Great looking nursery kerry, you look ready to go!

Puppy I hope it's not going to take that long to get your results

I'm struggling with morning sickness again and it's been worse today. Hardly eaten as every time i try I feel worse. Even a macdonalds disgreed with me which is most unusual! Every time I stand up I go dizzy. I know my blood pressure is quite low but don't know what I can do about it? Any tips welcome... Xx

Peanut - for the dizziness, try adding some salt to your diet (surely the McDonald's helped with that) and keep hydrating yourself. Otherwise - take it easy. I never found that "cure" for morning sickness, and honestly, I've woken up today to nausea for the first time in weeks! I don't understand it myself! So when do we get a bump picture from you!? Surely you're looking adorable at this point! Also, so glad to hear you enjoyed your holidays!

Baby D - sounds like DH is communicating beautifully with you - a great sign! Can't wait to see how things go once you get your pay raise!

Kerry - that nursery is gorgeous and I agree, very calming! Makes me want to crawl right in and take a nap. And your belly is gorgeous too - perfectly all bump and nothing else! You must be getting excited to start your leave! How is your energy? Have/will you take a birth class?

Jess - any word on the rash and ttc?

Puppy - good for you for getting the ball rolling with the doctor's visits. I'm excited to see if we can't stimulate some little eggies to come out and get fertilized soon!

I'm rolling along here -- had a beach weekend with DH and his family (the whooole lot of them). By the end we were both ready to kill them all, but managed to get along with each other wonderfully! We took some looooong strolls on the beach and really just enjoyed spending time with each other in a new environment - I had no idea how badly we needed it!
DH is healing up nicely, still gets grumpy if he doesn't take his pain medication regularly and can't work out, but is getting through life's daily tasks without much difficulty.
I, on the other hand, desperately need to work out! I ate sooo many sweets while we were away on our weekend vacation. Then, of course, we came home with extra marshmallows from making all of those S'mores, and I had to use them up and make Rice Krispie treats! Delish! I'm thinking I'll try swimming tonight, or maybe an aqua aerobics class (never done one). My joints are getting a bit achy and I've heard the water feels heavenly.
DH now keeps referring to our baby as a girl. I think we are both 90% sure it is a pink bundle, but we are really struggling with whether or not to confirm it. On the one hand, we pledged to stay team yellow, and it feels like we are going back on our word, but we didn't choose to have the tech at my work accidentally call it a she! On the other hand, if we *knew* it was a girl, we could just start calling it as such, and it would be our special secret, we wouldn't tell family we knew.
It feels really awkward to be team yellow/pink. What does that make us? Team Coral??

Hi ladies,

Sorry for the long absence! Traveling is certainly taking it out of me, as is my work schedule at the moment (which sucks extra 'cause this is obviously a mostly work-related trip). Even after nearly 3 weeks away, I still feel so super jet lagged, which I guess isn't really jet lag, it's just my current state of exhausted pregnant lady being.

I promise a longer, more thorough post eventually and to do a better job of catching up with all your updates (I only just skimmed through - Jen, so sorry to hear about your hubby, but glad he is doing better, if just a bit grumpy, as is to be expected. Poor guy!). I'm doing good though. I'm in San Francisco at the moment on the last leg of my trip and fly home on Friday. I told my mom when I saw her and she is very excited! She pretty much hyperventilated. Of course, the first thing out of her mouth was, 'is this planned? are you okay?'. I was like, "um, mom, seriously I'm about to turn 32, I got the whole not accidentally getting knocked up thing worked out by now. So yes, it was planned!' Haha, she makes me laugh. I think it took her awhile to come to terms with it because I guess she didn't think it would happen yet, despite the fact that all of my friends from school that she is close to as well have like 3 kids already and all her friends have grandchildren. Not sure when she thought it would happen, considering how old I'm getting though! But she's super excited now that the shock has worn off. And keeps checking up on me and making sure I'm okay, which is really sweet. She also said she actually had trouble getting pregnant with me and that it took her over a year, so it was actually a relief to her that I didn't have to go through that as well. She said she'd been concerned about that. Fortunately, I think I'm much healthier and much less stressed out than she was at that point in life (my dad was a dumbass, so not the easiest person to live with!). But it did make me feel really good about our decision to not put off TTC any longer than we did.

