The Joys of Motherhood

"Your baby's skeleton is changing from soft cartilage to bone, and the umbilical cord — her lifeline to the placenta — is growing stronger and thicker. Your baby weighs 5 ounces now (about as much as a turnip), and she's around 5 inches long from head to bottom. She can move her joints, and her sweat glands are starting to develop." From Babycenter.com

I'm up to 17 weeks on this pregnancy and I already feel huge! I know things happen faster with each pregnancy and this is my 4th one, but wow, this looks like a 5-6 month belly for my norm! My friends all tell me I'm still pretty small but since all of my other pregnancies were in a different state, my well meaning friends weren't around for the other three. I wish I had belly pics of the other pregnancies so I could compare them.

Wow my bathroom mirror needs cleaned! lol

On a positive note, my morning sickness is gone and the headaches are a little more bearable. I'm still pretty tired but then I do have four other kids to raise! That would tire anybody out! lol. Although, I can't take all the credit. J, father of the baby, and Dani, our awesome friend, roommate, and honorary Aunt to the kids, are both wonderfully great helps. They both really do help make things a bit easier on me.

Now, if I could just convince my two year old, Holly, to be a little less glued to my hip. I don't know if it's separation anxiety or something else. She does fine if she goes somewhere with J or Dani without me but when she's with me she's closer to me than my shadow. I love her to pieces and adore spending time with her, but she does get a little ridiculous at times. I can't go pee, sit alone, cook, clean, leave the room or anything without her. I know I need to do something to help her through this, especially with another baby on the way, I'm just not sure how to go about it. Hunter was 2 years old when I had Holly and while he definitely loves his Mama, he wasn't as glued to me as Holly is. It wasn't very difficult to help his adjust to his baby sister. Holly loves babies but I can see where breastfeeding the new baby might be a problem.

I remember after Holly was born, Hunter would sit next to me on the couch while I fed or just cuddled with Holly. He loved to rub her head and give her kisses! I actually taught him his colors sitting like that using the colored hearts on Holly's onsie. It was so cute! Sitting that same way we practiced drawing and recognizing shapes using one of those little toys where it has the magnetic pen attached and you slider the lever to erase it. They both love those toys and I can't remember what they are called!

Hunter and Holly as a baby.

Ahh, memory lane gets me every time. Now I just want to sit and snuggle with both little monster babies! On that note, here they come yelling at and tattling on each other! lol. The joys of motherhood!