UpNate, Notes from the Underbelly, Congrats and welcome to all of the girls!!!

UpNate:
Hello everyone!  This week Nate has grown to approximately 2 pounds (about the size of the head of cauliflower) and is about 14.5 inches long with his legs extended the whole way.  He is likely waking and sleeping at regular intervals and might even be sucking on his fingers (especially if he is anything like me as a child...always had my thumb in my mouth).  His brain is hopefully very active, while his lungs still need some more time to develop.  Additionlly, as an added pregnancy bonus, Nate might get the hiccups!  The feel like tickles and tend not to last too long.  It's kind of crazy to think about, but depending on the website or method of calculation used, I am either into or will enter in the next few days, my third trimester.  That's 2/3 of the way cooked people...

Notes from the Underbelly:
Just wanted to give you an update on what Kurt and I are up to!  We finished the groundwork for the nursery!!!  I think it looks really sweet and can't wait for all of the furniture and things we ordered to arrive so that we can start getting the room together.  We spent last weekend cleaning out and re-assembling the closet system that was in the room (one which had been disassembled 2 years ago when we had all of our floors stained and refinished).  It's amazing how much those little systems seem to hold!  No pictures this week since we still haven't taken out the desk which will move to the brand spankin' new office. 

But where did this new office space come from and why haven't we heard about it before?  In a moment of designer inspiration, Kurt decided to sell his beloved Bo-Flex, known by me as the "dangerous monstrosity that takes up an enitre room in our house" so that we could repurpose the room.  We were "lucky" enough (hehe) to have 3 gallons of extra paint from the nursery due to my indecisiveness, so we got to use one of my favorite colors in the new office.  Sorry nieces and nephews who liked to play on the Bo-Flex (and test the working order of my heart each time they meet a near death fall from it), you will have to satisfy yourself with the other dangerous attractions in our house...we should probably start working on removing those!

Welcome to the World to all of the Girls!!!
So I was getting a little nervous about the ratio of boys to girls being born in 2011.  I have several friends who are either pregnant or have just given birth recently and almost all of the babies that have been born and ones  being born around the same time as Nate are boys.  So what's up with the "NO GIRLS ALLOWED" year in births?  Does this mean, despite his betrothal to Jordana Vulpis, Nate will have a hard time finding a prom date (if he choses to, of course)?  Enter the February girls club!  I knew of 3 families having babies in February and only one of them found out that they were having a girl.  I'm happy to report that all of them have arrived and here is the roll call, WELCOME TO THE WORLD:

Sophie Lynn



Grace Irene



Abigail Katherine

What a beautiful group of ladies!  Congrats to all!

 Have a great week!
xoxo, Jill

UpNate, Nursery Sneak Peek, Kitchen, and Happy Birthday to me!!!

UpNate:
Here we are at 6.5 months of pregnancy and the reality is that I feel like I exploded sometime between Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.  I went to sleep feeling cute with a little belly and woke up feeling (and looking) like a beached whale.  In fact, several of my co-workers (as well as the sandwich guy who made my lunch yesterday and I have never met before) remarked on how pregnant I was...thanks everyone, I just love hearing about how BIG I am getting :)

As for Nate, he is currently around the size of an "English Hothouse Cucumber" or 14 inches.  He weighs around 1 and 2/3 pounds and his testicles are making the trip into his scrotum (takes about 2-3 days)...aren't you glad you know that?  In other news, his ears are becoming even more developed and he can hear my conversations and probably is getting familiar with Kurt's and my voice.

Nursery Sneak Peek:


After a few weeks, we are almost finished with the ground work for the nursery.  Per my pregnancy hormones, the design has been ever changing.  Contrary to what I had originally planned, we scrapped the idea of painting the shelves a different color than the walls (actually what really happened is that I had the painter paint the shelves 3 different times with all 3 of our color choices and even though I'm not 100% sold on how it turned out, I'm too embarassed to ask him to paint them again).  We picked a fully upholstered glider which is super cute (pictured below, but not in the colors we selected...hehehe).  And as of 2 days ago I changed the bedding completely.  This comes as a crazy twist of events since I had initially chosen the bedding before we knew if we were having a boy.  In the end, I searched high and low for exactly what I wanted, but never found it.  The new bedding selected has all the colors in our palate, and has little puppies on it that look like Sammy (you know I can't resist that)!  Check it out:

Still messy, but I can't show you everything!



Chair in the wrong colors (we got the matching ottoman too!)



New bedding from pottery barn kids (this is a picture from their website, not Nate's room...although it would be nice to have this much completed, lol).



Kitchen:
Here is a little picture of the new backsplash which was just finished last weekend, if I can get some better shot with our camera this weekend (the only time I am ever in my house during daylight hours), I will post them next week:

Happy Birthday to me!!!

Thank you everyone who called, messaged, wall posted, etc for my birthday.  I am so lucky to have friends and family as sweet as you!!  This year, Kurt and I kept it pretty low-key.  We had snuggle time with Sammy, finally ate the crepes I've been craving, lunch and shopping with my parents, an evening of fun with Dan & Olga (and Dan's friend Cody), and then all of us met up with Carolyn, Jon, & the girls for brunch the next day.  Perfect weekend!  To top it all off we are extending the celebration tonight with dinner with Kurt's parents.  My favorite gift this year?  A super fun and functional baby bag!  As some of you may know, I spent a glorious internship working at Kate Spade, New York in their legal department.  It was one of the greatest experiences in my life (as well as in my legal career).  As a result, I have always had affection and loyalty for the brand.  When I became pregnant I scoured their website for the perfect baby bag that would meet all of my criteria (wipeable, big but not too big, tote/shoulderbag hybrid, zipper top, cute pattern, and (if possible) Kate Spade).  This bag has it all (and comes with a coordinating changing pad and pacifier holder).  Thank you to my parents and my sister (and family) for this most awesome gift!  See Below:


Dessert from lunch (followed by chocolate fundue)



snuggle time with Sammy



I hope everyone has a fantastic week!

xoxo, Jilly

UpNate, Notes from the underbelly, and Pooh through the ages!

