Bumpdate: week 36

How far along are you? 36 weeks  
Total weight gain: 31 lbs 

Stretch Marks? None on the belly. Found a few new ones creeping up each of my hips. 

Sleep: I've been taking more trips to the bathroom and sometimes I'll wake up with an aching hip, depending on which side I've slept on. 

Best moments: My aunt, uncle, and cousins were in town for a day so I was able to meet them for lunch. It was so nice to see familiar faces again :) 

Missing Anything? My pre-pregnancy wardrobe and painting my toenails. 

Movement? Yes. I think I can visualize/feel her positions, and understand where her body parts are now. 

Food Cravings: Nothing in particular. 

Symptoms: More trips to the restroom. Swelling~ I was scolded by my midwife for not drinking enough water. 

Belly Button in or Out? Out. 

Happy or Moody? Happy. And nervous. 

Looking Forward to: My sister-in-law and brother-in-law coming to visit during Labor Day weekend! 

We did a neat exercise in Bradley this week that involved ice water. (No, not the ice bucket challenge.) We were each given a bowl of ice water and we had to put our hand in for a whole minute while trying to relax our bodies. It's meant to be a contraction simulation. I understand that putting your hand into freezing cold water is nothing like labor pains, but the point of the exercise is to see how our bodies reacts to pain. You start the minute by slowly emerging your hand into the water, and by 30 seconds your whole hand needs to be submerged. Your coach/husband then times the rest of the minute and helps you to relax during the "contraction." It was fun to see how Ryan acts as a coach. We did this exercise three times. The first time my body was tensing up like crazy and my breathing was ridiculous. By the third one, I was much more relaxed and tried not to think about the pain too much. It's a cool exercise to do to mentally prepare for labor. All the men got a turn after us, and Ryan didn't even flinch during the minute. I tried to coach him but he was in his own world. I'm jealous. 

Another neat thing that happened- we were at the birth center for a breastfeeding class and during the class I could hear  moaning coming from the other side of the building. I whispered to Ryan, "Someone's having a baby!" Soon everyone else heard it too. We all became pretty excited about it. Near the end of the class one of the midwives emerged, with a little blood on her shirt, announcing the baby was born, "She got the baby out in three hours!" She didn't mention if her labor was 3 hours, or if she was in the birth center for 3 hours before the baby came. A three hour labor would be amazing.