Ok... Nauseous

So it kicked in.  The dreaded first trimester symptom has officially made its appearance.  I felt a little iffy at work last night, but this afternoon ever since I woke up I definitely don't feel well.  I don't feel like I'm gonna throw up, but I am nauseous.  Tried to go on a hike with Mike and Daisy but only made it a half an hour (usually our hikes are a good hour at least).  I just felt nauseous and weak and tired.  So we turned around.  Lame.  Don't feel like eating anything, and oddly, if I want to eat anything at all it has been vegetables these past two days.  Are you serious?  Me, the girl who hates veggies and has to force herself to eat a salad every now and again has had carrots and celery as snacks and a chicken caesar salad for dinner?  Whaaa?  I guess it's true that you end up craving what your baby needs.  Pretty amazing I must say.

I had my prenatal appointment this AM and it was pretty uneventful.  Talked with the pregnancy coordinator about what to expect, got offered a bunch of optional genetic testing for a bunch of extra money, and got 6 tubes of blood drawn.  Hopefully all of my blood work will come out OK.  I guess I'll find out next week.  I made my next appointment for June 16th and that will be my first ultrasound!  Yay!  Hopefully Mike will be able to get out of work early and come with me!

Mike's parents will be here in about a half hour and we're going on vacation with them tomorrow for a week.  Hopefully this whole nausea thing won't be too bad or it might blow our cover!  We shall see....

The First Weeks

So I am now 6 weeks and 2 days pregnant!  I've known for almost two weeks, but it seems like an eternity!  How am I going to keep this a secret for another month or more???  Mike and I decided that we wouldn't tell anyone for a little while (which, like I mentioned before, didn't really work.  Currently 5 people know the news!  Not bad though, eh?).  We didn't have any specified number of weeks that we wanted to wait, but I know that the risk of miscarraige is so much bigger in the first trimester, so I kinda wanted to wait until almost 13 weeks.  However, it's important to us that we tell our families in person, and we don't see them often enough to be that specific with our time frame. 

My mom is coming to visit June 10-14 and we decided we'll tell her at that time.  Then the following weekend we are going to my cabin with my dad, grandparents, and Mike's parents for Father's Day, so we decided to share the news with the rest of them there.  And unfortunately we'll have to tell Mike's sister over the phone, because we won't see her until the 4th of July, and people will not be able to keep it from her until then.  But I told my sister over the phone too, so it's all good.  I'll be in the middle of my 8th week when we tell my mom, and the middle of my 9th week when we tell the rest of the fam.  I think we'll probably wait a few more weeks until we announce the news to the general public.  So that's the plan for now.

I bought a little bib the other day for my mom that says "Grandma loves me", and I'm going to wrap it and tell her it's a late Mother's Day gift.  There is a cute little baby announcement card that I'm going to give her too.  Then, since we're seeing the rest of the family on Father's Day, I got "Grandpa" Father's Day cards for our Dad's.  They'll be so confused, but I'm going to write "Congratulations!  You're going to be a Grandpa!" on the inside, and sign it "Love, Mike, Jess, and Baby "H".  I can't wait!!!!  This will be the first grandchild on either side of the family, so anything with the words grandma or grandpa will really throw them all for a loop!  I also got a great-grandfather card for my grandpa, which will be fun to watch him open.  So there's my plan for telling our big news to the family!

So, like I mentioned before, I love when I have something to study up on.  Mike says that I baffle him, and he doesn't understand why someone who likes to study so much has no desire to go back to school.  It's because I love my job.  I really do, and I have zero desire to do anything else.  If I did, I'd go back to school.  Simple as that.  Anyway, I digress.  When we got Daisy I got a bunch of books on how to train dogs, when we decided to do something with our lawn I got a bunch of landscaping books, and now.....pregnancy books!  The most exciting of all!  I bought the obligatory "What to Expect When You're Expecting", and also "Your Pregnancy Week By Week".  I like them both a lot.  Probably because they are both semi-technical, and I like to hear the facts.  Some people find these books scary, and say that they give too many bad scenarios, but working in the PICU, I see bad scenarios on a daily basis.  It's almost comforting to me to read about them, because it does talk about how rare most of the genetic defects are.  I see kids with congenital and genetic defects every day at work, and sometimes I forget that it is the minority of the population that I am working with.  So, I love both of these books, and maybe "Your Pregnancy Week By Week" just a little bit more.  It's hard not to read ahead, but I have been good!  I have only read through week 6.  I read it aloud in bed at night to Mike so that he can share in what is happening both to the baby (or sac of cells, as he currently calls it) and to me.

