Thoughts and fears about pregnancy

So it is still hitting me that I am pregnant, and with twins! I am gently reminded every morning ;) I have waited and dreamt so long for this to happen. I thought I would be so excited, instead I am so nervous. I am so nervous to become a Mommy. Have I done enough in my life pre-children? Will we be okay financially if I decide to stay home? How will our marriage change? Oddly enough, these are all questions we asked ourselves a year and a half ago when we decided we were ready for a family and we knew all the answers and were very confident. Why the change? Is this how normal women feel when they get pregnant? Is there always some level of anxiety when thinking about the biggest change that will happen in our lives to date? Am I normal? Ha!

And then the twins are an entirely different worry. I felt confident in my skills to parent one child. How am I feeling about two? How do you parent two babies, two children, two teenagers? What do you do for birthdays? What if we have a boy and a girl, how do you get mom to bond with the boy and dad to bond with the girl? It always seems like boy/girl families always have a tendency for the boy to do a lot of boy things with the dad and the girl to do girly things with the mom. As one of three girls, I am thankful for the "boy" opportunities my parents gave us, building us a train table, taking us to baseball games, teaching us to play football, as well as the girly things too; having every Barbie, American Girl, and cabbage patch doll know to man!

So again, are these normal first time Mommy fears or am I just paranoid and over-analyzing? Which I do have a tendency to do!

Week 7

We had an awesome week this week and got to see our babies (that's right there are TWO) for the second time. The first was during the transfer when they were just little embryos and this time we were able to see them on the ultrasound and hear their precious heartbeats. I also learned that I calculated my due date wrong so the "6th week" last a few extra days! Posts will now be coming on Sundays.

Pregnancy Highlights:

Today's Date: Sunday, December 4th

How Far Along: 7 Weeks (over the halfway mark of the first trimester!)

Size of baby: Baby is the size of a blueberry.

Total Weight Gain/Loss: Back to normal

Maternity Clothes: No but stretchy pants are feeling pretty good right now! 

Gender: No Clue! I have a weird feeling about a boy and a girl so we'll see.

Movement:  None yet! 

Sleep: Still very sleepy. I'm pretty much in bed by 9 or falling asleep on the couch. I also get pretty tired around 2 and try to sleep a bit at my desk. I woke up early (4:21am) this morning for the first time to use the bathroom.  Other than that I've been sleeping until around 7:30 or 8.

What I miss: Food! Nothing really sounds good to me besides cereal. I'm also missing my energy!

Cravings: Coke Icee's. They seem to settle my stomach a bit. I'm also getting really worried about gestational diabetes because I was overweight before getting pregnant and because there are two babies in there! Hopefully, I'll get to meet with a nutritionist soon to discuss my eating habits!

Symptoms: Tired, Heightened sense of smell, Nauseous all the time, a few bouts of morning sickness.

Best Moment this week: Learning that we are pregnant with HEALTHY babies! I was just so relieved to learn that they are measuring at the same length and their heartbeats are close together and strong. Also really enjoyed sending my ultrasound pictures to our close family.

your baby's the size of a blueberry!

Your .51-inch embryo doesn't exactly tip the scales just yet but she's developing like crazy. She's already doubled in size since last week.

Hey! Two for the price of one!

That is what our doctor announced to Jay and I yesterday during our 6week3day ultrasound (I thought I was at 6w5d so the due date will change). Jay and I are expecting twin babies in July. I cannot even begin to describe the emotions I felt upon learning that I was carrying two healthy babies.

Yesterday was such a crazy day with a huge range of emotions. I burst into tears while sitting in the waiting room. I was so overcome with emotion that I had sat in that waiting room for almost a year trying to get pregnant and here we were about to see our baby for the first time. I was just so thankful, scared, nervous, worried, and blessed (and hormonal!) all at the same time.

At the beginning of the ultrasound the doctor commented that he saw two gestational sacs and that he could definitely see the baby and the heartbeat in the larger/closer sac. We held our breath and waited for what seemed like forever before he located the baby and heart in the smaller sac. He told me both sacs were actually the same size, one was just closer to the ultrasound wand. Their little heartbeats flickered and hearing them beat was the coolest sound! Jay was practically leaning over me to get a closer look at the monitor. On another note, the doctor told me I could stop progesterone shots, begin working out (walking only), and needed to keep a very close eye on my diet.

