33 Week Checkup

We had our 33 week check-up yesterday for Parker and it probably took about as long as it will take you to read this post! The doctor listened to Parker's heartbeat and recorded it at 129...slowly decreasing at each appointment, which it's supposed to. And, she measured my stomach...drumroll please, the measurement was 32.5! So, it's actually the same as it was at 30 weeks and exactly the same as I am in the number of weeks. I guess my expanding stomach decided to slow down a bit, finally! Although, I did manage to gain 4 pounds from my last appointment, so I'm sure that weight went somewhere else on my body that it probably didn't need to go.

That pretty much summed up the appointment and we don't go back until April 8th, exactly one month before I'm due. Stay tuned until then for more updates...hopefully I will have pictures of Parker's nursery in progress before then.

Tristan's favorite place to play (for the moment at least)

I snapped these pictures the other day of Tristan's new favorite place to play. Just another place that he constantly hears "Tristan, get out of there"!

Crawling up to sit on the door, thinking Mommy is not watching

Realizing he has been caught in the act

All smiles!

No need to write anything here, just look at that face!

We might have figured out this eating thing...

Okay, a few posts back I wrote a novel about Tristan's eating habits, so I promise I will keep this short and sweet!

Tristan is still picky about what he eats but has been much more open to eating when I let him feed himself with his own fork! I started giving him a fork a few weeks ago and he has pretty much come obsessed with it. Not only does he like to feed himself with it, he even wants to stab his own food, which he is able to do pretty darn well, depending upon what it is. He's really good with mac and cheese, ravioli, pears and sometimes meat sticks, bananas, chicken nuggets, sweet potato fries, etc. He hasn't been able to get the harder texture stuff like grapes, so I usually put those on the fork for him, and he shoves the fork in his mouth.

In addition to the fork, he wants to use the spoon himself too! This is definitely messy! I don't always let him hold the spoon completely by himself, becuase we would have food everywhere , but he is usually satisfied as long as he is holding part of the spoon with me. His favorite thing to eat with a spoon is a bowl of cheerios with milk and bananas for breakfast. He won't even eat his banana sliced up off his tray now...it has to be in his cereal and eaten with his spoon!

I guess poor Tristan has been trying to assert his independence and all the while I have been wondering why this kid just wouldn't eat...lesson learned! I haven't taken any pictures of him eating with his utensils (usually becuase I am busy monitoring him to make sure the bowl of food doesn't end up on the ground), but enjoy the pictures of him eating a very messy bean and cheese taco.

A bean and cheese taco taste test

Deliberating...do I like this or not?

The decision: screams of enjoyment

More screams and squeals

Happily covered in bean and cheese

Happy St. Patty's Day

Easter, already?

Here's a peek at Tristan's Easter pictures I had taken last week. I can't believe that Easter is next weekend, it just seems way too early! I am planning on taking Tristan to the mall this week to have his picture taken with the Easter bunny...so for those of you loyal blog readers who remember last years scary bunny picture (click here), don't worry, another one is coming!

Tristan, get out of there!

It seems that every day Tristan finds a new place to "play", like the refrigerator or pantry. If I turn my head for one second, he has opened something up and decided to remove all the contents. His latest accomplishment is opening the dishwasher, much to my dismay...this was the one place I was hoping he wouldn't figure out how to open.

Usually if hears me open the dishwasher he comes running into the kitchen, ready to grab the plates and silverwear, but normally I get it closed (with his help) and don't have to worry about him getting to the dishes until the next time I open it up. Well, the other day I looked over and he was pushing the button/handle up and pulling the dishwasher door open...I was quite surprised he had figured this out and was wondering what in the world am I going to do to keep him out of there. I haven't come up with any solutions yet and have just be keeping a close eye on him around the dishwasher. Luckily, we have only had one plate casualty, and that was before he learned to open the door himself!

Check out a couple of his favorite places to play below.

One of my favorite times...

There's nothing like your baby falling asleep on you or in your arms and then you dozing off too...this used to happen all the time when Tristan was a little baby, but not so much any more. I love that we were able to snap a picture!

Anyone Know What Today Is?