I'm feeling good. Morning sickness comes and goes, but still haven't thrown up (mom said she never puked either, so maybe it runs in the family). The main thing is that I'm just exhausted! Like so, so, so tired. I really can't function much past 6pm, which is less than ideal as I really need to work some evenings, but I'm managing. I thought I would tell a few friends when I saw them here, but I actually haven't felt like I wanted to yet. We've met up for drinks and I've managed to either order my drinks before they got there or when they went to the bathroom, or told them I couldn't drink because I had to get back to work right after. So far, it's worked and no one has acted like it was strange. Though I was at a conference last week and bumped into a friend and was having a particularly massive/bloated day and she did keep staring at my stomach! But the good news is while I've been away, we got our scan date and it's the 20th of August. So only a couple more weeks and we get to have a look in there. I think after that, we'll tell our close friends and family. And then eventually we'll tell everyone else. I am suddenly in no rush, maybe because the scan is getting so much closer. Or maybe I'm just too tired to act excited at the moment (probably also a likely explanation!).

Oh wow, I love that I said this would be a 'brief' update. I guess I have more energy than I think I do when I'm trying to avoid getting back to my work. Anyway, I head home on Friday (arriving Saturday morning - straight into Olympics chaos at Heathrow, I can imagine). Then Sunday, despite being ridiculously jet lagged, Tim and I are off to the Great Dorset Chili Festival (as in the spicy pepper, not the spicy stew), which is one of our favorite events of the year (I actually planned my trip dates in order to be home in time for it!). I'll update more when I get back to normal life. Hope you ladies are doing great though!! I promise to keep up on all your updates better soon.

Karen

Kerry - I completely missed your bump pictures! You look great - all belly! What kind of stroller is that you got? I like the big wheels on it.

mrspeanut - I hope you're feeling a bit better. Hopefully you can get your blood pressure up enough to avoid the dizziness, as that is not a fun feeling to have all the time.

Gen - glad you had a nice little vacation, even if you were ready for it to be over by the end! I am still impressed with you going to the gym, and really need to get my own butt in gear (how many times have I said that now?!). Maybe tomorrow!

Karen - glad that you're not getting much morning sickness. It's nice that you could talk to your mom about your pregnancy. I don't blame you for not really wanting to/feeling like telling everyone yet. enjoy it for now, while you can, and then share it with the world when you're really ready!

As for me... still waiting on the results. Although, I didn't expect to hear anything yet, it would be nice to at least know what was found with the ultrasound (if anything). I suppose I could call just to talk to them about that, but I'd likely have to go in for an appointment, so might as well just wait and get all the information at once.

puppymom I put my chart pics up to, for you if you want to look at my temps!! Dont take any notice of the cross hairs or the positive O test as I put that in there afterwards to see if it changed when I O'd. And that is crap about her not telling you about your ultrasound!!! Hope you dont have to wait too much longer. The pram is a Strider plus....in black, a four wheeler, see we are excited set the pram and bouncer/toys up already!!! It comes with a bassinett that you can click on there aswell which we have got to use when its a newborn. Its green the feature wall to match the cot quilt and toys on the shelf. Very team yellow!!!


Mrspeanut Dont have any advice about the low blood pressure or morning sickness really, pretzels maybe?? they are dried and have salt on them

Jen glad hubby is on the mend and you have time together after his bromance holiday that didnt turn out so good

Mind have fun with the crazy olympic stff when you get home, were kind of watching it on TV Aussies arent doing too good lol

Kerry, thanks for posting the charts! They look similar to what mine looked like before my cycle decided to go haywire! I am hoping they'll return like that again soon.

Just a quick one today - feeling 100% better after eating higher salt foods and drinking energy drinks and staying in bed for nearly 2 days! Tested blood pressure and it's back up to my normal again. Hooray!

Here's my 16 week bump (it looks bigger from above to me!)

You look great! Do you find you've popped more quickly this time, as it's your second child? I have heard that around the boards!

I don't really know as I'm at least a stone lighter on my starting weight than I was last time and I've been much more controlled with my eating (last few days excepted!) I think I could see it earlier this time as a proper bump rather than bloating and weight gain. I don't need to wear maternity clothes fully just yet which is later than last time!

MrsPeanut you are soooooo cute!!!!! you look amazing!!!!.......I always think it looks bigger too from when your looking down at it!

Glad the hear your feeling much better xo