A comparison

I'm now 29 weeks along, which means only 11 more to go (more or less). After a round of steroids, my back is a little better, and I'm able to tolerate sitting and/or standing for longer periods of time. I'm not ready to do cartwheels or anything, but I"m thankful to have a little more function back. The physical therapist told me that it may not be until after the baby is born, possibly not until after I'm finished breast feeding, that I actually feel fully recovered. But I can at least sit through a meal now without having to choose between laying down for some relief and getting enough food in my belly.

One side effect of the back issue is that I waddle a little more than a normal pregnant woman, apparently causing the woman at Sam's last week to ask me if I was due on Thursday. Uh, no, I have 3 more months to go. She responded that I must be having twins then. Uh, no, there is only one. She told me she thought one might be hiding in there. Gee, thanks a lot! But I wondered whether I seem to be smaller, bigger, or the same size this pregnancy as with Peyton. So I pulled out a picture from 29 weeks with Peyton (left) and took another picture today to compare (right).




















I don't know...maybe I was bigger with Peyt? I will say that I don't think I've gained as much weight this pregnancy. However, today I was measuring 30 weeks, which is about a week ahead of schedule. According to my 32 week post with Peyton, I was measuring 32 weeks....who knows. I guess we'll just have to wait and see how big this little girl is .....in 11 weeks!

Halloween!

Halloween was a little quieter this year. Unfortunately, no trip to the pumpkin patch :( But next year, we'll go back and have a great time! These days, our activities are limited to things where I can find a place to lay down so we strategize before we do anything. I was feeling up to going to Trunk or Treat, though, so we did get to have a little fun. Families decorate the trunks of their cars and kids go around and collect candy. I knew some friends of ours would have their trunk decorated so I would be able to sit in their car for little breaks. There was also a little green space where the kids were running around so I was able to lay down in the grass. Because I'm now visibly pregnant, it seems to be slightly more socially acceptable for me to lay down in strange public places.

Several months ago, I asked Peyton what he wanted to be for Halloween. We discussed several possibilities but he seemed to settle on being an astronaut. I'm not really sure where he came up with the idea or why that was what he wanted to be, but I was happy to honor his request. A little shopping on amazon later, I found a few for him to choose from and he picked the one he wanted. As soon as it arrived, he wanted to put it on. He even posed in front of the fireplace for a picture. (He's not too much into taking pictures these days).

We usually like to do some kind of family theme, so Patrick and I thought about how we could complement Peyton's costume for the Trunk or Treat event. I settled on being "outer space" and Patrick was an alien. We managed to get a family picture, although certain participants were not willing to look at the camera.

Trunk or Treat was a week before Halloween, but I assumed Peyton would be an astronaut for Halloween as well. The day before Halloween, a friend asked Peyton what he was going to go dressed as for Halloween. I fully expected his response to be an astronaut since that's what we talked about for months. Nope. A pirate. I reminded him that he was going to be an astronaut. Nope. He was an astronaut last week for Trunk or Treat. He needed to wear a different costume. Like he's 16 and can't wear the same dress to a second prom, even though no one was going to see him twice in the same costume -there's totally different crowd in our neighborhood!
I know my son well enough to know that when he has an idea in his head, there really isn't any changing his mind. Luckily, I had a pirate costume in the closet from a kindergarten teacher friend that had a bunch of extra dress up costumes that she passed on to me. I'm not sure I could have pulled off buying a pirate costume with less than 24h notice.

It poured down rain in the early evening on Halloween, but it finally stopped long enough for us to walk around our neighborhood and gather some candy from a few houses. There aren't many kids in our subdivision, so we only saw two other families out and about, but Peyton still had a fun time. And I was happy to get to see him run around in his pirate costume gathering candy that I would subsequently get to steal and eat myself.