Someone's going to be a big sister! Baby#2 Arriving February 2019

I am officially 14 weeks pregnant with Everly's little brother/sister, and thought it high time I start documenting this pregnancy before it's all over. Gosh it's VERY different with a second pregnancy, and I am determined to not let time slip by without at least attempting to do everything I did while pregnant with Everly. I'm pretty sure this is not going to be easy, as life with an-almost-toddler is pretty crazy, and some days I feel as though all I've accomplished is keeping my child fed and watered...like a good plant haha. But even if that's all I have been able to do, I still give myself a pat on the back, because let's face it fellow moms...no one else is going to!

So, let me start at the very beginning.

I had an inkling that I was pregnant about 10 weeks ago (just like I did with Everly...click here to read more about the start of that pregnancy). Again, just the same as what happened with Evs, I took pregnancy test after pregnancy test, because I just 'had a feeling' and all 5 of them came back negative. Then I waited a few more days, took one last one (well, I actually did another 3 after this next one came back positive) and there was no denying the double line. This was just before the Creighton Aloe Festival, where I was going to be setting up and selling Gin cocktails...needless to say I was unable to actually sample any of my exciting homemade cordial concoctions and had to rely on the repeat customers and cheesy gin smiles as the day progressed to know that they were indeed good!

My mom came to visit from Joburg, mainly to babysit Everly while Farmboy and I worked our little bums off day and night at the Aloe Festival...me doing Gin and setting up the stalls etc and Farmboy who worked many a late night smoking enough pulled pork to feed 1000 people! My mom arrived armed with a ClearBlue Week Calculator pregnancy test and, thank goodness no morning sickness had hit me yet, as I was surrounded by meaty smells and alcohol! The test maxes out at 3-5 weeks so I knew that, 1. I was definitely pregnant, and 2. that I was about 3 -5 weeks pregnant. 

I decided pretty early on that I wasn't going to go for as many scans as my first pregnancy, and only popped into a GP with a very old scan machine to do a very basic check up. She struggled to find baby, and eventually found a little blob and a which was a bit of a dissapointment to be honest. She thought I was actually not as far along as I had thought, but still, it was nice to get a visual confirmation and see the strong and healthy heartbeat.

From about weeks 6 - 10 I had terrible morning sickness, something I didn't have at all with Everly (could this be a sign that this little bundle is a boy???) and I've also had all the same symptoms as before...spots on my back, dry and cracked heels, having to go to the bathroom CONSTANTLY, and feeling incredibly tired around weeks 6 - 8. My tummy also POPPED around week 10. I have done very little exercise (I'm going to blame those weeks of nausea but in reality, now that i feel back to my old self, I've just been plain old lazy). I am determined to get back to Pilates, and keep up with walks around the farm. I have also not been very good about drinking water, and have been AWFUL with snacks and junk food (again, I want to blame those weeks of nausea but in reality I know I've just been lazy to cook healthy meals) but I am suffering because of it and it's not fair on the little growing life inside of me. As of tomorrow it's back to low carb/Banting (mostly) and no more sugary drinks!

This week I went along to a Gynae for my first official scan and check up. Baby is doing well and was so lively on the scan, waving his/her hands about and kicking up a storm. She estimated my delivery date to be the 22nd February, but if I end up having a cesar (I am hoping to be able to make my VBAC *vaginal birth after cesarian* dreams come true as I ended up having an emergency cesar with Everly, after a VERY long 40 hours of labor...blog post to come on my birth story soon) then baby will be here around the 8th Feb. I went into labor at 37+6 days and Everly was born exactly on the 38th week. So, this new little one may also arrive early.

Finding out that I was indeed pregnant, was a HUGE shock for both Farmboy and myself. While we both wanted more kids (and the fact that I wasn't on any form of contraceptive....mostly because I didn't want to put my body through any more doses of hormones after being on the Pill for 15 years before Everly). It's just that we hadn't planned for their to be such a short gap in-between our little ones, or that I would fall pregnant so quickly. I am in no ways complaining, it's a 'hashtag' blessing (sorry, I couldn't hep myself with that '#' considering how it gets bandied about these days) to be able to fall pregnant without any complications and I am in awe of what a woman's body is able do...carry and grow a life...but at the same time, I was filled with so many mixed emotions. Just before I found out I was pregnant, I was feeling fantastic, I was back down to my pre-pregnancy weight (and then some!) and was just feeling so healthy! I was just getting used to my body again, feeling strong. This definitely contributed to the feelings of shock.