As far as symptoms of my pregnancy so far, I really haven't had many.  The very first thing that I felt was breast soreness.  I actually felt that before I knew I was pregnant and before I knew that it was a symptom of pregnancy.  I went running about two and a half weeks ago and my boobs were really sore during the run.  I figured my sports bra was getting stretched out or something and didn't think much of it.  Then boom, two days later, I found out I was pregnant!  So that was my very first symptom! 

I have also been peeing a lot more frequently than normal, which is a early symptom of pregnancy, but that could also be because I am trying to be more conscious about drinking enough.  So, who knows.  The only other thing I've really felt so far was slight cramping.  This one really had me paranoid at first, because the two things that go through your mind when you are pregnant and cramping are miscarriage and ectopic pregnancy.  Or at least, those were the only two things going through my mind.  But after doing some research I happily discovered that mild cramping is completely normal during pregnancy.  Whew!

Here are some pics I took at month 1 of my pregnancy.  I love how by the time you figure out that you're pregnant you are already at month 1!

Before the belly!

Ok, I know this one is kinda weird, but a girl on a blog that I read took a pic like this when she first found out she was pregnant and another one when she was about to pop.  Her photography skills might be slightly better than mine, but whatever.  You couldn't see her feet at all by the last one, and I thought the progression was pretty cool.  So for now, my feet are still in full view (and my belly button ring is still intact....wonder when I should take that out???)

Bare belly shot

So, we know that my birthday was earlier in the week.  This past weekend Mike and I went out on the town with a bunch of friends of ours and friends of mine from work.  It was a blast, but not easy keeping the news a secret.  Especially since it was my birthday, so I was expected to drink...and heavily.  I'll tell ya, it's tough work drinking straight ginger ale all night pretending it's Jack and Ginger and acting hammered.  Seriously, I was exhausted!  Don't think I pulled it off all that well either because people kept asking how I was still so sober when I had been drinking liquor all night.  Shhh, don't tell them....yet!   Here is a pic of Mike and I before we went out.  And yes, that's ginger ale in my wine glass.  It actually looked shockingly similar to the white wine that everyone else was drinking.  They had white wine with strawberries, I had ginger ale with strawberries.  And nobody was any the wiser.  I'm a sneaky sneak!

Then, the day before my birthday I opened the front door to find this...

Yay!  A package for me!  Who doesn't love packages?!  Opened it up to find my very first baby presents, from none other than my awesome sister!  Loved it all!

Sooooo fun!!!!

That's about it for now.  I have my first prenatal appointment in less than an hour and I am so excited!  Not really sure why, because I have no idea what it will entail, but I am excited nonetheless.  I'll keep ya posted on how it goes!  I'm 6 weeks, 2 days and counting.....

Happy Birthday to Me!.....and.....BIG NEWS!

I last wrote a week and a half ago that I woke up in a great mood, and there was a very specific reason for that.   That wonderful Friday morning at 6AM I found out that I was....

Can you believe it????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   I knew that May was my favorite month for a reason!!!

Here's how it all went down.  Mike got up for work at 5:30 like always and I layed there in bed pretending to be asleep.  I had already decided the night before that if I woke up and still didn't have my period I was going to take a pregnancy test.  Friday was Day 30 of my slightly irregular schedule, so I figured it was late enough to give it a try.  I wasn't expecting anything though, so I waited for Mike to leave because I was sure it would look the same as all of the others.  But it didn't!!!!  I saw that plus sign and I was too stunned to move for a second.  I thought if I so much as blinked it would disappear.  But it didn't!!!  (The test above was a different brand that I used the following Monday, just to be sure.  After I took tests on Saturday and Sunday too of course!  Haha!)   Here is the original test that I took.

