16 Weeks

We only have 166 days left!

It makes me heart warm and fuzzy with indigestion and my back ache with excitement!

This is the first week my bump looks like something other than the results of a  diet high in saturated fat and sugar,

but the pictures don't do my growing stomach justice.

In fact, I keep wearing the same three or four shirts over and over again

because they are plenty long to cover my itsy bump

and the stretchy part of my maternity pants. 

I told Henry that I think our baby will join the circus to be an acrobat.

This is because the last two days have been full of somersaults and cartwheels.

Of course, I can't see if that's what our baby is doing in there.

But it sure feels like it.

Last night we went to the movies to see "Battleship," 

and right when the Navy blows up the giant alien ship with their giant Battleship I felt a nice sharp jab behind my belly button.

I suppose it could have been the baby's appreciation for peanut MnM's...

 it's times like these that I grab Henry's hand and put it wherever I feel motion,

but it's not really strong enough to feel from the outside. 

This also makes me nervous....because I can't help but think that if I feel this much movement now,

what is my poor stomach going to feel like in another five weeks? ten? twenty?

Just knowing I have more than twenty weeks left makes me slightly ill...

We picked up Levi and Poppo from the airport yesterday afternoon

(or...Henry did at least while I fidgeted on an extremely uncomfortable chair in Art History and left to go the bathroom every half hour) 

I'm not sure what they were up to today, but they've been out of the house touring the town. 

Levi has to enjoy his last few days of freedom before he starts his classes on Monday.

I felt a little guilty when I realized his last weekend off would be spent hauling everything I own 

across a hallway that's a mile long

down two flights of stairs

into a moving truck

out of a moving truck

and into a new house.

But then I remembered that I'm going to be cooking for him

for the next two months

And this boy eats his body weight every meal.

So then I didn't feel too bad anymore.

= )

Thank goodness he's here (or I don't know how we'd move!)

Back to baby business:

Monday is the big day! 

We will (hopefully) know if we're having a turkey girl

or a turkey boy. 

Mommo already has things covered.

She sent Levi and Poppo with baby clothes and a blanket for either--

or as Henry keeps hoping, both. 

Pregnancy symptoms that have made themselves felt include the following:

Bathroom trips every half hour to forty minutes, regardless of fluid intake

constant achy back

my nice bra keeps getting smaller and smaller

--(I want pictures to have proof of this phenomenon)--

Sore, tight, crampiness as my stomach expands

never wanting anything to do with chicken--ever.For the rest of my life.

I have never hated a certain type of meat more than I hate chicken right now;

raw, shredded, cooked, grilled, broiled, you name it. 

A few of Henry's friends have asked him the following question:
"Has Kate told you she hates you yet?"

This has not been the case thus far.

I've never verbally abused my husband...as of yet.

What we have noticed is even funnier...and much less vindictive.

This has happened thrice in the last two weeks;

Usually in the evenings when I am exhausted and completely useless 

(in getting anything productive done)

Henry can say something as mundane as

"Can you pass me the salt?"

and I will laugh so hard, so hysterically, that I will start crying

and Laughing

and Crying

alternately for upwards of ten minutes. 

I laugh/cry so hard that my stomach muscles hurt the next morning like I've been doing sit-ups. 

This used to happen to a lesser extent when I was a kid

and my Dad would make me leave the table so I wouldn't choke on my dinner.

The best part is that Henry laughs just as hard as me 

(without the crying, though)

just because it is so ridiculous. 

But he makes me laugh even harder because he's laughing so hard.

It's a vicious cycle. 

We both agreed that this is a better way for the upswing in hormones to present themselves.

Neither of us are very confrontational.

And we never stay mad at each other for more than 5 minutes.

We've timed it.

(Okay-no we haven't but we really can't!) 

Give me this over constant morning sickness any day and I'll be a happy camper!

Tune in next week to find out what our baby will be!

(And to suggest any cool names since we will be thinking about this more in coming weeks!)