29 Weeks

Week 29, the week before the 30's count down.  Thinking about it gets me a little anxious since Tillman came early, and surprised us all.  I hope Sweet Caroline will hang out until her due date.  Our next few weeks will consist of cleaning out the house to make room for Caroline, getting out all the "baby things," and getting as much sleep as possible before she arrives!

I have also had to "clean out."  Maternity clothes that is...all the smalls are now not fitting, so I had to say good bye to those, and we're on to bigger and better (maybe) things!

Speaking of cleaning out for Caroline, I've put a few things on Craigslist.  Yesterday, I thought I sold a sink that was left over from our home renovation.  Got it out of the storage house, cleaned it, and toted it to the front door for pick up.  Did I mention that it is a ceramic/fireclay sink? Too heavy for Mrs Pregnant in the Lowcountry to be carrying, but I did anyway.  I feel like I have pulled a muscle in my torso.  As if those muscles aren't stretched enough at this point, I'm sure it is over extended at this point!  I can't be doing that again because I was out a breath for two hours after that.  We went on a walk, and I was having t catch my breath to carry a conversation.  Did I mention the guy didn't even show up to get the darn sink....ugh!

Shameless Plug: Help us clean out for Caroline; shop our Craigslist postings and search 5586.

I also purchased her mattress and her chandelier came in this week.  This will make the room a little more girly and will go well with her furniture.  We hope her furniture will arrive within the next two weeks.

How big is baby at 29 weeks?
Baby will be weighing in at around 2.54 pounds (1.153kg) and measuring 15.2 inches (38.6cm).
How is baby developing and growing
Baby's lungs will be developed enough that he/she would be able to breath air. Baby's brain is now developed enough that it can control rhythmic breathing, and so if baby were to be born now, then he/she would be able to breathe on his/her own. In fact - with each passing day baby's chances of surviving outside of the womb increase dramatically.
Should be noticing a vast change now in your pregnancy week by week as baby will be growing bigger and bigger quite quickly now. Because weight gain is so rapid now, babies that are born prematurely, even if only a few weeks, may be tiny and a lot smaller than babies which go to the full term of your pregnancy.
Here are a couple of interesting factors about birth weight:

• Boys weigh more than girls
• Birth weight increases with the increasing number of pregnancies you have.

As baby's brain and senses develop she will become more and more sensitive to light and dark, sound, taste and even baby's skin is becoming sensitive. By the end of this week baby's eyes will even be capable of moving inside their sockets. Baby will be practicing seeing.

Run For The Money

Dear Master Tillman,
You are giving me and daddy a "run for our money these days."  Please ease up on us, little man!
Love,
Mommy!

So, Tillman has been rather temperamental the past few weeks.  "Time out" is the name of the game at daycare and at home.  Yesterday, when I got to school, he was in time out.  The temper-tantrums can be over just about anything these days.  Sometime we can't even figure out what they are even about.  Tillman has been know to "fall out" in the daycare parking lot, kick his shoes off, throw food while eating, dump food out in his car seat (my personal fave), and get stiff-bodied (this one is hard to explain but he makes himself stiff as a board that way you can't carry him unless it is football-style).

By no means do I think poor Tillman is a bad child, it is just tough at times to see him scream and get really upset.  It is a way of expressing himself, and we are working on figuring this little guy out.

Tillman also brought home all the "daycare yuckiness" this week, and Nick is "out of commission" with a 103 fever!  We think Nick has Hand Foot and Mouth.  Tillman currently has a rash that looks like HFMD that we thought was diaper rash, but I saw a bump on his lip as well--it makes me think, it might be that.  He doesn't have any fever, and appears fine (daycare folks think he is fine too--good thing because having Nick and Tillman at home all day....Oy Vey!).  This rash can come back time to time (per physician), so I'm thinking his has reappeared.  For those of you coming over for a pool party on Saturday, Tillman isn't contagious, but Nick may be, so we might be meeting folks at the beach if Nick isn't better.

27 Week Appointment

I went to Dr. Villers this morning.  The glucose screening was normal, so that is very good.  It was a rather quick appointment.  She checked Caroline's heart rate, and Dr. Villers stated that Caroline was very happy in there!  So far, I've gained 20 lbs (ugh!), she said the weight gain is fine.  She wants to see her patients gain no more than 30 lbs.  I'll see Dr. Villers in 2 weeks again.
I asked about when I would get another ultrasound.  She said since she was normal weight range at 20 weeks that we probably won't need another.  However, she won't want her to be too big if we are going to try for a VBAC this time.  We were spoiled with all the ultrasounds for Tillman since they were tracking his growth.  It seems strange not to have them this time; however, I'm glad everything is normal.

