32 Weeks!

Eight months already! I can't believe that Rob and I only have eight more weeks (give or take) before the baby arrives.  In our childbirth class we learned that a woman's first labor and delivery closely mimics her mother's first labor and delivery. If this is in fact the case the baby might be here sooner than eight weeks, because I was a first baby and I was two weeks early! That would be just peachy with me too cause I'm kind of over being preg- I want the baby to get here!

In reality, we still have a lot to do before the baby gets here. I finally got all my wall art framed, and the giraffe decal and animal heads arrived this week.  He won't say it, but I think Rob hates the animal heads (I think they are hilariously awesome).  Apparently, because they are fake, they creep him out.  This is going to have to be one of those times where Rob and I just don't understand each other. I'm creeped out by the actual dead animal heads and bodies at the farm house and he is not. He is creeped out by white resin animal heads that were never alive and I am not. Hey, no couple is perfect right?! Ha!  We haven't hung any of our decorations yet, the giraffe was rolled up for shipping, so it's laid flat on the floor to... well, get flat, and we still need our glider chair and maybe a small bookcase for the room. The glider is on our registry, so we figured we'll wait til after the next shower before we make any purchases ourselves.  Once we have everything we need, we plan to fill in the gaps and finalize the nursery.

We did get quite a bit of stuff this past Saturday at our first baby shower up in New Jersey. It was a lot of fun, it was the first "Jack and Jill" baby shower I'd been too, and really it was more of a big holiday dinner/party/bbq but I was the only one who got presents. I didn't really open any of my presents though, I have several cousins between the ages of 3-8... they basically tore open all my gifts. Thank God my aunt was writing down who gave me what, because I had no idea. When I packed up the gifts I would say 50% of the stuff I didn't see while gifts were being opened. So, if you were at my shower, and my thank you card left some gift out- I'm sorry!  We did get a lot of fun stuff, and lots of cute clothes! My grandmother even knitted the baby an outfit (pants, hooded sweater, booties, and mittens) and a baby blanket. They are beautiful!

And............. we finally decided on a name! If you are a member of my family, or if you've met my family, you know we can be, what's the right word? Pushy, we can be pushy. On our way to the airport on Friday, Rob said, we need to decide on a name right now, otherwise everyone will be harassing us at the shower. Nothing like family to light a fire under your bum! We decided on two names we had been discussing since the beginning. We had wanted to use family names from the start, and we decided to name Baby Boy after both of our dads. So, Baby Boy's name is Michael Allen Seerley. Michael is my dad's first name, and Allen is Rob's dad's middle name (Allen is Rob's great-grandmother's maiden name; quite a few of his relatives have Allen as middle names).  It's kind of funny that after all our back and forth disagreements about names and not liking what each other liked, we ended up going back to names we discussed really early on in our pregnancy. Clearly we were over-thinking the name thing.  The best news- there was a clear second place name that we both liked. So if our next baby is a boy too, we won't be arguing for eight months over a name!

Oy, my face looks FAT. Not my best angle, gross.

How far along? 32 Weeks- 8 months!

Total weight gain/loss:  138, +15
Maternity clothes? Still wearing a mixture of regular and maternity.
Measurements: Waist: 38 inches, Hips: 39.5 inches. 
Stretch marks? Nope.
Sleep: Not great at all. My hips have been getting sore, so I roll over a whole lot, and rolling strains my tummy muscles- let's just say sleeping is unpleasant.

What is Baby doing? He has been practicing sucking, breathing, and swallowing. With all the fat that he has been packing on, his skin is no longer clear- it's baby pink!

Best moment this week: Seeing all our friends and family at our shower this past weekend!
Movement: Lots, my cousins Lia and Michael were really excited to feel the baby move.
Miss Anything? I miss being able to bend over and pick stuff up.
Food cravings: Nope.
Anything making you queasy or sick: Nope. 
Have you started to show yet: Last week I said I had a big ol' baby bump. At the shower Saturday I heard a lot of, "Oh, I thought you'd be bigger," and, "You're EIGHT months pregnant? You look five months." I am going to take these comments as compliments. 
Gender: A baby boy who FINALLY has a name! Yay!

Labor Signs: I had a serious Braxton-Hicks contraction last Thursday night. It was uncomfortable, and lasted quite a while, but with my trusty heating pad, body pillow, and Rob massaging my back, it wasn't too bad.
Belly Button in or out? Flat as a pancake.
Wedding rings on or off? Still on; some days they feel normal and other days they feel tight.
Happy or Moody most of the time: Happy. 
Looking forward to: This weekend I have a doctor's appointment on Friday (it will be the first time in the states Rob gets to go with me!) and Saturday we have our hospital tour.