UpNate:

Good morning all!  This week Nate is the size of an average Rutabega (go ahead, google what exactly that means...I sure did!).  Supposedly he is starting to get some baby fat and his skin is smothing out.  Nate is also growing more hair, if we could see it, we'd be able to tell what the color and texture will be (Blonde like daddy?  Dark brown like mommy? Or perhaps red like great-grammy?).

Notes from the Underbelly:

It's been a while since I posted about the weird changes going on as a first-timer to this pregnancy thing.

Illness:
This week (sadly) was spent partially with the stomach flu (that is to say I had the stomach flu for part of the week, not that I had part of the stomach flu all week...just in case you were confused).  Thank you to my co-workers for spreading the love, and germs, and subjecting me to one of the 3 acts I never wanted to commit at work...throwing up (ew).  For those interested, the other 2 acts are 1. losing consciousness and 2. incontinence (luckily avoided those).  The only upside is that I now know the trick to surviving the stomach flu...popsicles!  My doctor recommended them as an alternative to drinking (which was not going well) and they are perfection! 

Cravings:
Sadly, the last meal consumed before getting sick was the Fruit and Cheese Plate from Starbucks with a carton of Chocolate Milk (one of my newer cravings), so I think that craving/obsession is officially over.  New obsessions include Skittles (which are consumed at an alarming rate), breakfast foods, and the newly minted food of choice: Popsicles, or poxicles as my niece Kate used to call them. 

Body Image:
I don't feel like I am getting much bigger, though apparently I looked pregnant yesterday.  Many more co-workers seemed to have figured out that I am "with child" as no less than 4 people approached me yesterday to ask about my pregnancy and to tell me they had no idea.  According to the weekly pregnancy newsletter I subscribe to I am getting less coordinated and more likely to trip and fall as a result of my largeness (which Kurt recently told me I recieved a "Gold Medal" in bigness...he then spent time thinking about what he had done in time-out).  Did I really need extra help in this area?  I am already pretty clumsy...how can I tell if my ability to trip on a flat surface is attributable to pregnancy or just my general clutziness?

Hormones:
Yeah, they are crazy.  I'd like to take this opportunity to publicly apologize to my loving husband, the painter, the electrician, and anyone else who has had to endure my hormones over the last few weeks.  While my moods are generally happy, I have recently been known to be indecisive when making decisions involving house construction, paint colors, dinner, and weekend plans.  Sorry (except for when you told me I won the gold medal in bigness, I don't apologize for any reaction I had the to that statement)!

Pooh through the ages:
So as I mentioned in an earlier post, Kurt and I have started reading Winnie-the-Pooh to my belly (under the assumtion that Nate is listening).  We were extremely happy to be able to read from my father's copy (which is over 50 years old).  However, we also recently purchased an iPad.  On it came a free digital copy of the same book!  The comparison is crazy, see for yourself:

Dad's Copy



Title Page of Dad's Copy



Title Page of Digital Copy



Have a great week!
xoxo, Jilly

6 Months, Nursery, Snow, and Happy Birthday Kurt!!!

Hello all!  After pondering what clever nickname we could give to our Nate updates (which is obviously too wordy), we have landed on upNates!!!  Each week we'll give you a little upNate on whats going on in the belly.  This week marks the begining of my 6th month of pregnancy!  It's kinda crazy, feels like it's going too fast and too slow all at the same time.  I am feeling great, almost as if I'm not pregnant at all (apart from the persistent kicking and growing belly).  As for Nate, he is estimated to be at just over a pound and almost a foot long.  His lungs and brain should be developing more this week, so I'll be sure to verbalize only my really "smart" thoughts for his ears.  Here is the funny picture I promised last week from the ultrasound tech...the three arrows are pointing to the family jewels, hahaha:



I can't figure out why this won't rotate the right way, but you get the idea!

 Nursery:

The nursery is under way!  Last week I shared with you all the color scheme for the room.  This week I am attaching the new crib and dresser we ordered. I'm also posting the crazy light and popcorn ceiling which are being replaced even as I type.  The painter and electrician are hard at work at our house every day so stay tuned for new pictures!



This light is super scary and doesn't turn off properly, we've decided on something safer!

Snow:

Will the snow ever stop?  It's been craziness and poor Kurt has had to do all of the shoveling on his own since my doctor told me to "take it easy" this winter.  One puppy not upset by the snow?  Our little Sammy!  Here she is on our back porch enjoying one of the more recent snow storms:

Happy Birthday Kurt!!!:
This past Friday was Kurt's 33rd birthday!  We celebrated over several days with dinner out with his parents, Hibachi with the Michels and the Pietrowskis, and lunch with my family.  Thank you everyone who sent birthday wishes!  We had a fantastic weekend!  (Isn't Kurt the cutest?)

That's all for now, hope you all have an excellent week!

xoxo, Jilly