Book Review- "The Girlfriend's Guide to Pregnancy"

*Nope, I didn't get this book for free or anything.  I just wanted to write about it.*

 
I read this along side "What to Expect When You're Expecting" and I think that's really the way to read this book. This book is NOT going to explain the science behind what is going on in your pregnant body, so it shouldn't be the ONLY pregnancy book you read. But it DOES talk about the things you'll have to deal with day-to-day during pregnancy (like extra large boobs).

There are a lot of stories about women and their experiences with every aspect of pregnancy, so expect (usually funny) anecdotes that may or may not represent what you're experiencing. I really enjoyed reading this, as it's mostly a compilation of pregnancy and birth experiences.

Some people hate the fact that this book basically tells you to not worry too much about exercise during pregnancy. But I can understand where she's coming from- exercise is great if you can handle it, but lots of women do just fine without weight lifting and running every day. And if you've lost pregnancies or had a hard time getting pregnant (as the author has) you're going to want to take it easy- better safe than sorry.

Make sure you read the new edition- she specifically mentions that she rewrote the entire section on clothing, since maternity fashion has changed significantly since the first edition 10+ years ago.

I would not recommend this book for those who are determined to have a "natural" birth, home birth, etc. Those who are anti-epidural will likely have a hard time with this book's assertions that medicine will not degrade the birth experience.

Great Expectations

Exciting News! Erika and I wanted to announce that she is pregnant! We have both wanted this for a while and we are very excited. The scheduled due date is December 10^th, making her currently about 14 1/2 weeks along. Here are two of the ultrasounds we have  so far. The first is from week 10 and the second is harder to see but it is at 14 weeks. You can see the baby is healthy with a heart rate at 150 bpm.

Baby at 10 weeks

Baby at 14 weeks

The pregnancy experience has been rough so far. Erika has morning sickness and feels queasy off and on throughout the day. Usually she would eat breakfast and have some trouble keeping it down. I'm glad she decided to quit her job and stay at home. It would be a nightmare to try to deal with this kind of morning sickness at a job. Erika definitely has shown her heightened sense of smell. She cooks food that is quick to make to avoid all the smells from the kitchen. The good news is that just in the past few days she has been feeling better and not so nauseated. I'm glad because when Erika is happy, I'm happy.

With the baby coming Erika has started being in the baby mode. First project has become fixing up the second bedroom to be a baby room. We have picked out two color schemes just in case it is a boy or girl. We bought two new 5 shelf book cases to try and condense our belonging and make room for a crib. One idea that Erika had was to take the old entertainment unit we have and make shift it into a diaper changing station with storage. I was a little hesitant but since her Dad agreed it would look good and that he would help, now I'm now all for it. I am not worried anymore and I'm getting pretty excited about it all.

Two other things come with babies, shopping and names. The shopping is going to take a while because babies are expensive. We have a huge list of things we will need to purchase and try to figure out which products will work best by reading through all the user comments is a lot of work. As for baby names, surprisingly that has gone pretty well. We have a few names we have agreed upon and I think I'll leave it at that- for now we're calling him/her "Gummy Bear."

All in all, we are both very happy, and excited to be expecting our first child!

Erika Goes to Boston!

Well, it was actually Sudbury, where my oldest brother and his family live.  My brother was headed to NYC for a little over a week so I went up there to keep my sis-in-law company so she wouldn't go crazy with the kids.  (Hopefully it worked!)

We did some fun things while I was there.

We went to the zoo,

the Discovery Museum,

and just hung out.

I don't know how Cassie does it all day- those kids are just bundles of energy!  But I had a lot of fun hanging out with them.