If you guessed daylight savings time change you are wrong! Although the time change does take place this weekend, that's not exactly what I was thinking of. Today marks exactly 2 months before Parker is due to arrive. We are getting closer every day and I can't wait, not only for this pregnancy to be over, but most of all to hold my new little baby boy.

In the upcoming weeks I am going to be posting, hopefully, some pictures of his bedding and what we are going to be doing in his nursery. At this stage of my pregnancy with Tristan I was way ahead of the game, already painted his room, had wood floors laid, furniture set up, bedding ordered and shopping for accessories to complete his room. It has been a little different with Parker, because we literally don't have anywhere to put all the stuff so we have kind of held off on buying things. For those of you who don't know, we are trying to sell our house, in this terrible market, and haven't had much luck thus far.

If we haven't sold the house by next month, we will definitely start moving furniture around to make the front spare bedroom into Parker's room, and I will have some pictures to post. Until then, you will just have to wait to see his room!

Just for fun I posted a poll on the left side of my blog to guess Parker's due date...click one of the four options and we'll see how many of you were right in about 2 months!

One well trained circus monkey!

We get a lot of comments from others about how well Tristan "performs" on command that I thought I would share a few clips of his latest skills. Enjoy!

Fun Places to Play

I forgot to post these pictures in February...they're almost a month old now!

Fun times at Landa Park

Exploring the Children's Museum spaceship with Kinsley

Quick Update About Parker

I haven't had a chance to post about my Tuesday visit to the doctor for our 30 week check-up yet, so here goes.

Not a whole lot to say and no sonogram pictures...the doctor did the normal stomach measure with the tape measure and listened to Parker's heartbeat. The heartbeat was 136, totally normal, and my stomach measured at 32.5. That makes me only about 2.5 to 3 weeks ahead, which I am perfectly happy about...I feel so big that I was seriously expecting to go in and measure like 35 or 36! She reassured me that it is normal to get bigger faster with your second pregnancy and that the baby is progressing normally.

Also, I didn't gain any weight since my previous appointment, so that puts me at about 20 pounds thus far, all of which I gained in my second trimester! When I didn't gain any weight in my first trimester I thought that I wasn't going to gain a lot of weight or get very big with this pregnancy...I had already heard the rumors that you start to show and get much bigger with your second, but I thought I was going to be the exception. Well, apparently I was wrong because I made up for it in the second trimester by gaining a pound and a half a week.

The only other new things going on are I'm having Braxton Hicks contractions, painless for the most part, just my stomach tightening until it is rock hard making it difficult to move around until my stomach untightens, some major heartburn, sensitive gums, sleepiness and it is definitely getting harder to carry Tristan around for an extended period of time. I'm actually feeling the way I felt during the last 3 weeks of my pregnancy with Tristan...I think it is going to be a long 2 months ahead!

That's it for now until my next appointment at 33 weeks.

In Case You Were Wondering...

I know there are some curious minds out there who I don't get to see on a regular basis, so this post is for you! So, if you are not one of those individuals and you don't like to see pregnant tummies, then I suggest you stop reading right now!

I have mentioned a couple of times already that I am measuring much bigger with this pregnancy than I did with Tristan and that I feel ginormous (trust me, it is the appropriate word to describe how I'm feeling right now), but sometimes a picture can say what words can't! That's right, drumroll please, I am actually posting some pictures of my stomach...I never even took any when I was pregnant with Tristan, except one picture about 6 days before he was born. I guess I figured I didn't need to capture in pictures the way I was feeling at the time, but now I wish I would have.

So without further ado, here are pics at 28 and 29 weeks.

Belly pic at 28 weeks


For comparison, I posted a picture of my friend Courtney at 28 weeks (which I stole off her blog). I think the pictures speak volumes, but then again, her picture is from her first pregnancy and she is smaller than me to begin with! Hopefully she doesn't want to kill me when she sees this posted here!

Courtney at 28 weeks

Belly pics at 29 weeks


Another comparison...my belly pic 6 days before Tristan was born

Oh no, it's time to eat!