I was so floored to learn that we were pregnant with twins. I was so overwhelmed. I was tearing up and my chest was tightening with anxiety all at the same time. I kept feeling like I was going to pee on the ultrasound wand! The nurse had to ask me if I was ok. I was so thankful to have two healthy babies but terrified at the same time. Dollar signs flashed through my head! I'm just praying everything will work out from the health of our babies, to our sanity, to raising two babies at once! Without further ado, I present the twins:

Baby A is on the left and measures at .63cm with a heartbeat of 124 bpm. Baby B is on the right and also measures at .63cm with a heartbeat of 127 bpm.

Birthday Celebrations!

I had so much fun celebrating my birthday this year! To start the celebrations, my entire family came to Charlotte to hangout for the weekend. We enjoyed tons of food and football! The day before my birthday several sweet friends took me out to dinner at the delicious Nolan Kitchen. On my actual birthday Jay kindly asked me where I wanted to go out to eat to celebrate. I asked if there was any way possible we could skip the dinner and go shopping instead, luckily he was fine with that idea and I got a few cute new things :)

sister secrets

Als and Brett

Momma

The head of the table

Enjoy a huge Sunday breakfast

yum

Birthday celebrations

MC, Kathryn, and Allison

Delicious dessert!

Jen and Lauren

All the girls.

A huge thank you to MC and Kathryn for putting this together. Ya'll are such sweet friends!

Reunion!

Two weeks ago most of my best girlfriends from college all came back to Raleigh to cheer on the Wolfpack! We had so much fun tailgating and catching up! We've decided to make this an annual event!

Jess, Mary Clare, and Nikki

Yummy low country boil

Zeta's for life!

Lovely meeting up with Mrs. Boehm!

A great win and a great night!

Go To Hell Carolina

So this post is VERY late but I've finally gotten my pictures off of my camera! We had so much fun cheering NC State to victory several weeks ago at the NCSU vs. Carolina football game! Jay's sister Ivey is doing her high school senior project on event planning and hosted a wonderful tailgate for Jay's family and friends. The game was awesome and we had so much fun shutting out the tarheels!

Jay and Miranda

(again in the white sweater! I told yall!)

Jay and his Dad

Yummy food!

Isn't this the cutest idea for display tailgate food?

delicious ham biscuits

Love the fun NC State straws she found!

Go State!

Everyone at the tailgate

Jenna and Jay's Mom

Me, Miranda, and Jenna

Big Jay and his kids

What a lovely day for football

Ivey and Cole

I loved this on the jumbo-tron!

Jay and John 

Meeting up with Katie!

Jay and Price

Thanks for photobombing...

Thanksgiving

We had a fun, family-filled Thanksgiving this year. We left for Asheboro on Tuesday evening and enjoyed spending Tuesday-Thursday with the Caviness/Carroll family. On Friday we got up bright and early to head down to Atlanta for Thanksgiving with the Sadow's. It was a busy long weekend but we had so much fun hanging out with family and relaxing. It was nice not to cook or clean! (On a side note, I promise I have more clothing besides this white sweater that I appear to be wearing in almost every picture I have in my camera!)

Sorry if this grosses you out!

The turkey fryers

Looking at these boxes of oil sort of makes me sick...

One hot turkey fryer!

look at the determination on that face!

Fryin'

Jay's Grandmother's very retro kitchen

All the yummy food!

Sophie is keeping an eye on the turkey

yum

Boomer is hoping Grandmother drops a piece or two!

Kisses to Jaybird

Again, our little beggar!

Jay's 97 (almost 98 year old PaPaw)

Chowing down at the adult table

Ivey (Jay's sister), Adam (Jenna's Boyfriend), Jenna (Jay's Cousin)

The whole fam

Ivey and Jay

The lady in charge of all this delicious food! Thanks so much Grandma!

I don't have any pictures of the Sadow Thanksgiving because my Mom is the photographer and they are all on her camera. I do have a few pics of our annual Thanksgiving photo shoot to share! We were a little worried we missed the fall setting but the leaves in my parent's backyard still provided a pretty background.

Everyone waiting for Mom to set up the tripod

This is how Jay feels about having his picture taken

Christmas card option #1

Christmas Card Option #2 (if only the dogs would look! and Jay would stop looking the Brawny paper towel guy)

Getting some Sophie love

Outtakes

The girls

I think this should be their Christmas Card

Pretty sister #2

Pretty sister #1

Hope you had a fun day giving Thanks with your family!