So, the line was kind of faint on this one, but make no mistake, it was the first hint of anything positive I've ever seen!  I was beyond elated!  I can't even describe the feeling.  Here is a pic of me right after I found out. 

I was home alone, so it was one of those take a picture of yourself things.  But I had to capture the moment, home alone or not. 

Next up, I called Mike while he was driving to work and delivered the good news.  No cute delivery of the message or anything like that.  I was too excited for that; I just blurted it out!  And he was so excited too, which was awseome.   So I proceeded on with my day trying to think about anything else, but let me tell you it was NOT easy (or very successful!).  I didn't blog about it on that day, because I wanted to keep the news to ourselves for a little while.  Not that that worked either.  I pretty much immediately called my sister and told her.  She was screaming and saying how excited she was for us too, which I loved!  Then when I thought about it today, I thought "Why not post about it?"  The only two people that know about this blog are my husband and my sister, and those were the first two people to hear the news! 

Mike and I left for Asheville after he got home from work and here is a pic of us in the car on the day we found out I was pregnant.

Not the greatest picture (especially of me, eww), but it's the only one we have of both of us from that day.

I brought some extra pregnacy tests along on the trip because the faintness of the positve line made me nervous (I know, I know, paranoid much?)  I mean there are three in a pack, so you should use all three just to be sure right??  That was my rationale anyway.  Haha!  So I took one Saturday and I got positive result number....

And then again on Sunday, for positive result number...

 We went to Asheville with the same couple that we went to Nashville with, and the girl kept asking me if I thought I was pregnant.  I wasn't drinking, but then again, I never really did during the two weeks a month that it was possible I might be pregnant.  I stayed strong and didn't tell her....until the last day of vacation (Monday).   I just couldn't hold it in any longer!  Plus, she is one of the very few people who knew that Mike and I were trying.   I didn't tell her about our fertility struggle until February, but I definitely unloaded on her then.  The fact that we had "only" been trying for 7 months might not make it a fertility issue by the books, but it definitely was to us.  She knew about all of the discouraging months we've had since last June, and I think that made me even more excited to share the news with her.  She was sooooo excited for us, and wanted to talk about it nonstop, which was fine by me!

Mike and I ran the Biltmore 15K on Sunday morning, which was really a beautiful course.  I have never done the 15K distance before, and it was great because it is around mile 9 of a half marathon that I start to get tired.  Mike didn't want me to run it because we already knew I was pregnant at this point (but we hadn't told my friend yet).  He thought it wasn't good for me, blah blah blah.  But he gave up after I told him that I promised to be careful, and I was gonna just stay with him and run/walk.  I promised that I would listen to my body and walk when I was getting too out of breath.  I did, and it was fine, but it was tougher than I thought it would be to walk during a race.  It's all a mental game, and I have had it engrained in my head since high school that during a race (or any run for that matter) walking is NOT an option.  But I wasn't gonna let my crazy head keep me from doing the healthy thing for my baby.  So I ran/walked the race, and Mike and I stayed together the whole time which was nice for a change.  I normally blow him out of the water on the long races, haha!  Here's Mike before the race started.  Remember how much he LOVES getting up early to run.

And here we are together....

Looking a little perkier at this point!

So, all in all it was a fun weekend in Asheville.  On the ride home I wanted Mike to stop at a Barnes and Noble so I could get some pregancy books, because we all know how much I love when I have something to study up on.  But he refused, and said I could wait until we got home.  I told him that the three hour car ride was the perfect time to start reading up on things, and he countered by telling me that I had 9 months to read up on things.  Humpf.  Cruel I tell you.  So all of 5 minutes after we got home I got back in the car and hit up Rite Aid for just one more box of pregnnancy tests (a different brand this time of course) and then Borders for some reading material.  

My next post will be about my books and what I think of them, as well as some of the symptoms I've been experiencing so far.  I am currently 5 weeks and 6 days pregnant, and I plan to write in this blog least once a week throughout my pregancy with what I've been feeling and going through that week.  Until then I will leave you with a few more gems.  I was picture happy I know.  Can you blame me??