Mealtime, one of my most dreaded times of the day, and it occurs at least three times every single day. I never know if it is going to be an easy, clean, everyone is happy meal or a fussy, "I'm not going to eat anything you put in front of me", throw all the food on the floor meal. Some days I get three "good" meals, which is rare, some days three "bad" meals, not too often, but mostly I get a combo, one or two "good" ones and the other(s) "bad".

Breakfast: The easiest meal by far is breakfast, about 95% of the time Tristan and I are both satisfied with his breakfast behavior. He normally eats breakfast around 9:30/10:00 a.m. since he drinks milk when he wakes up around 8ish and isn't quite ready to eat until a little later. Around this time I usually ask him if he is hungry and he replies "num, num, num", walks over to his highchair, puts his hands in the air and waits for me to pick him up and strap him in. I then get him a bib and begin to slice a banana...he pretty much eats a banana everyday, unless I run out and haven't made it back to the store. After putting the banana on his tray I normally wash the dishes in the sink, make the bed or do some other household task (real fun stuff!). My cue to come back is when he starts making a lot of noise and squirming, to which I find one of two things.

Either he has eaten all of his banana and is ready for something else or half the banana is on the floor, his way of showing me he just wasn't in the mood for a banana that morning and is ready to move on to something else. So we move on to a NutriGrain bar or Cheerios and finally a yogurt. I can pretty much bet my entire life savings on him eating the yogurt...this kid is absolutely obsessed with yogurt, if he could survive on yogurt alone then mealtimes would be a piece of cake! After he scarfs this down, all that is left to clean are his grubby little hands and face. This is when the lion lets loose...he can't stand for me to clean him up after a meal, but we get through it and he is off to play again, concluding the breakfast meal.

I know it seems kind of mundane and boring that Tristan eats pretty much the same thing everyday for breakfast, but he really doesn't like to budge from his breakfast routine. I have tried pancakes, waffles, blueberry waffles, banana muffins, eggs, oatmeal and a ton of other things, but he is pretty content with his banana, Cheerios and of course, yogurt (at least it comes in multiple flavors and is made with whole milk!). Although, we did stray from our normal breakfast routine the other day when I took Tristan to eat breakfast tacos at a local Mexican restaurant...he actually ate about half of a bean and cheese breakfast taco, and of course a yogurt! The next morning is ready for good old faithful though!

So, you are probably thinking that this doesn't sound too bad, right? Well, keep in mind that I did mention that breakfast was by far the easiest meal of the day, and it is also when Tristan eats his favorite food, yogurt.

Lunch: Completely hot and cold when it comes to lunch, but on average this is when I seem to get most of the "bad" meals and when I end up the most frustrated and thinking that my child is going to shrivel up from a lack of nutrition. One day he eats most of what I give him and the next day he'd rather starve than eat what I put on his tray and pretty much throws everything on the floor in protest. We have absolutely no pattern or schedule for lunch, unlike breakfast. He usually eats after he wakes up from his nap, any time from 1:30 to 3:00, totally depends on if he takes an hour and a half nap or a three hour nap (yes, he took a 3 hour nap the other day!).

I have been trying to expose him to more "adult" foods since he was about 11 months, but this kid is so stubborn and picky about taste and texture that he won't even try half the stuff I give him and refuses to eat baby food. I can usually get a piece a of cheese down him, and some days that's all he wants to eat. Other days, he'll polish off a whole jar of meats sticks along with his cheese, but the next day I struggle to get one or two sticks in his tummy. He's not really a big fan of sliced deli meat, he tends to chew it for awhile and then pull it out of his mouth and pick up another piece just to chew it and eventually pull it out, repeating this process over and over. For awhile, he would eat sliced pears and peaches everyday, but now it's a toss up whether he wants those too. Strawberries used to be a favorite, but he has recently decided to give those up altogether.

Lately, he has really liked grapes, blueberries and blackberries, but not the whole piece of fruit. He puts a sliced grape in his mouth, chews on it until he gets the entire middle part out and then spits out only the skin. He does the same with the berries, basically biting into the berry to make the juice gush and then pulls the rest out...what a trip this kid is!

Other foods that sometimes make the cut, and sometimes don't, include thinly sliced apples, applesauce, baby fruit strips (essentially dried fruit), bread, peanut butter crackers, NutriGrain bars, goldfish and graham crackers (sometimes he'd rather crumple the cracker up than eat it). But, animal cookies and vanilla wafers almost always pass the taste test for Tristan!

