Heather's Pregnancy Compendium: Part 1

welcome to everything i know so far about pregnancy...my own that is :)

i am 20 weeks right now and have been surprised by how many varied and new experiences one encounters when pregnant. 

i don't know if this is enhanced by the fact that i tried for so long and for so long desired to be pregnant, but i am constantly aware of every tiny shifting detail of this incredible experience, standing by and taking notes!

so here are some tidbits of what's gone on for me so far....

1. age: 

i am 35 years old and this is my first pregnancy ( i am a primagravida!) well let's be more specific shall we; i got pregnant while 34 and turned 35 a few weeks later. technically i think i am considered a mother of advanced maternal age although kindly, when i first met with my obgyn and nurse they reassured me that they do not put me in this category and that they see mothers much older than me all the time. even though it doesn't seem to worry anyone else, it is often on my mind. when i hear about wonderful, healthy, non complicated pregnancies and childbirths i immediately wonder, well how old was the mother? i mean, optimum fertility is at 18 years old! lord knows what nature really intended! i have heard that younger mothers have easier childbirths but really...i like to think that it all really just relates to how healthy you are and your state of mind and being during that crucial experience. 

despite being a little older than a lot of other moms, one thing i have always had going for me is plenty of energy. i have always felt younger than my years, and you're as young as you feel right?! so anyway, although age plays a small part in aspects of my pregnancy, overall it is just a fact and not a worry.

2. anxiety: 

here age might play a role! because i am a little older and i tried to get pregnant for six years.... i mean do you know how many months passed when i tried not to get my hopes up? when i saw my flow begin yet again and i tried to stay positive, to welcome it, to carry on with my womanness with greatest of care and acceptance and love.

to suddenly become pregnant after so many moons of NOT being pregnant, the attachment i felt immediately was visceral and every action now tinged with a new resolve and a mighty tenor.

so yes, i've been anxious like i mentioned in my very first pregnancy post. this was much worse during the first trimester and also, each time i have been to the doctor my worries have been assuaged.

to deal with anxieties, i try not to go online too much. it is overwhelming the amount of information you can find about every tiny detail of pregnancy and often you can't be sure of your sources. so i have tried to stick to a few books so far, and some solicited advice from trusted friends. mostly my methods for dealing with anxiety come down to two things:

1. journalling

2. breathing

i have found these both to be immensely helpful in pregnancy. when i had fears or doubts or panics early in my pregnancy i would lay down or do a yoga pose like child's pose and just breathe deep into my belly. i really felt like my breath itself was swirling around that new being and providing energy and life and love. sometimes i would think a word, and breathe it into and out of my belly, like "love" or "healthy" or "grow." it might sound cheesy but it works wonders on keeping me calm and sometimes it helps me fall asleep. and i have always been a journaller, of both mundane and more profound topics. so i grab my little blank book and i spill it all out on paper so that my spirit can breathe too.

3. beer:

you all know i love to drink. usually it's wine in the winter, beer in the summer, but a little of all of it all in between. i love seasonal ales and IPAs and sometimes a nice hemp ale. remember this farmhouse ale? sometimes i dream about that flavor. so long before i got pregnant, i used to worry about this. when my friend kim told me, "you just don't crave it" i hardly believed her. i thought, yeah right, you're just obviously not me! well i am surprised and happy to say she was actually right. i do still enjoy the smell of wine and beer, even did during the first trimester, but a switch must have turned in my brain because i never crave a sip. now i am not a super hardcore pregnant woman and if indeed a sip becomes desirable, especially as the sun shines brightly, i just might indulge.

i think that's enough for the beginning of my compendium. as you can see i'm rather long winded on these subjects!  i'll be back next monday with body and boobs, cats, clothes, and coffee.  

meanwhile i'm off to go read and enjoy feeling these tiny movements i'm feeling inside me :)

goodnight sweethearts.

all photos taken by darin except i took the one of him walking away and the one of the little wooden house. 

we were on a country walk and i was doing some etsy stuff.

my outfit was 100% thrifted except the jewelry which was gifted :)

motherly love and sunshine

that last post was making me HOT just looking at it, 

had to get another up quick!

it is at least 70 degrees here every day now, so bare legs all the way baby.

19 weeks pregnant!

this was me last friday, when all my family began to arrive for grandma's party.

i wore this to meet up with my mom and matt and amy and kids at In-n-Out for a fun sunny lunch.

it was a gorgeous day and i felt cute.

i also had a meeting with my dietician.......yeah......right after In-n-Out fries.

it went great though and she actually commended me on my healthy blood sugar levels even after i have treats.

this is one of those dresses that kinda disguises the belly, even though that wasn't my intention.  a poofy skirted, slightly high waisted dress that i probably won't be able to wear much longer, because even the high part of my waist is growing ;)

i'm using my adorable new kitty bag from missa which is the perfect size for journal and a couple books.

the sweet little grey shrug was a gift from amber, and the bracelet is an antique from my mom that came down from her grandmother.

later that night, i went to a baby shower for amy's sister (that's sister of my sister-in-law, got it?) and my sweet friend, dolly. you may remember her from her gorgeous bohemian wedding in the spring. actually, she called this a "mother's blessing" and it was all about womanhood and togetherness and the incredible ability to grow new life.

