Ice storm!

This week got turned upside down a bit due to weather. It started on Monday night after we got home from work (which closed at 3pm!) and started accumulating quickly.

Sleet accumulation on Monday night

I was keeping a close eye on my flight scheduled for 5:45 a.m. Tuesday morning from GSP. Even though all the other airlines had cancelled their flights for the rest of the evening, Delta still had everything "on time" which I highly doubted... got the text around 9pm that my flight had been cancelled and I was rescheduled for a 6pm flight, getting me to Pittsburgh at 11:45pm. Um, NO THANKS. Plus, I would have missed an entire day of my class with no assurance that I would have even gotten there then, or would have gotten home when expected. After discussions with my supervisor, it was decided to just cancel the trip. Bummer for missing the class, but at least I felt better about not traveling! 

So, worked from home all day Tuesday since the office was closed until noon and roads were super icy all day. I got SO much work done! It was fabulous to work from the couch in my sweatpants in front of the fireplace. :)

Back to the office as usual on Wednesday, and the rest of the week has been pretty normal but busy.

Hump Day Bump Day photo

This weekend Scott and I are traveling to Houston, then he'll be there (and Dallas) all next week for a conference. It'll be my last flight before Cletus arrives!

Speaking of whom, Cletus has been crazy active this week! Seems like after every meal he just dances, does kickboxing, or somersaults all over the place. It's really quite distracting to have going on during a meeting at work, but I can't help but smile. Very weird to watch my tummy bobble around! One of these days I'll catch it on video. 

24 Weeks - Happy Valentine's Day

Another week down, rapidly approaching the end of the 2nd trimester... the weeks that seemed to creep by in the beginning are now speeding by so quickly, and we have so much to do!

We're certainly making good progress though. This week we've both gotten books to read - Scott is currently reading Bringing Up Bébé - a book about an American living & raising a child in France and her observations about the differences between American and French parenting. I'm reading one of two books I bought on the Bradley Method of childbirth. We've chosen this as our "method" since my goal is to deliver unmedicated. I mentioned this method to our midwife at last week's appointment and she goes, "Well, if that's what you want... it's very... intense." After reading more about it, I think what she meant to imply is that it's very thorough and requires preparation and dedication from both the mother and father/husband. The Bradley folks equate preparing for childbirth to training for an athletic event (can you see why this appeals to me and Scott?) - you have to physically and mentally condition yourself for the big day, and it takes both the "athlete" (me) and the "coach" (Scott) being fully involved. We've signed up for a 10-week class, too, so we're excited to learn and prepare!

We've gotten a good start on our registry as well. Chatted with Amanda about plans for the shower - so many things to look forward to!

This past week we had several nice small celebrations of Valentine's Day. First was dinner at the Commerce Club on Tuesday followed by a beer & chocolate pairing event at Quest Brewing Co. featuring LaRue Fine Chocolates.

Chocolates from the beer/chocolate tasting (clockwise from top - descriptions below)

Beer & Chocolate Pairings:

• Golden Fleece with a cardamom orange infused milk chocolate ganache enrobed in dark chocolate
• Sassamanesh Saison with "GrandMa" (Grand Marnier) milk chocolate with orange
• Smoking Mirror with a dark chocolate sour cherry ganache enrobed in white chocolate
• Kaldi Coffee Stout with Moo Who, milk chocolate ganache enrobed in milk chocolate and rolled in cocoa powder, sugar, and coffee sea salt

Scott got to have most of the beers, but I was able to sip enough to get the effect of the pairings - so yummy! The chocolate maker is from Pickens, SC and basically hand-makes everything out of her home kitchen. They were so creative and delicious!

On Friday we went to Sidewall Pizza, the new restaurant in Travelers Rest that took over an old tire mechanic building (hence the "Sidewall" name). They had a really good special - meatball pizza, and BOGO homemade ice cream! We split the pizza and each enjoyed a delicious ice cream dessert. Everything in the restaurant is handmade or locally sourced. SO good! We'll definitely be making that a regular stop.

Saturday was a busy day - went for a long run in the morning, delivered Singing Valentines with some ladies from the chorus, ran errands including finally getting some real maternity clothes (PANTS!) from Macy's, and then home to make our Valentine's dinner.

Prosciutto-wrapped duck breast with white wine and parmesan risotto

Molten-center chocolate cakes with fresh whipped cream

Clearly, this was a big hit and we didn't have to fight any crowds to do it! Success! :)

All-in-all, it's been a great week and I'm excited to finally have some pants that I don't have to fight with!

Maternity jeans! Yippee!!

Appointment Update!

Had another excellent check-up appointment with the midwives this morning. Met with Susan again (she was the midwife who met with us our first time there as well) and she answered a lot of our questions, the primary one being "Soooo... what should we be doing right now??"

The answer: educating ourselves!

So we're now signed up for a breastfeeding class and are looking at childbirth classes... just have to find one that works with our schedule. Also need to visit the library to get some reading material! There are so many "methods" for childbirth out there... seems overly complicated, but I guess that's why education is the key.

