It's A Girl!

Welcome to the world.




Will blog about the birth and new baby soon, but wanted to share the good news with all of my blog friends. Stay tuned for more.

XOXO humps + baby

Lullaby

It’s Monday and we are now two days overdue. While it’s a shame that we haven’t had a chance to meet the baby yet, I don’t want to rush the time away. The little one will get here when he / she is suppose to. So now, I’ve got some time on my hands…

Our condo building has great amenities. While I’m on mat leave, waiting for the little one to arrive, I’m taking advantage of it. Earlier today, spent some time doing laps at the pool and hung out in the “library” browsing through a stack of magazines.

As I was sitting there in a comfy leather chairs by myself, I started talking to the baby. I thought – with the great acoustics in the room – that I should start practicing some lullabies. The problem is, I don’t know the words to any lullabies.

My first attempt sounded something like this:

Hush little baby don’t say a word
Mamma’s gonna buy you a mocking bird
And if that mocking bird don’t sing
Mamma’s gonna buy you a diamond ring
And if that diamond ring don’t shine….
… don’t shine… umm..
Mamma’s gonna buy herself a bottle of wine
And if that bottle of wine tastes funny
It’s too bad ‘cus mamma’s out of money.

I’ll have to brush up on my lullabies before the baby gets here. :(

~ humps

Reassurance

"An amazing 75 per cent of babies are born after their due dates, so don't panic if you're still waiting. Though it may seem as if your baby is stubbornly refusing to leave your cosy womb, a few studies have found that most overdue babies aren't late at all — their due dates were miscalculated."

Thank you BabyCenter.ca.

What's Your Sign??

My due date is tomorrow April 18th. I know that the likelihood of delivering on my exact due date is slim - less than 10%. I’m also not really seeing any of the early labor signs, so we may be waiting for a while...

In the meantime, I flock to the internet to look at some entertaining horoscopes. While I’m not too much of an astrology fanatic, I think that it can have some on personality. And if not, it’s a lot of fun.

When Dad-to-be and I calculated our due date originally we were excited about the possibility of having an Aries baby. He is an Aries, born at the beginning of April. Also my mom is an Aries, born at the end of March. There are a lot of March / April people around me. I think that I’ve learned to deal with the unique personality of the Ram.

But the Aries sign is said to be from March 21st to April 20th. We’re sitting right at the cusp between Aries and Taurus. So having the baby next week puts us in a new category. Of course, I had to do a little bit of research.

Here’s a short overview of the two signs from Australian website Allbaby:

Aries: March 21st – April 20th
Symbol: The Ram
Ruling Planet: Mars (God of War)
Element: Fire
Gemstone: Diamond
Colour: Deep Red
Personality & Characteristics of your Baby Aries:
Those born under the sign of Aries are determined, strong willed and have all the signs of becoming a great leader. They are full of energy and love to be active, generally doing everything with lots of enthusiasm. They are loving and affectionate and can be a source of inspiration to those around them. They are often early developers and love to learn through imaginative play. Aries can be competitive, stubborn and impatient and when challenged will stand their ground very firmly.

Taurus: April 21st – May 21st
Symbol: The Bull
Ruling Planet: Venus (Roman God of Love)
Element: Earth
Gemstone: Topaz
Colour: Yellow
Personality & Characteristics of your Baby Taurus:
Those born under the sign of Taurus are generous yet determined and strong willed. They tend to think about things before they say them, coming across as conservative; don’t be fooled they can be very persistent and headstrong when needed. They are quiet and gentle and can be very clingy. They are often late developers, happy to sit and take in the world around them. A Taurus baby will be musical with many talents in different areas, especially creative ones.


With the baby really “chilling” in my body right now, being quite conservative with labor and being very clingy, I think he or she is displaying some signs of being a Taurus baby. I guess the next few days will tell.

