Feeling crafty

First of all, I want to thank everyone who gave me advice on leg cramp remedies. After reading everyone's comments and talking to my doctor, I went to buy some calcium supplements. Since then, I have been on a calcium + potassium diet and haven't had a painful midnight leg cramp for more than a week now. I also have been keeping a water bottle next to our bed so that I won't get dehydrated. It's been great and I really thank you for all your comments!

During the 4-day Thanksgiving weekend, I got a little crafty and crocheted a baby hat with a big flower for my baby girl.


If you want to make one, here's the link that I used --> Baby Beanie Hat. Or you can come over to my place and make one with me. This little hat made me want to crochet more and I started making a baby afghan this weekend. It's coming along really well and should be done in a few weeks. I'm so excited!

AAAAAAAH!

I am like this Homer just about every other night. I get super painful leg cramps in the middle of the night and wake up, screaming. Sometimes I get only in one of my legs, and other times in both of them. It's really not fun. For the rest of the night, my legs are usually very stiff like wood logs and remain the same for the next 24 hours. When it happened for the first time a few weeks ago, I really scared Mike because I screamed so loud and he didn't know what was going on. Now since it happens pretty regularly, as soon as I scream, he reaches for my legs and gives me a massage. Sadly, everyone whom I have talked to said it is pretty common...sigh....

Does anyone have any advice on how to make this not happen???

My first maternity skirt

By the way, my due date is March 20, 2010. It's actually a very special date for Mike and me because it's our engagement anniversary. It's cute that this baby girl picked this date. We'll see if she sticks to her original plan.

Well, a few weeks ago I made myself a skirt that fits my growing belly.


Recipe for a maternity skirt

What you need:
your favorite fabric - I used red Indian cotton
stretchy fabric - I used thin knitted material
thread that matches your fabric of choice

1. Stand in front of a mirror.
   
2. Wrap around your favorite fabric around your lower belly. Because this part will not stretch, you want to make sure that you can fit in the circle you are making with the fabric.
3. Mark the fabric at where you want to seam the front and back materials together. Pin the fabric together if you want to see how it looks without you holding it.
   
4. Mark the fabric at the length you want. My skirt comes up right below my knees.
5. Wrap around the stretchy material around your big belly.
   
6. Mark the fabric at where you want to seam the fabric. You don't really have to worry too much about your belly becoming too big because this part of the skirt will stretch.
7. Cut the material as you marked. I made my skirt slightly A-lined.
   
8. Sew the bottom of the skirt so that it won't fray.
9. Seam the sides of the skirt and make a loop.
10. Sew the top and bottom of the stretchy material so that they won't fray.
11. Seam the stretchy material and make a loop.
12. Pin the stretchy material and the skirt material together as you stretch the stretchy material. This is probably the most tricky part.
13. Seam the material together.
14. Done!

It cost me less than $5 and a few hours!!

Half Way Through

I am 20 weeks into my pregnancy. I can't believe I am half way through it.

Some people asked me for my pregnancy photo and here it is. It's kind of hard to see my growing belly under a thick sweater, but it is there.


Because I didn't talk about my pregnancy with anyone (but Mike) for a long time, it almost seems that my last 20 weeks never existed. Therefore, I am going to take this opportunity to write my midterm pregnancy report.

My first trimester was not as terrible as some people say about theirs. The biggest thing was that I was tired all the time. I could sleep all day and needed more. I didn't want to eat because food didn't look or sound good. My nose was very sensitive and I could smell things from miles away. The worst smells were meat being cooked, garbage, and Mike's burp, which he sometimes "accidentally" did and made me run to the bathroom. But, that was pretty much it.

Right now I am just hungry all the time, all the time. I have been eating food around midnight three days in a row now. It's scary, but I am saying it's the baby who's eating. Not me.

Oh boy!!!

I thought it would be fun to keep more secrets, but I am being a good girl and telling you what we are having!

Here's our baby's first shot saying "hi!" to her daddy and mommy.

Yep. It's a GIRL!!!

Both Mike and I were thinking the baby would be a boy, but we were both wrong! It's a girl.

Our first ultrasound experience was really fun. It was simply amazing to be able to see so much of her body parts. I was so amazed when I saw her strong heart pump and her mouth open and close. She was super active during the ultrasound and it made us very happy. However, she was not very cooperative and we could not see her spine very well, we have to go back again in a month to check if everything is OK. But she seems to be pretty healthy so far.

I hope you all enjoyed our news as much as we did!

Let me tell you our secret...

"Look within!. . . The secret is inside you." by Hui-neng

Yep. It's inside me.

Our families and most of our neighbors know about it, but some of you who live far away from us might not know about our special secret. We've kept it between us for almost 5 months and thought it was about time to share our happy news. I started feeling the baby move about a week ago, and our baby is becoming more real to us. We'll know the gender of the baby this coming Tuesday and are so excited! Stay tuned!

City Creek Excursion - Meadows Trail

We went to City Creek Canyon two weeks ago for the first time and really enjoyed our walk there. Because we only saw and walked a very small part of the canyon that time, we decided to go back there to explore the canyon further this last Saturday and drove the City Creek Canyon Road we walked last time all the way until the end of the road.

On the way to the trail head, Mike all of sudden stopped the car. He just said "did you see the spider?" As he was jumping out of the car, I was thinking "did he just stop the car to see a spider?"

He opened my side of the door and pointed his finger towards this. TARANTULA! I had never seen such a big hairy spider outside of a zoo or a PETCO.

This picture kind of tells us how big that spider was. It was almost as big as Mike's hand! Eeeew!

After our encounter with the spider, we got a little bit too excited but drove on to the meadows trail head. As we drove, we could see fall colors surrounding us, and it was simply gorgeous.

The trail was pretty friendly, and we even got to see awesome views like this.

Though I said that the trail was pretty friendly, as we got deeper in the canyon, there were places like this where grasses were taller than us. We saw some moose footprints and tracks along the way, too.

I like this time of the year. It is so pretty!!

We could hear the water from this creek during our hike and it was so refreshing.

After the hike, we got to see this beautiful scenery as we drove out to the city. I feel so lucky that we live so close to a beautiful place like this.