Another reason for the shocked emotions was because up until that time I was still breastfeeding Everly, like, a lot! I was feeding her 4-5 times a day, and while I have always known that breastfeeding is definitely not a hard and fast form of contraception, it is more on the unusual side to fall pregnant when feeding so frequently. I only had one period (when Everly was about 7/8 months old) and then I guess the next month I fell pregnant. I think around the 7 month mark I had dropped her night/early morning feed and so my body must have started getting ready to make more babies. In case you're still wondering, I am still breastfeeding Everly, but am slowly weaning. She has had absolutely no issue with dropping feeds so far (since a week ago I now only feed her twice a day, when she wakes up in the morning, and when she goes to bed at night). I had initially planned to breastfeed until a year (she will be a year in just under 2 weeks time!!!) but I've loved our journey so far (click here to read our breastfeeding story), and if I wasn't currently pregnant, I would probably carry on until she decided she had had enough. I still seem to have enough milk for her, but she eats her solids really well and has even continued to sleep through on the od occasion I haven't been around to feed her at bedtime, so I know she probably isn't needing the feeds much anymore. I know that its going to be a very bittersweet moment when I give her her last feed, but at the same time, I would like a few months of my boobs back before the next little one is here and I am back to being the in-house dairy cow :)

I also had a lot of up and downs in the very beginning, mostly because I felt like 'I already have a baby' and Everly really was just a baby at that time. And she is still pretty much going to be a baby (in my eyes at least) when her little sibling is born. But I am encouraged by all the moms I know who take the small age gap in their stride. And it's happening either way, whether I am mentally prepared or not! I'm just going to have to roll with the punches, I mean nappies (because boy oh boy are there going to be a lot of them! Although we are hoping Everly will have started potty training by them...she has been in cloth nappies since the very beginning and from what I have read, it seems cloth nappies really help with potty training...we will have to wait and see!).

You can read more about my first pregnancy, as well as all my pregnancy posts by scrolling through the images below (just click and you will be taken to the full post). I'm hoping to make some more videos like I did for my first pregnancy, so please do keep me accountable for those!

As always, thanks for following along.

x

My Pregnancy Update ~ Week 20

Ohhhhhhhhhh....we're half way there....now that I've got Bon Jovi stuck in your head to, I'm going to get right down to things.

I have been following my Instagram friend Kendra (VeganStrong) 's pregnancy updates on her blog, and it's made me realise how her posts are such a lovely way to document her pregnancy. I'm going to be borrowing from her prompts and sharing more of my pregnancy journey with you here.

I have made a couple of videos (click here to see them) but videos take a whole lot longer to create (not to mention the hours and hours and hours they take to upload on the farm) and so I thought I'd start a series of pregnancy posts.

I think I'll do a round up of the first 20 weeks at another time but today I'm going to jump right into my first official post in this series, and start where I am today (May 13th) and that's in Week 20.

How Far Along:

20 weeks (or 5 months for my friends who have yet to understand the whole 'weeks and days counting method that pregnant women rule their lives by). I'm technically half way there if our little one decides to join us on the exact due date (which is Sept 22nd).

Size/Food Comparison:

Cantaloupe (Spanspek or sweet melon for my South African friends) and weighs about 300g.

Weight gain:

7kg's

Considering my little one only weighs 300g...I can't blame it all on her. Im going to go with the fact that my blood volume has increased dramatically, and not blame it all on the hot cross buns.

Gender:

I planned on doing a whole gender reveal with the whole balloon/part/cake surprise shebang and then life kind of ran away with me. So I'll let you all in on the surprise...we are having a little girl <3

Everyone who knows me would have assumed I always want to have girls (maybe it's my love of all things pink and girly?) but before I was pregnant, I ONLY wanted boys.

Five of them.

The idea of a little girl going through all my makeup and cosmetics gave me shivers...I am fiercely protective over my things... but since I found out I was pregnant, I have been secretly hoping it would be a little girl.

I definitely want a boy (or two, or three!) but I am delighted to know our first will be a little girl. Now here's to hoping she gets my dark hair and her Dad's gorgeous blue eyes!

Baby bump:

It's most definitely there, and no longer mistakable for an over indulgence in Wimpy hamburgers or hotcross buns!

All jokes aside, I have been eating very cleanly 85% of the time as I do understand how important your diet is. Also, baby really has no choice in the matter and it's not fair to give them junk food when what they really need is healthy and nutritious things to help them grow big and strong. But I will tell you this, your willpower will diminish in pregnancy...those cravings are every bit as out of control as people say!

Movement:

I haven't felt anything yet, or at least I haven't been able to distinguish kicks from gas and other normal tummy movements and changes. I THINK I may have felt a few little butterfly kicks a few days ago...but it may also have been the Kale chips I had for re-dinner snack.