We finally started discussing names last night at dinner (sorry, not sharing those, either!) and have made some progress. We decided it would be good to have 2 boy names and 2 girl names going into the delivery and we'll make the final decision when we get to meet him or her!

We also got to hear the little one's heartbeat (147 bpm) and measured my uterus to gauge baby's growth - so far right on track, right around 23 cm. Susan said the centimeters should align pretty well with how many weeks along I am... currently 23w 3d, so right where I should be!

Next month's appointment will be the gestational diabetes test... joy!

23 weeks

A little late on this week's update, but after traveling and yesterday being just incredibly frustrating at work, I was in no mood to post! But today is another (hopefully calmer) day, so here we go...

This past weekend was SO nice after being gone all last week, plus the weather was beautiful (60s and sunny both days) so Scott and I were both able to get outside a good bit to enjoy it. I got a 10-mile run in on Saturday, and was a good bit faster than my 11-mile run a couple weeks ago. I think I forgot to mention... last week I finally bit the bullet and signed up for the GHS Swamp Rabbit Half Marathon on Feb. 28th! I'd been holding out to make sure I still felt good as the weeks ticked by, and with one month until race day, I decided to go for it. Angelina is going to come up from Atlanta to run with me, so it will be awesome to have a buddy join me in the long slow 13.1-mile trot! :)

On Sunday, Scott and I went to church in the morning and then took a nice bike ride down the Swamp Rabbit. We even got a snack from Poppington's Popcorn and picked up some fresh baked bread from Swamp Rabbit Grocery (their stecca loaves are to DIE FOR!).

Dressed for church

Sporting the maternity cycling jersey that Scott got me for Christmas!

Overall it was quite a lovely weekend! If only Monday had been as lovely... though I guess after being away for a week, it would be expected that I'd come back to a little bit of chaos.

Other than that, still feeling great - Cletus is moving around more and more each day! He seems to wake up when I do and stays pretty active through the morning, perhaps takes an afternoon nap, then wakes back up in the evening after dinner... really any food will perk him right up!

Next appointment is tomorrow morning - just a quick checkup with the midwives. Looking forward to it!

Hump Day Bump Day!

It's the mid-week "Hump Day Bump Day" so I thought it might be interesting to take a little trip back through time for comparison...

Oh wowza! I think there's something in there! And to think I was "hiding a bump" at 8 or 12 weeks. Hah! Is it just me, or does it look like the bump is getting lower? I guess little Cletus is settling in there quite nicely. :)

Anyway, still in Daytona for work and starting to long for home. I just miss normal routine... eating, sleeping, exercising. I have been able to get out and exercise each day, which has helped. On Monday I went for a run on the beach and it was nice and sunny and warm.

Bump shadow on the beach

Moon reflection on the ocean

Tuesday it was sunny again, but much cooler and very windy, so I stayed in the hotel gym and rode the stationary bike instead of going out on the beach. I didn't plan for cool weather in Florida!

Sunrise view from my room

Today (Wednesday) it was warmer but cloudy all day, which just made it seem not as nice. I still took the opportunity for a nice barefoot 3-mile run on the beach.

I can still see my toes over my belly!

Now just 2 more days until I get to go home to Greenville. Not that I don't enjoy and appreciate the opportunity for travel and education, but I miss home!

22 Weeks

Last week we made our "big reveal" (i.e. announced on Facebook) and it's been so nice to be "out"! We posted this on both of our pages:

The tandem bike is taken directly from our wedding invitations/programs/thank you cards. So much excitement!

Anyway, here's what's up this week:

Still feeling good and growing more and more each day. I think I have really popped this week. Even Scott said one night, "Where'd that belly come from??" I told him it was mostly from dinner, but I think in reality that might not be the case.

Hotel selfie from Daytona Beach

On Sunday (Feb. 1st) I flew to Daytona Beach where I'll be for work all this week. While I'm not excited about being gone for so long, at least a) it's somewhere with nice weather in February and b) I have a couple of work colleagues with me who also happen to be good friends, so at least I'm not too lonely.

Flying in - hello Florida coastline!

Got to visit with Kristy yesterday and spent a lovely afternoon in New Smyrna.

Not a bad hotel room view... this morning's sunrise. 

21 Weeks

Another great week has passed! Felt good all week, got some great exercise in the beautiful sunshine this weekend, and had a fantastic 30th birthday party on Saturday, thanks to Scott's great planning and organizing!

We went for a bike ride on Saturday to downtown on the Swamp Rabbit, stopped at Falls Park, and had some tacos at Papi's Tacos.

Rode the vintage 1976 Raleigh!

Liberty Bridge in the sunshine

Falls were roaring after Friday's rainfall

 On Sunday I ran some errands, including purchasing some maternity shirts - maternity pants still don't quite fit right, so I'll continue to hold off on those. But I love the shirts I bought! So comfortable.

I also ran my longest distance since pre-pregnancy... 11 miles!! It was slow (took me 2hrs 20 mins, 30 of which were walking) but I'm so glad I got it done. Felt great just be out in the sunshine!

This past week we also started some early research on items for our registry, so hopefully we'll actually start putting that together soon. There's just SO much information out there!