting to dilate. Naturally this is getting my butt into gear and getting some stuff done around the house, like finally putting together the hospital bag, buying newborn onsies (was waiting for a sale, but that isn’t happening), and writing some thank you notes. I told my Mom and family members, and they are convinced I will be going into labor this week.

I went to work on Tuesday and just felt EXHAUSTED. I was feeling so many early labor symptoms, braxon hicks contractions, crampiness, and sore back. Then Wednesday morning my mucus plug came out, which further prompted everyone to stress that I would be going into labor at any moment now. So here I am on Thursday, still not in labor, so I am starting to feel very anxious.

weeks1639

The Belly

“Did they tell you if you dropped yet?” That’s the first question I always get from my husband when I go to the doctors. I don’t think they would ever know, because I’ve actually dropped and I don’t really look like it. I can feel the baby is lower, mostly because my belly rubs on my legs whenever I drive. There are other things, mostly that suddenly a lot of basic things have become MUCH more uncomfortable, like sitting on the floor or getting up.

Other things I’ve noticed, my belly button is officially in the out position. For the longest time it was either an innie or outie if my core was engaged or not. Now it is out 24/7 and it is a little weird. XD I’ve also noticed a few stretch marks on my stomach. A little bit of a bummer since I was stretch mark free for so long, but whatever. Nothing that I could really do about it.

Boney Butt

One thing that doctors have been doing at my appointments is that they are feeling my stomach to get an idea where the baby is located. My last visit was with a midwife, who felt what I call “the knobby bit.” On the top of my tummy the baby keeps poking the top right corner, and often will be a visible bulge. I find it gross. Well it was kind-of nice to get some vindication when the midwife made a slightly horrified face saying “what is this hard bit?” After a pause she checked lower and felt around, and was reassured that the head was on the bottom. Apparently, her guess that “the knobby bit” is just a very boney butt. Great. Our child has Jon’s boney butt. Okay, his butt isn’t that boney, just compared to mine XD

Animals

These past few weeks have been a little weird- week 38 is a Pomeranian and week 39 is an American Shorthair Cat which can be misleading. I am fairly certain my cat is going to be MUCH larger than our baby. The Pomeranian is hard to imagine since they are so fluffy. Like is my baby fluffy Pomeranian sized? Or alopecia Pomeranian sized?

Exercise

I’ve been working out again! I’ve been trying to do a workout a day, but you know, some days get skipped. But I am trying to do one round of a 20 minute barre workout. I figure the endurance muscle exercises will be good for delivery day. But I only do one round because I am a little paranoid about exhausting my muscles for when I DO go to labor.

I also have been walking around a lot when doing errands. I try not to think of errands as working out, but with all these early labor symptoms, it really does feel like a workout. I never park my car close to the door, which is a little bit out of habit. I might also try and convince Jon to go for a walk around the neighborhood at night and look at the Christmas lights, to help speed things along. I am not sure that will ACTUALLY help, but it does feel like a little bit of a “no pain no gain” mentality.

Posted by Jennifer in Pregnancy Tags: pregnancy, third trimester, week 38, week 39

3 comments

Vegan Mofo 2016 Day 28: Pregnancy – Weeks 36-37

November 28, 2016

weeks3637

I had a hunch that Thanksgiving would kill my Vegan MOFO mojo. And it did! XD It is pretty typical, especially since Thanksgiving rings in my panic mode of trying to get things done. It is hard not to do this because I am so use to working retail and knowing that I will be working more hours. But I guess there isn’t too much of a difference since I will be panicing to get everything done around the house before delivery day. I guess the plan is to finished the planned Vegan MOFO posts. So they will be delayed but whatever.

Thanksgiving

I am not kidding when I say I woke up on Thanksgiving, drove to Wegman’s to get a new loaf of bread for stuffing (mine got too stale), got a treat of a latte, then cooked until 12. Then I got to take a “break” by driving an hour to my parents, then stood around to make appetizers. Sat down a little for the parade, then cooked until dinner time. And then I worked the next day. XD I told my boss what my Thanksgiving was like and he just looked at me, then my stomach, then my face again with a look of disgust. Oddly standing around all day didn’t occur to me as a bad thing. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Then of coarse the next few days I’ve been all on my feet. I went into Philly for the V Marks the Spot Vegan Pop Up Shop, and Sunday was running around getting groceries and Christmas gifts. And today I had to go for my 38 week check up at the doctors.

Oh BTW- best part of the Thanksgiving Day parade was CLEARLY when Tony Bennet almost fell on top of Miss Piggy.

Nursery

It’s almost there. I swear next pregnancy update will have lots of photos of a nursery! We got my sister’s old rocking chair, and my Father brought it in. Now, I am not sure if I mentioned on the blog, but my Father is good at enthusiastically lifting things, but not so good at moving things in a controlled manner. This has involved many dents with the walls in our new home. And I knew that my husband spent FOREVER patching up spots in the nursery, so when my Father wheeled in the rocking chair I cleared out a path for him to put it in living room. Good old Dad had a clear path but managed to 1) ram into our old desk and 2) make a nice new dent in the living room walls. Eventually Jon’s Father came over to help carry it into the nursery, and my sisters helped bring over the old toy box.

So what is left? Still some artwork to hang and I need to put together a little mobile with messed up mat board clouds that I got from work. I am not sure fully how I will hang them together yet. Also Jon is painting our last piece of furniture- a small bookshelf for all the books to read at night and for our pretty night light. We are hoping it will be finished painting and curing by the end of the week.

