He's the size of a baseball hat!  Yes, that's right, no fruit sizing here.  A few months ago I came across this sizing chart comparing him to a toy soldier, a game boy and a baseball glove, all things E can relate to.  It's easier than saying he's the size of an heirloom tomato which vary in size and aren't an everyday food item in the DD household.  So this week, 21 weeks to be exact, our little bean is the size of a baseball cap and growing more and more each day.  

The kicks and the punches to my internal organs are at this moment a welcome treat that I get multiple times a day. I'm starting to notice what positions he either hates or loves because he's either ninja jabbing me to move or celebrating in his own little party.  And almost every morning when I wake up I linger just a few minutes longer in bed because like clockwork I receive one or two little stretches that say good morning and start my day off in ways I never imagined.  

Roxy I think is starting to notice the difference.  She's realizing lately that if she wants to cuddle the only way that can be accomplished is if I'm laying on my side on the couch and she lays/sleeps behind me.  There's no longer enough room in front of me for both her and the baby.  

Preparation for the baby's arrival is well under way and I'm starting to understand how much work is really involved. We've started our search for a day care facility since I will have to go back to work when Bean is 4 months.  It's really been an eye opener looking at the cost and comparisons of each.  Don't forget the need for you to be on a waiting list for some and requirement to take a tour for others.  Thankfully Babe is most worried about child care so he's willing to do a little extra work in this area.  

I've also begun researching registry items and asking friends their loves and hates.  It's great when you find a friend who has very similar ideas about what is needed and what isn't.  Remember E's cousin N I wrote about at the beginning of my blog.  Well she's pregnant with her second right now and she's been a great resource.  The bonus is her and her husband research the heck out of things just like we do and she's been sharing a lot of her resources with us at the same time not being too pushy.  It's been so helpful.  

And since we're in the new home we can finally start working on the nursery!  Babe and I finished painting the walls light gray and finally decided on a theme if you will.  We're going to decorate it with the circus in mind.  Pinterest has some of the cutest ideas that will help bring our vision to life and made it easier for us to both be on the same page. Hopefully my expectations aren't too high and I can get all of these done like this elephant mural that's too darn adorable and reminds me of Jumbo and Dumbo, this fun take on barrel of monkeys, this bright painted banner to bring a little extra color to the room and lastly this super cute homemade felt circus mobile.  Now that I write that all out I'm not so sure 4 months is enough to get through them all.

All that going on but the most exciting of all is the classes we've already scheduled.  We're planners and so it was awesome that our hospital not only recommended what time frame we should do them in but also allowed us to schedule them as far out as September.  So on the calendar already is our hospital tour so we can start to visualize exactly where everything is going to happen.  Then we have a 5 week labor class to help me and Babe plan for unmedicated labor.  And lastly is our infant/child CPR class.  We should probably do a refresher for adults too but at least we'll have one in the books for the littlest one in our life.  

Looking at this list I'm so thankful one of my symptoms hasn't been fatigue.  It's all so overwhelming but I know in the end it'll be such a huge payoff.  Now keep cooking little bean while we get everything ready for you.

It's been so long and so much has happened since my last post.  We got to see baby bean again and he's doing so perfect. My OB actually said it was a perfect pregnancy which was so great to hear a couple of very frustrating appointments and a worrisome mama.  By the end of this month we'll be able to see him another two times, once for a standard appointment and another for my anatomy scan at the perinatologists.  Of course with every new appointment comes the added stress that they'll find something wrong followed by the relief that all is okay.  I'm trying to take one appointment at a time and relish in the fact that I have a healthy baby growing inside of me that will join us in just 5 months time.

Aside from baby we've been incredibly busy now that we're new home owners again!  Our houses closed on the 25th and 26th and we were finally able to move on the 3rd.  Thankfully Babe was understanding enough with both our health that we hired movers making it the most boring moving day ever.  I'm so not used to that.  But 10 hours later and Babe and I were on, unpacking boxes and making this new home ours.  It's been 5 days and we're doing pretty well with the transition.  Babe by the way is a rockstar when it comes to home maintenance and I never know why I'm so surprised.  It also bugs him that I am, sorry Babe, I don't mean to have little faith.  It's just, that man can locate just about any problem, pick up a tool and with only a handful of curse words and a trip or two to Home Depot have it fixed in no time.  He's definitely taking on the lion-share of housework/unpacking without one complaint after I ended up with swollen ankles and belly pain over the weekend.  

And now that we've completed that hurdle, I've been taken off of the baby related purchase ban.  Babe actually started it off by suggesting we stop off at the bookstore on the way home one day.  He said he needed a how-to book for the house and suggested I look around for a new read for myself.  Instead I walked to the very back of the bookstore to the children's section and set out to look for "My I Love You".  Five seconds later E strolls to the same section to look for the exact same book, the real reason he wanted to stop.  Of course I always ruin surprises and this was no different.  Except that both baby beans mommy and daddy had the same idea for his first baby item and it was still such a sweet surprise.

With that I'll leave you with two of my favorite pictures from this weekend.  The first is our new killer view from the back of the house and the second is the master bedroom accent wall which just happened to match my nail polish.  I swear it wasn't planned.

