Brie Fit

Other possible subtitles: a study in growing out a short haircut; a tour of ugly bathrooms; or I can’t believe I used to think I was big.

The bullet points for week 26:

• Movement this week is becoming clearer and clearer.  I have a feeling that the baby was sitting breech for a few weeks, because I’d only feel motion down low.  But I felt some pretty epic flip-like feelings, and now I feel motion high above my belly button, on the sides, and all over. 
• Hands down, the weirdest feeling I’ve ever experienced is the sensation of waking up in the morning, only to realize that the baby is already awake, has had his morning coffee, and is leisurely practicing his handstand push-ups in my uterus.  Like, what?  I’m asleep, kid.  You don’t get to wake up before me yet.
• Exercise-wise, this week was a bit of a wash.  I went to CrossFit once, but I’ve been traveling for work so I’ve been mostly doing lots of walking.  Which is a bit weird, because if I get too speedy my round ligaments hurt.
• Food-wise, this week has been terrible because of gross conference food.  No major cravings to report. 
• This week, we ordered the glider for the nursery!  We ordered this one (Best Chairs Quinn, highly reviewed by my bible, Baby Bargains), in a color called Dolphin, which is basically a charcoal gray.  It’s very soft and squishy and big enough for Tim, who is 6’2” (-ish).   The glider is our “splurge” item in the nursery—we ordered an inexpensive but sturdy crib, and bought our dresser secondhand.  After we ordered it, I freaked out that we didn’t buy the ottoman, too, so I’m going to order that soon.  It should show up at the end of July sometime.
• Speaking of the dresser, how about a little HGTV-style before and after?  Before…

and after!

I am not handy in the slightest, but I used this tutorial and banged this puppy out in a weekend.  It’s certainly not perfect, but it looks pretty damn good in my opinion.  We went with a bright white finish to match the crib, and I picked up some cute red glass knobs from a craft store to finish it off.  Total for the dresser, including supplies, was less than $200!  I’ll take it.

So, thus ends the second trimester.  Whaaaat?

I remain constantly flummoxed at how the first trimester just absolutely crawled by, but the second trimester was over in the bat of an eyelash.  In the first trimester, I was mostly completely miserable.  I was scared and had trouble connecting to the fact that this could be real—like, for keeps real—and so I just sort of felt like I had this odd illness for an extended period of time.  I felt like I had a six week long hangover, I hated food, and I couldn’t poop.  It was terrible.

But second trimester was everything everyone on the internet promised and MORE!  You hear the stories about how that light switch flips on somewhere about week 12 or 13 or so and suddenly you feel normal again.  And I did!  And it was exactly as fantastic as I’d hoped. For much of the second trimester, I felt fantastic.  Sure, I had a few issues—like slightly out-of-control asthma, and sciatic pain, and “no, it’s not twins” giantoid syndrome—but most mornings, I’d wake up, stumble into the bathroom, and do a double-take in the mirror like, “hey, who’s that pregnant lady?  Oh right.” 

The only thing about the second trimester that I’m not totally wild about is that I’m rapidly approaching my heaviest weight ever—the point at which I saw pictures, grimaced, and then lost 50 pounds.  And that is a scary thing for me, mentally.  I huff and puff my way up hills and stairs, and it’s a real reminder as to WHY I lost that weight to begin with.  No, I wasn’t 100% successful in keeping it off, but being back THERE again is frightening.  And it’s kind of renewed my commitment to want to get back in the best shape possible after the baby makes his arrival. Except doing that with a baby?  Oy vey.  I don’t know how I’m going to do it.  But I’m going to do my damnedest.

Onward to third trimester! (holyshit holyshit holyshit)

Soooo…I’m in Washington, D.C. this week.

My last work trip until 2013!  Hard to believe.

Anyway, exercise this week has been unofficial—I’m doing lots and lots of walking, which is interesting considering the humidity and the fact that going too fast gives me round ligament pain.