Sleep:

I haven't been sleeping too badly. My first trimester I was up A LOT during the night to go to the bathroom (which is harder and harder to do now that it's getting so cold!) and then had a very good first few weeks of my second trimester. Now that I'm a month into my second trimester, I'm up at least once a night to go to the bathroom. I do toss and turn a bit at night, but in general I've been sleeping well. Speaking of sleeping and tossing & turning, I'll be doing a full review on a preggy cushion soon. I'll also go into more detail about how I have/haven't been liking it so far. Stay tuned for that.

Exercise:

I've been trying to keep up with my walking, but having an extra 7kg's of body weight (I'm quite petite and only weigh 62kg's now) really takes it's toll on you. I find just walking around the garden makes me quite of of breath.

I have been LOVING Pilates though, and have been going at least once a week since the start of the year. I don't go to any fancy preggy Pilates classes...I'm luckily enough that we even actually have a qualified Pilates instructor here in my small farm town...but I did tell my instructor that I was pregnant from the beginning so she's aware and was able to discreetly help me with certain positions in the beginning. Now that it's my tummy is very obviously in the way, certain positions are harder, but it leaves my body feeling amazing, and ALLLLL that stretching is only good for the time labour and birth come around.

Clothing:

I can no longer wear any of my pre-preggy pants, and am loving my recent CherryMelon purchases I made on the Spree app. They even delivered to my tiny town within 10 days! Now that's impressive. I'm a HUGE fan of their linen shorts, and the side guage T-shirts are so flattering and comfy. I've never felt 100% comfy wearing tight tops, even though I've always been in pretty good shape. My body shape is on the curvy side, and I've always felt a bit self conscious wearing tight tops around my tummy. But now, I'm all for showing off my belly and love that I no longer have to hold my tummy in all the time...it's wonderful!

Being here on the farm is also much easier when it comes to clothes, as I'm mostly in a pair of tracksuit pants or shorts, and Farmboy's baggy shirts. I think I would be having a much harder time if I was living in town and wanted to look nice everyday. Luckily the cows here don't really mind me looking like a scruff ball.

How I’m feeling:

Great! I've been very lucky and had a very easy pregnancy so far. No morning sickness...teeny tiny moments of nausea, and only a bit of fatigue in the first trimester. I have had a few very bad moments of heartburn lately (I've pin pointed to a combination of carbs and fizzy drinks which only happen when we go away for the weekend) and so have stopped buying my favourite Sparkling water from Woolies. Living out on the farm means we don't have a lot of access to treats and other snacks so I'm thankful, and we mainly eat a low carb diet during the week.

I've only had Rennies on hand for the heartburn and it has seemed to help. But I'm making sure to stock up on Gaviscon for our upcoming trip to Italy next week. Any other heartburn remedies you may know? Please let me know in the comments below :)

My eczema has also flared up in the last few weeks, and seems to have made it's way onto my face. The areas around my chin, nose and sides of my lips are SO dry. I've had to completely adjust my skincare routine (let me know if you'd like a post on that too!) and have it sort of under control. The change of seasons has also been a huge culprit so here's hoping my skin settles in the next few weeks.

Cravings/Aversions:

I'm still not really into tea. Our farm milk is full cream and I find I've gone off having it in my tea & coffee. I have the odd cup of coffee (which I always enjoy when made by my Father-In-Law...I have no idea why?!) but I haven't been very strict with caffeine allowances (or any other diet do's and don'ts when it comes to being pregnant).

I've even been drinking our farm milk (which is unpasteurised...and many mommy-to-be's would be horrified that I've been drinking it) but it's not practical for me to be married to a dairy farmer and living on a dairy farm and not drink the milk. I have found I've naturally gone off the taste so don't drink very much of it anyway.

My cravings throughout my entire pregnancy have been pretty savoury in nature:

• Salt & Vinegar chips with tuna (literally, using the chips to eat the tuna out of the can...don't judge me till you try it!)
• Cheese Doritos
• Hotcross buns 
• Pretty much ALL carbs (I have now found pretty a good balance and use cous couse for meals instead of pasta etc when I'm really cravin something filling)

If you're interested in what meals I've been eating, let me know in the comments below and I'll do a post on light/low carb pregnancy meal ideas

What I miss:

• Lying on my tummy. I like to sleep on my side with my one leg pulled up, but my poor tummy just gets squashed and it's sooo uncomfortable.
• My 5 cups of tea a day.
• Easily putting my socks on! Can't believe what a mission this simple task has become! 

