A draft that I hadn't published

 I don't know why I didn't publish this, but I wrote this in May. So here's an oldie I just discovered still in draft form. 




Wow. I'm terrible at keeping a regular blog. I can't believe it's been 3 months.

Let's see....

A plant based diet has been working out great for my health. Kidney stones have virtually been eliminated! Seriously! Amazing. When I mention how I'm eating and people know I'm pregnant, they always gasp and ask with concern and doubt, "Are you getting enough protein and vitamins???" Well... the baby is growing. I'm on track. Nothing has been wrong so far.... So.... Yes. I am. And in fact, I believe that my pregnancy is going a lot healthier than most women I know. Heartburn is rare (only happens when it's been too long between meals), weight gain has been slow but steady, no constipation, etc. The only bad thing that's happened has been anemia, but my sis had that with her two pregnancies and she didn't eat a vegan diet. So I'm just eating lots of high iron foods with an occasional supplement. Here's a great article on pregnancy and diet: http://www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2011nl/jan/pregnancy.pdf

February went by with no major milestones. Valentine's Day was my turn to plan. So I made a pretty big production of it. Breakfast at The Wild Grape. Couples massage at Sego Lily Spa. Afternoon snowy hike up Millcreek with the dogs. Homemade pizzas (I NEVER make pizza because I hate it, but Justin loves it, so I had to include it.) The grand finale was taking him to his favorite movie of all time at the IMAX in 3D... Top Gun!

March was also uneventful. I literally counted down the days until the end of the ski season. That last month is always the hardest. We had a bit of drama at work with our director, assistant director, sales manager, and spa manager quitting simultaneously and dropping some crazy policies on us right before their absence. I was also told by the HR department I was short hours to qualify to take a maternity leave and not lose my job while off. It caused me quite a bit of stress, but I am at peace with everything now and working more hours in order to qualify.

Justin's birthday was at the end of the month. I took him to The Roof (NOT vegan friendly... Mormons aren't so good with plant-based food diets, despite scripture pointing to it) on his birthday and Pancake House for breakfast (also not vegan friendly). Then in the afternoon he did his favorite thing in the world, road cycling, from our house to the point of the mountain and back. Roughly a 50 mile ride. The following Saturday I invited a few friends over for pizza, guarana, and a movie. I must really really love this kid, providing all this non-vegan friendly food for him. Yes, I do love him.

We also finished the nursery! It's so cute. My design, but Justin is the one who makes anything happen around here. I'm a dreamer, he's a doer. And a great one at that.

Speaking of projects, he also built me garden boxes! I ordered a ton of heirloom organic seeds from Baker Creek (rareseeds.com) with the hopes and dreams of creating a beautiful, delicious, and healthy garden full of veggies to harvest through the summer. Justin made this a reality for me.

Meanwhile, Justin did a ton of backcountry skiing. Sometimes with the puppies, sometimes without them really really early in the morning with neighbors.



As far as the pregnancy goes, only 7 more weeks!! I'm in the home stretch. I have been super paranoid and watching my skin like crazy. Every time I shower I drench my torso in seaweed oil or lotion, take frequent seaweed baths, and never put anything non-organic on my skin. I've also been super diligent with my facial regiment. Here are the products I'm using:

http://www.spatechnologies.com/Shower-Gels-&-Polishes/c12/p103/Hydrating-Laminaria-Oil/product_info.html

http://www.spatechnologies.com/Shower-Gels-&-Polishes/c12/p107/Body-Hydration-with-Porphyra-Red-Algae/product_info.html

http://us.eminenceorganics.com/Coconut-Milk-Cleanser_p_54.html

http://purenaturaltouch.com/isun-honey-goji-berry-mask.html

http://www.spatechnologies.com/Specialty/c39/p218/Micro-Pearl-Dermabrasion-Cream/product_info.html

http://purenaturaltouch.com/isun-organic-skin-care/herbal-moisturizers/isun-sapphire-facial-oil.html

And for the update!