Life is a whirlwind these days while we're buying and selling a house, working full time, packing and trying to plan for a baby and all the appointments it entails.  Don't get me wrong, I'm loving almost every minute of it and will absolutely be happy to reap the benefits.  The downside to moving when you're 3 months pregnant though is that your husband might not allow you buy anything for the baby until you're 100% moved in.  I've literally pored over page after page of cute baby clothes, nursery design ideas and how-to's on Pinterest only to be able to pin them to my private board.  No buying for this mama just yet.  No planning for a nursery for a couple more weeks.  And no hypothetically dressing my baby until there's a room to put said clothes in.  So although I'm super excited to be moving into our forever home in less than a month, I'm even more excited to be able to get into this pregnancy in real life, not just on the internet and in my mind.  

Speaking of real life.  We're getting so close to the end of 1st trimester (holy crap I JUST realized I'm 12 weeks already) that we put together a little pregnancy announcement for our friends and family.  Most know we're moving soon so we thought a great tie in would be a moving announcement by postcard.  Long story short, after dealing with social media and infertility, I really didn't want to share my own pregnancy with 1/2 strangers and people who would genuinely be hurt by the announcement.  The picture on the front of the postcard shows a picture of Babe, myself and Roxy standing on the porch of our current home with a box packed for the nursery captioned "We're moving...because we need a little more space".  It should reach family and friends from California to New York by early next week and we can again be another step closer to living life like a pregnant couple.

Then next Thursday we're scheduled for a series of appointments for the baby.  The first is the usual NT scan to check the baby for genetic disorders like down syndrome.  That will be followed by a high risk diabetes specialist.  It's a little too late now but for the past 4 years or so I have been treated for diabetes.  I tested once as a borderline diabetic and was asked to diet and exercise to bring my blood sugar down and it did.  The next doctor who saw the original tests then put me on 500 mg of Metformin.  Then at the beginning of the year another doctor ordered me to start taking 2000 mg (I might be forgetting a step in there too) because I was also struggling with infertility.  Fast forward to my first OB appointment and she's shocked that I've never really tested diabetic but there's nothing they can do for me now. So more than likely I'll be required to test my sugar for the remainder of my pregnancy to ensure Bean is safe.  While they're at it though they're going to take a better look at Bean's twin to see if everything is progressing okay.  I've been told that with a vanishing twin you can potentially have high blood pressure throughout pregnancy but am reading that there should be no other complications to little Bean.  Here's hoping everything looks great and I can see him kicking around in there again.

So yeah life is crazy right now but it's also just the beginning.

Is it possible to be even more blessed than you already are.  I mean, this feeling has been oozing out of me for a while but there have been so many more unexpected things happen to us I don't know how to contain myself.

As you know we had planned to move soon.  We were shocked to find we received an offer a week after putting it on the market.  Thank God, one thing down.  Since then we've been scouring the surrounding cities looking for the perfect house, with the perfect location all within our budget.  Babe and I had started to get discouraged because we couldn't quite find that combination until this weekend.  As soon as we saw it online we knew it could be our house but the day we arrived we realized the odds were against us.  In four days of being on the market more than 30 people had already walked through and offers had already been submitted.  We literally were sitting in our car outside waiting for our realtor watching cars slow down in front of it and pick up the phone.  

The house was as close to perfect as we could get.  The neighborhood was ideal, only 5 minutes from our current home but in a better part of town with better schools for baby bean.  The lot was large, large enough to have all our families over, let the dog run free, watch our little ones grow.  And the house, large enough to grow our family for the rest of our lives.  Good enough to feel cozy in, to make it our home.  It felt right, but we knew the competition was going to be tough.  So we did what any realtor would suggest of their clients, offer as much as you could.  By the next morning all our cards were on the table and we were nervous.  It would be a lot for us but it was doable.  I mean we'd done it before and if this was the right move, we'll never have to do it again.  

That same night we were notified that everyone would need to go back to the drawing board and come back with their very best offer.  E and I talked about it and realized there was nothing more we could do.  We'd already given them everything we could, we'd even written a letter to the homeowner directly thanking her for showing us around.  We took a huge risk knowing we would more than likely not be chosen.  We decided to resubmit the exact same offer.  

Last nights call came as expected.  Babe and I had resigned ourselves to not getting chosen because we didn't have any more to give.  We would just have to schedule more walk through over the weekend to find that right place.  But then our realtor said something that we had never in a million years expected, they chose our offer.  What?  But how? Why?  So many questions, some that we're okay are never answered.

Of course the second we get off the phone Babe begins budgeting, packing and planning some more.  After this years medical problems we've still been waiting receive the bills for his surgery, my fertility treatments and of course planning for baby beans impending birth.  So I promised I would call the insurance company first thing in the morning to find out what's taking so long on his surgery bill.  This morning I talked to John.  By the way, I could kiss John.  John told me that the insurance had already been billed and that we should never receive a bill for E's knee surgery. Seriously!  He also told me that when baby bean is born, we will not be charged one penny.  As I relayed the information to my husband I could literally hear the smile spreading across his face.  How great it is to hear his sign of relief.

I'm just at a loss for words at how good God is.  How much things have turned around for us when we were expecting such devastation this year.  That there are too many things to be thankful for to count.  But oh how I am.