New Years Resolution Anyone?

I gave up making New Year's Resolutions a long time ago. Simply for the reason that they were unrealistic, I didn't stick to them and ended up feeling like I'd failed. This happened mostly because I was a kid and would get excited about cleaning my room more, eating less junk food and being nicer to my little sister for about a week, and then I'd be over it!

But this year I feel like I need to make some promises to myself and my family. I say 'promises' because they are much harder for me to break than 'resolutions'. So here are my New Year's Promises:

I am entering a whole new chapter of my life this year ... I am becoming a mother. This is possibly the biggest life change that a woman can experience. I am going from a life that was all about what I wanted to do and taking care of myself to being a mother of a child who is completely dependent on me to live.

• So my promise to my soon arriving new born child is to be the best mother I can be. I promise to follow my instincts and the advice of my doctor and mother to raise you to be the best you can be so that you can take advantage of every opportunity that comes your way. I promise to to be healthy so that you have the opportunity to be healthy and live a long and happy life. I promise to love you unconditionally and let you be who YOU want to be (as long as it doesnt land you in prison or an early grave).  <3
• My promise to be soon-to-be-husband is to be the best soon-to-be-wife that I can be. I promise to be there for you in every way that I can providing you with my unconditional love and support. I promise to be your partner in the raising of our son.  <3
• My promise to myself as a new mom is to not forget about myself. I promise to become as healthy as I was before becoming pregnant. I promise to take time to myself and allow myself to get back into my running schedule (schedule-ish). I promise to not be hard on myself when not everything goes to plan in motherhood. I promise not to stress out as I learn the ways of being a new parent.

I think those are good promises to try and keep, not only for this year of 2012, but for the remainder of my life. I think it will help me stay sane and not take life too seriously. I love my family and want us to live a long and happy life together.

So how about you all out there? New Year's Promises? Or maybe some life long promises? Will you be entering a new chapter in your life or do you perhaps want to start a new chapter? Get healthy? Take more time for yourself? Become a more active member of the community? Volunteer? We are all at different places in our lives ... it's up to you to decide where you want to go next!

Love you all! Happy New Year!!!

My favorite time of the year.

I love the Christmas season. For me Christmas is about quality family time. I look forward to it every year because my parents, Josh and I take a few days off work and Laura has a few weeks off school so those few days are the ultimate stress-free, just take time for each other, quality family time. Sadly it doesn't happen much more than once a year, so I cherish Christmas for that reason :)

I cannot believe that James will be here next Christmas. Not only will he be here, but he will be 8 months old already! There is nothing like Christmas morning through the eyes of a child ... but more than that, you're own child. I know that he wont quite understand the whole Santa thing and all, but at 8 months we can still get him some cool stuff, where as if he were younger, toys wouldn't really come into the equation until the following year.

The plan is to have Christmas at our apartment next year and have everyone come down (my parents and sister as well as Josh's mom and hopefully his sister too). It will be fun to decorate our own place and plan dinner in our own kitchen. I, myself, have never hosted Christmas or anything more than a BBQ ... so it will be a whole new experience. And I must be honest, it makes me feel quite grown up, not to mention excited  :)

One of the coolest James related things that happened this past weekend was that everyone finally got to feel and SEE him move  :)  One of the days he was very active almost all day long. I have also noticed the sensations are changing. They are no longer just kicks. I can feel him rolling and stretching. So the movements are slower and can sometimes move from end of my stomach to the other. It sometimes also feels like he is poking me. I love it! The only thing I could do without is the nub of a belly button hahaha. Or as Josh calls it, my nubbin ... its not attractive! Good thing it's not bathing suit season lol.

So over all it was a wonderful weekend, though it is always nice to be back home. Roll on 2012 ... I love even numbers AND it is the year my son will be born.



Dec 27, 2011 (24 weeks). --- My love and I at Dargans in Santa Barbara for my dad's birthday :)



From One month to Six!



Can you believe how much I have grown in these past six months?! I have gained a total of 14 pounds since conceiving and most of that has been in the past month and a half. And I am only going to keep growing!!!