Christmas

Yes, I am thinking ahead to Christmas. I already made plans with Alexa and Justine to come over and help decorate our Christmas tree. I love having the Christmas decorations up but this way we can enjoy the tree and know it is up before the baby comes…. which honestly could be any moment now. I keep hearing from people about how baby sometimes comes a week or two early, and truthfully I am slightly nervous, since my sister delievered her first daughter a month early (they were able to delay the labor, only to have her be delievered a week early still)

I also have been trying to get as much Christmas shopping done now. I got I think about half of it done, there is a few homemade gifts that I will be making, and I haven’t started that at all yet. So…. you know.

Animal Size

For week 36 the baby is the size of a Chihuahua dog. Truthfully, I don’t like this breed. No it isn’t because they are small or “yippie” but because I think they are very aggressive dogs and since they are small and cute, people let them get really nasty. But I will admit- I do think Long Haired Chihuahuas are super cute- especially in Santa hats.

Supposedly at week 37 the baby is the size of a striped skunk…. which seems wrong. I mean I thought skunks were pretty big? But I guess maybe not? I do have to admit- baby skunks are really stinkin cute!

Waiting Game

Now it is all down to waiting I guess. I am still working, and trying to get as much done. We have SO many frame jobs, and I am only working a few more weeks. I am feeling a little stressed, even though it technically isn’t my problem. XD And to put in perspective how big a frame job we have coming up, let’s just say about 100+ frames need to be done by sometime in January. I have no plans of coming back until February. I am just assuming I will be super sleep deprived.

I should put together my hospital pack, and pretty much only put together what the baby can wear home from the hospital. XD I know I should be better about these things, but there is something in the back of my head that is just like “meh, I’ll pack it when I go into labor, whatever.” But I know I should get a few things in there- like magazines, snacks, slippers, you know stuff I don’t actually use while at home.

I am more interested in booze. Yes, I feel like I am always talking about it. I really wanted a drink during Thanksgiving since it is a time to have a special drink. I also can’t wait till I have some spiked egg nog. And today I bought a bottle of beer, sitting in the fridge, for when we get back from the hospital for celebratory drink.

Posted by Jennifer in Pregnancy, Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2016 Tags: pregnancy, third trimester, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2016, week 36, week37

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Vegan Mofo 2016 Day 13: Pregnancy – Weeks 34-35

November 13, 2016

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Holy cow, I had a hard time telling apart the photos I took this time around. Now I am only wearing the special maternity shirts (at least in public XD) and this H&M bird shirt (they now sell a long sleeved version) fits the best for these progression photos. I am pretty consistently the same size…. but I keep gaining weight. I guess just fattening up the baby?

The Feels:

Unless you are living under a rock (lucky you!) you probably know about our new President. Yuck, I can’t even say that word before Trump. I mean I remember the days when Jon Stewart would make fun of Bush for mispronouncing nuclear, now our country will be run by a man who says “swatches of land” and “bigly.” Ugh. I was really upset when I woke up the day after the election, and I think a lot of it has do with having a child. I am hoping my baby doesn’t get old enough to know what a president is, so I don’t have explain who he is. I just hope that after 4 years, we get someone new and Trump will just be the new Nixon (minus the endearing puppy).

The worst part? I think talking to friends and family who seem to not understand the big deal. I get it. With our system of government Trump can’t just say “Hey, start with the blue prints for that wall stat!” and have the blue prints by the end of the month. We won’t loose Obamacare for at least another year and half, and we have lots of individual state laws that vary all over the place. So when some people ask why people are protesting, or why we are so upset, it isn’t just that Hillary lost. It is who she lost to. A man who feeds on racism, misogyny, and bigotry and another man who wants to take away everyone’s rights. Anyone who doesn’t already know, Trump maybe a mediocre white dude who’s success was handed to him the “classiest” 24-karat plate but Pence is a monster.

But it seems that hopefully, everyone who sat around complaining about Trump (aka people like me) are a little more enthusiastic about doing something about it. I want to try and get more active with local government. I probably will try and volunteer more, and hell, I might even register finally as democrat instead of an independent. *gasp* Funnily, my husband is registered as a republican, which shocks my friends. XD Although it isn’t ALWAYS true, but most northeast republicans are thought to be fiscally responsible. Though sometimes they are just jerks.

Belly:

I still find it funny when some people say I look small. I have to admit, I remember when watching Rosemary’s Baby thinking “Come on, really Rosemary is THAT small with her baby? At 9 months?!” Now I am looking at my tummy and I can kind-of see how it was plausible. But I know a lot of it is because it is my first baby, and I have fairly strong abdominals from working out consistently (well, that I USE to workout consistently.) If I focus on relaxing my abdominal muscles my tummy gets pretty large. But if I don’t engage my muscles my back hurts a lot by the end of the day.

To make the whole engage and disengage the muscles weirder, my belly button is ready to pop. Somedays if I engage the core and disengage, my belly button looks like a goofy muppet mouth. I feel a little Seinfeld-y by making my belly button talk, HELLOOO! No need to take my hands to make my belly button stretch and talk. #pregnancyperks

Oh look how much I’ve grown in literally seconds!

Animals:

Week 34 had my FAVORITE animal featured. A QUOKKA! OMG, I know, I was a weird American child who knew what a quokka was, but uh…. isn’t it the cutest thing ever? And if you google this guy you get a lot of selfies with them, which is because of Rottennest Island. It is packed with quokkas that seemed to get use to tourists. I am not sure how I feel about this, but I know if I knew about this place as a kid I would be trying to convince my parents to make a trip to Australia.

