Pregnancy Post #17 – 36 Weeks

Me @ 36 Weeks ♥

*36 Weeks & 3 Days Pregnant Today!
*35 Pounds gained since pre-pregnancy.
*27 Days Until Natalia’s Due Date & Head is Already Down! (:

Before & After Laundry Pics
2 Whole Hours of Washing & Folding Baby Clothes!
They still need to be organized by size and put away. “/

To all my lovely readers, I cannot tell you guys how anxious I have been over the past week (really the whole pregnancy but a lot lately). I am pretty much done doing all the main necessities in the nursery, as I’ve talked about in my last post, however there are still a few touch ups that I still want to do. I even came up with new organizational ideas for the closet. With that said, this morning Natalia’s satin zebra print dresser runner came in the mail this morning! So I wiped down the dresser and neatly placed it on top. Now all I need to do is figure out exactly how I’m going to decorate it. Today I started washing all the baby clothes and did not realize that I have WAY more than I need! I don’t even think Natalia will be able to wear them all before she grows into the next size! This is wonderful because it means she has more than she needs, which makes her the definition of SPOILED, lol. I can honestly say that I am not too much looking forward to doing all this laundry. -_- But I’m glad that I will be able to dress her in a different cute outfit every day though. I’ll be taking lots and lots of pictures to add to the baby book and scrapbook.

Aside from my generous friends that gave me clothes, and my mother and I buying clothes, I attend a Pregnancy Care Center every two weeks that also gave me a TON of clothes yesterday! I am so grateful that there is a pregnancy care center that I can go to that helps you out with everything you need. The people there are so very kind and thoughtful and I will recommend them to anybody and everybody. You go in to watch a video that has to do with pregnancy, prenatal or postnatal, take a short 5-10 question quiz on the video, and they give you “mommy money” which is paper money that you can spend on items from their resource room. This room is filled from wall to wall, floor to ceiling with alllll kinds of baby items imaginable, all donated. Most of the stuff is brand new and hasn’t even been opened. They have everything from bassinets, bouncers, cribs, swings, breast pumps, blankets, baby hygiene (i.e. shampoo, body wash, etc.) diapers, wipes, baby food, TONS of clothes, shoes, socks, hats, bottles, everything you can think of really. So I was able to spend my mommy money on several of these items yesterday and left with all kinds of useful things, for free! I am so thankful that I am going to donate anything I have to them because they deserve it more than anyone I know. I told my care taker, Ms. Bonnie that I am going to spread the word and let everybody I know about them because I think they are the greatest help center I’ve ever known.

I also had a doctor’s appointment yesterday which my mom accompanied me in. We had an ultrasound so we could measure the baby and see where she is positioned. She is already head down, so she could be here any day from now until her due date. I have a feeling that she could be here earlier than her due date! I had to take a Group B Strep test (whatever that is) and should here the results at my next appointment, which from now on will be once every week until Natalia arrives. I weighed in at 145 pounds, which means I’ve gained a whopping 35 since pre-pregnancy. Hopefully I don’t pass the 40 mark! But this is good and it tells me that I have a big, healthy baby girl inside of me.

Additionally, the baby’s father and I have started talking again for about a week now. We are surprisingly getting along really great (so far) and are going to spend this weekend together in Gainesville. He wants to see me and Natalia, take me out and take me shopping because he is also very excited that it’s this close to our daughter being here and he wants to go baby shopping with me. So we will see how this goes. (:

Braxton Hicks contractions are definitely happening more frequently and lasting anywhere from 1-3 minutes. Sometimes they can be quite uncomfortable to the point where I have to be real still and stop everything I’m doing. For instance, the other day while I was taking a shower, I was having a mild contraction that was so intense I actually had to sit down in the shower. But then it went away shortly after and I was fine. Now I know what I can expect during the real event. I have a feeling that I’m going to be able to take this like a champ and hopefully not need any pain medication because my goal is to do this whole thing completely natural. I am very optimistic about this pregnancy and going through labor and I think this will be a fast, uncomplicated birthing experience for me.