For more baby horoscopes you can check out:
- Parents.com
- BabyZone.com
- Justhoroscopes.com (check out the Baby drop down on the right side)

My Makeover

Well now that I’m off work and waiting for the baby to arrive, I have a ton of time on my hands. Most of my day is spent sitting on my ass and rubbing my belly – trying to determine if the “contractions” that I’m feeling are getting any stronger. I say “contractions” because I’m not even sure at this point if that’s what they are.

In addition to wandering around the condo, I have also had a lot more time to brush up on my baby books, surf the net and visit blogs. I’ve come to the realization that my blog was seriously lacking design-wise. I was still sporting my original Blogger template.

If you’ve dropped by Humps and Baby Bump over the last 24 hours, you may have seen a few different layouts that I’ve been trying on for size. Like any outfit, you just can’t tell if it’s bringing out your positives until you get it into the change room.

This template that I’m rocking now is my favourite. I downloaded for FREE from Deluxe Templates. You know this mommy is on a budget! Although it’s a lot darker than my previous layout, there’s lots of great options that I have with it. I love that it’s a simple design, I can replace my Humps and Baby Bump header with a unique image once I get that far, and there’s room to grow with sub-pages. Lots of space automatically built in for advertising if I ever decide to turn the Google AdSense on. It’s also the best one that I found to incorporate the sidebar elements that I become attached to on my previous layout. Surprisingly not all layouts make that easy.

Now the most important part – what do you guys think? I still have to work out some bugs, which are directly related to how much I suck on the HTML stuff but with that in mind, is the layout a keeper??

~ humps

Labor in 140 characters or less.

It was the summer of 2008 that I started this baby blog. The pee wasn’t even dry on the stick before my mind was racing. Something about the complete unknown that was / is pregnancy, parenting, babies that made for some interesting internal commentary and questions. (And lots of hysterics!) Blogging, like a public diary, was an outlet to talk about what I was thinking and feeling before I was able to let friends and family in on the news. Surprisingly, blogging has done much more for me than I thought it would.

Through humpsNbumps I have been able to connect with mommy bloggers of all kinds. I have been uplifted, encouraged, inspired by the people that I have meet through this blog, by visiting theirs, through the increasing network of people I meet on Twitter.

I was still a baby to Twitter when one of the mothers that I follow twittered her birth.

I had hardly known much about her – apart from the 140 character bio, witty name, thumbnail picture. I hadn’t even gotten around to visiting the blog that she had listed. But with each tweet I was more and more enthralled. It was almost like watching a high speed chase on TV. You’re just as exhilarated and excited, you want to look away but you can’t, you’re stuck, watching the twists and turns, anticipating the next move… all from the comfort of your Lazy Boy. A safe distance back.

While the tweets were short and vague – I mean come on she is in labor! – it was just enough to leave you at the edge of your seat. When it was all over I wiped the sweat from my brow and went to get a cold drink. “Now this is what I’m talking about.”

Since my Twitter account consists mostly of mommy bloggers, I have had the great fortune of following a few different Twitter birth experiences. They all vary significantly. Some are just quick messages during key milestones, others fairly regular tweets. This was just before Erika Badu made headlines on entertainment news outlets for Twittering her home birth. (More information here). In preparation for this post I learned of Jason Morrison and his wife, Ann who Twittered the birth of their child and Paul and Annamarie Saarinen who shared their birth experience on Twitter, through the video-streaming site UStream.TV and posted pictures Flickr .

Also check out this BabyCenter article on Video-streaming and Twittering birth events.

For someone who doesn’t want any audio visual recording devises in the delivery room what-so-ever (almost sounds like I’m talking to Dad-to-be right now), I do want my cell phone close by. I just enabled the Twitter text feature on my phone. While I can’t promise a full blown play-by-play, I look forward to sending an update or two to my blog family via Twitter. So many of which have been counting down the days with me and sharing in my ups and downs.

Perhaps it is a bit ambitious. Who knows. How do you feel about Twitter in the delivery room??