Here’s how traveling is different when visibly pregnant:

• Airport security is way better.  I try to pick a line with a sympathetic-looking female TSA agent, exaggerate the waddle a little bit, and I get waved through the metal detector line.  No weird body scans, no pat-downs. 
• Strangers become talkative.  Particularly old ladies.  I’m going to pin a sign to my front that says “September 16th, it’s a boy, yes I know it’s going to be a long summer.” 
• Everything is slower.  Instead of speed-demoning it to baggage claim, it’s more of a leisurely stroll while my hips and lower back crack twelve times and I try to shuffle the baby off my sciatic nerve.
• No drinking.  Which is basically one of the few things that makes work small-talky receptions and late-night flights bearable. 
• Less exercise pressure.  Instead of worrying about when I’m going to fit in workout sessions this week (which is good, because there’s no hotel gym and this room is the size of a postage stamp), I’m just walking extra and calling it a day.  And I don’t feel a damn bit guilty.
• Swelling.  Between flying, being on my feet a lot, and DC humidity, my wedding rings no longer fit and my toes look like wee sausages. Hooray!

Honestly, I get a lot of fun, easy work trips, but this is not one of them.  It’s been/going to be a long, grueling week, and I can’t wait to go home Saturday night!

Anything else to add to my list?

(PS: Comments on my last Under Armour giveaway post were wonky yesterday, but they should be fixed now.  Weigh in here to win cool stuff!)

Another fairly uneventful pregnancy week in the books.

This week, we bought a dresser for the nursery!

I found this at a most excellent antique market a friend clued me into.  This bad boy was $127.50, is solid oak, and will be refinished.  I’m thinking of painting it either white or charcoal gray, with fun red knobs.

Other stuff:

• Movement is pretty regular now, and if I don’t feel him, I can usually poke or shake my stomach a bit to feel something.  It’s reassuring.  They are getting stronger every day, too!  Not to the point where they’re painful or uncomfortable, but they do occasionally make me pause and say, “whoa.”
• Craving: hard boiled eggs.  Random?  But okay, easy enough.  And healthy!
• We picked a pediatrician this week.  It was easy enough; a friend recommended theirs and I looked them up.  They accept our insurance, and I really like that they have an on-staff lactation consultant and a breastfeeding support group.  Done and done.
• Daycare continues to frustrate me.  I dragged my feet on this decision for awhile, but we ultimately decided that me going back to work makes the most sense.  And now, I’m looking for spots in JANUARY, and am already being waitlisted!  What the hell.  It’s hard enough to make the phone calls, and then to hear “sorry, we’re full” makes me want to scream.

Physically, I feel pretty good.  I usually have a numb right buttcheek by the end of the work day, though.  I definitely feel like my mobility is getting to be limited—twisting is a no-go, and stretching out at CrossFit is interesting because my belly gets in the way.

On to week 26—last week of the second trimester!  Holy crap!

We’re repeating a lot of WODs at CrossFit lately!  I think the theory is that you should be able to see your progress, and that’s motivating, but in my state, it’s kind of the opposite.  Boo.

Last time we did Helen, in September, I finished in under 10 minutes.

This time, not so much.

My times on the KB swings and the pull-ups were probably great, but I’m waaaay slow on the running these days.  Today it was actually making me cramp uncomfortably, so I walked most of the last 400m.  It is what it is.

Milhouse’s life is hard, FYI.

I can’t believe it’s June 5th already.  We have a busy few months coming up—two family weddings, a long work trip next week, my baby shower in Chicago…I’m sure it will be August before we know it.  Eep!

Still time to enter the big Under Armour giveaway here!

Happy twenty-fourth week to me!

Randoms:

• I feel like Lumpy is having a growth spurt this week.  I had about a two-day period where I was insatiably hungry, had lots of round ligament pain, and my belly button reached the point of “officially no longer an innie.”
• I’m getting lots of movement, mostly at night, still.  I hope this baby doesn’t have his days and nights mixed up!  Tim can feel him pretty much every night.
• I’ve been able to maintain fairly normal activity levels up until now, but on Friday, I was on my feet at work all day, and man, I felt it a lot more I normally would.  My hips were achy, my feet swelled a bit, and I was absolutely exhausted!  I think I need to find some more supportive shoes.
• Inappropriate pregnancy comment of the week: “Isn’t she of wonderful size?” (while gesturing to my stomach).  Things that are of wonderful size: Victoria Falls, elephants, prize-winning pumpkins, giant ice cream sundaes.  Not my stomach.
• Cravings: root beer floats.  I don’t even LIKE root beer.  What the heck, kid?

