To find out or not to find out

So I have been getting a lot of people asking if we know the sex yet, and when I say no they ask are we planning to find out.

In the beginning I was very much a committed TEAM GREEN member. But so many women in my February Mommies online group have started revealing the genders and so far the tally is 9 girls and 3 or 4 boys, and over 20 team greens. Not all of us are regular posters though...and there are quite a few still waiting to find out, seems to be the norm now a days to find out, everyone women says its the planner in them hehee.

For me, I love surprises and love the idea of calling friends and family to say It's a ____ his/her name is ____ she/he weighs_____. I like the idea of all the idea of after labouring FOREVER and carrying this little one for 9 months to hear those fabulous words It's a ___ come out of our midwives mouth.

However (there's always a BUT) I think finding out if we have a hamburger or hotdog growing instead will just bring me, us that much more connected to the little ghaki no more calling him/her it or baby or whatever. And as much as I love yellow and green, I know I will be super sick of seeing those colors once we bring the LO home and yes I know we can do the fun clothes shopping after baby gets here...BUT I really love little girly stuff and little man stuff and it would be nice to have some before "the real exhaustation" sets in ;) ha

I'm not really asking for advice or opinions, just super confused and James does not seem to really mind whether we find out or not so he is not a pressure on either side of the fence (no help!)...and our ultrasound is in less than a week...my goodness I cannot believe that September is almost over. I swear to god I am going to blink for to long and it will be February!

Love to you all!

James, Callista (&baby) and Emi in Kelowna Sept 18, 2008 (Happy Birthday Nik)

The most amazing sound...

We got to hear our little monkey's heartbeat at our 12 week appointment with our midwife, but did not think to record it...this time I was ready phone in hand...thought it would be a nice little treat for the soon-to-be grandparents since you are all so far away :( Ghaki's heartbeat was 160 bpm the first round, today about 154 bpm and moving around like a gymnast the static bursts of sound is the baby flipping around, practising the breast stroke hahaa. So babies active, and I have been feeling the movements every few days, nothing crazy yet...just feels like bubbles, or popcorn popping, healthy and I'm measuring good :D But my bloodpressure was a little higher than last time, so I am going to try out accupuncture to be pro-active.
Ughhhh having a bit of difficulties with uploading the soundclip, hopefully figure it out by tomorrow! Otherwise I will just have to email it to those who want to hear it.

James has been referring to baby as she, her, how are my girls...until today at the midwife clinic he kept saying him, he's strong, I can't wait to feel him kick...so who knows maybe his spidey senses are saying something ;) heheee.

I have only gained about 5 maybe 6 lbs now, it's hard to count since my weight fluxuated so much before, and I was holding so much water in the beginning that I was heavier than normal. So in celebration of "I need to gain more weight" we went out for Vera's Burgers and POUTINE sooooo delish, now maybe I will top it off with a bowl of icecream hahahaa. I was told that I should aim for a minimum 20 lbs being a lighweight, the "little parasite" is just feeding off me hahahaa.

And of course more BELLY PICS! Only a weeks difference from the last pic. These were taken today...18 weeks 1 day.

17 weeks now

Today I'm 17 weeks along (well by our guesstimate)...can't wait for my ultrasound on the 30th to see how good our guess is of due date, and what not.

The bloat has kind of gone down, and now I mostly feel chubby and am looking forward to having a noticeable bump and be asked, when I am due hahaa. Emi and I did the BC SPCA Paws for a Cause walkathon today, and it was great lots of fun and our Shiba Team raised enough money to be within the top 10 groups! Yay!!

Mama these are what one pair of my mat pants look like hahaa...sooo sexy!

And my official 17 week baby picture from Sunday September 14, 2008

Future Goals

So James and I have been discussing lots (nearly every day) for the past couple months where we want to "settle", or I guess I should say start our roots, our foundation, family, and what not. We have our family started with our furbabies, and little monkey now on the way. But the hardest part about it all has been living so far from my parents and sister, with my dad being in the military we were always away from family, and became a very close small family...at least in my eyes. The 3 of them are my support, my back bone, and now James has joined them (my 4 favorite people ;)

Anyhoo...I want more than anything for my children to know how amazing their grandparents are and Aunty, and grow up building a friendship with them. James is very much on board with this, he is the one always suggesting to move closer to them, or to buy a big home here to accommadate them hehee...he loves you guys just as much (who wouldn't!) After our trek out to New Brunswick this past May, we have really started to fall in love with the idea of moving to the east coast, so long as I have an ocean I'm happy....anyways nothing is set yet and it won't be for a couple years, but we are hoping to move to some part of the East Coast.

The main part of this post is to share my personal goal...I have been trying to figure out some sort of business I can do from home, to be with my kids (fur and flesh) to be working with animals and people. I originally wanted to start an in home boarding service for dogs and cats. Now I am more focused on cats and wanting to not only have a cat hotel...but take it further and start my own no kill shelter, it breaks my heart whenever I see the homeless kitties at the SPCA, the older ones hardly ever get homes, and the superstition rules there and the black cats are always the last color picked! Personally my fav are the orange, black, greys, the calicos....oh heck all of them ;) I came across this video which is incredibly inspiring and heart warming and just wanted to share it...I am the crazy cat lady...thank god James is as equally the crazy cat man hahaaa
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwM6f0liHpo

Hope you enjoy! Lots of love to you all xoxo

Overdue...

Not me, not quite yet ha as pretty much all of you know now We are EXPECTING. Just overdue in updating this blog...huge apologies to not posting in so long. I have been crazy busy the past 2 months, with summer, work, dog sitting on the side, and trying to do some baby research.

Our estimated due date as of now is Feb 23, 2009 (we will get a better idea at our ultrasound in a few weeks), so that makes 15 weeks and 1 day along. I am planning to take a belly picture every other week, hopefully it will pop to to a cute round belly soon, mostly right now I just feel like I hit the buffet one to many times...so to anyone who does not know I am expectng they probably think I just had lots of icecream this summer hahahaa.


Dianna gaves us our first baby gift, and it's absolutely adorable and perfect, just love it! If anyone wants to get us something wink wink, I love silly onsie like this, and we are likely not finding out the sex so gender neutral is perfect.

And here is the growing baby belly, and Enzo with his perfect timing..."I'm the baby mama!"