Nursery:

So far we have our compactum (which I picked up second hand in Durban and after a good scrubbing and a fresh coat of paint it looks as good as new) and I've ordered our cot (from CoziCot which has their showroom in Joburg).

Purchases:

I've bought a few cheapie receiving blankets and bits of fabric to attempt to sew my own pre-folds and flats to use with cloth nappies/diapers. I'll keep you updated with how that goes. 

Hubby:

Farmboy gets a shock every time he sees my tummy. It's a very happy shock and he can't resist hugging it and having long chats to his little girl. It's been such a wonderful seeing how excited he gets when he is reminded (by my bulging belly) that he is going to be a Dad soon. He is also very excited to carry her around the farm and take her to the dairy in the early mornings and show her the cows and chickens.

Best part of the week:

Our 20 week ultrasound. We had an in-depth visit with the Sonographer who did a very detailed scan of all of baby's organs and body parts. We were even able to see how full her little bladder was. It was pretty incredible!

But, we are probably going to be moving Gynae's when we get back from our overseas trip mid June. I am really happy with my Gynae, but she charges so far above medical aid rates that it's just ridiculous. Every time we see her it's an extra R800 on top of what medical aid covers. We are on a hospital plan with Momentum, but also have their Maternity plan which is really great. We also have Gap cover for when baby comes and I'm in hospital, but having to pay so much ontop of those fees (especially considering how often the Gynae insists on seeing you!) I think we are going to make a move to a Momentum associated specialist. Luckily I have found another lady not too far away who charges only medical aid rates. I am in two minds about switching, as I have been really happy with my current Gynae. But as my pregnancy has been so easy so far, I don't think I will have any problems moving. And if I find I'm not happy with the new lady, there is still enough time for me to move back. So will keep you updated on that front too.

Can’t wait for:

Our trip to Italy & the Mamamagic Baby Expo next week! I'm in Joburg at the moment seeing family (plus I needed my moms expert sewing hands to get a good start on sewing cloth nappies) and Farmboy will join me next Thursday. We fly to Italy next Friday for a wonderful holiday (or babymoon as it's affectionately called) to adventure, eat all the gelato & pasta and simply enjoy some special alone time before baby gets here in September.

Until the next update!

Lots of love

x

We're having a baby!

We have such happy news to share with you today! We will be welcoming a little bundle into the world in September this year, and we couldn't be more excited.

I have to be very honest and say I wasn't sure I was ever going to feel 'ready' for kids, but that feeling of readiness really does come to you when the time is right. Of course, it doesn't alway happen as quickly as it did for us (the moment we both decided the time was right, I was basically instantly pregnant) and I know a lot of people for whom the process can take a while.

Everyone's body is completely unique, and you really just have no idea how long things will take or what your pregnancy will be like. It's great hearing other ladies share their stories as it helps to open your mind as to what might happen for you. But definitely be prepared for the chance that it might take a whole lot longer (or a whole lot shorter) than your friends.

On that note, I read the most amazing book that covers everything and anything you've ever wanted to know about getting pregnant, but were too nervous to ask. I learned SO much from this book and can't help but tell everyone I know about it. Even if you're not thinking about having kids now, this book will help you prepare mentally & physically for what's to come. It helped me understand why I kept getting negative results on my pregnancy tests, even though I just knew that I was pregnant (turns out there is a waiting period after actual conception and you won't be able to test for pregnancy until your next period is due...around 2 weeks later).

The book I keep mentioning is The Impatient Woman's Guide to Getting Pregnant and I just loved every page. It's written by Jean M. Twenge who is as informative as she is funny, and each chapter is filled with everything you need to know about getting pregnant, including when you can test for pregnancy, how to prepare your body both physically and mentally and it also has a whole chapter dedicated to natural ways of enhancing your fertility.

I actually only bought the book for the chapter on how soon you can test whether you're pregnant, but found every single page to be full of useful information.

It's not just for first time mom either, Jean also talks about trying to conceive baby number 2 and 3 and also goes into great depths dispelling myths around older women not being as likely to fall pregnant as younger women. It's a must read for anyone even thinking about possibly having a baby at some point in their lives.

I am now in the last week of my first trimester (I'm 12 weeks pregnant) and that means I'm a third of the way there...eeeek! Nine months has always felt like a long time, but it's just flying by. 

And now for something a little different.

I've decided to create short weekly/monthly (I haven't decided how often I'm going to make them) videos to document my pregnancy, and I've just wrapped up the first one.

I hope you enjoy this little look into my pregnancy so far, and if you have any questions/comments/queries please feel free to leave me a comment below!