You can see in the second picture that the inital test that I took had more of a faint positive line, and as the days went on it became more distinct!  Monday when we got back I bought the Clear Blue tests and took one that day and the next one this past Sunday.  So all in all I have taken 5 pregnacy tests since Friday May 14th, and gotten 5 positive results!  Mike and I are through the moon with excitement!!!  Happy Birthday to me!  Date night dinner and a movie with my hubby tonight!   Yay!

Broad Street Bound

The Philly Broad Street Run.  It's the biggest 10 mile race in the country with 30,000 runners, and my sister was signed up to run it this year!  It was the first weekend in May, and I had no plans so I bought a plane ticket and decided to head to Philly to cheer her on.  I haven't been on the sidelines of a race in a long time, and I thought it would be fun.  Wellllll, then a few days before the big race I get a text from her saying that one of her friends bailed, and would I take his place and run it with her?  So, of course, I said yes.  Secretly I'd much rather run than be on the sidelines anyway!

So that Friday morning I flew up and she picked me up at the airport.  Her first Friday off as a part time accountant!  That was a big step for her, becoming part time in accounting to make more time for photography.  So, she picked me up and little did I know, I was in for a full day in the car.  First we picked up our race packets, which, let me just say, was a chaotic mess.  The room that they had it in was NOT big enough to accomodate that many people.  The only good part was the free Dunkin Donuts samples while we waited in line.  Anyway, then we met my best friend in Kutztown for lunch so her and Tina could talk "branding".  Then we headed out for a nice little 3 hour car trip to South Jersey for a photoshoot.  Finally, home to Philly for some sushi!  Yum! 

Then on Saturday we lounged around a lot before heading into the city to go to a Phillies game that a high school friend got us tickets for.  It was a gorgeous day and we had a blast.

We both bought these sunglasses the day before at the expo!

How good were our seats?

We finished off Saturday with the obligatory pre race pasta dinner at Bertucci's with Mom, Sarah, and J.  Delicious as always!

So that brings us to race day.  My job was to take pictures and video along the way, and I took my job seriously.  I think I took 11 videos and who knows how many pics.  Tina was sooo over my picture/video taking by the end.  But she told me to do it, so I obliged.   Haha.  Here are some shots from the day.

Oh yeah, did I mention that the race shirts were the ugliest thing EVER??  Oatmeal and purple....seriously?

Tina promptly threw hers out and traded it in for this...

Note my I-Fitness belt.  Some may call it a fanny pack, but I love that thing.

The beginning...talk about crowded!

Go Bean and Sarah!  Still feeling good at this point....

This run was pretty cool, because you ran from one side of the city to the other, on Broad Street the whole time.  It started in North Philly by Temple, went through Center City, and ended in South Philly.

The crowd heading toward Center City

It was HOT on this day, so the city opened up the fire hydrants along the way for runners to cool off.

Halfway point!  We made it to Center City!

One more mile!  The end is in sight!

We did it!  The three of us stuck together the whole time, and I am so proud of these two.  It was the furthest they have ever run and they never gave up, despite the heat.  Congrats girls!  You should be proud!

Mom came out to support us!  Too bad she missed us finish...despite the fact that we saw her and were calling her name!  Haha!  Poor mom and her bum leg.

View back to the city on our way to the car.  Man, we just ran twice that distance!

I had a great time in Philly that weekend!  It's always fun hanging out with my sis, and it always makes me wish I lived closer so we could hang out more often.  She is my best friend and I miss seeing her on a regular basis.  But alas, she has her life in Philly, and I have mine in NC.  Someday maybe, we'll live closer to each other. We'll see.....

It's a Beautiful Day!

Woke up in a great mood today!  We're heading to Asheville with some friends for the weekend to run a 15K on Sunday.  I'm so excited to go!  But first I wanted to write a new post with some of the things that I've done over the past 2 months (besides racing that is).

Mike and I had a St. Patty's Day party at our house, which was a blast.  One thing about us is that we love having people over.  We'll use any excuse to have a party, small or large.  Our house is really conducive to parties, especially in the warm weather because of our large deck in the back.  It is a three tiered deck with a hot tub on the top tier!  We had the deck redone and added the hot tub this past summer, and we love it!!  Then, of course the kegerator in the garage doesn't hurt the party atmosphere either.  

