Peace is Having a Peanut.

When I was a little kid, I made a nativity set out of a shoebox, with clothespins as Mary and Joseph and a little tiny peanut with a smiley face on it for the baby Jesus. Right now the baby is about the size of that baby Jesus peanut and so peanut is what Aaron and I have started calling it. We do have names picked out, but until we know the gender, we can't start using them, and I don't like calling it "it". So for now it's just peanut.

~*~*~*~*~*~

This week I am on spring break, and it is very much needed. I've just been tired and worn out all week. I kept hearing that this was a side effect of pregnancy and I have kept waiting to feel it, and now I am. I wonder what will happen next week when I go back to teaching. Thankfully I have only had morning sickness once, about two weeks ago, and that's been it. My mom told me that she had no morning sickness with my older sister and had hardly any with with me, so maybe that's a nice little gift from mom? I have six more weeks left of student teaching, and I really hope that I continue to not show until after I'm done.

Speaking of teaching, on Monday I had my first job interview for a teaching position. It was with a small district about an hour away from where I am now. On my drive up to the interview I was turning over in my head whether or not I would really want to move to a new town in a few months. Granted it wouldn't be very far away, but I was questioning how well I would hold up trying to deal with being a first year teacher and having a baby and being away from my support system all at the same time. My fear is: not well. Thankfully though, I am not having to make that decision quite yet. Halfway through my interview it became very clear to me that this district and I would not be a good match with each other. The district is a very good one, and has a great reputation, but we definitely have different ideas about the purposes and practices of teaching English. I left the interview knowing that if they offered me the job I would politely decline. However, I found out today that they ended up going with someone else, which does not surprise me. So now I await for one of the other five districts I've applied to to call me up for an interview.

On Tuesday I had my first appointment with the baby doctor. It was pretty basic, the nurse just went over things with me: what I should be eating and drinking, what vitamins I should be taking and my medical history.

The doctor also gave me a planner with week by week pictures of what the baby looks like. Here's where I am (week 7):

freaky. Also, there is a heartbeat. ONE heartbeat. ONE. Granted, they said that I could still be having multiples as the heartbeats could just be in sync right now.

Sorry, just had to do that.
But yes, as of right now, ONLY ONE. Though after I told the doctor about all the twins in Aaron's family and the fact that my dad was originally supposed to be a twin, the look on their face was pretty priceless and they just said, "Oh my. Well. We'll just have to watch for that."

The doctor also talked to me about nutrition. The biggest thing right now is that I need to be getting between 80 and 100 grams of protein a day. That is a lot for me, especially as someone who doesn't eat a whole lot of meat. Thankfully protein is in a lot of other things.
2 glasses of skim milk (8 grams per serving)=16 grams
1 cup lowfat cottage cheese=26 grams
1 bowl cereal + milk= 12-15 grams depending on the type of cereal
2 tbsp peanut butter + an apple= 8 grams

That right there is 62 grams, so plus whatever I eat for lunch and dinner (I usually always have some meat with dinner) I'll easily get to 80 grams, plus I'm getting a ton of calcium in too.

The doctor also recommended I drink a gallon of water a day. I don't know how this is humanly possible. Seriously. I bought a water bottle that holds a quart, and I can't imagine drinking four of them each day. Two? Yes. Four? Not unless I want to float away and flush every electrolyte out of my body.

After my appointment I went shopping with my mom and sister. Even though I didn't plan on it, I did end up buying some clothes. I got two things from New York and Company that have room for me as I grow. Here's what I bought:




















The top is very stretchy and drapey and very comfy, I'll be able to wear it well into my pregnancy. NY&Co also has the top in gray, black, brown and white. I might go buy it in another color or two.




















This was on the clearance rack, and I don't care what anyone says, I love it. It's a one piece and will be very cool and comfortable during the summer. With my big sunglasses and heels I think it'll still look nice. I absolutely refuse to look like a shulb while pregnant. Usually (right now) I am a size two, though in this I bought a six, so it's very large on me right now, but there's plenty of room to grow now. I think this will be a great summer outfit for things like Jazz in June and Movies on the Green.




















Also at the mall, we found a really cool store that had a lot of crazy awesome things, including stuff for kids. There I found this book called The Peace Book by Todd Parr. Parr is a children's book author who had been recommended to me by a Facebook friend (who I also went to high school with) as well as by my sister (who is a kindergarten teacher). His books are really bright and colorful with beautifully simple messages for kids. The Peace Book tells kids all different ways to make the world a peaceful place, what we/they can do to create peace in their own lives and what peace means.

