Dear Baby Pacheco,

I am a little behind this week, so now you are closer to 17 & 1/2 weeks (size of a large onion)…. we had such a busy weekend that I didn’t get to take my weekly belly picture until today:

And what a picture! As soon as I uploaded it and saw how far out my belly was I said “WHOA! When did that happen?!?!” To which Dad goes “How many times do I have to tell you that you’re pregnant? It’s been going on for awhile now!” Haha. In hindsight, I did notice that my last few pairs of regular pants are now unwearable without some sort of assistance via a belly band this week. However, my belly is still not that typical hard round thing you think of when you picture a pregnant woman. It’s just a large, slightly better shaped ball of squish… except towards the bottom, where you mostly reside… there it feels a bit firmer.

But other than that, I feel pretty good! Pretty much the same as the last few weeks. Last week I took the glucose test to check for gestational diabetes, but never heard anything back. However, generally the doctor doesn’t call unless the results are bad… so I’m going to assume no news is good news in that department. My monthly check-up is next week, so I’m sure I’ll get the “official” results at that point.

One symptom you hear a lot about for pregnant women is crazy, vivid dreams. Honestly I hadn’t thought much of this since I’ve always had crazy vivid dreams, but I find that I’m remembering them more often. Just this past weekend I had the weirdest dream where we had just brought you home and I was changing your diaper with Grandma & Papa watching me like a hawk. I opened the diaper and there was shredded cheese inside. LOL. But it was clear to me that it wasn’t something that had come from you, it was like someone had put shredded cheese on you instead of baby powder or whatever when the diaper went on initially. So of course I was like “what the heck is this?” and Grandma goes “oh, she hasn’t gone yet” (you were a girl in this dream)… the next thing I know, you decide it’s time to go while the diaper is still off & there’s pee and poop spewing everywhere! I got all kind of flustered & embarrassed that I was looking like such an idiot in front of my parents. Then I managed to get the diaper changed and tried to breastfeed you, but that wasn’t going well either. Overall I think it was a dream expressing my anxieties surrounding my ability (or lack thereof) to care for a newborn. Totally normal feelings I think, but man that dream was crazy!

Anyway, Grandma & Papa actually did come to visit this past weekend (perhaps that’s what prompted the dream?). Dad & Papa spent Saturday installing ceiling fans in both the spare bedrooms (one of which is now your nursery). It was a dirty job since there weren’t ceiling fan hookups in there before, which meant Dad had to spent a lot of time in our dusty & gross attic. Poor Dad! But the results were worth it:

So much easier to just be able to flip on a light when you walk in the room! And as you can see, pretty much all your furniture has been set up. All that’s left is to do the actual decorating, but I’m waiting on that until we find out whether you’re a boy or a girl. 🙂 Actually that is just a couple weeks away now! The count down is on, haha. Well I suppose that is enough for now. Until next time little onion!

All my love,
Mom