(sorry for the blurry pic but she's just so cute!)

amy is self-admittedly crazy for babies. this one is their little niece holly, born right before christmas, and amy would not put her down all night! also she is wearing a vintage blouse i gifted her, which makes me proud :)

even little bella has that motherly glow.

truly, she has such a kind and nurturing soul, is nice to all the kids at school even the underdogs; she's a peacemaker and a giver. this is a family with a very strong mothering gene.

we took turns lighting candles and sharing names and stories of our own moms.

dolly's best friend diana applied pretty freehand henna tattoos.

we each brought a bead that reminded us of some aspect of motherhood. i brought turquoise, queen of the desert and emblematic of me, my own journey. i also brought a jade scarab beetle bead, which the ancient egyptians believed symbolized good luck and rebirth.

baby love keeps right on loving...

merry gave amy a painted henna heart on her arm. i got to witness these girls have a severe laugh attack too.

there are six sisters in this family (plus many sisters-in-law) and they get delightfully goofy when they get together. i was thinking about how lucky and glad i am that each of my three brothers has partnered up with the most wonderful women that i can truly connect with from the very depths of my heart. built in friends and family for life, such rich beauty!

dolly with her besties, mackenzie and diana.

just look at that radiant belly! 

two blossoming mamas.

So tomorrow i am going to try to post the first post of my series: Heather's Pregnancy Compendium, Part 1.

i decided to do a series of posts by topic, in ABC order, starting with these: age, anxiety, beer, boobs, cats, and coffee. just a few of the things i've grappled with or had thoughts about since i've been pregnant.

any ideas for topics, let me know in the comments!

my sunshiney outfit:

dress: F21 couple years ago on clearance

grey shrug: gift from amber

cat bag: gift from missa

moonstone triangle necklace: gift from mom

peacock feather earrings: christmas gift from dad

bracelet: antique family heirloom

silver flats: thrifted a couple years back

Candy Rocker

these are my new beloved leggings from anne!

that floral print takes me straight back to junior high. i love it. i want it accompanied by Oh L'amour and Eternity perfume and long walks to Wendys or the library, but really just to check out boys. 

i feel like a rocker when i wear black.

so i threw in pink stripeys to sweeten up my look a bit. guess what i did for the skirt?

i remembered reading in one of brigit's outfit posts that she used a long tank top as a skirt. i have a bunch of maternity clothes from a friend that includes a lot of simple tank tops. so i just cut the top off, tucked it into the waistband of my handy dandy leggings, and voila! tight little black skirt.

this was a week ago.  i was headed out thrifting, 18 1/2 weeks pregnant. 

these pictures were taken earlier in the day so my belly wasn't too big yet. by nighttime, it seriously doubles in size.

there is so much interesting stuff about pregnancy. i know every woman is different, but i think just for fun i am going to do a post just related to various experiences i've had so far in being pregnant. i write in my journal a lot but i like to document things here too. i don't want my blog to become just a platform to talk about pregnancy, and i promise it won't, but dang it is an interesting process!

one thing i love: my hair lately. at first i thought that healthy-hair thing during pregnancy was a myth. mine was still coming out in handfulls in the shower, looking messy all the time, etc. it still looks messy all the time, but just a little more shiny and fresh while its at it. also, i barely ever need to wash it. it stays fresh and full looking! and it is too long. it must be growing although i thought it had reached a platform of length and wouldn't get any longer. i mean, this is getting ridiculous. i do want to be a long-haired hippie mama so i won't cut it much but i think a trim is in order.

it is the weirdest february. every day it gets hot. by afternoontime that sweater is a goner.

although these are beautiful days it is all making me a tad nervous.

so what do you guys think, if i do a pregnancy post?

any questions, thoughts, ideas? i am very open to real visceral pregnancy/motherhood discussion.

nothing is too shallow or too broad, too scary or gross or too personal to me. i mean, within reason :) sharing stories is a good way to prepare for motherhood, so feel free to share you own or ask me to compare aspects of my experience. 

and if the subject bores you, that's perfectly understandable too.

but meanwhile, i figure it's a fairly universal topic. we are all here because of pregnancy. somehow, beautiful and complex, it is a physical process that just works. it is still mysterious in so many ways.

and when it is happening to you, you are aware of it with every breath, every cell in your body knows, your dreams go crazy and you are bigger in more ways than one.

the Beatty Convergence

 over the weekend, Beattys converged from all over the map to celebrate a very important event:

Grandma Georgie's 100th birthday!!!

can you believe this lovely, spritely little woman has lived a whole century?

we all got together to prepare for the party. i collected trinkets, clothes, and photos from grandma's house to remind everyone of all their visits there over the years. she has lived in the same little house in sacramento since 1962! my dad was in high school when they moved there, and he raised pigeons in a coop in the backyard.

