24 Weeks

How far along? 24 Weeks (no picture this week..sorry!) Baby is as big as a Cantaloupe! Jeez that's beginning to be huge!

Total weight gain/loss: 17 pounds.  Making good progress.  It's steady progress and that's what my doctor likes to see.  Much better than losing 20 pounds like I did at the beginning.

Maternity clothes? Still haven't worn my maternity swim suit but I'm thinking I might wear it soon.  I did buy a dress (at the maternity store. ugh!) to possibly wear to my brother-in-law's wedding this weekend so we'll see if I actually put it on or not.

Stretch marks? No.  But I'm beginning to find shaving my legs (and lotioning up them afterwards) super annoying with my belly (not that it's big or anything, just that it is inconvenient).  Okay, so I've always found shaving to be annoying.  This growing belly is just making things more inconvenient for me.  Gosh I can't wait until it's winter when I can wear pants all the time.

Sleep: My dreams are still trippy but I'm sleeping well.  What's really killing my sleep is the Olympics.  I DVR them during the day so I can fast forward through the commercials and boring parts when I get home and then I still try to stay up to watch the rest of them...yeah...it doesn't quite work as well as I would hope.  I'm still way behind on my DVR'age and they are getting in the way of my sleep but I just can't turn them off.  They're so addicting.  Dan tries to spoil some of the events for me but I try my best to tune him out.

Best moment this week: Finishing the tail end of our unpacking process.  The baby's room is starting to actually look like we could turn it into an actual baby's room instead of a box storage area.  Now we just need to get the stuff that goes inside the baby's room.  That will come with the next few months though.  My sisters have been harassing us to choose a theme for the baby's room and Dan simply replied to them, "Tell them the theme is 'baby'." We're not what you would call 'theme people'.  We're more "make-it-work" people.  (That was a Tim Gunn impression for you Project Runway people) We're both decorationally-challenged so picking out a theme for our baby's room might be more difficult than you think.  The good news is that we are at the tail end of unpacking (obviously not done yet) which means we can FINALLY get started getting on preparing for the little nugget instead of just talking about how we're expecting.

Miss Anything? Coffee, beer, wine, cookie dough, cold cut ham sandwiches, you know....the usual.

Movement: He is getting stronger everyday!  He loves to flip, kick, jab, turn, etc.  Basically he's preparing to be in the Olympics in some type of sport...just not ping pong (let's get real, that's not a real sport and you know it.  There are a few others that are questionable as well but I won't get into those).

Food cravings: Sesame chicken, burritos, chocolate, but mostly DAIRY!  Momma loves her dairy products (cheese, butter, milk, cottage cheese, cream cheese, ice cream, whipped cream, yogurt, etc.).  God thank you for making dairy products so delicious and thank you for making sure I'm not allergic to them.  Every time I open the fridge and see that gallon of milk, I don't hesitate to pour myself a few glasses of it.  Gosh it's so good.  There is a reason God described Eden as a land of milk and honey...because milk is THE best beverage in the world and with it comes all the other amazing dairy products that He wanted to bless the world with.  God is so good.  Thank you for cows! (I think I made the right decision by marrying a man who's family is dairy farmers.  Winning for me!)

Anything making you queasy or sick:  I did pretty well this week.  No bad smells...except the rotting potatoes that were in our kitchen cupboard that we discovered after we came back from vacation.  Whoopsie!  Rotting potatoes rank up there with some of the worst smells in the world.  Therefore it was a candle type of week in the Koch household because it takes special efforts to get rid of that rank smell.  Woof!

Have you started to show yet: As you saw in my last post, the bump has arrived!  It looks like I ate a burrito more than a child but I'm sure it will get there soon.  I'm doing my best to make sure it develops at a healthy rate.  But if you saw the pictures from last week you can see why my bump frustrates me a little.  It's stuck under my belly button because I'm so tall so I feel like it looks more like a "B" than the cute "D" belly that adorable pregnant women get.  I keep having to reassure myself that it will come. It's getting bigger this week so I'm preparing to show it off at my brother-in-law's wedding this weekend if I can.  

Gender: We're adding more boys (well boy, singular) to the Koch legacy.  If you saw some of the adorable pictures of my hubby in my previous post then you would have seen that he only had brothers growing up...and now we're are continuing this tradition by having a little baby boy.  Dan coudn't be more excited.  I just need time to prepare myself for the different'ness that are boys.  I only had sisters growing up so this boy thing is going to be different for me.  Don't get me wrong, I've had plenty of experience taking care of other people's boys through babysitting and the like but I was always able to give them back at the end of the day.  My child will be mine...obviously...full time.  I can't give him back so I need time to prepare on what to do with a boy.  It's so weird to say that.

Labor Signs: No

Symptoms: I've noticed my lower back is starting to get sore.  I must be carrying a load in the front or something.  I also think I've started to have heartburn?  I've never had it before but I think that's what it is.  I could be making stuff up though.  I'm dying to start my aqua aerobics class next week though.

Belly Button in or out? In

Wedding rings on or off? On

Happy or Moody most of the time: Happy! I was sad to have come home from Montana to flat land so now I'm in depressed mode.  Where are my mountains?  Why am I surrounded by corn and soybeans?  Gosh it's so hott here!  etc.  I'm surviving I guess.  I wouldn't mind if we packed up and moved out there though...well I would have to make all of our families move out there with us because I wouldn't want to travel back to visit them.  So until I can convince all 1 million Joneses, Smiths, Kochs, and Cannons to move out to Montana with me, I think I'm stuck in flat Illinois.  At least I'll have my son to keep me company soon.  Overall, I'm a happy camper.

Looking forward to:  I'm looking forward to our next baby appointment which is on Thursday to hear how our nugget is doing.  But I'm also pretty excited for Meggie and David's wedding this weekend!  Gah!  It's going to be so much fun!  Not only do I get to gain another sister this year, but I also plan on dancing my heart out.  It's going to be like a repeat of Dan's other brother's (who got married in April) wedding but I'm actualy feeling well this time so I'm excited to get to chat with friends and family and party to the wee hours of the morning.  I do believe something ridiculous like 500 people (not kidding) will be attending this event so talk about a party.  Meggie and David are perfect for each other and gosh I just can't wait for them to get married!  More girls!