Still No Baby - 6 days to go!

Although some of the friends and family were hoping for the baby to arrive over the long weekend, still no little munchkin. We're now down to the last six days. I've felt over the last month that I would be early, but there's a real good chance that I'll be late.

Have I felt anything? I have no idea. Haven't had any pre-pregnancy symptoms that we read about. At the same time, I don't really know what I'm suppose to be feeling...

Belly Bump III: Like Woah!

It’s the final stretch – in more ways than one. The little bundle of goodness is due in less than 2 weeks on April 18. And I’m feeling, looking down at bump before me, that I really can’t get any bigger than I am at this exact moment. *pause for effect*

Just before starting this post I looked back to the previous two bumps pictures that I posted on the blog from week 25, and from week 28. For today’s pictures that are posted below I am wearing the same sweater as my first bump picture so it should give you a good point of comparison. Who knows where that black tank top is at the moment.

Since I haven’t posted a bump picture in a while, I should tell you that most of this gain has happened in the last 4 weeks. I – or we – had a big growth spurt. I’ve found myself, walking by reflective surfaces, not recognizing my body. It’s like woah, where did that come from? The belly moves so often and with such intensity that I don’t even feel like it’s mine. Its just my skin on loan to the baby until he or she is ready to give it up.

I’m still pretty compact, mostly gaining in the big ball that is hanging in front of me – and my nose. :) While its looks like I’m carrying high in the pictures, I have actually dropped in the last couple of days - the bump was crowding my rib cage before. I’m still pretty mobile and flexible. I can still touch my toes. I do have to hold my stomach to move from side-to-side in bed.

So check out the pictures… scary huh. Puts whole new meaning to humps and bump. ;)


And kabamm!! The side profile. This is what really tells the story that I am 38 weeks and 3 days. Just so you know I wore this to run errands and grocery shop this afternoon with my black trench, black rain boots and a scarf. (Just so you know the errands included a double cheeseburger.)

XOXOX humps.

First Day of Mat Leave

Today was the first day of my maternity leave. And because I have a special relationship with the big guy above, it was also the best possible day to stay home from work; a nice little April snow storm in Toronto. Yeah I know… snow!

So I woke up in the morning and ate breakfast, looking out the window at the snow globe outside of the condo window, watching the city beginning its week, hearing the groaning from commuters near and far, and feeling really damn good that I didn’t have to go anywhere. The errands that I had, the list that I created to get me through this week was easily slipped back into the purse. I’ll get to that stuff tomorrow.

Instead of getting dressed and hitting the road, I took a more leisurely approach to the day – full of domestic activities – cleaning the bathroom and kitchen, doing laundry, organizing more of the baby clothes. I also watched daytime television, spent some time online looking for a photographer for the baby’s first pictures, tried to catch up on my fav mommy blogs.

Day 1 of maternity leave down.

The Baby Time Show

Yesterday my mom and I made our way to the International Centre near Toronto’s Pearson Airport for the Baby Time Show. It’s a tradeshow-style 3 day event that happens twice a year. It was my first baby show.

Since my mom had an appointment in the morning, we didn’t arrive as early as I wanted. It wasn’t until around 2:15 pm that we made it past admissions. (More on the why it took so long below). By that point, I missed the cloth diapering seminar that I was interested in, and the Quinny Fashion Show. Although we arrived at the main stage not long after getting there, I expected to catch the tail-end of it. There was no sign that it even happened! Can someone tell me if this was a 10 minute show or something??

But I digress… The event. We spent the rest of the afternoon – until after 5:00 pm navigating our way through exhibitor booths, and purchasing a few things. That included a few pregnant momma rests and potty breaks. Overall the day had some positives and negatives. Thought I’d share my thoughts with blog-land.

On a positive note, the Baby Time Show was a great opportunity to see a number of different exhibitors, including baby retailers large and small, baby gear manufacturers large and small, and a whole lot of services. I had a chance to ask questions and get advice from a few of the booths that we stopped at.