Daycare Medical Alert!

If Tillman comes home this week without a sickness, it will be a miracle!

I never thought I would say "thank goodness Tillman has had Hand, Foot, and Mouth disease," but I am glad that he has had it in hopes that he will be immune to all of it going around at the daycare.

My sister and I had the 5th disease when we were little, so I'm glad I had that as some of these things can be bad for a pregnant lady!

Note to self, wear a mask when picking up Tillman, sanitize the hands after leaving, and try not to breath in that place! Boy, do I love my snot nose daycare kid! :-)

27 Weeks

We've entered into the 3rd trimester.  This pregnancy is going by way too fast!  The baby belly sure looks like we are in the 3rd trimester, but mentally, I'm not prepared.  I am grateful that we have made it to the 3rd trimester without any complications so far.  We are very fortunate to meet this milestone, as this is the viable baby marker.  If Miss Caroline was to come now, she would have a good chance at survival.  Of course, it would be a long road to recovery, and we want her to stay inside as long as possible.  The 27th week milestone has always been in the back of my mind ever since hearing that piece of information from a NNICU nurse.

This mamma has an appointment with Dr. Villers on Thursday.  I assume since I didn't hear back from the blood test that my glucose levels were normal.  I hope to get clarification on that when I go.  Also, I hope to get to take a peak at Caroline.  Since she measured normal at the 20 week ultrasound, there was no need for further ones, but I'd still like to see how she is doing in there!

Lots of planning has been happening around Sweet Caroline's arrival.  She has bedding, we've picked out a crib and furniture, and we're gathering hand-me-downs for the little one as well.

Bubblegum by Bananafish is Caroline's bedding.
Our set includes the bedding & a night light.
Cici is going to monogram the quilt. 

Here's Sweet Caroline's furniture for the next 18 years!
Love the crib & toddler bed has the drawer underneath! 

We plan to get the crib, night stand, door dresser
& wardrobe mirrored door. A HUGE thanks to Caroline's
Cici & JRS for purchasing this set for Miss Caroline.

Since Miss Caroline Sutherland is the first girl on either side of the family, there are no hand-me-downs from the cousins.  I have gone through Tillman's things, and gathered all of the "gender neutral" clothing.  It totaled to be one tote from 0-12 mo clothing.  This mamma has some shopping to do.  Just not sure what to buy, since we don't know how big she will be.  I guess we'll just shop along and along for her. I am very grateful to several of our friends who have offered hand-me-downs.  This will be a huge help!

I have also started stock piling diapers!  My weekly trips to Publix have been a little bit more expensive lately.  I've been gathering coupons throughout the week and will buy the diapers for sure if I have a store and a manufacture's coupon.  However, if the store has diapers or wipes on special and I have a coupon, I often buy them as well.  A $1.50 off a pack of diapers just doesn't go to far when the cheapest pack is $10! I'm purchasing size 1 and higher, as we just don't know how big Miss Caroline will be!


How big is baby?
Congratulations! This week is the beginning of your third trimester. Baby now weighs 1.93 pounds (875g) and measures from head to toe at around 14.41 inches (36.6cm).
How's baby developing and growing?
Your baby's eyes first appear at around 5 weeks after gestation and look like a pair of shallow grooves on each side of the brain. These grooves continue to develop and will turn into pockets, called optical vesicles, of which the lenses will start developing. At around 7 to 10 weeks the eyes start moving toward the middle of the face and at around 8 weeks blood vessels start to form and during the 9th week the pupils form.
At this stage the nerve connection from the eyes to the brain will start to form, this is called the optic nerve. At 11 to 12 weeks the eyelids form but remain fused together until 27 to 28 weeks, when they start to open and close and he/she will start to develop his/her sense of sight.
Your babys brain continues to grow and develop, and over the coming month special attention will be paid to developing the forebrain. There is also particular development in the portions of the brain which deal with visual and auditory information.

25 Weeks...I THINK we have a name!

 Sweet Caroline has been growing...a lot.  My belly growth has been out of control the past few weeks.  It does make me a little nervous to get my glucose test today.  I go at 4PM today for my glucose blood test and to see the doctor.  I'll be seeing a different doctor this time, so it will be interesting to see if they say anything different than Dr. Villers.  Particularly, I'm going to ask her about my belly growth and my weight.  I do feel that most of the weight is in the belly (but as you can tell by the picture above, my arm looks huge too).  The weight gain is concerning and I'm interested to hear the results of the blood test, since gestational diabetes babies can be large (not necessarily healthy for mom or baby).

