Week 22

I was inspired to start taking writing about my pregnancy seriously and taking better pictures when a friend shared a link to Pacing the Panic Room, a blog in which a gentleman chronicles his wife’s ups and downs during pregnancy.  Not only are the photographs of her week to week progression amazing, but his journal-like posts lend a window into what the experience was like both for him and for her.

I’ve had this blog for a long time and have been periodically updated it with photos I’ve taken.  No commentary.  No hard work.  No regular posts.  It’s time to change.  Every Saturday or Sunday, I’ll post a new photo with some of the updates from the week even as I post other thoughts and observations on other days.

This week has been a turning point for me in my first pregnancy.  For the last eight weeks, everything has seemed, for lack of a better word, normal.  I haven’t had nausea and I’ve been hungry like before I was pregnant.  My stomach has stayed fairly flat.  I’ve been emotionally stable.  And the baby, who we know is a girl, has been so mellow.

Since Wednesday, though, everything changed.  My stomach bulged.  My hunger intensified.  And the baby’s kicking started becoming more frequent and stronger.  While I had been thinking about getting things ready for the baby for a while, I started gathering my information.  I asked a couple of my friends who’ve already had babies to help me determine the best stuff to get…and man there’s a lot of it!  Is this nesting?  I’m not sure.  After reading Pacing the Panic Room and learning that Cole, the mom, had started nesting at week 18, I wondered if I’m abnormal for barely having thought about putting a room together for the baby.

We have a room set aside, but right now the baby’s room is serving as the greenhouse for my spring seedlings (tomatoes, peppers and shiso, a kind of Japanese basil, if you wanted to know).  Really, we won’t have any of our desired baby furniture for quite a while, so there’s no need to really worry.  Still, knowing that others started nesting earlier has given me pause.

The result of my nesting-like research is a long list of products and recommendations of how to look for the best, gleaned from a few places.  I got the structure and meat of my list from the book, The Expectant Parents’ Companion: Simplifying What to Do, Buy or Borrow for an Easy Life with Baby by Kathleen Huggins.  A couple of my friends offered their thoughts on a few of their must-have and most loved products.  Consumersearch and Consumer Reports offer good advice on what to look for and what features are important.

Here’s what I have so far on Car Seats and Strollers (and their travel systems):

Car seat—2 votes out of 2 for the Graco travel system until month 8 or so, the Snug Ride & Chicco brands are popular

Strollers— one reg, one jogging (that’s my plan)

Buying Guide from Consumer Reports paraphrased or copied and pasted:

-Should have a 5 pt. harness that is easy for us to use but hard for the baby

-Wheels:  One sign of good construction is wheels that sit on the floor uniformly when a baby is inside.

-Leg holes:  Carriages and strollers designed for newborns or young infants, which fully recline, must have leg holes that close so an infant can’t slip through. Manufacturers use mesh or fabric shields or hinged, molded footrests that raise and clamp over the leg holes

-Brakes:  One-touch brakes work quickly for added safety.  Avoid models that can hurt your feet when you engage or disengage the brakes with light shoes or bare feet. In addition to parking brakes, most jogging strollers have bicycle-type hand-operated brakes–important to help you slow down when cruising at a fast clip. Some pricier jogging strollers have hand-operated brakes on the front or rear wheels.

-Canopy:  Try to get one that is reversible (moves 180 degrees) and has a window

-Handlebars:  Reversible would be nice.

-One handed folding mechanism:  Should be easy to fold closed using one hand.

-Cup holders are nice.

-Large shopping basket.