Week #35

My Opinion:
I still need to:

1. Wash K's stuff.
2. Clean/organize his room (even more so).
3. Pack a bag for K, myself, and Kevin.
4. Make sure the car seat fits.
5. Pre-register at hospital.
6. Other stuff that I haven't thought of yet.

Next week I hit Week #36 - also known as Month #9 - and I imagine that's when the real waiting game begins.

I'm still working on my coursework. Although I've fallen a little behind on my personal timeline, I'm still a couple months ahead of the scheduled timeline, so I'm ok. I also just found out that I am (for sure) getting maternity leave, so now I can take it easy if I have/need to.

I think the nesting part finally kicked in. Or at least the part where I feel like I have to keep busy (like laundry at 8 pm on a Sunday night) and rearrange everything (the cupboard under my kitchen sink). Speaking of reorganization, my sister-in-law was lovely enough to give me a bunch of baby clothes, and, as a result, I realized that I needed more space. So, to compensate for all of the extra items, Kevin and I picked up 2 more fabric drawers for the 9 cubicle storage unit, and a 6 shelf garment organizer for the closet. We also picked up a pop-up hamper for dirty laundry, and I imagine that it is going to be used a great many times.

 

Garment organizer (left), Hamper (right)

My sleep patterns have been erratic lately: Tuesday and Wednesday nights involved me waking every 2 hours (on the dot), which left me extremely tired but unable to nap later in the day. Thursday night, however, I changed my sleeping position after waking once or twice, and then I slept solid for the rest of the night. Sleeping on my side would cause me to wake regularly, whereas sleeping on my back allowed me to sleep soundly.

Speaking of sleeping on my side: I was lying in bed last night and the kid totally stretched and I ended up with an elbow on my down-facing side and a foot on my up-facing side. He moved before Kevin could feel it, but it was like I had a pyramid-shaped implant sticking out my side! Actually, if you feel the tip of your elbow (with your arm bent), that's about the right size, and that's how hard it was too! The side that I was lying on just made it feel like I was laying on something hard, like a golf ball.

My feet aren't as swollen, again, but I think now it is actually exercise related. If I sit all the time, my feet swell. But, if I get out at least a little bit to do something that involves more than just walking from my computer room to kitchen then the swelling isn't as bad. My feet still are a little swollen, but not as badly (or as comically).

Development:
By now the baby should weigh around 2.383 kg (5.25 lbs) and be around 46.2 cm (or 18.19 inches) long. For those of you following along closely, it seems like the baby's length jumped a LOT (like 5 inches) this past week. The truth is that I didn't double-check the cm to inch conversions on the website and it turns out that they were wrong. So, the inches this week is correct and he really is that long. And I don't feel like going back and finding where the numbers went wrong, so I'll just leave it as is, lol.

Since the baby hasn't dropped yet, my uterus should sit about 15 cm above my belly button and about 35 cm above my pubic symphysis. My weight gain at this point should be around 23.8-28.6 lbs, but I definitely blew that and weigh in around 33 lbs.

This week his fatty deposits continue to develop and his arms and legs will start getting chubbier. If he were born this week, he would lose weight faster than a full term baby since his digestive tract wouldn't be fully developed enough to be self-sufficient.