After many weeks of hashing out names in my head and talking them over with Nick and family.  I THINK we have settled on a FULL name.  This middle name hasn't been mentioned before, but I think it is the right choice.

Caroline Sutherland

With this name, Caroline would have my mother's initials (CSS), and Sutherland is also my mom's maiden name.  I have always loved my mom's maiden name, and believe it is a very strong name.  My mom's generation is the last to hold the last name, Sutherland, within our blood line, so Miss Caroline will carry it on as her middle name.    

The meaning and origin of Caroline:

English & Scottish origin-Meaning is Joy. Song of happiness. Also feminine variant of Charles:manly. 

Latin origin-Meaning from Carol (joyous song) and Linda (pretty).

The meaning and origin of Sutherland:

Scottish-a sur-name meaning South-land or from the south (I'm taking that as "a southern girl!"). Sutherland is also an area of the Highlands of Scotland. The Sutherland clan (sur-name) motto is Sans Peur- "without fear."

At week 25, Miss Caroline should be...

The measurement is now at around 13.62 inches (34.6cm) and baby is now weighing approximately 1.46 pounds (660g).
If you were to go into labor now, baby would have a strong chance of surviving.
Baby is still extremely small and although there are chances of him/her surviving should he be born now, he/she would probably spend several months in hospital.
The smallest of the blood vessels are now starting to form underneath your babies skin now, and as they begin to fill with blood, your baby's skin takes on a pinkish appearance.

20 Months (5.12.12)

NICU reunion at MUSC Children's Hospital
(Tillman was invited because he was in level 2 nursery for a couple days)

Master Tillman turned 20 months on Saturday.  This monthly birthday actually snuck up on me.  I didn't realize it was last Saturday until today!  Tillman must have been very tired on his little monthly birthday because he took a 3 hour nap on Saturday!

Bounce house at NICU reunion

Tillman knows what he wants and if we don't interpret him correctly, boy does that put him in a tail-spin!  His language hasn't caught up with his mind/knowing of things, and that is frustrating for all.  Sometimes it turns into food being thrown, hitting, or a toddler laying out on the floor in a tizzy!  With all of that going on, we've had to implement time out.  Time out at first just got him more mad, but he was really respectful of it.  Nick created a corner in our dinning room for time out (between the wall and china cabinet).  When he is put there, he doesn't try to bolt (I totally thought he would do this); he stays there!  We only leave him there for a short time, but when he comes back out, he is a new child.  Time out has worked much better than popping him on the hand or verbally correcting him.  We give him lots of love when he come out of time out, and he seems receptive so far.

caution of the kitty (cute squat and hands close)

I must say, from my/parent's perspective time out is funny!  He is so cute over in the corner.  The china cabinet has hand-prints all over the glass and little nose prints too.  He presses his hands and face into the glass to look through to see what we are doing.  We generally stand at the door way of the dinning room with our back to him.  Once he sees us move, he peeks around the side of the cabinet at us.
In other news, it might have taken me 20 months to realize that bibs don't work, but we are over bibs.  The concern of making a mess of his high chair and clothes is gone.  We just let him feed himself and what happens...happens!  He is starting to want what we eat.  If we give him something new, we often have to show him us eating it before he will try it.  I won't say he is a picky eater...just cautious.

Pizza!

Grits! Followed by A BATH!

Tillman's class at "school" also has the potties out!  That means...potty training time.  He is more aware of his diaper and that something happens down there.  If we ask him if he has a "poopy" he holds his "hiney," so he is getting what we are saying.  I guess that is the first step to it.  It would be great to have him potty trained, but I'm not going to set any goals on this.  Someone suggested letting him walk around the house naked...we will not be doing that...he peed in my closet (on my suede boots none-the-less) when he was walking around after his bath (it was the grits bath above).  Really kid, you had to take a leak there?

This Messy Eaters's 20 month stats:

Weight: holding steady around 23 lbs (no doctor visits this month, so not sure on the weight) 

Diapers size: size 4 of Little Movers day and night. (potty training has begun at daycare!)

Clothing size: 12-18 months (some 24 mo shirts)

Shoe size: 4.5 or 5

Food tricks: drinking from a small cup (without a lid) & learning to feed himself

Naps: 1 nap during the day around 11:30 and sleep until 1:30

Play (new things): puzzles, stack-able cups, going forward on his little push car, dancing to music, bath time, helping with chores around the house (laundry) and giving hugs and kisses!