Went home to PA for Easter and tagged along with my sis on a photoshoot of the blooming trees in the Parkway.  I like to think that I "helped", but I think I was just keeping her company.

I hung out with my adorable kitty when I went home too.  Mike gave her to me when I had just graduated college and I was lonely in DC.  She was great company, but after several years my allergies to her were getting worse and worse, so my mom adopted her.  Thank goodness!  I still get to see my little Kayla whenever I go home.

Daisy and I did a 3K dog walk in April with some friends and their dogs.  Mind you, I took Daisy on a 6 mile run BEFORE this dog walk, thinking that I would tire her out and she'd be semi-calm.  Ha, what a joke.  She was her usual wild self (as you can tell from the pic!).

Mike and I went rollerskating (yes, rollerskating) with some friends from work on a random Wednesday in April.  So fun!  I have not been rollerskating probably since.... ohhh sixth grade.  But it was fun to do something different.  And there are definitely some interesting people at a roller rink.  We'll leave it at that.

I also went to a wine tasting festival in Raleigh with some friends from work in April.  Gotta love quality time with your girls and some wine!

And last, but not least.....Nashville!  We were loving all of the bars on Broadway downtown. 

Like this sign for example.  Inappropriate?...Yes.  Hilarious?... Absolutely!

So, I'll leave it at that for my conclusion of March/April.  Next post...Philly Broad Street Run recap!  Off for a quick run, and then packing for Asheville!  Happy Friday!

Back on the Blogging Saddle!

Man, it really has been forever since I've posted anything.  I'm gonna blame it on the fabulous spring weather and the crazy amounts of races I've been doing lately.  Let's see... I had a St. Patty's Day race in the beginning of March, a 5K at the end of March, a half marathon at the end of April, an impromptu 10 miler at the beginning of May, and then I have a 15K this weekend and then another 5K in the middle of June.  Whew!  That is a lot of racing for this little girl.  But I really love it, and I've been feeling so good lately!  Keeping up with Body Pump twice a week and then running about 3-4 times a week.  I'm pretty proud of myself, I'll admit :)  Here's a recap of my races.

St. Patty's Day Run:  Here was my outfit for the race.

And you can't really see it, but there was a little picture of Kermit the Frog on the corner of my pants and it says "It's not easy being green".  I loved that!  This run was an 8k, which is a distance I haven't done before.  I really liked it, but this course in downtown Raleigh kicked my ass.  Very hilly, and hills are my definite downfall.  But Mike and I finished in a respectable 46 minutes, so I was happy with that.  And I was even happier with the good times at the bar with our friends afterwards :)

Next up was a 5K in Raleigh at the end of March.  I ran this with a friend from work, and we did it in 25:28!  That is my best 5K time since high school!  It was really cool, because we both got second place in our age groups!!  My friend who worked the event called me afterward to tell me that I got second place in my age group and he had a gift certificate to give me.  Are you serious???  I have NEVER placed in a race since high school, and I must admit it felt damn good!  No pics from that race unfortunately.  It was unseasonably cold that morning and maybe that's why we were so quick....we just wanted to finish it as fast as possible!

Then came one of my favorite races to date so far.  The Nashville Country Music Rock and Roll Half Marathon.  I loved loved loved this race!!  Mike and I and another couple went to Nashville for a few days and all four of us were gonna run this race, which was fun because the other couple hadn't ever run a half marathon before.  Nashville is a great city and I truly had a blast there.  Fun bars with great live music and no cover charge....does it get any better?  I think not. 

Anyway, on Friday we went to the expo and picked up our packets, which was pretty cool.  Very organized for an expo for 32,000 runners.  It didn't take long at all to get our numbers, and everything was alphabetical by last name, which was nice. 