Next week I plan to install the car seat and pack my hospital bag. The only reason I haven’t packed the hospital bag yet is because I still need to find out what the hospital will provide so I know what NOT to bring, and I don’t quite have everything I want to bring with me yet. I looked up what a typical outfit would be for the mommy to wear home from the hospital because I have a going home outfit for the baby already, but I have NO clue what I’m going to wear! After reading a few forums from other pregnant women, I have made the decision that what sounds the best for me to wear is a cute cheap sun dress. Some girls mentioned wearing gauchos or yoga pants, but since I will most likely be bleeding, I don’t think I feel comfortable wearing pants; so a dress is the way to go for me. I get more and more excited everyday about Natalia’s arrival and expressing my feelings definitely helps me out a lot with my anxiety. My next post will be about packing my hospital bag so I can give a detailed example to other girls who would have questions about it like I did.

How To Make Your Own Baby Shower Decorations

To save myself money, and to express some creativity, I decided to make my own decorations for my baby shower. I already blogged about my baby shower decorations on a different post, but on this one I’m going to explain exactly what I used and how to make what I made. (:

First, I googled some baby shower decoration ideas and came across quite a few inspirational ones. The first one I like was this gorgeous brooch that I found on Google Image Search, but for some I cannot seem to find the photo on the search engine anymore. and I didn’t save the link, just the picture. Anyways, I thought it was the cutest brooch ever and it was the perfect theme of my baby shower: pink and zebra. So I went to walmart to get a bunch of supplies to make this. Mine looks very similar to the picture I tried to follow, but I added my own extra girly touches to it and made it look fabulous. I made two, one for me and one for my mom. (:

I bought 1 yard of hot pink craft boa for $4.50 on Amazon. Zebra and different shades of pink ribbons from Walmart. I usually buy the entire roll of ribbon so I can have some left overs for a future project! I bought glitter foam for $0.80 and black foam for $0.47. I had some adhesive rhinestones used for scrap-booking and black bows that I got a while ago for $2 at Walmart. I used those for my ribbon decorations. I used craft glue to make sure everything would stick together really good ($3 at Walmart). I also had safety pins handy, so I didn’t have to buy those, which you can find at the dollar store. First I cute 8 pieces of the zebra ribbon and 8 pieces of the sheer black ribbon to make my flower (4 of each were used for me and my moms brooch). I cut them long enough so that I could glue them in the middle and have enough hanging over to reach all the way to the other side. Once I glued all 16 individual ribbons together, I glued one on top of another in an alternating pattern. Once that dried I cut 2 large circles of glitter foam to use as my middle background and glued that in the center of the glued ribbons for each of the brooches. I then printed Mother-To-Be and Grandmother-To-Be on the computer, cut it out and glued that on the glitter foam. Then I cut enough of the craft boa to form a complete circle lining the outside of my foam. While I let that dry I cut 2 more circles of the black foam to use for the backs of my brooches. I cut a bunch of several different kinds of pink and black ribbon for mine and my moms brooch, glued them onto the foam in a string line pattern and waited for them to dry so I could add the little bows and rhinestones to the ends of each ribbon. Once I did that, I glued to flower part of the brooch to the back piece and let that dry. Lastly I glued a safety pin to the back of each brooch so we could wear them on our clothes on the big day. They turned out looking better than the picture I originally got the idea from! I was very proud of myself. And now, I’m going to save them as keepsakes for my little girl. I’m still debating whether I want to hang it in my room, or frame it in hers. (:

My next favorite idea that I can across and decided to make were these adorable pink and zebra table top imitation flower decorations. Here is the link to the website where the girl teaches you how to make them. I changed mine up a little bit. I had to improvise because I did not have the things that she had. Instead of tin cans I used recycled toilet paper rolls. And I used some pink straws instead of pens because I didn’t have that many of the same kind of pen. I covered the cardboard rolls with the zebra duct tape that I bought at the Dollar Tree for $3.75. Then I taped assorted pink feathers ($5 on Amazon) to the tops of my straws and pens to make the “flowers”. Last, I tied a pretty pink bow around the cardboard to add some pink to the base. I used a sheer light pink ribbon that had wire in it so I could shape the bow how I wanted it. That was pretty much it for those! I thought this was the easiest of them all and it took no time to make. I did have to buy the feathers online though and wait for those to be delivered because I live in a small town (Lake City, FL) where there are no large craft stores around.