This has been kind of a hormonal, emotional week.  Like, I spent some time thinking, “OMG what have we done?”  And maybe that makes me a bad parent, but I feel like it’s a huge disservice to pretend that pregnancy is all puppies and roses emotionally.  I wonder about having to give up aspects of my life that I love—will my 5:30 CrossFit class be possible anymore?  Can I continue to investigate my obsession with my ice cream maker?  Will we ever go out to a nice dinner again?  Are we going to go broke?

(It is impossible to take a decent self portrait with Tim, because he is 9 inches taller than I am.  Sigh.)

I sometimes feel like I haven’t bonded with this baby very much yet—obviously, I’d do anything to protect him, but it’s all so abstract to me right now that I wonder, “is this really going to be worth it?”  Do I love him?  Well, yes.  But I love him in the sense that I love things like world peace, or the idea of curing cancer.  It’s not the same kind of concrete love that I feel when I look at Tim, for example.  Is that terrible?  At this point, I’m just trusting that at some point, post-partum, those motherly hormones will kick in and we’ll be good to go.  Right?

Moms: when did you bond with your baby?  Were you able to maintain your sense of self afterwards?

Today’s WOD was one we did not too long ago!

When I did it last time, I was about 15 weeks pregnant, and feeling pretty normal.  Last time, I finished in 15:43.

This time…I was slower.  Finished in 18:29, BUT I kept the weights/band for the pull-ups the same.  So, that’s something?

Apparently, then, 10 weeks of pregnancy=3 minute reduction in your WOD time.  Good to know.

It’s been a 12 hour day at work since then and I’m exhausted and my feets are a little swollen.  Time to zone out on the couch with a glass of water!

Buckley hasn’t been featured on the blog for awhile, so I thought I’d share this picture I took the other day.

You know, Buckley was a little shit when we first got him, but he’s really mellowed into an awesome adult cat.  His latest obsession is watching the Today Show.

Anyway, back to your regularly scheduled programming.  Today’s WOD:

I’m into AMRAP workouts lately, because everyone finishes at the same time and I don’t worry about coming in dead last.  (Not that that’s something I SHOULD worry about, but I do.  What?  I’m human.)

Today’s WOD was right up my alley—I really like all those movements, so I was happy to see them on the board.  Unfortunately, I just don’t feel as strong at them as I used to.  The front squats, especially, were not working for me.  My belly was getting in the way, and I felt especially off balance.

Another weird thing I’ve noticed lately is that my feet ache and cramp when I’m doing any kind of serious lifting.  I think I may have to give up my flat, unsupportive CrossFit shoes in favor of a heavier running shoe with more arch support until this baby makes his appearance.

I still think I did pretty well, all things considered.

I allllmost got 12 rounds even, but had about 10 steps left to take when the WOD ended.  Oh well.  It was still a beautiful morning to be outside and moving!

What’s your latest footwear of choice for exercise?

Backing up a bit—yesterday’s WOD was a simple one: move 5,000 pounds from the ground to overhead.  You could choose to do high weight, low reps, or lower weight, high reps…and you could do it by doing snatches, or breaking it up into a power clean/push press or jerk combo.

Since I have very little core strength these days and don’t feel confident doing technical lifts like snatches with heavy weights, I went for 92 reps of 55 pounds.  I split it up into sets of 10, and finished in 15:25.

Today, however, was all about Murph:

Memorial Day Murph is kind of a CrossFit “thing.”  Boxes all over the country are doing this very tough workout in memory of a fallen hero, and ours was no different.

We had Rx, Partner, Team, and Kiddie versions all going on this afternoon.

I was contemplating going for the solo version, but by the time we started at noon, the temperatures were already hovering around 90 degrees and I decided that, unfortunately, now isn’t the time to push myself quite that far.  So, I found a partner and we went for the even split version.

Before picture (stolen from my box’s Facebook page):

We ran a 1/2 mile together, then split up the pull-ups, push-ups, and squats pretty evenly.  My partner did more pull-ups and I did more push-ups, since those are our respective strengths and weaknesses, which worked out well.  Then, we finished up with another 1/2 mile run together, and crossed the finish line together in 32:33. 