I truly hope that Aaron and I can make our peanut's childhood as wonderful and magical as our own were, and that they will grow up knowing how beautiful and complicated the world is. Hopefully we're on the right track to do so.

this is why you're fat (dot com)

I am not the healthiest eater. Granted, I'm not terrible. I don't eat fast food very much, I eat lots of salads and lean proteins and try to buy organic when I can afford it. I do however have a huge sweet tooth and I do admit to eating a marginally ridiculous amount of candy, cookies and other sweet things. Also, while I said I don't eat fast food very much, I have definitely been eating it more this semester that I've been student teaching.

Being pregnant, I not only think about every chemical/product I use, but of course I am tremendously preoccupied with what I'm eating. Thankfully, I do have a good resource in my pseudo-sister-in-law Krystal who is a nutritionist. This past week Krystal brought me handouts from her job about what I should and should not be eating. There weren't a whole lot of surprises or disappointments. I can't eat sushi which makes me a little sad and I can't eat a whole lot of fish in general. I also can't eat deli meats (weird) which is probably going to be the biggest change for me as usually I eat turkey all the time.

So, my changes meal by meal:

Breakfast
Usually I had cranberry juice and toast with jam. However, lately I just haven't been very hungry in the mornings. I don't exactly feel nauseous or anything, I just don't have an appetite. I can usually at least get a granola bar down. I've found that by the time I get to school though I'm pretty hungry, so I really need to start having some healthy snacks there to eat, as this past week I've just been eating stuff out of the vending machine, which is a habit I'd rather not get into.

Lunch
Pre-pregnancy I had a salad topped with a hard boiled egg, turkey, cheese, carrots and lite dressing every day for lunch. My basic lunch has stayed the same with a few changes. I now make my salad out of spinach instead of lettuce and have grilled chicken instead of turkey, because apparently lunch meat is now on my list of "don't eats" unless it's heated up. I've also started eating this really great 9 grain bread from The Grain Bin with my lunch to get in even more fiber and such.

Dinner
I need recipes for this! Usually Aaron and I make whatever is quick and easy. We have taco or fajita night once a week, so anyone who has any other Mexican recipes should send them my way. Once this semester is done we'll have more time to cook and will actually get to eat together more than 3 times a week, so I'm sure I'll get to eat some more interesting things then.

Caffeine
Caffeine is definitely my vice. I started drinking coffee when I was thirteen and while I don't drink as much as I did in high school (as in, a pot a day) I would still usually have a cup or two a day. Then I would also have a diet coke, sometimes two. This has changed. I've now limited myself to one caffeinated drink a day. This has admittedly been pretty difficult for me to do. Though in the spring and summer I pretty much live off of (herbal) iced tea, so it should get easier...I hope. Sigh, what a luxury it would be to have a coffee in the morning and a diet coke in the evening...

In other news, but still related...
Last weekend my friend Ann who is currently teaching English in France called me to talk. She asked me if I had noticed any changes in my body yet. I told her I haven't yet, aside from noticing my chest is bigger. This of course will change in a couple months. Right now the baby isn't even half an inch long, but eventually it'll be like carrying a watermelon around (or so the baby book I bought described it). So I've decided to document my changing body. My doctor told me I should gain between 25-35 pounds. I just really want those to be health pounds, not cookie pounds, because that wouldn't be healthy for the baby or for me. I've only had one other time in my life where I needed to purposely gain weight, but that was a pretty different situation. Basically I'm just going to eat as healthy as possible and try and make sure my extra calories come from proteins and calcium and other good things.


















Starting Numbers:
Weight: 125 pounds
Waist: 26 inches
Bust: 35 inches
Hips: 36 inches.

These are numbers that I am certain will make me horribly depressed in a few months, but I want a chubby happy baby. And I'll be cute pregnant--right?

I'm currently working on a new entry all about food and nutrition during pregnancy, but while I'm working on it, this is a link to another blog that I've started reading about a teacher in Illinois who is eating school lunches for a year to prove just how horribly unhealthy they are for children.

http://fedupwithschoollunch.blogspot.com/

A few months ago I saw a documentary titled Killer at Large, which explores the growing problem of childhood obesity. As a lover and advocate of children and young adults, this is something that was greatly concerning to me. Now as a soon to be mother, the importance is even greater.

It truly sickens me how little concern and care is given to the meals students in this country receive. There is definitely an issue of poverty in this as well, as students who come from low income families have no choice but to eat the lunches available to them as school. While getting some food is better than none, this poor nutrition only further serves to feed the system keeping lower economic classes down and dependent on the very system abusing them.