Week 35 is the very specific Mini Lop Bunny. I don’t really know how big a regular lop bunny is, so mini is more mysterious. But they are also pretty cute, but I can’t help but wonder if the ears are annoying for the bunny sort of like how bulldogs have a hard time breathing. Any big bunny fans? Also, if anyone has their hearts stolen by these photos, there are lots of mini lop bunnies for adoption on PetFinder.com. I just can’t even with Bettie Brown.

Werkin Out:

Oof, finding time is hard. Mostly during the work week. Luckily I work only 4 days a week, but we have been so busy I pretty much get home, cook, then just sit around feeling fried. But I am trying to go for long walks on weekends with Jon, which puts me out of breath with my stuffy nose (pregnancy symptom) and having the baby sit so close to the diaphragm (when will this baby drop to give some relief?) But the good news is that my muscles are still pretty strong and I can still curl a 14lb weight, though I should try and do more barre workouts consistently. I think it will help with muscle endurance when it comes to labor time.

Oh, and if you love body positive fitness- please donate to Lacy Davis’ IndieGoGo campaign! She is the author of the blog Super Strength Health and co-host of the podcast Rise and Resist. Passing a few bucks will help the campaign. She is 55% of the way to her goal, and every little bit helps.

Nursery:

We are getting there! My parents are stopping by tomorrow to bring over the fancy pants rocker my sister use to own. I think my husband was confused to why it wouldn’t fit in our car, or my sister’s until I said it was like a couch. But we will set it up in the room this weekend and hopefully pick up the toy box that sister has that matches the rest of the furniture. Which will hopefully get the bulk of the nursery all tidied up. Oh! And our closet door is finally all painted and can fully shut. Thank goodness.

Next order of buisness is framing some of the art that will be going in there. My Mom did a needlepoint of Mrs. Tiggy Winkle (my favorite as a girl, and today) and Alexa is making a painting. So I am pretty excited to see the final results.

Posted by Jennifer in Pregnancy Tags: pregnancy, third trimester, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2016, week 34, week 35

4 comments

Vegan Mofo 2016 Day 2: What I Ate Wednesday #4

November 2, 2016

I know it is only the second day of Vegan MOFO and I am taking a break from the prompts. I like using this blog sometimes as a way to remember things, so keeping up with some of my pregnancy posts is important to me. Granted, this post IS about vegan food, so it is still in the same spirit. It just doesn’t have the theme of the go-to-impressment meal. I won’t lie- you will be getting a preview of future Vegan MOFO posts. XD But let’s move on-

shake

As always I start my morning with a shake. Yup, I’m boring. I usually am so busy doing remaining dishes from the night before, and prepping ~~my husband’s~~ our lunches that I really like having quick shakes that I don’t need to think about. So this shake is one I featured before in my first and second WIAW posts. They turned out looking more brown looking. I guess it large depends on how much greens I happen to add that day. XD The photo looks extra pretty today since I was taking a photo for a Vegan MOFO prompt.

latte

Before heading to work I had to stop by Wegman’s to buy some peanut butter since we ran out. How will my husband live without his PB&J sandwiches?! XD So I figured I would pick up an almond milk latte as well. I am always surprised how much a latte will fill up my belly until lunch time. I figured I would take a photo of my “drink station.” Keeping my work area clean is SUPER important. Like 99% of the stuff we get at the frame shop isn’t worth much. Many things are digital photos or a $40-100 print. But some things are one of a kind- like needlepoints, old family photos, kid art. And now we are getting increasingly more and more expensive art, ranging from $1,000-80,000! No joke, the other day we got a call because a customer thought we lost his $80,000 print we framed, and I went white. I had no idea that piece was so expensive. Turns out he forgot that he brought it an appraiser to make sure it was authentic. Side note guys- if you think you have $80,000 print, get it appraised BEFORE getting it framed. They are most likely going to have to open it back up and reseal it. I know how many of my readers are sitting on expensive art ^__~

wrap

Lunch rolled around 12:30, and I ate my cut apple and a wrap with crumbled pumpkin black bean burger, radish greens, carrot shavings, and some Just Ranch dressing. The wrap was okay, it was a little dry. I also ate a few handfuls of tortilla chips because my boss took them out while we were eating. How do people NOT eat chips when the bag is opened?

So I didn’t photograph the apple and chips (use your imagination guys). I also didn’t photograph the two rolls of smarties and one of the new Nut Filled Clif Bars. I actually had the Coconut Almond Butter, and it was pretty good. I am not sure how much of a fan I am of them. I think I will stick to the originals, but they are still worth the occasional splurge.

burger

Before work I took some photos of the Pumpkin Black Bean Burgers (will be posted tomorrow) so I figured I would wrap up one of them and eat it as a mid-day snack. It was actually a pretty nutritious snack- gots some extra beans, pumpkin, and radish greens! I added some roasted garlic hummus to the bun, but I wish I could of added more since it was a little dry… and cold.

dinner

Dinner is going to be featured in an upcoming Vegan MOFO, I wonder if anyone will be able to guess from the photo? It is kind-of a stretch for the prompt. XD I rarely make meals like this, but I know I should start getting use to it as I plan to have kids. It isn’t too hard to make three separate things, especially when you can just shove the tofu in the oven. I had a little brown rice, curried beets, and tandoori tofu from Vegan Eats World. I saw that My Cat Loves Daiya tried it out and it just looked so yummy I had to do the same.

Then I wrapped up the night with a Pumpkin Spice Macaccino Cupcake. Again, something I will post on the blog for Vegan MOFO. I didn’t take a photo since I ate one of the first batches where I mixed in chocolate chips and had a crumb topping. The topping- uh…. melted. So they looked pretty nasty before I took any photos. So I made a second batch without those add ins. Baking is never perfect the first time right?

