23.5 weeks!

It has been a while since my last update and so much has happened with baby Qbert. A few weeks ago I was reading in bed around 11pm when I felt something poke my bladder from above. I thought it an interesting feeling and then it happened again. I sprung out of bed (well, as much as one can spring when 20 weeks pregnant) and ran to tell Tom. It happened two more times that night. It took me a few days to determine that this was, in fact, Qbert saying hello and not, say, last night's dinner saying hello. Since then Qbert has exhibited his future career as an Olympic track star by running mini-marathons on my bladder. At times it actually gets really uncomfortable. However, it is so exciting to finally feel the little guy!

Last week I had my monthly prenatal checkup. She informed me my uterus is in the right place (good to know I didn't stash it behind a kidney). One of the ways they judge the progress of the pregnancy is by where your uterus is - each week it should be in a certain range. My uterus, apparently, is complying. We also listened to the baby's heartbeat.... ahhhh... so much fun to hear! It always makes me grin like an idiot. The last few times they've had to chase the baby around my tummy because he just moves so much! Next week we go in for an ultrasound to see if the placenta has raised up at all.

A few weeks ago I was having some pretty bad heart palpitations, which can be normal during pregnancy. However, I was getting dizzy afterwards, so my OB referred me to a cardiologist. They put me on a Holter monitor for 24 hours. They said they would call if there were any problems, and I haven't heard a thing, so I assume all is well with my heart. I have a follow-up with the cardiologist at the end of next week. I think stress got the better of me with the palpitations. However, I've been trying to drink more water, which seems to have helped with the dizziness.

When we found out we were pregnant, it jump-started our plans for remodeling the house. After a few months of design work, we finally submitted our plans to the city of Saratoga last Tuesday. I waddled in with the contractor, hoping to play the pregnant card and get our plans pushed through a bit faster. In the process of talking with the building inspector, we found out the previous 1100 sf addition put on our house by the previous owners was never permitted. Or, rather, the permit expired and was never finaled. So, technically, half of our house is illegal in the eyes of the city. We're now trying to get the previous owner to provide copies of the finalized permits, which they say they have. My dreams of having our remodel finished before the baby gets here are quickly vaporizing... We also decided over the weekend to rip the upper deck off the house, as we don't see ourselves really using it, and it is likely to cost about $20,000 to rebuild. It is currently unsafe and possibly causing problems with the 2nd floor cantilever.

However, the one room Tom and I are remodeling ourselves is the nursery! We've spent the past three weekends working on it. The previous owners used the room as a framing studio, so we had a lot of work to do. We ripped out a huge shelf along one wall, painted the walls, tore out the old trim, and partially installed the new trim. The room was a light purple with hideous dark purple trim. We're working on removing the linoleum and we have the hardwood to install. There are also pipes in the room, so we're going to put in a vanity with a little sink. It has been a lot of work, but it is fun seeing it all come together.

Finally, we went Friday night to set up our baby registry. After the fun we had with the wedding registry, we approached this with a mix of excitement, apprehension and dread... After getting our scanning gun, we started in the first aisle, which was bottles. We came prepared with two books and a few emails from friends. We almost went in to meltdown just on the bottles. 20 minutes later we decided it really was going to depend entirely on what the baby decides he likes, so we registered for a bottle set that seemed good... We referred to our books and emails a few times, but generally we picked things we thought would work well... All in all, we were done in 2 hours! Tom said it was more fun than the wedding registry. I wasn't so sure --- choosing nipple pads vs china patterns? Tough call. :)

Some pics from the nursery in progress:

The nursery before we started:

Tom removing the giant shelf (notice the lovely purple moulding around the wood beams):

Working on the room (notice the lovely new white moulding) The door and trim around the sliding door had been deep purple:

Yay power tools!

Part of the 150 feet of trim we painted:

The old linoleum floor:
Tom unloading 66 boxes of hardwood flooring, at 62 pounds a box: