6 months preggo

Well hello baby

Here we are, 24 weeks pregnant.

since the adorable ruffles tended to hide that beautiful baby bump, i took a bare belly shot

thats a lot of baby in there. Wowsa. 

Last week i had my 6 month dr visit with dr olsen.  this is my first pregnancy with her as my other children were delivered by dr taylor and he is  no longer practicing at zeeland. Thus far, dr olsen has totally impressed me with her prompt and personal calls whenever i have some sort of testing done. last month we had  our ultrasound appointment performed by a tech. so we did not receive any info at the actual afternoon appointment.  Well, before 8am the next morn, dr olsen called to celebrate the fact that baby Ralph looked amazing,  no abnormalities whatsoever.  Hallelujah!  this month was the glucose test for gestational diabetes. My blood was drawn at 2:30 and dr olsen called with my passing results before 5 that evening.  

Perhaps she is sensitive to my pregnancy hormoned anxieties, perhaps we r just buds, regardless, i am so thankful for her fast result response.  so thankful as well for all the good results. Pregnancies are amazing and miraculous and hard. My  body and mind seem to have plenty going on with a normal/healthy pregnany, and I know that kinda pregnancy is a huge blessing.

Weight gain is steady and slowish. I consider my current weight to be at the high end of pre pregnancy normal for me. My baby bump and cheecks seem to have absorbed all the weight gain.

Food cravings have been minimal. I am still at the point of quick eating anything that sounds good before i lose my apetite. Mostly i have food aversions: still hating coffee, not such a fan of mcdonalds right now (difficult adjustment to make when i am so typically adoring their fried goodness),  and most foods I make sound delish and I end up hating moments later. I just threw away some pumpkin muffins and chocolate chip cookies because they got stale from waiting to be consumed. Shame! We got to experience cranes apple orchard twice this year and those honeycrisps have been tasting amazing. Also, i serve some sort of chicken and potatoes and gravy about once a week because of the yum.

Being preggo w/ baby 4 is such a different experience. Most of the time, my thoughts are continued amazement that this is happening. Now that i am further along than i have to go i am getting super anxious and super excited about whats coming next. The babe is the best part,  but there are so many teeny blessings along the way. Feeling baby ralph roll and kick and watching my tummy move with his/her life is miraculous and wondrous and beautiful. Listening to my current adorables exclaim at the size of my bump and at the future with  new baby is so precious. Hearing people's exclamations when they see me at work and ask if this is my first baby, and I reply actually this is my fourth always leaves me entertained.

People tend not use a filter when conversing with pregnant  me. A man once told me "you know, they figured out whats caused that now".

Lots of peeps wish me luck.  One lady asked what number baby this was and then told me she was going to tell me to keep going but it looks like i already did.

One man asked if i swallowed a watermelon seed, and a young girl will forever be traumatized since she asked if i had a big lunch and i replied, no, there is a baby in there. in horror she screamed, you ate a baby?!

mostly though, i have been encouraged and supported.  already mothering three small adorables leaves me weary when growing a fourth, especially when harvest is under way.

 So i am forever grateful for the love shown me by friends and fam and public alike.

One conclusion i have recently come to is my need to refer to the baby as something other than baby ralph, the usual moniker given by the brothers. i can only picture a tiny 40 year old man complete with beard and mustache, red in color. Not a comforting image wnen referring to my sure to be cute .little sweet baby. My sister in, law told me that while praying for me and babe, she referred to the newby as precious little morsel. Love that! Ralph also makes it difficult to even consider giving birth to a beautiful baby girl! I adore the name rafe, and its similarities to ralph are super so i tried that for a few days. The brothers were not accepting of that idea. For a girl baby i tried willow out, but hate the nickname will...reya is so sweet, but very simlar to ayla... brad has 2 names and he is stuck on those. I keep working him though, providing more cute options daily. Thankful we have some time yet to decide.

Living as an incubator is a special time that i am cherishing. Especially since i did not predict getting this opportunity again. i delight in every whirl and twirl, guessing if those will be soccer kicks or gymnastics moves when the adorable is born. As we enter into the remaining 15 weeks, my prayer is that baby continues to develop beautifully and that the lord uses this time to prepare us for this blessed bundle.