So how did I do? Well, I ALWAYS point out, everyone is different, and needs different amount of calories. I am 8 1/2 months pregnant, so yeah, I’m eating a lot XD Just click the chart to enlarge it if you can’t read it. Out of all the days I think I hit the most of the nutritional goals. As always, the packaged goods aren’t very accurate, I mean the clif bar didn’t register most of the vitamins and minerals, which is a bummer since the regular clif bars usually show up.

I know it looks like I ate A LOT of sugar, but I have my specs registered for 50 grams of sugar, the suggested amount. About half of the sugar that is being registered are naturally occurring from the banana, apple, beets, and carrot that I ate. Yeah, not the greatest that I have doubled the amount from smarties, clif bar, latte, and a muffin/cupcake. And let’s not forget all those sneaky added in sugars in dressings and breads and such.

I can’t believe I am getting to the end. There might be ONE more of these What I Ate Wednesdays before the baby comes. And if I try hard, I might do a few more to show the food recommendations for breast feeding. The good news is that I can freak out a lot less about iron! YEY!

What are you guys eating today?

Posted by Jennifer in Pregnancy, Vegan Mofo, Vegan Mofo 2016 Tags: clif bars, pregnancy, Terry Hope Romero, third trimester, vegan eats world, Vegan MOFO, vegan mofo 2016, week 34, what I ate wednesday, wiaw

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Pregnancy – Weeks 32-33

October 29, 2016

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These past two weeks have been crazy. I’ve been either doing non stop laundry (getting all the baby clothes cleaned) or spending 2+ hours each day driving my husband and myself to work. It is so sad. I actually live 10-15 minutes away from my work. My husband has about a 20 minute drive. But because of where his work is, it just isn’t a straight shot from his work to mine. Plus we have an hour difference in when when we start our jobs. Then add on rush hour traffic. I’ve been cursing a lot guys. XD We should be getting our second car back on Monday.

Baby Shower:

I had lots of fun with my shower. There were lots of drinks, food, and LOTS of vegan desserts. My friend Justine had a sugar overload, she wasn’t use to there being more than one vegan option at a party. There was pictionary, and some of the usual baby games (Guess the Baby Gear Game and Guess the Baby Stats) But it was mostly just a party where people could have some booze (well, except for the kids and myself) and just mingle and catch up. I am not much of the type of person to have planned games, cutesy things, and being the center of attention.

trailmixbar

My sister planned a trailmix bar, which was pretty vegan friendly. There were some non-vegan mixins, but you can easily sub them with some vegan chocolate chips and non-honey nuts. We made our own little mixes, and I am sure Jon will be mixing it into his oatmeal every morning. It will be super helpful when we are dead tired from staying up late.

smores

I think my sister remembered that Trader Joe’s had vegan marshmallows and saw these cute vegan s’mores pops. She said they were pretty easy to make, and they were pretty tasty. Just put a stick in a marshmallow, dunk in chocolate, and roll in graham cracker crumbs. Naturally you want to check if all the ingredients are vegan, but my sister checked all of that. I think she used a recipe like this one. My sister said the vegan marshmallows are denser than non-vegan ones, but I can’t tell the difference since I can’t remember when I had a “normal” marshmallow.

stinkeye

This photo cracks me up. Looks more like a funeral than a shower. Some people had to catch a train back to NYC so they got first dibs on the desserts. Almost all the New Yorkers are wearing all black or something very dark that looks black in the photo. And then there is Alexa in the middle with her pink hair giving our friend Ali the stink eye as she eats a dessert. I am guessing Alexa was hungry. She claimes it was just unfortunate timing. BTW if that dress looks familiar (which it probably doesn’t) I wore that dress on the blog many moons ago. I gave it to Alexa since the dress armscye (the holes where the arms go out) was too small for me.

gifts

I didn’t get any particularly good photos of my outfit. I was rushing out of the door to get to the shower, plus I can’t find a dress similar to link to anyways. I bought the dress second hand from Kate Gabrielle‘s online instagram account. I paid something like $20 but a medium black shift dress with little bell sleeves. It originally came from Forever 21, a store I wouldn’t promote, and it wouldn’t have the dress available anymore anyways. It clearly is no longer a dress with my tummy, and became more like a tunic with black leggings. If you want a similar look for a baby bump- Pink Blush has an actual dress made for baby bump that is similar. I hope everyone likes my super serious and super derpie faces.

Aside from great food, clothes, and company, we got a lot of great stuff for the baby. We got practical stuff like wash clothes, and car seats, but also cute things like Sophie and Fanfan! We are finishing up our shopping as the days are coming up. It is kind-of nice to know that we can pick whatever we want at the point. We stocked up on secondhand newborn onesies, and I will be checking out Swap.com for sleep sacks and jackets.

Animals:

For week 32 the baby was the size of a naked tailed armadillo. The app doesn’t say which species, which drives me nuts (since I am such an animal know it all) but I can leave you guys with this cute cartoon about armadillos. For week 33, the app says the baby is the size of a ferret. Since they are a semi domesticated animal, I feel less bad leaving a link to a google search of ferrets in costumes.

Birthing Plans:

Right before the shower Jon had been getting so anxious about the baby. For the most part our prep work has been painting rooms. Now that we are getting closer he started to worry about all the technical stuff. I don’t blame him. He kept asking me “Are you SURE you don’t want to take a birthing class?” I was pretty hesitant because I am pretty good at remembering things, so I was worried about taking a class, paying for it, and having lots of info repeated. Even a two day class at the hospital was $70. I can’t imagine how expensive some of those 8 day lamaze classes would get. So to get Jon to shut up, I mean calm his nerves, I rented a DVD from the local library. They have one option- Laugh and Learn About Childbirth.

