Pregnancy Updates - 6 months

Today marks 6 months! Matt snapped a few pictures of me to show my growing belly. It has been growing a lot in the past couple of weeks. There are times where I tell Matt I can actually feel my belly stretching and growing. The baby also moves around a lot, and sometimes shifts toward the front of my belly, making it stick WAY out there!

I'll share a few pictures, stories, and updates in this post.

Just this weekend I've had a couple of times where I have a textbook or a songbook in my lap, and she'll kick so hard that it makes the book jump!

One night Penny had her head resting on my belly and the baby kicked right under her chin. Penny sat up and stared at my belly, then stuck her nose right on the place where the baby kicked. I was laughing so hard that I had tears streaming down my face!

One night, around 2:30am, Penny heard a car door slam outside and barked. When she did, it felt like the baby nearly jumped out of my tummy! Even though Matt and I were still half asleep, we got a good laugh out of it (though it wasn't as funny several minutes later when she was still awake and kicking, and I was ready to get back to sleep!).

The baby is about 12 inches long now, and weighs about 1 1/3 pounds. She hasn't been quite as active in the past week or two (at least compared to before!), but I still feel her movements pretty regularly. Though not as frequent, the kicks and punches have gotten much stronger. She also likes to push up on my ribs, which is painful, at times!

I haven't noticed too much of a pattern yet with her movements. I've noticed that she moves around more after I've had a lot of water to drink or when I've had sweets. I had to practice real self-control this weekend after making delicious homemade snickerdoodle cookies... but it was fun to feel the baby jump around a few minutes after indulging! I had to set out the tray of cookies when the teens came over this weekend just so I wouldn't have so many sitting around tempting me!

Matt and I are really starting to get into planning mode now. Matt started working on fixing up a dresser for the nursery, we've started looking at items for a registry, and we've started talking about some serious labor and delivery topics to decide what we want to strive for. I'm sure the next 2-3 months will be busy, as we try to get everything together and ready (as much as we can!).

We have an appointment later this week, so hopefully I'll have some more information to share then!