we have a #2 on the way....

YES! It's true, we're expecting #2!

I was inspired by Vivat Veritas's pregnancy Q&A the other day and thought it'd be a great idea to do one like it here. I've already gotten a few of these questions from family and other friends who know, and thought I'd make them available to all who I share this blog with anyway.

How far along are you now? 16 weeks exactly

Have you had any nausea or other pregnancy symptoms? Around week 6, I started having nausea. It went from a mild discomfort to several rounds of meetings with the toilet. It could change from day to day, hour to hour. It prevented me from eating proper meals, and I definitly didn't feel like cooking anything. My energy levels were generally low, so when I did have some, I took advantage and tried to get a bunch of things done around the house. That maybe wasn't the best idea, because then I'd be really tired later. The nausea continued almost to week 15, but I've been feeling better this past week. It was a new experience for me, as I didn't experience anything like that when I was pregnant with Luc.

*So, what ARE you eating? You might remember earlier this year when I talked about cooking meat in our house. My taste buds have done a 180°, and now I'm eating more meat than I normally would, and having a hard time eating as many vegetables as I did before. I wonder if it's my body's way of trying to get extra protein for the pregnancy. I've even been craving things like hot dogs, which is just weird for me. Also on the list of cravings; english muffins, bagels, MD crabcakes, cheese dip from Guapo's, Twinbrook Deli, Pho, and fresh peaches (we can find them here, but they're imported from France and never in good condition). So basically, my food cravings match with this list of saturated fats, (this is a great article to read by the way!) Also, for the first time since living here, I bought candy to keep in our house. And Luc knows all about it, asking for a lollipop almost every day. I usually eat one with him when he does get one. I'm not a big candy person, so that surprised me as well. I suppose my nutritional reserves were pretty well stocked for this pregnancy, (which wasn't the case for the first one) so I shouldn't worry if I'm eating a little differently, or perhaps not up to my own healthy standards.
  
Coffee or tea? I quit drinking coffee very shortly after we found out I was pregnant. But it's winter here, and I do like a little bit of pick-me up in the morning, so I started on tea. My favorite is vanilla tea, but Chamomile is good too.

Weight gain?  2.5 to 3 kg so far. (2.2 lbs is equal to 1kg, I'll let you do the math.) Interestingly, the french guidelines recommend 9-12kg (20-26lbs) total of weight gain, while the US recommends 25-35lbs.

Sleep issues? In a word, yes. We're currently trying to work out the kinks. I'm going to save this topic for a separate post. When I do have a good night's sleep, though, I tend to have the strangest dreams.

Have any kind of new beauty routine? ha! Have I ever had much of a beauty routine? I just try to keep my skin hydrated, but I think that has more to do with it being winter now. I always put lotion on body parts where I expect the skin to stretch. Thankfully, I did not get any stretch marks in the last pregnancy and I hope that remains true this time. Other than that, my daily routine consists of brushing my teeth, and once in a while putting some mascara on. The hard part isn't keeping a beauty routine while pregnant, it's after the baby arrives that there is less time to say, brush your hair (or teeth!), keep your eyebrows from getting overly bushy, and to ever shave your legs.

I don't want to see it, but what does your belly button look like? I had an innie (sp?) before I got pregnant with Luc, which turned into an outie in the last month. It never returned to normal, and even now it's starting to protrude outwards again. I still look down at it and think "this is so weird".

Can you feel the baby moving yet? Just yesterday I felt the first noticable movements!

Are you going to find out if it's a boy or girl? Yep. The echographie is set for Oct 10th. (I cannot ever remember the word sonogram, the french word is just permanently burned into my brain, I always have to look it up.)

Will you tell me? I swear I won't tell anyone. Not sure yet if we'll be sharing the gender with others. My Mom wants me to tell her if it's a girl so she can start stocking us up on "cute outfits". We don't have many girls on either side of the family, so I think a lot of people are sort of hoping it will be a girl.

Thought of any names? I thought of one I really like for a girl, but it doesn't work in french, which is necessary. Other than that, no.