Let’s just say thank GOD we didn’t pay for a class. Okay clearly it would of been different experience depending on the teacher. But I think I made a face of disgusts the whole time at the tacky wholesome jokes while Jon looked like he might of fainted. Things got a little easier as things went on for him, and I think I got more in vibe with the tacky jokes, or maybe she just grew on me more?

birthin

The first few classes/episodes/whatever didn’t have much new information for. I think that’s why I hated it so much at first. But it didn’t help that this lady has the most dated hair, and acted like a character played by Cheri Oteri mixed with your outgoing-but-not-so-funny high school drama teacher. Highlights? Showing everyone what a baby looks like coming out of a knitted uterus… which I can’t really remember why she needed that simulation. Then she talked about the different positions you can be in to give birth. She shows some of the positions- all are not flattering. Then she proceeds to say “you might look silly doing this one” and goes on all four. Nothing particularly bad. Then proceeds to say “or you can go on your side” and makes that move up above. Jon and I lost it, and couldn’t stop laughing. This lady made it seem like this was such a normal position to be in. Oddly, I just noticed that she is wearing tights under her khakis.

There are so many weird little things this lady does (like tights under pants.) Actually there are lots of weird decisions about the filming. Like they make as if it is a “real class” and have other couples sitting there. Which kind-of stinks there isn’t any same sex couples, or single moms or something like that. But they go around having everyone introduce themselves, you know, like a class. They even have a Dad who doesn’t speak English, but they keep asking him questions and such, only to have the teacher be like “uh… not sure what you are saying.” That one got me scratching my head. Another fun fact about the teacher- she had twin boys. She claims she would eat 4,000 calories to keep up with her milk supply and still loose weight. She claims she ate half an Entenmann’s cake every day. What?!

I think it overall was helpful, though I can’t say it is best since we haven’t seen any other videos out there. But I think it helped ease Jon about how awful the labor will be. He also better understands why I don’t want an epidural. We’ll see how I deal with the pain, but honestly I think I have a high pain tolerance. And if there is one thing I took away from this video is that it is better to try and tough it out as long as you can before getting the epidural.

Vegan MOFO!

I am a little happy to focus some of this blog to food again. Vegan Mofo is coming up and I didn’t get as much prepped as I hoped. I am crossing my fingers that Sunday and Monday I can do a lot of pre-writing for posts. It will be nice to have a few things to counteract all the baby stuff. The other day I was at Barnes and Noble and I was thinking about grabbing a pregnancy magazine. And then just couldn’t do it. And instead grabbed Bitch and Ms. I think the guy ringing me up was a little confused. XD

Posted by Jennifer in Pregnancy Tags: baby shower, pregnancy, third trimester, week 32, week 33

9 comments

Pregnancy – Weeks 30-31

October 14, 2016

Exercise

Exercise has slowed down quite a lot. I think in general I am more active than most people since I stand all day at work. But on weekends I try to get in some extra walking from doing errands and going to my CSA. Plus that is when I try and fit a longer workout in, whether it is lifting some weights, a barre workout, or a run. Well, sort of. I have to officially retire my running. I think I might be having Braxton Hicks contractions while running, and I read that isn’t the greatest. So it is official- running is done until probably the end of the year.

I am going to try and fit in a 30 minute walk everyday, since that seems to be what most doctors recommend anyways. Problem is that I kind-of hate my neighborhood for just walking, so I will try and figure out how to budget my time to drive into parks or towns that I find more relaxing. *crosses fingers* Hopefully that works out.

Health

Doing well. Occasionally my back hurts at the end of the day, and I’m a little slow at sitting up when watching TV. But otherwise I can’t complain. I ended up getting my flu shot last Monday, and that was the first time doing that since… goodness… I don’t know. High school or earlier? Yes, I know I am a bad adult, especially since I have insurance to cover it. I need to go back again and get my Whooping Cough shot as well.

The other day I did get a migraine. It sucked away an entire day. Which stinks because I thought- sure, I will get some random stuff for the baby done if I’ll be home all day. Nope. At one point I fell asleep for 2 hours, thinking I would be fine without my complicated pillow set up. Nope. Hips really hurt afterwards. It is the weirdest thing to me about any pregnancy symptom.

Animals

There are two very aquatic animals this week- the platypus and small-clawed otter. They are kind-of weird choices, mostly because I don’t think I’ve ever seen a platypus. Like never at a zoo when I was little. It is one of those animals that most people know of, but I guess most people never see. So I have no clue how big they actually are. I mean, how common are they in Australia? Like do most Australians see them swimming around in ponds and such?

As for the small-clawed otter? I’ve remember them from the Jungle World exhibit from the Bronx Zoo. Actually they seem to be in a lot of zoos, so they either must be pretty happy in captivity, or just very abundant in Asia. If they are pretty common in Asia, I would love to spend a few trips just searching for them by the water, since zoos don’t benefit animals.

Oh wait! I have to do stuff!

Jon and I are hitting that “oh yeah, we should probably get some stuff done soon” sort of moment. I mean, we aren’t acting late in the game, just sort of slightly freaking out since it FEELS like we have been putting these things off forever… which I mean we kind-of have. We need to do all that boring stuff like get shots (one down, two more to go), pre-register at the hospital, pick a pediatrician, get a breast pump, figure out more health insurance stuff, and you know, all that sort of jazz PLUS thinking about holiday stuff. I already asked Alexa to start planning when she will help up decorate our Christmas tree, to get it done before the baby might come. Because I know my arms aren’t going to reach as far as they use to.

