9 Weeks

Yesterday marked 9 weeks in this pregnancy. I've been meaning to blog for a couple weeks now and the weeks have just gotten away from me! I guess that's good in the first trimester, right?

Since the day I found out, I've been treating this pregnancy as my last. I have told Greg for years that I wanted at least one more because I just didn't get to enjoy Gunnar's infancy as my last becuase he was so close in age to Kylee. I had a 15 month old when he was born, so if he was happy and content in the bouncer, I had to just leave him there.

But the age difference between Hunter and Gunnar is the exact age difference, to the month, that will be between Gunnar and the new baby - 4.5 years. My kids are so much older and independent now that we all will definitely get to enjoy and soak up every bit of this baby!

So anyway, we found out we were pregnant at exactly 5 weeks, on a Tuesday. By Sunday, I was already getting all day nausea. This is definitely the earliest morning sickness has reared its ugly head. By the next week, I was throwing up multiple times a day, which is typical for my first trimesters. Oddly enough though, even when I lost 15 pounds in my first trimester with Gunnar, they never gave me anything for my nausea. About 1.5 weeks ago, around 7.5 weeks, I called the doctor's office and asked if they could see me to give me medicine because I just couldn't function enough to care for myself, let alone my 3 kids.

They got me in the very next day and gave me this glorious stuff called "Diclegis." It's half b6, half unisom. Of course it has its side effects, including drowsiness, so that means I have to take it at night. I take 2 nightly, and have been for almost a week now, every night. If I miss a day, it's almost like I need to build it back in my system again. It is causing constipation (keepin' it real, here, folks!) So I've had to be diligent with taking in coconut oil and stuff to combat it. The medicine definitely keeps me from throwing up (for the most part) but I still get a stomach ache after eating. I have found that carbs (bagels, bread, potatoes, etc) sit really well with a pretty mild stomach ache. So if I gain 10 pounds this trimester, there will be no question why! Currently though, I'm actually a pound or two under prepregnancy weight.

I have hopes that the morning sickness will end earlier since it started earlier, but time will tell. I have actually felt decent yesterday and today which has been nice so that I can get things done, but at the same time, I of course worry that something might be wrong. My first real appointment is next Wednesday, and they'll try to listen for the heartbeat and everything, so hoping I get to hear that sweet sound!

I definitely have a belly. And some may just go with it and say to show it off being that it's my 4th pregnancy. And some days I do. I'm sure it's mostly bloat because the baby is only the size of a grape, but I definitely do believe  you show faster with each one because your body is like, "oh hey, I remember this!" I won't be posting belly pics for a few more weeks though.

Here are links to my other 9 week pregnancies from my last 2 children if you're interested in comparing...

2nd baby: http://wehrmans.blogspot.com/2010/07/lots-of-weeks.html

3rd baby: http://wehrmans.blogspot.com/2011/09/another-blessing.html

I guess there isn't much to compare for 9 weeks. I'll post other links though as I get further along. First trimesters are always really rough for me and I have a hard time blogging.

How to Make a Fake Pregnant Belly

Now I know what you're thinking...yes, I'm already pregnant. However, the person that played Mary for our Christmas Cantata is not! I was in charge of making it look like she was.

After considering lots of different ideas and consulting with a master costume-maker (thank you for your help, Andrew!) I decided a stuffed pillow would be best.

I started with stretchy polyester that I had laying around. It was a royal purple, but I knew it would be covered up, so color didn't matter.

First, I cut a piece of fabric about 12-13" wide, and I turned the fabric so that if I pulled it on the sides, it wouldn't stretch. The length wasn't really important at first, so I left it about 2' long.

Next, I blew up a beach ball about halfway to serve as stuffing while I pinned. Since I already have a 5 month pregnant belly, my poor husband had to keep stuffing the beach ball under his shirt to see if it made him look 9 months pregnant, haha. Needless to say, he wouldn't let me get a picture of that.

After I got it to be a good size, I set it on top of my cut fabric.



Next, I draped another piece of fabric over the ball, making sure it was turned 90 degrees from the other piece of fabric so that if I pulled the sides, it WOULD stretch. Then, I pulled the fabric tight on the sides so the beach ball would flatten on the bottom and pinned the sides in a straight line to my bottom piece.

Next, I pinned the bottom corners in pleats to work around the curves of the ball, like this:

Then I did the same thing to the other side, and pinned a straight line at the bottom. Like this:
I then sewed the U shape on my sewing machine. Here is what the underside looked like with the flat piece of fabric. No pleats, just flat:



And here's the top side with the pleats:Next, I left the beach ball out of it, and pinned pleats around the top part of curves, but made them smaller than the bottom, since this would be the top of the belly. I made sure to leave the top open for stuffing it. I then trimmed the excess fabric around the edges.

I used fiberfil for stuffing, and did the same thing as the beach ball...my husband had to keep putting it under his shirt while we adjusted the size.

Sorry it's not a great picture, but here's the finished pillow.

You can tell it's a bit lumpy from the fiberfil but it wasn't a problem, because she wore it under a BellaBand like this so it could be easily slipped in and out:


I already had the BellaBand, which I got at Target for about $20, but it's just a tube of spandex. It could be easily recreated.

She wore a maternity tank over the belly which helped smooth out any last lumps, and then here's the finished product:
Doesn't it look great?!