After the workout, we cheered on the solo finishers (including two veterans who finished solo in 20 pound weighted vests—whoa), then fired up the grills and had a good old-fashioned barbecue.  Let me tell you: a popsicle has never tasted so good!  It was just a nice time socializing with everyone—I love how family-friendly all our box events are.  It’s so nice to see parents working out with their kids running alongside, and I can’t wait until our little guy can join in the fun, too. 

Mark my words, though: next year?  I WILL do a full solo Murph.  

Don’t forget to enter my Under Armour giveaway by clicking here!  I hope you’re having a great weekend!

Again.  The weeks are flying.  I can’t believe that third freaking trimester is just around the corner.  Do I sound like a broken record yet?

Lumpy’s closet is definitely filling up after a trip home! 

Randoms:

• Consistent movement started this week, I think.  I don’t feel him much during the day, but will get at least a wiggle or two every hour.  I can actually see and feel movement from the outside pretty regularly, too.
• I had an OB appointment this week.  Baby’s heartbeat was normal…the only thing that made me raise an eyebrow was that I apparently gained 8 pounds in 4 weeks.  Pregnancy weight gain is totally normal, of course, and the nurse said that it’s common to go through a growth spurt, but I won’t lie, it freaks me out a little bit.  Funny how it works—in first trimester, I ate like total crap and barely exercised and gained just a few pounds.  Now that I feel like great and I’m exercising regularly and eating much more healthily, my weight explodes!  Go figure.
• RIP innie.  It’s in a precarious half-in, half-out state.  This is the week I think I can officially say it “popped.”
• Cravings have all been healthy this week, which is nice!  I want SUMMER foods—spinach salads, watermelon, corn on the cob, and fresh cherries.  Also, iced coffee.  I’ll be going to the grocery store later to make that happen.
• I feel generally awesome, just larger.  My hips and lower back ache at the end of a long workday, but it’s really no big deal.  Still exercising, and I’m slow, but it feels good!

I think my cloth diaper stash is just about complete, too.  So let’s talk about that, shall we?

Here’s what I have/plan to buy:

• Newborn phase:
• 12 Green Mountain Diapers newborn prefolds (need to buy)
• 12 Green Mountain Diapers size 1 prefolds (need to buy)
• 3 Thirsties Duo size 1 covers 
• 1 Bummis Super Whisper Wrap cover, newborn size
• 3 Snappis
• 3 BumGenius Newborn all-in-ones
• 3 GroVia newborn all-in-ones
• 3 FuzziBunz perfect size pockets, size XS
• One-size diapers:
• 4 BumGenius 4.0 pockets (have 2, need to buy 2)
• 4 BumGenius Elementals all-in-ones (ditto)
• 4 FuzziBunz Elite one-size pockets
• 3 Rumparooz one-size pockets
• 4 Twinkie Tush one-size fitteds
• 2 Blueberry coveralls (need to buy)
• 1 Itti Bitti Tutto all-in-one (freebie!)
• 1 Kawaii one-size pocket (freebie!)
• Mystery one-size freebie on the way!
• Note: we plan to probably buy more one-size diapers once we’ve tried these and know what we like best.  We’re going with the “try a little bit of a lot of things” approach.
• Miscellaneous stuff
• BumGenius diaper sprayer (on registry)
• Cloth wipes (on registry)
• Diaper Dekor (on registry)
• 2 Planetwise pail liners (on registry)
• Medium wet bag for the diaper bag (on registry)
• Cloth-diaper safe detergent
• Cloth-diaper safe diaper cream

I have no idea if this is going to work for us, but I’ve done a LOT of reading and research and hope it will.  The nice part about cloth diapering is that if we fail, they have a pretty high resale value, so we can get most of our money back anyway. 

My favorite site to order cloth diapers from is Kelly’s Closet.  They always have free shipping over $49 (and it’s fast!), and almost always have a coupon code for a free diaper of some kind with an order of $X dollars.  I’ve gotten four perfectly nice diapers this way (one FuzziBunz, one Kawaii, one Itti Bitti Tutto, one on the way), and the surprise is always fun.  Plus, they have rewards points, so after awhile you get store gift credits which is nice.

Anyway.  That’s my piece on cloth diapering.

Week 24.  Bring it on.