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.

So this happened last night.

Yup, my husband and my dog both have fractured knees.  It happened in a split second and I'm kicking myself for not preventing it.  She was coming to the edge of the bed to welcome me home and slipped down the 3ish foot drop snapping her arm to the side.  Poor baby was in so much pain.  Thankfully our vet was open for another 10 minutes and is only 7 minutes away.  They took her in, did x-rays and bandaged her up sending us home with a bunch of instructions and pain medication.  We'll find out in the next day or two if she'll need surgery to repair it but the vet seems to think it will heal fine on its own.

Today I have both patients at home irritating each other while they commiserate.  I guess we're going to have a lot more nights in than I was expecting.

Life has been hectic and wonderful and tiring all in the same breath lately.  Roxy girl is acclimating well to us and our schedules as are we to her.  She's a little fire ball who loves napping and cuddling close to mom and dad at the drop of a hat.  All of this means she's been given multiple nicknames.  She's foxy Roxy, Roxy Hart, my Parrot, E's Billy Goat and my favorite, sour patch kid.  She's super smart and quick to learn.  

In fact, during the day, and only while she's young, we keep her in a play pen while we're at work.  When she's old enough to not get hurt and she's closer to being 100% potty trained, we plan to change that.  But for now, that's her little home.  Unfortunately for us, she's way smarter and learned to scale the side and escape into the living room. Thankfully I think we've got it under control now, but for a second I thought we were doomed.  But more than that, I was afraid she'd hurt herself badly in an escape attempt.  

We're trying to stay one step ahead of her antics but she's definitely outsmarting us.  Hopefully soon we'll be able to enroll her in obedience training to fill in the gaps.  For now she's learning to come and sit on command and has had no accidents in the last couple of days.  Things are looking up.

The weekend was long and busier than we expected it to be because we added a new member to our little family. Introducing Roxy, our ten week old puggle baby, or my 30th birthday present from Babe.  She's so sweet and so good and just so, ahhh.  We already love her.

 

We picked her up Saturday and immediately took her to the vet for a check up.  Then after spending most of the day lying around we were in for a rough first night.  Although I have to give a huge thanks to her mom's family for potty training her because that's been a huge weight lifted.  Especially because by last night, she was well into a good bedtime routine.  

I realize I'm posting less often than usual and I only slightly feel bad about that.  In the past couple of weeks we've had some busy times.  First off, we finally changed over to our new insurance and are working with my PCP to get an official referral for the RE.  We decided recently against Babe going through insurance for a repeat SA.  Because of this, we can essentially schedule it at any time.  Unfortunately my husband has decided that he would like to wait until he starts a new job at the beginning of February.  He believes that this will leave him less stressed than before and able to give a better sample.  Personally I think he'll find less time to do it in and be more stressed in the new job.  It's not worth the argument though.  He's already made so many changes to help with our success that I'm very grateful for.  

Speaking of changes, we both decided to eliminate something from our diets.  Since I always have a difficult time remembering not to drink soda, I've asked him to keep me accountable.  In return, he is no longer drinking beer and will drastically cut back on alcohol altogether.  I'm pretty excited about the change because I know it's not even that big of a deal for either of us.  I drink soda out of habit and I can definitely use less sugar and caffeine.  I've cut it from my diet before with no significant results so I'm not expecting too much.  It's just nice to know I'll be doing something healthy for myself.

Recently I mentioned that we were looking at puppies.  After a really emotional trip to a PetSmart adoption fair we've decided to wait just a couple of weeks.  We have a busy weekend coming up and to leave a puppy home alone 5 days a week then again on a weekend is just too cruel.  In the meantime, Babe and I have been mulling over pug and dachshund litters to adopt.  I'm looking forward to the addition it will be for our family.  Since I've never owned a dog let alone any pet we're both pretty nervous about it.  Thankfully I'm married to beast master Jr. 

With all of these little things happening in our life we've also decided to take on one more hurdle.  We're going to refinance our house!  Over the weekend we settled on a lender and are in the process of negotiating the interest rate. If it works out as planned, we'll be saving almost 2%  in interest PLUS be able to take out some cash for some much needed updates on our little home.  

So far it's a great start to a new year.