mikie graciously helping me put up streamers. streamers are so obnoxious to use, but they make things look so festive!

my older half-sister jeanette baked 100 cupcakes.

it was a potluck. a good old-fashioned church-style potluck. 

i am used to my friends' potlucks with healthy quinoa and ginger pumpkin soup and stuff like that, so it was kinda fun to see stuff like this galore:

addie, who is a budding graphic designer, printed large photos and made some amazing posters. here is one she made with a sweet sentiment to grandma:

together addie and i made this giant wall-size timeline of grandma's life. addie put up all the photos and i made the timeline itself. we included historic and cultural events along with family ones, and people had a lot of fun checking it out and adding more Beatty occasions.

the guest of honor arrives!

since she broke her arm just before christmas, grandma can't walk very well because she can't hold herself up on her walker. so she came in a wheelchair, from which she sat comfortably like a queen and visited for hours.

on the right below is my cousin teresa. she was grandma's very first grandchild. darin and i visited her near sedona arizona once where she was working at a wild animal park. she is an animal caretaker and the most wonderful, hilarious person.

here we are cracking up with teresa.

it was so great to see so many beattys, but most of all my very own little group of them.

matt and amy and the kids came from utah; mikie and amber came up from LA. it is a party whenever we all get together.

here's my display table of some grandma georgie memorabilia. i found this antique fur jacket in her cedar chest. my mom made the pillows for grandma in the 70s. and she always had a clown collection ever since i can remember.

more beatty love.

this is my cousin allison, she is right around the same age as addie and i so we hung out a lot together when we were small. her father was my dad's youngest brother stephen, who died when we were kids. he and my dad were close friends and shared a birthday, exactly two years apart. i like to think his spirit was there with his family and adorable grandkids that day. allison has the two most outrageously adorable daughters, gracie and kassidy, who are about the same age distance apart as ade and i, almost like little twinnies.

and my cousin laurie hugging my pops. her dad was my dad's oldest brother, fred, who died in 2000 of throat cancer. laurie loves my dad extra much because he reminds her so much of her own.

and by the way, she has six kids and two adopted kids, all gorgeous!

the food line starts...

we were the photographers.

an outdoor session would have been nice, but hey, there's only so much you can do inside a mormon church building with twenty foot ceilings and fluorescent lighting.

i could look at old family photos for hours on end.

my dad took grandma to a hair and nail appointment the day before the party. she got to choose her own nail color, and guess what color she picked? LIGHT BLUE. she is so funny.

she and emily had matching nails!

amy brought activities like these word searches for the kids, here's darin helping jarom.

and people got up to share fun memories of grandma. here is my nephew tyler, my older half-sister jeanette's son, talking about how good grandma is at remembering birthdays and how every year for his birthday (and all of his seven siblings!) he got a card and money from grandma georige. he asked everyone in the audience who remembers that, and almost all of us raised our hands. that's a lot of cards and checks to send out!

it was fun to hear addie, who is only one year older than me, share memories that i don't remember as well, like riding in grandma's tiny honda on fun excursions. we all remember her two chihuahuas that she had forEVER, rocky and tinkerbell. i was scared of them.

this is my second cousin cassidy, laurie's youngest daughter. i remember clearly when she was born. WEIRD! she is studying creative writing at BYU now.

another branch of beattys, this is my cousin Kevin, his wife Caleen, and their six kids, including the illustrious RYAN BEATTY. in case you haven't heard, i have a famous cousin, hee hee. apparently the little girls go cuckoo for this kid. he really is quite a star. you can buy his single on itunes if you'd like :)

i think his mama caleen is the real star ;) 

another branch, this is my aunt mary with her three daughters teresa, kathy and kim and their kids. aunt mary was grandma's only daughter out of five kids. 

grandma with her three living children: robert, mary and dan. 

my uncle robert flew out from new york. i haven't seen him since i was a kid!

grandma hugs robert's daughter, my cousin marci who lives in taos new mexico.

cousin aaron visiting with grandma. he was always one of my faves as a boy. he played piano like you wouldn't believe. and now he has a baby boy of his own!

grandma snuck in a few bites of cake while my own clan gathered round for our photo.

left to right, back row: art, addie, pops (dan), emily, joey, mikie, amber, amy, matt

left to right, front row: darin, me, grandma georgie, bella, jarom, orion.

old people can't party too long.

in the afternoon we had to wind things down and say goodbye to family we probably won't see again for five years or so. my cousins are so scattered in age and distance that it is really rare to get together. that's why i want all my siblings to have kids around the time i do, so we can have a big group of cousins to play together and grow up together!

it was so weird to think that we all have grandma georgie to thank for being here at all!

for beatty traditions, like loving white rice, homemade handknit christmas stockings, and coconut cupcakes.

100 years on this earth is a long time, and i am proud of her. she now has a caretaker living with her, the wonderful Marika, but grandma retains her endless charm and talkative spunkiness. i think she'll make it a few more years :)