26 Week Recap: Tae-Bo Baby

26 weeks / 5 days
(in the classiest of all office bathrooms).

Ohhhhhhhhhhhh my gosh - how is it possible that this baby is going to get any bigger?  I still have 14 weeks!  An ENTIRE trimester!  Seriously.  I don't mind my stomach growing, but I don't think it's growing fast enough to accomodate him.  The reason I say this is because I feel EVERY.SINGLE.MOVE this kid makes - and with his predicted size, I want to say he'll be a linebacker, but with the strength of his kicks, he may very well be star punter.  (Either way, we've decided to go ahead and start the recruiting process and check out possible colleges - although we all know Drew only has eyes for his beloved Ohio State).
Anywho, as I sit and type, I'm being kicked and punched and falling victim to just about every type sweet of martial art skill that this baby has managed to acquire while in utero.  He may be born black certified but one thing's for sure - I hope he loves kicking my right lung as much as I used to love breathing with it.  Sometimes I can't handle it (especially when I'm sitting in my office and I can feel his head on my lung) - so I gently try to nudge him to politely request that he move off of mommy's vital organs...to which he always responds with a series of jabs and immediately returns to his previous location.  Clearly he doesn't understand that if I dont breathe, then neither does he.  But whatever - I still cherish every moment and every movement - even the ones that render me (literally) breathless.

Drew was out of town again this week - this time in VA Beach.  But thankfully he was only gone 2 nights (remember my rule about 2 night being good-but 2 weeks being WAY too long?)  So it was just enough time for me to catch up on my shows (hello Ms. Bachelorette Emily Maynard - let Kaelon and Ryan go STAT) and straighten up around the house a bit.  Drew was home on Friday afternoon - just in time to let the guys from BuyBuy Baby in to deliver and assemble our nursery furniture!  YAY!  I got home and was so amazed that in just a few months there will be a baby in that crib!  **First I have to get the bedding ordered or at least a mattress so the poor thing isn't sleeping on springs, but hey, at least he has his own bed now and the garden tub in our master bath isn't the only option.
Friday night we went to dinner at TGI Fridays (which I used to hate, but has REALLY stepped up it's game - especially with the appetizer pretzel breadsticks w/ the beer cheese dipping sauce.  Seriously - preggo craving HEAVEN). 
Saturday we actually slept in til like 8:30.  And by noon-thirty, it was officially POOL TIME.  The past 3 summers we've taken advantage of Kevin and Shavon's Berewick pool guest passes - but this year we got to use our very own!  The Morris Bros met us at our house, we packed the cooler and pool bag and headed to meet everyone to kick off Summer 2012!  That night (after preggo brain struck and I realized that while I had thought Drew put suscreen on my back, he actually hadn't *ouch*), we all went to a cookout at Mandy and Damon's.  It was a great way to kick off the Summer and I'm super excited for all of the great memories we're all going to make while we pass the time before Cohen's here!

Sweet Dee, me&Cohen, Mandolin & Kimmy.
(why does it look like I have a FUPA?)

WEEK 26 CRAVINGS:  So, I think I need to switch the label to this section of the blog, because I'm kind of past the 'cravings' point.  Every now and then something will strike and I'll have to have it, but other than my typical green apple/lemon juice water, there's not really any food that I'm craving. 
However, I am ALWAYS looking to put together a cute outfit and maintain my stylish self...even at 6 months pregnant.  Don't get me wrong, there are days (like today) where I'm rocking jeans, flops, a cardigan and my glasses w/ my hair in a messy ponytail, but at least 3 or 4 days a week I try to really doll up and look cute.  It's not a vanity type of thing, it's just that I really love clothes and see this pregnancy as the opportunity of a lifetime to accentuate all of the good ways that my body's changing (the bump is my alltime fave accesory), as well as try my hardest to hide the areas that aren't so cute (hips and thighs OH MY).  So Thursday of last week I premiered this look - and I was stopped all over the place with compliments.  I don't know that it was because I actually looked cute enough to receive them, or if people didn't know that kelly green maternity skinny jeans existed, but in the crapshoot world of pregnancy where half the time you feel like you look like a troll, I smiled and accepted each of them politely. 
With that said, I give you: Destination Maternity kelly green skinny jeans, Heidi Klum maternity beige chevron blouse and gold accents w/ Essie coral nail polish.  Easy, comfy and fab.  Just the way I like it.

WEEK 26 "Dose of Daddy":  Beyond RIDICULOUSNESS is the only word I can use to sum up these pictures:

The 2 minutes that Drew was simply 'the photographer'.
That definitely didn't last long.

Who needs and Elf on the Shelf when you have Uncle Boo on a Ledge?

Proof of the Reebok v wall battle.
(Reeboks-1.  Wall-0)

I'm the king of the worrrrrrrrrrld.

Saturday night, after a day at the pool and a cookout, Drew and Brandon were once again totally in 'their' element.  I think it was Brandon who decided it was a good idea to channel his inner Spiderman and scale the wall of our foyer and perch himself up on the ledge of our main entrance. 
It took t-minus 3 minutes before Drew felt left out and decided to follow suit.  After screaming "you don't have insurance until July 1st!" about a million times, I gave up and me and Dee decided to sit on the couch and enjoy the show.
I'm happy to say no one was injured and there are only minor scrapes up the wall from Brandon's first attempt, where he decided wearing shoes was the way to go (all additional attempts were conducted sans Reeboks).  As a concerned wife and mother-to-be who cherishes the thought of bringing this baby into the world with BOTH his mother and father in attendance, I wasn't impressed.  But as a fun, free entertainment-loving chick, this was epic. 
It's just too bad I've decided to never introduce Cohen to his father or his Uncle Boo.


WEEK 26 "To Remembers":  A few months ago there was this thing going around Facebook where you sent a message to someone that you've lost touch with over the years, telling them what they most remember about you.  I got alot of funny ones that made me reminisce and laugh at old memories and the people I shared them with.  But the best one I got was from a girl that I went to highschool with named Ashley.  Ashley was a year ahead of me and while I don't think we ever shared a class together, we had a ton of mutual friends and passed alot of notes in the hall :)  We've lost touch over the years, but keep up on FB...and she sent me this:

It was one of the sweetest things I've ever read and I was blown away at how she went out of her way that day to take time out and send me those words. 
Like I said, this was sent to me some time ago, but she had messaged me again on FB last week and it brought up all of the messages we had ever sent back and forth btw eachother.  As I re-read it, it touched me as much as it had the first time I read it, but in a different way.  I'm not perfect...I've said and done ALOT of things I wish I could take back.  But the fact that someone remembers me this way makes me strive to be an even better person today than I was yesterday.  And now that I'm having a child of my own, I pray that I'm a daily example to Cohen of the person God planned for me to be and that he follows in my footsteps.  I pray that he always sees the good in everyone, that he sits with the kid in the cafeteria that's sitting alone, that he empathizes when necessary, and that he always makes people smile.  I pray that I lead him to be the person that my parents taught me to be - because this FB message is proof that even when you don't realize it, people notice and it makes a difference.  

"Be the change you wish you see in the world."

~Ghandi