How far along: 33 weeks!
Total weight gain: 12 pounds
Maternity clothes? Definitely. Nothing else fits.
Stretch marks: No, some little red lines appearing, but no full on stretch marks
Sleep: I dread sleep. I can't get comfortable anymore. My left hip aches from always lying on it. There's a knot under my left scapula that won't go away, and I feel like I can't breathe at night.
Best moment this week: Hearing his heartbeat at the doctor's office. It never gets old.
Movement: Tons tons tons. I just know he's going to be crazy and in the words of a friend, a "holy terror"
Cravings?: Nope. I'm getting sick of eating food. I know I need to do it, but nothing sounds good to me ever. Except a hummus veggie sandwich from Carlucci's. That always sounds good.
Anything making you queasy or sick: No
Labor Signs: Occasional Braxton Hicks. But nothing else!
Symptoms: Fatigue, waddling, food all over the front of me when I eat, can't remember anything these days (thank goodness for the calendar app on the iPhone), sacral pain, breathing is harder
Belly Button in or out? In still.
Wedding ring on or off? Still on. No swelling.
Happy or Moody most of the time: Neither. Just tired. Very very very tired.
Looking forward to: Delivery! I really really want to meet our little sprout. 

Speaking of pregnancy, we finished a Lamaze class together a week ago. It was a great experience. I got lots of backrubs and hugs from Justin in class-- my favorite. And I learned about all the medical and non-medical options I have so I can be prepared for delivery. It was awesome! And I've decided not to have a birth plan in order to make sure I don't set us up for failure. We are going to go with the flow and see what happens with this kid. If I can make it naturally, I will. If not, I will still be excited to meet him and hope for a healthy baby.        

Halloween

I hate Halloween. Seriously. I think it's stupid to spend a bunch of money on a costume you wear for ONE DAY (wedding, anyone?) and then binge on cheap sugar to celebrate demonic creatures and decorations. DUMB. I would rather celebrate the harvest season. But Richie's grandma loves Halloween costuming so she went all out for his costume. His Hawaiian cousins picked it out. So here's some pictures of what we did on Halloween.

Slept.

Hung out.

Waited for Trick-or-Treaters that never came. Sigh....

Before Halloween my former teaching partner and I held a class party for our Sunday School Class. I am still sad they took Sarah Windes from teaching the 16-17 year olds with me and put her in primary. We had such a fun thing going. I have really grown to love teaching, more for the part of interacting with the kids than the actual teaching part. They are truly amazing teenagers. All of them are really outstanding. Watch out world, you have some amazing future missionaries/students/mothers/fathers/wives/husbands/workers coming!

Dog Park

When the weather became too gloomy and muddy to go hiking I took the dogs to the dog park in Sugarhouse a few times. Porsche is such a little social butterfly. She likes to play with EVERYONE and gets so excited. Her favorite game is to chase other dogs around. Koda is like the awkward kid on the playground that doesn't know how to interact. He sniffs around, barks at random dogs (not aggressively), picks on little dogs, gets nervous around the big dogs, and tries to steal other dogs' balls. It's annoying but very endearing. No one understands Koda like we do.

Fall Break

During Justin's fall break we borrowed my parents membership to the Marriott and stayed in Park City at Marriott Mountainside. It wasn't super exciting. We napped a bunch, hung out in the hot tub, ate out, took a nice drive, and watched a lot of movies/TV. Richie didn't do too great and cried a bunch. But he tolerated us trying to salvage what we could manage to get out of the break.

Fall Happenings

Well, I got my body back! Wahoo! (That postpartum illness definitely helped.) The picture on the left was me at 11 weeks and on the right was sometime in October.

It probably helped that I trail ran with the dogs. Can you tell how much they love to go with me? A few times I drove Justin up the canyon to let him mountain bike for his own sanity. I love how athletic he is.