I always get upset when someone is not being served and supported by those in a position and with the responsibility to do so. This increases when those people are children, as I feel that children should be fully engaged with the experience of being children. That is, exploring, experiencing and learning about the world around them and the wonderment it contains. We as adults have a responsibility to ensure that children are given an honest chance to become fully developed, caring and critically thinking adults. When we do things like let our children be fed garbage that makes them unhealthy and unable to be full human beings, we are failing them, plain and simple.

uck. chemicals. chemicals.

This week I have been figuring out what beauty products I can and can't use anymore and trying to find alternatives to those that I can't.

As soon as I found out about being pregnant, the first thing I did (other than tell family members of course) was went on-line to find nail polish that was safe for me to use. I had heard before that nail polish and nail polish remover weren't safe to use while pregnant. This is because of the chemicals found in the products, which can be very unsafe for the baby. I know nail polish might not seem like a big deal, but I've had my nails painted every day since I was 16, and doing my nails has become something that's become very therapeutic for me to do if I'm feeling stressed out or sad. So to me, finding safe nail polish was pretty important.

Luckily this was easy to do. After doing a basic search, I found a bunch of different companies/websites that sell nail products that are environmentally friendly as well as safe for pregnancy. I ordered a bottle from Peace Keeper Cause-Metics (www.iamapeacekeeper.com) which sells a line of affordable, vegan nail polish and nail polish remover. I also ordered a few bottles from Suncoat Products, who have a line of water-based polishes.

This led me to start thinking about the other beauty products I use every day and whether or not they are safe for me to be using. So, I made a list of the products I use every day (or at least frequently) and started researching. I found the website Natural Living for Women to be pretty helpful. Though of course you have to take everything with a grain of salt. There are some sites that basically say to not use anything while you're pregnant and in all honesty, seemed to me to be taking precaution a bit too far.

Skin Care--Proactive
I have been using Proactiv since I was 13 and it has always worked well for me. I searched for any information about its safety, and could never find a definitive answer. The active ingredient in Proactive is Benzoyl Peroxide, and I couldn't find any definitive proof as to whether or not it was harmful during pregnancy. It seemed like every site said some variation of "yeah, there's no proof it isn't safe, but you should still worry about it and not use it", which was more than a little annoying--just tell me whether or not it's safe! So for right now I've been continuing to use Proactiv, but I'll be sure to ask my doctor for sure when I have my first visit.

Hair Care
Basically, unless you use a prescription shampoo and conditioner, whatever you use to wash your hair is fine. This is what I assumed, so thankfully I don't have to make any changes in this area.

Hair Styling
To curl my hair every day I use old-school Richard Caruso Steam Rollers. They are fantastic, and because they just use steam, are completely safe.

This is not so much the case with my hair spray. Every day after taking my hair out of their curlers I use Aqua Net Extra Hold Hairspray. This stuff is heavy duty and is a remnant of my days as a competitive dancer. Of course, because it is heavy duty and works wonderfully well, it contains some pretty serious chemicals. Almost everything put into this hair spray is bad for the baby, so of course I promptly discontinued its use. I did start looking for some pregnancy-safe hairspray, but I've actually found that my hair holds the curl pretty well without it anyway, so as of right now, I'm not searching for any alternative. This may change when the weather gets more humid.

Every few months I get bored with how I look and color my hair. I have always used Feria by Loriel for this, and have rotated between "midnight black" "crushed amythest" and "chocolate covered cherry" (this is the one I use most often) for the past 8 years (has it really been that long!?). My natural color of hair is a really really dark brown which is actually quite pretty. Just, as I said, I get bored with how I look and hair is an easy thing to change. Now, I have searched around and not found any definitive answer as to whether or not hair color is bad for the baby. My mom told me that she colored her hair while pregnant with both my sister and I, though, it is important to keep in mind that this was over 20 years ago, and the chemicals may have changed. Also, my mom has always had short hair (usually above her ears) as compared to mine which when straight reaches the bottom of my sholder blades, so she would have been using a lot less color than I do

Makeup
So, lipstick contains lead. Fun, right? Because lipstick isn't ingested, the FDA allows lead to be present in the product. However this can be harmful to the fetus as it is developing. This is of course sad news to me, as I love to wear my red lipstick every day. However, as with everything else, I have found a few companies that sell safe lipstick, including this one that offers samples of their products.

Perfume
This was the hardest. Basically perfume contains awful chemicals that aren't good to have on the skin or be inhaled. So I immediately stopped using my usual Elizabeth Arden Red Door and J.Lo Glow perfumes. I found a few websites online that sell pregnancy-safe perfumes, but without being able to smell them before buying, I'm wary of making a purchase. Right now I think I'll just skip perfume till November. One less thing to buy I guess.