I honestly had no idea how small I was before getting pregnant until looking at these two photos side by side. It makes me confident that I will be able to lose all of my pregnancy weight by working out and eating right :) 

So far I have done well to stay in the healthy range ... I was on the lower end of the weight gain until about month 4 due to morning sickness, but I quickly caught up and am now smack dab in the middle of the recommended weight gain :)   Oh and I can no longer take photos in my bathing suit bottoms because ... well ... they no longer fit :-/ hahaha!

This morning I stood on the scales (as I do at the same time every week to ensure that I am gaining the weight I need to gain) and was quite shocked to have passed the 120 pound mark ... I am now at 121 pounds! For me that is a lot because I am a petite person who has never weighed more than 108 pounds. So I said to Josh, "I'm getting fat."  .... to which he replied, "Yes, but it's a beautiful fat."  .... One of the many reasons that I love my man  :)  He always knows how to make me feel better  :)  I love you!!!  <3

Anyway, I am going to go and not eat ice cream .... wait, do we have ice cream? .... mmmmm ice cream  :-D

Feeling Positive

Hello :)  Two exciting things this week ... Christmas of course, so quality time with the family and entering the 6th month of pregnancy. I don't know why, but the 6th month has always felt like a milestone of some kind. So I am almost there  :)

I went to urgent care at the end of last week to ask about my chronic fatigue and acid indigestion. The doctor told that I can take pepsid ac rather than tums and that we will only resort to prilosec if the pepsid doesn't work. Well, the pepsid works wonderfully! I take one with breakfast every morning and that one little pill lasts me the whole 24 hours with not a single acid burp  :)  It started working from the very first pill too. So I am very very happy with that. I can now finally eat more than just rice and veggies!
This also means that I am now sleeping through the whole night with the odd bathroom trip around 6am. So guess what ... the fatigue has also gone away. Now I just deal with the regular tiredness of pregnancy. It feels fantastic to be sleeping  :)  It puts me in a better mood for work and with people around me in general and has lessened the stress caused by exhaustion .... so I haven't cried in days!  :)

I am also sleeping better because it seems my body has gotten used to spending the whole night on my left side. I no longer wake up with numb legs and arms. I have also stopped stressing about sleeping on my back because the doctor told me that if its uncomfortable for James, it will also be uncomfortable for me and so I will either roll over or just wake up and change position.

I have a morning routine now that I quite enjoy. I don't really sleep in anymore, so when Josh wakes up around 630am or 7am for work I usually turn on the bedroom TV to watch GMA (Good Morning America) while I slowly wake up. Once I feel alert enough, I start doing my physical therapy stretches which are done lying down. I do those for about 15-20 minutes and then slowly sit up. Once that feels good I get out of bed and do a few rounds of pigeon pose (squat position pushing my hips outwards) and forward fold. All of these stretches are to loosen my hips and strengthen my pelvis floor for birth. By the time I am done with all of that I feel ready to start my day!

I am feeling ready and able to start a little workout routine too, so Josh and I are going to start going to our apartment complexes gym where he will probably jog and I will walk. It will be nice to get moving again ... heck, it feels nice just to have the energy and motivation to want to workout again!

Anyway, I am starting to ramble. I will try to remember to post my 6 months belly picture on here on Thursday so you can see the progress! Have a great day!

Some of the coaches at South Coast Gymnastics here in Irvine, CA on December 17th for the Christmas Party. Pam and I are sitting on the blue block front and center. Can you believe that we are both 6 months along?!?! Pam is just two weeks ahead of me and we are both having boys  :)

Keeping it Simple.

So after a few weeks of not sleeping due to discomfort, indigestion, weird dreams and anxiety, last night I slept amazing!

The indigestion has been getting worse and worse and was starting to occur after things like a glass of water etc. Like the water was re-upsetting what I had eaten before. So after a few nights of waking to feeling like I had just swallowed acid (the flesh eating kind), I decided I needed to change something. Yesterday instead of eating whatever I wanted, as I had been, I just ordered 8oz brown rice, 4oz steamed veggies and 2 vegan chicken skewers with no dressings or sauces etc and it went down very smoothly. It tried to threaten me with indigestion, but that went away very quickly and I went the whole night without an acid-filled burp.

As for the physical discomfort ... my legs going numb, heavy tummy, dead arms etc ... I didn't have any of that either. I started doing my physical therapy stretches before bed which I think helped a lot because it really loosened my hips and legs. So I think I will try to do that from now on.