It’s All Downhill

I feel like the past two week flew right by. I have a hunch the next 8 weeks will fly right by as well. I will be busy buying Christmas gifts, planning things, and blogging for Vegan MOFO (at least that is the plan XD) I have a feeling the last four pregnancy posts will be very short. Or maybe not. I guess we will have to just wait and see.

Posted by Jennifer in Pregnancy, The Girls Tags: pregnancy, third trimester, week 30, week 31

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What I Ate Wednesday #3

October 12, 2016

Let me first point out- today is such a nicer healthier collection of foods than the past few days. Yeah, I’ve been scarfing down lots and lots of sugar. Hello pumpkin spice oreos and birthday cake flavored target-os. Oh a cookies and cream filled doughnut, the broken smarties from halloween candy, you know, anything I can get my hands on really. It is so easy to eat carbs and sugars since they are shelf stable and quick to make. Bagel and cream cheese? Easy and satisfying. Vegan boxed mac and cheese? Pretty filling. My acid reflux has been AWFUL the past few days, which I think has made me reach for the super junky foods. It also might be making leftovers filled with veggies less appealing. Part of me wonders if the things I am craving with the reflux (read: sugary snacks) are what is causing it.

breakfastshake

But let’s start with my shake. I just wasn’t feeling spirulina this morning. I wanted to taste more of the chocolate so I took out the spirulina and blended up a small beet from my CSA. I love how it makes the shake turn a deep shade of pink. I pretty much made the same shake I always do- soy milk, banana, cocoa powder, stevia, brown rice protein, kale greens, and chia seeds. Super tasty and yummy.

latte

I was feeling a little peckish before heading out to work so I quickly made a macaccino using some ripple chocolate milk. I really love the consistency of ripple, it is so thick and creamy and possibly a little gritty. Target keeps having sales for them so I keep snatching the small ones.

lunch

Around 12 I got too hungry and ate my lunch. I ate two very small golden delicious apples and a cluster fuck of leftovers. I made a red curry that was very thin. It made quite a lot so I kept trying to make the leftovers a little different each time. It kind-of morphed into a bland linguine dish that had some angel hair pasta as well. I pretty much just plugged 1 1/2 cups linguine, 1/4 cup white beans, 1/8 cauliflower, and 1/8 green beans into Cronometer. Seriously, no clue what the nutritional/calorie count would be for that. My bosses also opened a bag of corn chips, and I might of eaten a few handfuls of those.

hinderfork

So I clearly didn’t eat this- but I didn’t take photos of many things I ate (2 apples, corn chips, or raw cookies) so I figured I would share this interesting piece we just got in at my work. It is a fork from the Hinderburg! One of our clients said he was scoping out the field for work and his co-worker accidentally kicked it around. The backside of the fork has a lot more melting going on. It is hard to see in the photo, but on the burnt part there is a little logo (you can see a close up here.) For the record- I did NOT use this fork for my lunch.

Then I got hungry again around 3, and ate the rest of the Rawdical Raisin Cacao Cookies with Oats I made. I really didn’t like them much, which is weird since I really like a similar dish from Ani’s Raw Food Kitchen. I think it is the coconut oil that Emily adds to hers, it just is icky to me. Plus Ani puts hers in a dehydrator, which I think makes them a little more intense in flavor. I ate about 2.5-3 little cookies worth.

dinnerbaby

Then for dinner I made a recipe for the Vegan Mofo Blackest Dish challenge. Funny because I love this dish, it is very dark, but compared to the black rice, the stir-fry looks so brown. XD I thought the super metal dish matchy my spoopy shirt. So you guys get some tummy action. And you’ll just have to wait for the recipe for this. But it does use chunjang, a Korean black bean paste. I also used eggplant and broccoli from my CSA and a can of vegan abalone that I’ve had sitting around forever.

I might have a snack- thinking maybe half of a pumpkin mocha scone that I made from Protein Ninja. It’s the first time I made scones before, and I think I added too much flour to them. I wish she gave weights instead of cups for measurements. I plugged half a scone into Cronometer, just incase I decided to eat it before going to bed. As always, the numbers are off. The black rice and ripple didn’t have a full nutritional profile, nor did the canned abalone, I used miso instead of black bean paste, and so on. So I fell short, though I am sure I would of been off anyways.

As always, got all the calories I need- and hey I have 45 calories left! JK I had half of a broken package of smarties. I mean I can’t give it to trick or treaters right? Just got my fats requirements, all my carb, and pleanty of protein (160%, who says vegans don’t get protein?!) I am getting a lot of sugar though. I know I ate a banana and two apples, but there was a good amount of sugar in the ripple milk and in the raw cookies I ate which used agave. I am still short on a lot of various vitamins, but again, some food didn’t get fully registered, and it might of added to the totals.

Anyone else get their Halloween candy yet? And do you have a strong will to not eat the whole thing?

I know I’ve got the will to not eat the ones I can give out. XD

Posted by Jennifer in Pregnancy Tags: macaccino, pregnancy, rawesome vegan baking, ripple, ripple milk, third trimester, this rawesome vegan life, week 31, what I ate wednesday

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Pregnancy – Weeks 28-29

September 30, 2016

weeks2829

Doctors:

Went to the doctors for one of the long appointments. I had my prenatal diabetes test done (and I got the results which say “reference range: <135 (mg/dL) ” so I passed?) which wasn’t nearly as bad as what I was expecting. The way they scheduled appointment made it seem like I would be doing the glucose test- THEN see the doctor after waiting an hour. It more like seeing the doctor after drinking the sugar drink, then waiting the remaining time before getting my blood drawn again.