However, since I am only 2 weeks away from my due date, it wasn’t the most beneficial for me. I would recommend the show for someone earlier in the pregnancy, as an opportunity to do a little bit of research. Definitely check it out before you start your baby registries. There were great offers from The Bay, Sears, Babies R US for moms who started their registry at the event. A few other booths, like Savvymom.ca had great giveaway contests for dream nurseries and other stuff. Luckily I already signed up online here.

I went to the event looking for more info and advice on cloth diapers, but was disappointed that there didn’t seem to be more than 2 or 3 exhibitors – either cloth diaper manufacturer or retailers. I was also hoping to score an amazing deal on photography. My dream of being “discovered” while walking the street and getting a great offer for some free shots, hasn’t quite materialized. And I really want to book a photographer for the baby’s first pictures. I did pick up a few cards from photographers at the show that I’ll have to look into further.

And now the “negatives”: Probably no fault of the Baby Time Show, maybe more of the International Centre’s. It was a logistical nightmare getting into the show. The International Centre seemed to have a few different tradeshows happening this weekend and the parking situation was a nightmare. As my mom and I were approaching the centre on Airport Road, the backup of traffic was crazy. Blocks of cars were waiting to get into the main driveway. As we got closer we saw the “Lot Full” signage. They seemed to be letting in one car for every car that was leaving. Most people were turning around and looking for street parking or free parking lots at the businesses a few blocks away.

Now as you know, I’m 38 weeks pregnant. And while I feel great, in great shape and pretty mobile all things considered, the last thing that I wanted to do was walk. I did think at that very moment, looking up at the “Lot Full” sign, that we should turn around and head home. We ended up finding a parking lot nearby and walking in. To my dismay, as we were approaching the side of the building where the Baby Time Show was held, there are spots all over the place. After I freaking walked my fat butt blocks to get there. Do they not know their audience?!

And for an event that charged $15 admission, I didn’t think that there were the deals or free stuff to make it worth it. The whole idea of paying admission to a place where people were trying to sell us things, was counter-intuitive. I opened my wallet with expectations that the show organizers really had to impress me. With a few exhibitors selling their merchandise without tax or similar types of minimal “show specials”, it wasn’t really impressive. Here are a few pictures of the “swag” that we picked up and despite all the reuseable bags that I received, and a few magazines, I really could have done without the other “freebies”.

So for ways to spend a Saturday afternoon pre-baby it gets a 2 out 5. I should have used that $15 for a manicure.

The Big Day – leaving work

April 3rd was probably as deeply etched into my mind as the baby’s due date – April 18th. I was counting down to April 3rd for weeks. Months even. As soon as I made the decision to leave work two weeks before my due date, I started to anticipate the arrival of THIS Big Day.

And here in Canada where moms are encouraged to take 1 year maternity + parental leave, I head out the door knowing that I won’t be back until this time next year. A full 12 months of bonding with the baby. My job will be waiting for me when I get back.

You would think that I was doing the electric slide out of the door! Or the hustle. Surprisingly it was a day with mixed emotions. I am a workaholic – undeniably. And what makes the matter worse is that I really do love what I do. I love my job, I love the company that I work for, and for the most part I love the people that I work with. Being a workaholic for my whole adult life (I started my career fairly young) my work is also a large part of my identity. It’s more than a 9-5 for me.

I was leaving the comfortable environment of my career – something that I wrap around myself like a blanket – for the unknown, challenging, not-sure-if-I-can-cut-this world of mommy-hood. I don’t know what to expect with the next stage of my life. I don’t have control anymore. This terrifies me.

I left the office yesterday feeling relieved that work was behind me, encouraged about the new time I will have to unwind and get organized, and scared shit-less about new journey. Most of all I have no idea what to do with myself. I cried a little on the highway.

So now it’s official. There’s no turning back. Here comes the baby.

~ humps