Last but not least, the garland. I could not find ANYTHING that I liked as far as a garland for the baby shower. So I decided to come up with my own idea. I drew my own zebra striped on card stock with a sharpie, cut hot pink poster paper in smaller squares to accent the background of the letter, cut black letters to spell “Welcome Natalia”, glued black glitter on the outside edges of the pink paper, and bought a 100 ft. silver sparkly garland from an after Christmas sale for $1.50. The whole thing cost less than $10. $3 for the sharpies, $3 for the paper, and the garland. I already had the glitter, but if I didn’t I would have only had to spend $2 on that. Unfortunately I didn’t get to display this decoration because I could not hang it in the outside with all the wind that was blowing, nor did I remember to bring thumb-tacks. -_-

Well here are three really easy ideas that anybody could use for any pink or zebra party event. They are inexpensive, fun and easy to make! Now I’m going to end this post with one more interesting idea from “Pinspiration”. Hershey’s candy bars; use acrylic paint to pain the he blue for a boy, the she pink for a girl, or both if you don’t know the gender. ❤

Pregnancy Post #13 – 32 Weeks

Before I get started, this is just a friendly note for my readers: The purpose of my pregnancy posts is solely to express my thoughts about my pregnancy and to describe my productive daily activities. I understand that sometimes I write a whole lot, but that’s because I have a whole lot to talk about. I don’t expect anybody to read everything I write because it will probably bore some of you. I assume this because I personally don’t like to read any super loooooong post about somebody’s life that I don’t even know, although sometimes I find it interesting to read about how other people spend their days. So for anybody who gets bored of my forever long posts, I apologize. And for those of you who enjoy reading my posts, I’m glad you enjoy reading about the things I enjoy spending my days doing. So the following is another one of my long pregnancy posts about the things I’ve been doing since my last post, and I hope you enjoy it. (:

31 Weeks & 3 Days Pregnant.

• 32 Weeks and 2 Days Pregnant Today!
• Gained a total of 30 pounds since pre-pregnancy.
• Upcoming Events: Baby Shower on Saturday, Birthday on Sunday, Dr. Appt. on Tuesday.

For the past couple of weeks, something has completely come over me, and I think it is what most people refer to as “nesting”. I have all kinds of energy and tons ideas running through my head all day and night. I find myself excessively cleaning & cooking, writing more to do lists than usual, and finding all kinds of crafting ideas to keep me busy. I’m making a bunch of cute decorations and my own games for my baby shower. I have a folder of saved Pinterest pictures of ideas that I want to do for the baby’s nursery. I also have shopping lists of all kinds of crafts that I want to have around the house that I can work on when I have nothing to do! This past week I have become OBSESSED with Pinterest, pinning all kinds of cute things to make for Natalia and her bedroom, organizing her closet, redesigning her dresser, etc. I am so excited about all my new findings and even more excited that I have all kinds of things to spend my time doing. This is good because then I have all kinds of things to blog about! ;D

Thumbnails from left to right:
Covering cheap plastic bins with fabric.
Glitter and glue on wine glasses to make them sparkle.
Using fabric scraps to make a collage on canvas.
Bows to decorate crib posts.
Handmade fabric, felt and paper nursery chandelier.
A child’s bean bag using 1 yd. of fabric.
A cookie sheet and fabric to make a magnet board.

Pinterest Inspired Cable Organizers.

The ideas that I’m finding are so easy to make and take no time at all! For example, I found this adorable organization idea for all my loose wires that are jumbled up in drawers. I don’t know what half of them are for! You save all your cardboard toilet paper rolls, which I have MORE THAN ENOUGH of since I am constantly going to the bathroom! Then you wrap your wires in them and set them neatly in a box. It’s perfect! The only thing is, I thought that plain cardboard rolls were kind of ugly, so I decided to decorate mine. I found some hot pink duct tape that I bought a couple years ago for a high school project and taped my cardboard rolls up. Then I labeled them with a sharpie so I would know exactly what that wire is used for. Viola; pretty in pink organized wires. Super cute, super easy and super cheap! I also like the idea that I can recycle things that are usually thrown away.