As for the weird dreams ... I feel like that was probably related to the food I was eating also. Especially the food I would eat right before going to bed. So the relief from the dreams last night is probably also due to the more bland diet I consumed yesterday. Just so you know, I also ate some special k cereal, a piece of corn bread, some chocolate (dark) in the afternoon and noodles as my last meal of the evening around 9pm. And of course because I didn't sleep the night before I had 1/4 cup of coffee (I am allowed 1/2 cup every day) to help me going in the morning and that energy lasted me all day, so I think all the extra moving around would have helped me digest everything before bed also :)

As for the anxiety, I do believe that it hormone related. We all know how when you wake up at night thinking about something, it all seems somehow worse, but then in the morning it doesn't seem half as bad or as urgent? Well, I didn't have any of that either.

It was wonderful to sleep a whole night without waking up to pee or for any other reason. I hope that I can get a few more nights like that before James arrives  :)

Settling in ... to a new home and the 'baby mode'?

This time last week were just about done moving all of our stuff into the new apartment and we (dad, Josh and I) were exhausted! We haven't unpacked everything yet, but this new apartment felt like home from night one. It's wonderful to have more space :)

We didn't get the Internet re-installed until Thursday and I have been working since then, so that is why I haven't blogged since before the move. But I wouldn't have had much more to talk about than being tired! It took me a good 3 days to recover from the 2 days of moving. I was in bed before 10pm every night.

I feel like my pregnancy has moved into a new 'mode'. I almost feel like I am in 'baby mode' ... meaning that if I am not eating or sleeping I'm crying about something [or nothing]. Seriously, I am constantly hungry! When I am eating, I am barely done with one meal before I start thinking about the next one. I do my best to make the majority of my meals and snacks healthy, though I don't always succeed. My stomach has also started growing pretty fast in the past few weeks, it's crazy!

I am also sleeping a lot more. I haven't really napped since my first trimester, but I am noticing naps sneaking back into my daily routine. I have also noticed that I get physically tired a lot easier than even just a month ago, another sign that I am growing for sure! In exactly one month I will be entering the third trimester, so no doubt the tiredness wont be going anywhere!

As for the crying ... I don't really cry that much. Though I do get frustrated a lot easier which ends in tears and the complaints of being uncomfortable are occurring more and more often.  At night time I find that I am either sleeping like a rock or tossing and turning all night due to numb/tingling legs and arms (from trying to stay on one side) or my abdominal area is uncomfortable because it is getting heavier or I wake up to use the restroom and cant fall back to sleep.
I also get the numb/tingling legs during the day if I have been standing at work for a while and my pelvis and lower abdomen also get tired from standing.

So in those respects I can definitely see my pregnancy progressing. One the more positive end, I am dreaming about James more and more (last night I was breast feeding, burping and bonding with my son). We can also see James moving more often now. Josh saw him move for the first time the other evening which was exciting. And I am just over all excited as the days to meeting our son become less and less :)

I also don't complain about having to eat all the time except when I am working and cannot (am not allowed) to eat! After all, this is the most wonderful time for a woman to eat whatever she wants and craves without the guilt  ;)

Hows it going?

My postings have been few and far between lately. I have just been so busy and cannot believe how fast time is going. I cannot believe that I am 21 weeks now! Little James will be here before we know it!

I have been receiving 'Pregnancy and Newborn' magazine as well as some 'Parenting' magazines, and the more I get into them, the more I cant wait to finally be a mommy.  It's not that I wasn't excited before ... but the magazines are opening up a whole world that I was oblivious to ... there is so much you can do with your kids at home and outside. They give healthy eating tips too. I guess knowledge is power because the more I read and the more I learn, the less nervous I become.

Anyway, so Josh and I are moving apartments the day after tomorrow. Packing has been a stressful pain in the behind, but it's getting done. And as I go, I am organizing and disposing. So I guess it's a little spring cleaning as well :)  It will be awesome to have a bigger apartment. Not to mention, of course, having a room for James! I am very much looking forward to setting that up! I don't really have anything to put in there yet, but that's okay ... I will soon enough!

So for the next few days I shall be moving and unpacking etc ... hopefully my pregnancy brain will let me do so efficiently! If I think of it, I will post some photos of the new place!