Are you beginning to understand what I am talking about when I say I dread mealtimes? Lunch ends up taking anywhere from 20 to 45 minutes everyday, and that doesn't inlcude all the cleaning up I have to do!

Dinner: Much like lunch, I never know quite what to expect at dinner, but I do think I get more "good" meals than "bad". If we go out to eat for dinner, then I order him a grilled cheese sandwich, macaroni and cheese, cheese quesadilla, or ravioli...depends on where we go...normally, he gladly accepts any of these. He also LOVES the honey wheat bread served at Outback...he practically eats half a loaf of it. Funny how he will eat bread from there or a grilled cheese sandwich, which consists primarily of bread, but when I give him bread at home he doesn't want anything to do with it, other than to throw it on the floor.

At home his favorites are cheese or meat ravioli covered in tomato sauce...he even likes to eat the leftover tomato sauce from a spoon! A close runner-up is pasta shells and cheese. He is actually pretty happy with most pasta dishes, as long as the noodles are small, not long and stringy like spaghetti or vermicelli...there's that pickiness about texture again. It's probably the reason he is picky about meat as well-I have had a hard time finding meats that Tristan will eat. Since he doesn't always want the meat sticks and tends to spit out most of the deli meat I really don't know what to give him other than meat ravioli or the meat sauce from spaghetti. He has eaten extremely tender chicken fajita before and seemed to like that. Any suggestions from experienced parents are welcome!

You may have noticed that I haven't mentioned much about vegetables...well, that is because Tristan turns his nose up at every vegetable before he even tries it out. I have tried green beans (who doesn't like green beans?), halved cherry tomatoes, diced carrots, peas, corn, broccoli and cheese bites, etc. They are all pretty much a "no" in his book. The only thing Victor and I have been able to get him to eat is a sweet potato (with a sprinkle of cinnamon and brown sugar). I have even tried to be creative (I say "creative" instead of "sneaky") when it comes to getting vegetables in Tristan's stomach.

Since he likes ravioli and mac and cheese so much I have mixed his vegetables in those, but it only half works. Once he catches on that there are veggies in his food he manages to eat all the pasta and sauce part and spits out just the veggies...it is really amazing how he can separate the foods in his mouth and manage to just spit out the veggies! I have also tried covering the broccoli and cheese bites in tomato sauce, but that just really irked him! He thought he was getting one of his good ole favorites, and instead it was broccoli! Once again, any suggestions are more than welcome!

I guess the only thing that has helped keep Tristan interested in eating and trying new foods, rather than throwing or playing with it, has been that I have let him feed himself with a fork the past few days, and he is actually quite good at it! He has a hard time stabbing his food, so I usually help him with that, but once it's on the fork, he puts it right in his mouth. He ate his bean and cheese taco from the other day with a fork, a whole bowl of ravioli the other night and part of his banana this morning using a fork. I have to say, I am quite impressed, especially since I am letting him use a real fork...I just haven't bought any of the baby forks and he does such a good job with a real fork that I am wondering if I need to. Of course, he is closely supervised when he has a fork in hand!

It's probably time I wrap it up...as you can tell by reading this (if you made it this far), mealtime is quite an adventure at our house. Oh, how I long for the days when eating used to be such a quick, easy and clean task...two jars of baby food/cereal per meal, fed by Mom and consumed within 5-10 minutes. What happened to that? I guess I'll have to keep wondering!

Well, I couldn't expect you guys to read this endless post and not give you any pictures, so enjoy the ones below but don't let all the smiles fool you, I just don't remember to take the ones when he is throwing food all over the floor!

Yummy graham cracker!

Here Mommy, you have some

You don't want my cracker after I've been gnawing on it?

I guess I'll just have to enjoy it then

See the spit out blueberries on the bib (yes, it is a Thanksgiving bib, but it is one of the bigger bibs I have, which is needed these days)

Look at that berry-stained hand

Sucking out the middle of the grape

Mmnnnn, tastes good

Hahaha, guess what I am going to do next with this blackberry