(More than) halfway there?

Friday marked 20 weeks of baby-growing fun around these parts. To celebrate, I had to buy What to Expect When You're Expected - completely hilarious as expected. It's made me laugh quite a bit and we all know that laughter is the best medicine... except of course for actual medicine... which I generally can't have.

But baby-wise, things are going well. I've started to feel "quickening" which is the odd term for the baby moving around in my belly. It's not consistent or hard at all, just a strange little muscle spasm-type feeling every now and then. Jonathan is eager to feel the baby too, but it will probably be a few more weeks before it's strong and consistent enough for that. I also haven't been quite as ill as I was in the past... I don't really keep count but I'd estimate that the toilet-hugging frequency is down to 2-3 times each week now and holding pretty steady there. It's not so much a nausea from food or smells issue as it is heartburn. I need to try some tums but I keep forgetting to grab them. For the time being, chocolate shakes seem to coat my esophagus sufficiently to keep the acid at bay for a while. Of course now I have to start writing down what I eat every day and tracking the balance and protein intake for class every week... so I might not be able to get away with a milkshake for dinner every night :) Did you know I'm supposed to aim for 100 g of protein every day?! I don't think I could eat enough to get so much. Unless I sat around gnawing on turkey legs all day. But even then...

We had our second Bradley class last night, and it was most excellent. Every week a different couple brings snacks for the group, and last night's couple set the bar high with these amazingly delicious whole wheat sweet potato chocolate chip muffins. Oh so good. We also had a visiting massage therapist in the house who taught everyone some techniques for relieving various aches and pains. She also told us that if we go to her for a prenatal massage, we can come back after we have the baby for a free post-partum massage. AND if we call her while we're laboring, she'll come to us and give a free labor massage! How amazing is that?! At the end of class we discussed breastfeeding and pumping, which sounds logistically complicated to me but I suppose we'll figure it out. I'm determined to breastfeed exclusively for 6 months. I mean... it's free! And free things are quite appealing to me. I would like to breastfeed for at least 1 year, but not exclusively of course since the little ones start getting to eat stuff at 6 months. Also, some trivia - we learned that the two people who influence moms the most and have the biggest impact on moms' decisions to start, continue, or quit breastfeeding are the mom's partner and the mom's mother. I think I lucked out there because Jonathan's all for breastfeeding (again with the FREE bit), and my mom is too. Yay!

Well thanks for sticking with my rambling self this morning. Sometimes I'm just trying to get this all down in no particular order before I forget it.