We took Richie to see my Grandma again. It's amazing that despite her Alzheimer's disease, she get so lucid when she sees Richie.

Also, remember how I told you about Richie's legendary ability to sneeze like 5 times in a row? Here it is on camera.

One week Brandi came and totally surprised us. They had moved to Hawaii that summer taking the 3 nieces and 1 nephew with them. We were SO stoked that they came back for a visit! Richie got to meet his Hawaiian cousins. Additionally, Justin's brother and his wife adopted another baby, JJ, and Richie got to meet him for the first time! We are so excited to have a boy cousin his age on each side of the family. We all went out for what seems like the Henderson family tradition of eating at Red Robin.

During this time our friends/neighbors, the Rich family, offered to help out with Richie a ton. I'm so grateful they did. They took him overnight a few times so we could catch up on sleep. (Thanks John and Kathleen! We will owe you forever!) Richie is in love (or maybe Jane is in love) with their daughter, Jane.

This fall was strange with some odd weather of snow before the leaves had fallen off. This was a picture I took from Montage while working one day. Can you believe how pretty it is?

Baby Blessing

Here are some pictures of Richie's baby blessing. We held it in September. It was a sweet blessing and we hosted a get together afterward with a vegan oatmeal bar, veggie sandwiches and some sides. It was fairly easy but obviously I stressed out about how I would get the house ready, work, and take care of Richie. But we managed. We dressed Richie like Justin Timberlake. (Justin's Mom picked it all out and had matching ties for the men, it was precious.) He didn't appreciate it.

Just some interesting info. We named Richie after two of Justin's heroes. Richard was his maternal grandfather that he had a special relationship with. His grandpa was an amazing wood worker, fun, hard working depression-era man who Justin still looks up to. Marcus, or Marcos, was Justin's mission president whom he learned hard work, dedication, and spiritual devotion from. Marcos Aidukaitis is now a member of the Quorom of the 70 but he and his wife made it for the blessing. It was an honor to have him there.

New Discoveries

As new parents, we are always finding out new things. Richie's faces for one. I snapped pictures for 20 seconds and literally got a different expression in each. It's crazy how much personality he has.

We also discovered that we love cloth diapering! Hurray for cheap and sustainable diapers! (They're super easy and wash so easily too.) Yay!

Yay??

Also, did you know Richie is a Ute fan? We didn't. But he is. Go UTES!

We also never realized how ridiculously cute babies are in PJs and when they sleep. SO ADORABLE. It makes up for all the middle of the night crying and colic.... Almost.

Also, dates away from home (like at Wasatch Brewery in Park City) are amazing to strengthen couple relationships and remind you that you're human and not just a giant breast feeding a little monkey all day.

Speaking of Park City. I discovered how much I missed trail running and doing yoga from my massage room during slow times. So good for my soul. I love working up at Deer Valley and having such a gorgeous view being surrounded by the Rockies.

And lastly, we discovered how much easier it is to shower WITH babies, than in a baby tub. And it's so cute to watch.

Sanity in work and hiking

A few times Justin and I lost our sanity. How did we gain it back? Hiking of course. Sometimes by ditching Richie with neighbors or family so we could be alone. Sometimes we brought him with us and threw in him in the Ergo. He napped really amazingly well hiking. Probably because I hiked a lot pregnant and the movement was soothing. The dogs enjoyed us getting our sanity back.

We visited my Grandma a few times with little Richie. She LOVES babies. This is her third great grandchild. (Come on, cousins, get on it! She needs more.)

Can you believe the gorgeous tomatoes we grew? Not a ton of them. But the ones we did get were gorgeous.

I started work again. Both good and bad. I freaked out a little thinking of leaving my baby behind while I was so far away in Park City. But my co-workers made me feel so welcomed back! They are awesome. Love you guys! You're the best!

Work also made it a lot easier to come back to my family recharged with a little more patience and guilt to do better.

I also managed to get Richie's first time finding his voice on film!