As I’ve said before, I’ve been making countless lists of alllllll kinds of things ranging from to-do lists, to shopping lists, to idea’s lists, wish lists, etc. I really enjoy making to-do lists on the daily, and anybody who knows me will confirm this, because it keeps me busy, organized, and best of all, it helps me not to forget the things I need to do! I find my lists very helpful and I usually like to write them in different colored pens and doodle all over them to make them pretty. If you haven’t noticed already, I am a HUGE girly girl that loves all things pink and glittery. So I attempt to make everything of mine as so.

Anyways, back to my pregnancy notes, my baby shower is this Saturday and I am SO super excited about it!!! All my decorations have been delivered, and so has my dress. I have to mention that the dress looks absolutely FABULOUS on me! It’s pink and black to match the colors of my shower, and I have the perfect matching shoes to go with it. The decorations are perfect and can be re-used for future parties. My 20^th birthday is on Sunday, but since I’m having the baby shower party, I’m not going to have a birthday party. It’s going to be kind of a birthday party and a baby shower, but I don’t want people to feel obligated to bring me baby presents and birthday presents, so it’s going to be labeled as strictly baby shower, lol. Because I’m making the baby shower such a huge production, I don’t really have any special plans for my birthday. After all, it’s just another year older and it’s not even a special number. So I think what I’m going to do is just get really dressed up, (pink & glittery!) go out to eat at a special restaurant and go shopping for some make-up supplies that have been on my wish list for the longest time. That sounds like the perfect birthday celebration for this momma this year! And then next year when I turn 21, I will have a fancy cocktail party! (;

Pregnancy Preparedness!

My next doctor’s appointment is on Tuesday and my mother will be accompanying me to this one because the doctor is going to give me one last ultrasound to see where the baby is positioned. I already know where she’s positioned because I felt her turning in me and I can feel where her heartbeat is exactly when I feel my belly. I still have no additional stretch marks other than the 2 itsy bitsy teeny tiny ones right above my belly button, which would not even be there if I had waited to get it pierced! But I’m very fortunate to only have those and I’m not going to look negatively at them because I think they are the cutest little marks that represent Natalia’s kisses on my body. This is the joy of being young and pregnant! My advice to any woman as far as stretch marks is to drink lemonade or incorporate lemon in your diet in some way, shape or form. Lemon is proven to have many beneficiary factors including skin elasticity and you can look it up if you don’t believe me. I also advise that you moisturize EVERY SINGLE DAY before bed. I’ not going to lie, there were a few times when I forgot to moisturize, but for the most part I did a damn good job at making sure my belly stayed lotioned up! Now, every woman is different and this might not work for everybody, but it worked for me and let me just note that I am very fair-skinned which makes me more prone to stretch marks. But I am very proud of the way my body handled this pregnancy in every way so far.

Over all, I am an extremely happy mommy-to-be and I find myself thinking about Natalia being here in my arms more and more each day. I am enjoying my pregnancy and having all the free time in the world to do whatever I want. I’m spending most of my time preparing and making things for baby girl. I don’t have any crazy dreams, or crazy emotional spasms like most pregnant women complain about, I sleep fairly good except for getting up to pee in the middle of the night (I also can’t wait to be able to sleep on my stomach again). I can still bend over to paint my toenails, although not for very long. I’m enjoying reading and learning about the things that I can do and make that are all-natural and safe to use on my baby for when she gets here. Best of all, I am very fortunate and appreciative not to have to work while pregnant and still have income to get the things that I need to get done, especially being a single mom. I am patiently awaiting the day when I can hold my precious little girl in my arms, look at her in her (hopefully blue) eyes and tell her how much mommy loves her. ❤

32 Weeks & 2 Days Pregnant (:

My Very First Blog! (:

You could call me a “newb” at this whole blog thing. Actually, I researched what a blog was and how to make one before I did this, lol. I can’t wait to start sharing my ideas and opinions about different things with people. This is extremely exciting for me also because I want to share my interests, talents, and goals for my future. But more than anything, I’m looking forward to viewers feedback! I want to people to know what I think, and I want to know what people think about it!

I think I’m going to LOVE thisssssss! ❤ (:

Diversity

Name(required)

Email(required)

Comment(required)

Website

Submit

Δ