Doing all this research just made me feel a little exasperated about the fact that it seems like I can't use anything anymore. I mean seriously, why do we have all these awful chemicals in our products? I literally now stop at every little thing that is coming in contact with my body and think about the consequences of it, which I guess is a good thing, if not a little tedious. However, nothing is more important to me than having a healthy, happy baby.

A Very Suprise Birthday Present

My birthday is on March 12, and this week I got a very surprise early birthday gift--I found out I'm pregnant!
On Monday night I had a dream that I was pregnant and it freaked me out, so Tuesday morning as I was getting dressed and ready to student teach, I took a pregnancy test. The test was an old store-brand one that I kept around in case of situations like this, and consequently I couldn't read it very well. The possibility of being pregnant stuck with me the whole day, and after school was out I went to Walgreen's and bought one of those super high-tech digital read out tests, telling myself it would of course be negative. I went home, took the test, and three minutes later looked down and saw it:
pregnant

I'm not going to lie, I flipped out, and not in a good way. My husband Aaron and I have always planned on having children, but we were planning on starting a family when we were around 28 and more financially stable, and after it had been just the two of us for a while. I called my older sister and left her a message saying I needed to talk and then tried to decide whether or not to go to my seminar class that evening. I decided that I really was not in a place where I could sit through the class, though I still went to turn in that day's assignment: a one-page personal teaching philosophy. I handed in my assignment and told my professor/supervisor that some family issues had come up and that I needed to leave. Then I went home and waited for Aaron to arrive from work.
As I was waiting my sister Miranda (who is 27 and teaches kindergarten) called back and said she had a half hour break from parent-teacher conferences and asked what I needed to talk to her about. I hated to spring this on her in the middle of such a grueling evening (p-t conferences are kind of crazy) but I really had to talk to someone, so I told her, "I think I'm pregnant." She told me the first thing I needed to do was go to the doctor to make sure and I told her I already had, and had an appointment at 3:15 the next day. She offered to go with me, but I told her that wouldn't be necessary. That night I also called my mom, she was happy for me, but also worried because of what a wreck I was.
Fast forward to Wednesday afternoon with Aaron and I sitting in the doctor's office, waiting for the test results--even though I think we both knew what they would be. Sure enough, the doctor confirmed I'm pregnant, gave me a prescription for pre-natal vitamins and told me good luck. That day we told Aaron's parents, grandparents and sister, who are all ecstatic, and on Thursday we told Aaron's brothers and significant others who are also all excited and supportive of course--we already have offers to babysit, haha.

Even though I was more or less a wreck when I first found out, it was something Aaron's mom (my mother-in-law) Rhonda said as she and Todd (my father-in-law) were leaving our apartment on Wednesday night that made me really start to feel happy about everything. She said, "Well, goodbye you two. Actually it's three of you now!"

I like that thought. That it's now Aaron, me and and the little one makes three.

So, even though this isn't what we planned, that's life, and I am a firm believer that everything happens for a reason, I'm just excited to meet our little boy or girl and find out what that reason turns out to be.


Background Information:



I have been married to my husband Aaron since October 10, 2009--we had a crazy awesome wedding and we are definitely each others best friend. We have been dating/together since fall of 2005. Currently I am finishing my degrees in Secondary Education and English and Aaron is finishing his degrees in History and Broadcast Journalism. We will both graduate this May and try to find jobs in our respective fields. This semester I am student teaching at a local high school and I absolutely love it. My students are great kids who always make me laugh and I have a really supportive Cooperating Teacher (CT) who gives me the freedom to experiment while still guiding me through what I need to improve on (which is a lot, haha). I also have a really great group of fellow student teachers and a supervisor who give me fantastic support.
I decided to do this blog for a few reasons:

• I have always loved writing and have kept a journal for the past 4 years in a trusty composition notebook. I find that writing helps me to discover and better articulate what I am feeling and often it is through writing that I am able to see connections and reach understandings.
• Student Teaching is an intense and very time consuming experience. I still have 8 weeks until I graduate, and I wonder how this new news of being pregnant will impact my experience. Am I going to be able to handle both at the same time? What happens if I get morning sickness while I'm teaching? Am I going to start to show before I graduate? How do I balance the roles of mother and teacher--these are roles I knew I would have to balance one day, I just didn't think it would be so soon.
• I want to record my experiences wading through the world of all the changes pregnancy brings combined with the other changes going on in my life: graduating, finding a job, *hopefully* starting my first year of teaching. These are all big steps, and to have them rolled into one year is pretty crazy.

So, let's do this! Just color me a mommy!