Exercise? I've been doing yoga 2-3 times a week, and Luc sometimes likes to join in. Other than that, we sometimes go to the footpath next to the sea for a long walk. I always feel better on the days I exercise, so I try to do a little something everyday.

What kind of terrible maternity clothes are you wearing these days? I'm only 4 months along, so things aren't super huge yet, and I can still make most of my clothes work. In the past couple of years, when clothes shopping, I've tried to buy clothes that could still look cute on a belly. Anything with an empire waist is good, and flowy dresses are my favorite because it makes getting dressed easier. Finding clothes to wear isn't really an issue for me until the last 2-3 months, so I've been looking for free patterns/tutorials online so I can make a few pieces of my own. (That's how I found Vivat Veritas, she has a great pregnancy series on her blog!) The bigger issue for me was finding clothes to wear after the baby, because breastfeeding meant I had to wear a top and bottom (no dresses!) and the top had to be kinda flowy, but I wanted it to hide my bra straps because I was always wearing an ugly nursing bra. If I make any maternity clothing for myself, I'm going to make sure it works for nursing as well.

Made any baby clothes yet? Nope, but I have a few patterns picked out in couple books, so I'm sure I'll make a few things, but I'm going to wait until we find out the gender. I've got a couple other baby projects in mind too, so we'll see how much I can actually accomplish.

Do you have a birth plan? When I first heard about the concept of writing up a birth plan, I had just gotten finished with my service in Madagascar, and was completely baffled by the idea of planning something that was so unpredictable, especially after all that I'd seen and experienced living in Ankaramibe. Now though, I can understand the need to write things down a little more, though it's not something we plan on doing for ourselves, nor is it really done here anyway. The only real plan is to have a healthy baby and a safe birthing process for both of us. That said, I'd like to do it without drugs, and hopefully to have an experienced midwife by my side for support. The doctor I see is a friend of my father-in-law's (he too, is an OB-GYN), so we have a great rapport with him, and he plans on delivering this baby for us just like he did for Luc. Also, I plan on watching "The Business of Being Born" sometime in the next few months.

Breast or Bottle? As with Luc, I plan on breastfeeding again. I learned soooo much that first time around that now I'll be way better prepared for this one, assuming there won't be any unforeseen problems. Luc nursed until he was 13 months old, so I hope to do as well or better with this baby too.

Diapers? We're going to try out cloth diapering! When Luc was 18 months old I tried to switch him to cloth, but he wouldn't tolerate it. I've been looking at lots of different places online to order the first bunch, and I've pretty much decided on prefolds, which means I also need diaper covers, of which there are millions of choices out there. I'm pretty excited about this, which is weird because it's just diapers!

Probably you've dreamed up a perfect nursery that will likely never happen. Tell me about it. Long before I got pregnant, I decided a red themed nursery would be good for either gender, so I've been thinking of different things I could make and do for it. I may post more about that later.

How are the 2 boys doing with the news of the coming arrival? Both Alex and Luc are doing well. We told Luc about the pregnancy about mid-way through the first trimester, and I'm glad we did. I think he understood that something new was going on with Mama, and was starting to act out in small ways. We still talk about "the baby in the belly" relatively often and he will come to me to give the sweetest little kiss or to put his hand on my belly. I've showed him pictures of when I was pregnant with him, and he likes to look through the photo album I made of his first year. I've also looked on Amazon for books to help us explain things a little more. We'll prepare him as much as we can, and then expect that the first 6 months after the baby is born will be the first major adjustment period for all of us.

What's one thing you can't wait to do after the baby is born? Eat sushi. Sleep on my stomach (when sleep does finally come!) Oops, that's two things.

What's one thing you will miss about pregnancy once it's over? Having a little bit of time to myself, or taking a nap at the same time Luc does.

Hope you enjoyed this as much as I did! If there's anything else I think of or you think of in the next 5 months, be sure to let me know, and I'll update this!

*You'll notice I didn't mention anything about craving chocolate, because I crave that all the time anyway. That hasn't changed since I've become pregnant again. :)