The Bell Pepper

You can blame the bell pepper for my lack of blogging as of late. According to babycenter, apparently baby Heff is now the length of a bell pepper. It was nice to have my little human compared to a vegetable rather than a fruit for once. And I believe Baby Heff is sucking the majority of my brain power. I am much more forgetful and have lacked any form of creativity in many aspects of my life. Just the beginnings of many sacrifices I suppose. Let's hope my brain power comes back after I birth this mini person.

So yeah, I am knocked up. 18 weeks now (that equals about 4 1/2 months for you all trying to figure out what 18 weeks calculates to in months). If you didn't click on the song I posted a few weeks back you probably missed it. We are just thankful that Scott is the father {wink}. I thought I would share some of the things going on with me during this pregnancy.

Disclaimer: If baby stuff bores you, or if you are having infertility struggles and want to poke my eyes out for being pregnant which I totally understand - go ahead and skip this post. I promise this blog won't become consumed with it but Shan told me it deserved its own post and I do everything she tells me.

My Midwives & Birthing Center
We decided to use the Puget Sound Midwives & Birthing Center rather than a hospital. Hospitals have always scared me BUT I am not comfortable doing a home birth (I don't even have a home of my own) so I felt this was a happy medium. So far our experiences with the midwives have been great. They spend tons of time with us at the appointment and really make me feel listened to. I appreciate this. The facility is very lovely, huge birthing tubs, close to a hospital if need be, and I feel comfortable and safe being in that space as I think about bringing my first child into this world. The lighting is good. For some reason hospital lightening makes me anxious. This was important to me. Scott feels good about the birthing center too so I am glad we are both on the same page with it.

The Birthing Plan
Everyone talks about this whole "birthing plan" thing that you are supposed to write before your labor. I have never been a "plan/goal setting" type of person - I just aim for a good outcome and things have turned out pretty well in my life. So my "plan" is just to do everything I can to get ready for the labor and go from there. Little expectations. I hope to be able to have my baby at the birthing center and that Scott is a big part of my labor. Those are my only clearly stated hopes. If that doesn't work out and I have to go to the hospital than that is ok too. I'm sure it will still be a lovely experience. Zen Birthing I call it. I hope I can stay in this space as the time gets closer.

Penis or Vagina?
Much to the dismay of my siblings (and the majority of people in the world it seems), we are going to be surprised and NOT find out the sex of the baby. When I think about going through all those hours of labor and finally having Scott tell me "It's a boy" or "It's a girl" gets me all teary. I realize me getting teary doesn't take much these days. Example: I cried watching the Ghost-like scene with Richard in Lost two weeks ago and finally got around to watching The Time Traveler's Wife, which was worse than I expected, but regardless I still cried at the end when Henry dies. I still just think that this will be the biggest surprise of my life so why not hold out for a few months and embrace the surprise?! Too much fun, right?!  I don't even like baby blue and baby pink so its ok if I don't get clothes in those colors. I hope people can use their non-baby sucking brain power and be creative if they chose to give the non-gendered Baby Heff a present.

Cloth Diapers
Oh shoot, just when you thought I couldn't get hippier in this post I go and throw out the cloth diapers. We're still in the decision making process with this issue. Once I saw my friend Libbi change her daughter's cloth diaper and she made it look so easy and she loved using them. Ever since then it has been in the back of my mind that it is something I would like to do. My friend Laina just started a cloth diaper consulting company (you should check out her website out The Uncommon Bottom) and we are going to meet with her about the process. Again, nothing is decided yet but I am leaning in that direction. I would love to hear if anyone out there has had good or bad experiences with cloth diapers. Funny thing is though, most of the people I've talked to that have used cloth diapers are extreme loyalist. They love using them. Kind of like how people are about their Apple computers. This leads me to believe there is something to these cloth diapers that I need to know about. When people are loyalist there usually is a good reason for their loyalty I have found. And are these colors not adorable on little bums?

Freaks & Geeks
This has nothing to do with babies but we are watching the series (one season) and so far so good. It is subtle and doesn't over do the humor or the drama. I am digging it.

Cravings
I haven't really had any except that chocolate milk hasn't ever tasted better. So creamy and delightful. Never felt this way about chocolate milk before. Go figure?

That's all for now. 

Happy April. What happened to Spring?