Oh, and I forgot to mention that I had a slight mishap with my ankle on Thursday night (race day in T-minus 36 hours at this point).  Walking back to the hotel from the bar in my high heel wedges and I stepped off the curb (Ok, I may have danced off the curb, but whatever.), and my ankle rolled.  It definitely hurt and I began to panic that I wouldn't be able to run on Saturday morning.  All I kept thinking was that after all of these months of training, and being in the best shape I've been in in a loooong time, I sure as hell better be able to run this race.  Or shit was gonna hit the fan.  So I iced it on Thursday night and Friday at the expo they had people that were wrapping knees and ankles, so I got it wrapped.  I really think it helped because I was able to run with no problem, thank goodness!  The injury obviously wasn't that bad to begin with, because I could barely feel it anymore on race morning.  Let me tell you though, that ankle tape was looking (and smelling) pretty rough by Sunday night when I finally took it off. 

So anyway, we are all laying in bed on Friday night before the race and this obnoxious alarm starts going off throughout the hotel.  Everyone went out in the hall and no one knew what was going on.  All we could think of was "Crap, is this a tornado alarm?"  Because all day we had been hearing about the tornado watch for Saturday morning.  The weather was supposed to be horrendous for the later part of the race.  So bad, in fact, that if you were doing the full marathon, and you weren't on point to complete it in 4:30, they were going to divert you to the half at mile 11.2.  How much would that suck??  You have been training for months for this, and just because you aren't some Olympic caliber athlete, you can't complete the race?  I felt so bad for those people.

Mike at 4:45 AM race morning.  Can't you just feel his excitement?  Haha.

I was the drill sergeant this morning to keep everyone on time.  I got up 5 minutes before everyone else and got the coffee started.  I made sure my outfit and everything I needed was nicely layed out the night before, so that I didn't have to worry about forgetting anything.  I woke up happy and excited, because like I said, I love this!  There were shuttles from the finish line to the start line and our hotel was only about a mile from the finish line, so we decided to walk there to avoid all of the traffic (Excellent idea, as the line of traffic was intense.  I really think we were walking faster than the cars were moving.)  The last shuttle left at 6AM and I wanted to make sure we were there in plenty of time, so I told everyone the night before "This train leaves at 5:15.  You can come with me or come later if you want, but I am leaving no later than 5:15."  Just wanted to put it out there, you know.  But I give our group props, because they were ready and we were gone at 5:15.  I was pleasantly surprised.

We all started together in corral #16, which was the 2:15 pace group.  Our friends were originally in a slower corral and I was originally in a faster one, but we all wanted to start together, so we started in Mike's corral.  Looking back on it, if I was really looking to push harder, I think I'd stay in my original spot.  It was kind of hard weaving around people, but I do have to say that it felt good to be passing people the whole time instead of the other way around! 

There were a lot of people in front of us, and ....

a lot of people behind us. 

It's almost our turn!

Here we go!

Saw this sign at about mile 9...great motivator!

I did it! A PR by 2 and a half minutes!  Next goal...you got it.  Under 2!

Official time: 2:02:20!

Found him!  He finished in 2:20:59, and he didn't have to walk at all which was awesome!

So proud of us!!

The medal!

I had such a fantastic time in Nashville!  I just can't say enough about it.  The course was great, the spectators and volunteers were awesome, annnnnd...the weather held out for us, thank goodness!  I waited for my friend to finish, and when we were about a block from our hotel it started to rain.  Perfect timing (for us anyway....poor marathoners!)  Then we all proceeded to take a 4 hour nap before heading out on town for our last night.   All in all a great trip!

So I think that is enough for one post.  I'll blog on my impromptu 10 mile race and some of the other random things I've done over the past 2 months in my next post.

But let me conclude with saying that May is one of my absolute favorite months (and no, not just because my birthday and my anniversary happen to fall this month!).  There are so many reasons to love the month of May:

The cold weather is finally gone for good ! 

Spring is here!

Summer is just around the corner!

Pools open May 1st!

First beach trip is usually in May (if not April!)

Picnics and barbecues!

Flowers!

Finally getting to see your neighbors again after months of hibernating!

Running outside without the misery of being freezing for the first 15 minutes!

Outdoor concerts!

And last but definitely not least.....Strawberry season!!!  There is nothing better than fresh picked strawberries to put a smile on your face every time!

This was my breakfast this morning! 

Cheers to the wonderful month of May in good ole' North Carolina!