The funny thing is that I don’t THINK I am a picky person when it comes to doctors. But when I meet a doctor I don’t like, I do complain a lot. I think I tend to dislike doctors that treat me as fragile, or overly delicately. I guess I shouldn’t be complaining if these type of doctors are delivering my baby, I can safely say they wouldn’t so anything questionable to rush the delivery (which I spare the details of what I mean.)

But the doctor I got recently proceeded to ask which arm I wanted a shot in because it would make it weak. He even offered to have someone give the shot in my bottom if I was worried that the shot would make my arm TOO weak. I instantly was expecting a huge needle that was insanely thick and an intense burning from the injection. But I figured get it in my arm, it probably wouldn’t be a big deal. Seriously, barely felt it, didn’t even bleed. My boss and I have a theory that maybe he got his shingle shot recently, which can cause a small inflammation on the arm. He is older, and was going on about how his recent shot was awful.

Oh he also offered to put my purse down and pick it up, which is nice I guess. But if I can’t bend over easily then how can I get various things done throughout the day?! Give me cold jaded doctors any day please.

Sleep:

Well, I haven’t slept through an entire night in awhile. It hasn’t been too bad. I often wake up in the middle of the night and turn over, then fall back asleep. So nothing too awful. I am also starting to understand why people drop $50-100 on those pregnancy pillows. Earlier this week I had horrible hip pain at night. After a few google searches it turns out that in an over simplified explanation, my legs were kind-of being pulled out of my hips sockets. All I had to do is cram another pillow in between my ankles. It solved the problem. But now it is a real pain to climb into bed, putting one pillow at my feet- one between my knees, and wedge a stuffed animal under my tummy. Actually wedging the stuffed animal is kind-of cute. It is sort of like my stuffed polar bear is hugging my stomach.

Another weird thing I notice is that my legs are super tense at night. I think it has to do with leg cramps that most people get at night. It is just very odd, I wake up feeling like my legs are soar as if I did an intense workout the day before. But once I get moving, the feeling goes away.

Clothing:

As you can tell from the picture- I gotta stop wearing that tank top for those photo shoots. It is just stretched out too much. XD I am actually finding that I should have enough clothes for the rest of pregnancy. Which is a little sad that I can stop shopping around. I have been looking around at nursing clothing. I plan on breast feeding, and I am starting to take note that some of my clothes aren’t the greatest for boob access. A quick look at my fashion posts quickly reveal that I like high necklines. Oops!

Symptoms:

I’ve been pretty good. I am starting to get Braxton Hicks contractions, but I usually don’t even notice when they happen. Which leads me to wonder if I get symptoms that I just ignore. It is funny that farts are a symptom that seems to plague pregnant women. I think I have been farting less while pregnant- except when I do fart it is embarrassingly uncontrollable. And usually when I am doing something like bending over or while walking. Luckily these are rare and usually when I am alone, so only I can laugh at how absurd it is.

I was also pretty excited to read this article that suggests that Pregnancy Brain might not be real! I think it makes sense, there is a lot on a pregnant ladies mind. I have a huge to do list with getting my house ready for baby (because I won’t have time afterwards), getting a pediatrician, dealing with the health insurance company, figuring out delivery details, managing money, etc, etc. It is just stressful, so yeah, I might not be able to remember smaller details that I normally would have time to.

Food:

Can I say cookie butter and I are totally clicking right now? I’ve been having a late night snack of Wegman’s new bajillion grain bread (might not be the official name ^__~) with Trader Joe’s cookie & chocolate swirl butter on it. Even more amazing is when I take the raspberries from my CSA and put them on top. I’ve even put the cookie butter on some Asian Pear that is from a local orchard.

Otherwise the acid reflux has been killing my eating game. It is very annoying, sometimes making me wait longer to eat dinner than with my husband. I recently posted a What I Ate Wednesday if anyone wants to take a look.

Baby Shower:

It just occurred to me that our baby shower is in 2 weeks! I am pretty excited since that means delivery day getting closer. Maybe Jon and I will get the nursery painted before the shower and start getting a nursery put together. Baby isn’t due for awhile but I am always thinking best to be as prepared as possible. We already got a gift in the mail and we now have one of those cute baby boogie suction balls.

Animals:

Last post I forgot to include cute animals! My goodness I feel so bad, it is probably the best part of the post. You learn about cool animals AND see something cute. So I included the animals that the baby was the size of from the previous two weeks as well.

Week 26: Slow Loris This small guy is a primate that hunts at night. He quietly sneaks up on his bug prey and quickly snatches them. I personally love these animals, but sadly they have a growing popularity on the internet because of some cute YouTube videos that people take of their pet Slow Loris. The pet trade is something I don’t want to promote, so finding cute photos of the Slow Loris is wild is pretty hard. But I did find some cute photos, and a fun SciShow video.

Week 27: Fennec Fox Another animal that is often found in the “exotic pet trade.” Again don’t get one, but luckily a quick google search has tons of cute photos of this animal in the wild. These cute guys live in Africa and have those big ears to help keep them cool in hot weather. They are so small apparently their main predator is an eagle owl.

Week 28: Echidna I have a soft spot for the echidna. This mammal lives in Australia and is one of the few mammals that lay eggs. Yup, that’s right eggs. The spines are for protection, and they will burrow under some leaves and dirt so all you can see of them are just the spines. The echidna eats in a similar way as anteaters, with a long sticky tongue, which is why they have so a long nose. I hope I’m not the only one who finds them cute.

