Sorry for the delay in updating everyone on the pregnancy. Things have been so busy since we came home!

The end of the pregnancy has been going so quickly. I am now 35 weeks pregnant and I still feel pretty good. I have occasional discomfort and spend about an hour awake each night waiting for Andy to go back to sleep after I go to the bathroom. I have almost decided to make my permanent residence in the bathroom. It feels like my bladder is always full although this is clearly not the case since most of the time hardly anything comes out (too much info??? :-)). I haven’t really gotten used to my big belly and find that I am often ramming Andy into doors, Ben and anything else that I try to squeeze past. Andy is definitely running out of space and I can feel him kicking and punching all the time. He had the hiccups for the first time last week and it was funny to see my entire stomach jump.

We have now taken our hospital tour, our childbirth preparation classes and our breastfeeding class. I think we know the material pretty well, but can you really be prepared for childbirth? We’re getting very excited as we get closer and closer. We have started to make plans for decorating Andy’s room and hopefully we will be ready for him when he decides to come!

Whew! We’re almost there! It’s hard to believe that I am already in my third trimester. Time has gone by so quickly (especially since Eden came home). My belly button is basically flat now and Eden and I can play peek-a-boo around my tummy because I can no longer see her when she’s at my feet. Andy moves a lot and I feel him most often on the right side. He gives little kicks just below my ribs. He moves around a lot when I lay down at night but I am getting used to it. I am not getting used to the feeling of my skin stretching at night. Sometimes I don’t even want to move because my stomach feels like it is stretched to the max. I’m still dancing at Sally Test with the kids but I definitely don’t do the jumping in the bunny hop or the straddle stretch during the cool down any more. The kids laugh at me during the song where we ‘hug your knees’ because I can’t put my knees together to hug them, I have to stick my belly in between them. Eden likes to ‘Pat, pat, Baby Andy’ and to give him kisses which is very cute.

I am meeting with my OB here in Kenya over the weekend to discuss our travel plans and wrap things up before we head home, then I have an appointment on the 4th with my OB in the US. We are hoping that we will get a clearer ultrasound picture and confirm 100% that Andy is a boy.

Wow, time is flying! I feel like we just posted our 20 week update. Andy is moving all the time now. He likes to kick Eden when she sleeps on my belly and he gets very active at night when I lay down. That makes sleep even more challenging because every time I get up with Eden, I have to wait about 10-15 minutes for Andy to stop moving after I get back in bed.

Ben was finally able to feel Andy on Oct. 25. He was very excited and says that it seems a lot more real now.

I had my first OB visit here a couple weeks ago and Sierra said that everything looked great and she was very happy with me until the end of my appointment when she weighed me. I had lost a couple of pounds since my last check-up in Indianapolis and that got me in trouble. She told me to make sure that I am eating enough and trying to get 6 smaller meals in instead of just 3 big ones. It’s hard because we’re so busy and the food options are pretty limited here, but I have gained 3 pounds since my appointment, so I think I’m doing pretty well.

You can see that my stomach has really grown these last four weeks. I’ve had lots of comments recently about how big I am getting and I’ve even found my clothes are fitting differently. My shirts suddenly seem much shorter in the front. We bumped the ultrasound back to my next appointment so we will just do everything on November 13. We will be sure to take pictures of the ultrasound for everyone to see!