Week 29: New England Cottontail Yeah I am not sure why my app decided to get real specific. I mean slow loris and echnida aren’t any specific species, but New England Cottontail? That’s a specific species of rabbit that lives in a very small amount of space. Most people see Eastern Cottontails, and I see them all the time. Since the species is so specific I don’t have any photos to share, although I did take a few snaps of an Eastern Cottontail last year.

Posted by Jennifer in Pregnancy, The Girls Tags: pregnancy, third trimester, week 28, week 29

4 comments

What I Ate Wednesday #2

September 28, 2016

I wanted to do a What I Ate Wednesday at least once a month during the pregnancy, and I am almost running out of time to do my September post! It has been a pretty busy month, so I figured it is now or never. Sadly today is a little boring in my selection of food, there are lots of leftovers and repeats.

I started the day with my usual chocolate spirulina smoothie. I went back to the powdered spirulina since I found the spirulina tablets more expensive and annoyingly you need to take 6 tablets to get 1 tsp of powder. The tablets are annoying to swallow, and aren’t very pleasant to chew either. What I do like about my chocolate spirulina smoothie is that hits so many of the nutritional needs for pregnant ladies. I get about 50% of the calcium (from the greens and soymilk) and 61% of the iron (from all that cocoa and spirulina) that I need for the day. I also get about 30 grams of protein with only adding 2 tablespoons of protein powder to the whole thing. I should probably post this bad boy on the blog because I think this is a great shake. And the greens I used today? Some beet greens and a little bit of swiss chard.

I’ve been obsessed with fizzy drink as of lately. I think it has to do with the fact that I can’t really have beer or cocktails. I’ve been getting by with non-alcoholic beers, tonic water with shrubs, and seltzers. And if I am honest I am always have a sugar-free soda at work, which I know, isn’t the best, but for awhile I was bringing my own seltzer into work. I also have been bringing in powder mix packets to mix with my water. I really like the Target brand mixers because they use both sugar AND stevia making it only 15 calories. I like how they don’t use coloring in the mixes, the drink ends up being a pale white-ish or completely clear. But they do use artificial flavors. I also really like Madhava’s powder mixes, though I usually find them a little stronger than I prefer. Just like the target ones, they use a mix of stevia and agave powder but they tend to stay away from artificial flavors. But I think I mainly wanted to show my wonderful new wall color ^__~

It was nice a chilly this morning, so chilly I got to wear a sweatshirt while getting ready. I was in the mood for something warm and comforting, and didn’t want to make a cup of coffee (just in case I needed a caffeine kick in the afternoon.) So I made a little latte using Macaccino. They are a new coffee replacement that is on the market, and I think it works best as a latte rather than with just water. I made my own latte by mixing a tablespoon of macaccino with 1/4 cup of hot water. Then I added 8 oz of hot soy milk and a tablespoon of a pumpkin caramel syrup. It was pretty amazing, and perfect for the weather.

Lunch consisted of watermelon, the last watermelon of the season! It was nice, this year we had yellow, orange, and red watermelon. But I think my favorite has been the red watermelon. It was just perfect this year. I ate a curry burrito with it. I used white rice my Mother made from a previous night. It was weird rice, I have a feeling my Father bought instant rice and didn’t tell my Mother. The other half is a South Indian styled chickpea and eggplant curry from Vegan Richa‘s cookbook. Sorry the photo is so crummy, I was trying to take a photo discreetly since my bosses were there. They nicely offered me some corn chips, and ate a small handful as well.

After lunch I eventually had a snack bar that I made. I forgot to take a photo- plus they were ugly looking and nasty tasting. I was trying to make a bar using tahini, cranberries, and lime coconut chips. It was a MASSIVE fail. Oh well. I drove by Wegman’s on the way home from work to pick up some veggie dogs for Jon on Friday. He is going to a Mets vs Phillies game and his office is doing a tailgating thing. I opted out since there are so many reasons why a pregnant woman shouldn’t be at a baseball game. No beer, uncomfortable seats, peeing every inning. Besides I am not a huge baseball fan. I was pretty hungry at the end, and grabbed a small bar to nibble on before dinner. I am a huge fan of these Raw Rev bars, though I only get them on special occasions.

I originally was planning on going for a run afterwork but it was raining a little and my hamstrings were pretty tight from a workout from the day before. But I kept with the plan of eating leftovers and had some brown rice noodles with leftover massaman curry from Vegan Eats World. The curry is filled with green beans, sweet potatoes, cherry tomatoes, and baked tofu. If you’ve never had a massaman curry before it is pretty much like a peanut butter curry. It’s awesome. Sadly, after dinner I got a lot of acid reflux, so I am not sure I will be eating anything else for dessert. It is seriously up in the air.

So how are my nutritional stats? Well, for one I noticed some foods didn’t really track any nutritional information other than what is on the label. So I might have been a little closer to some of the nutritional goals. But that is also why I take prenatal vitamins ^__~ And FYI cronometer is a little weird. I always get a lot of red because I have it in weight gain mode I guess most clients are trying to loose weight. But if you read closely, it says I can eat 210 more calories. I already ate 2400 calories! I got 100 grams of protein, 273 grams of carbs, and 90 grams of fat. I am a little shocked about the fat since I tend to have a low fat diet. Not really intentionally though.

Well, I am off to watch some TV with the hubs and count kicks for the doctors. Ugh. It’s so sad, it is always within 10-15 minutes I count 10 kicks. Plus I tend to ignore the small ones, depending on how interested I am in the TV show.