Poor Kate has woken up soaking wet three mornings in a row…. which means my sleep is cut short. In the evenings I’ve been staying up late to finish my homework and study for tomorrow’s exam. Plus I still have a stuffed up nose which only bothers me when I’m laying down – I keep waking up snorting and unable to breathe. I am rather tired. I was falling asleep on the couch all evening and wishing I could just go to bed when Kate did. But as usual now that I’m done all my work and the house is silent I’m just sitting here enjoying a couple minutes to myself. I’ll regret it tomorrow.

The past two nights I have put Kate to bed in a somewhat rushed, oh please oh please go to sleep so I can get something done or mommy is up a creek kind of way. I heard her get out of bed a few minutes later, thump on her door a couple of times. I tip-toed into my bedroom holding my breath, hoping she would just go to bed. And you know what? She did. I heard her tonight thumping a couple of times and giving little “Ahhhh?” questioning whines. And then I heard foodsteps away from the door and silence. I don’t have a video to check or anything, but I’m pretty certain she is sleeping in her bed. I am so thankful she loves that bed!

Baby Ember is as active as ever in there, soothing my anxieties. Her movements have definitely changed from the sharp frequent kicks to now much more stretching and rolling and waves across my belly. Just as frequent, just different kinds of movements as she takes up more space in there. She has been changing position a lot lately, some days being completely transverse and other times taking up her favored diagonal. I can’t say with any certainty which end is up, however. I just know her feet are everywhere and something is up in my ribs. If I were to take a guess I’d say she’s probably still breech but starting to turn.

I am getting a bunch of BH contractions as well, especially on days when she’s spinning around in there. But I get them randomly all day, typically when I change activities. If I’ve been laying down for a while and then get up that will trigger one. Or carrying Kate and leaning over putting her to bed, that will give me one. If I’m busy the only reason I can tell I’m having one is due to the sudden needs to pee immediately. Whenever I really have to pee I do a quick check of my belly and sure enough usually it’s very hard! The worst is first thing in the morning after several hours of sleep, I roll out of bed to a BH and hightail it to the bathroom before I pee myself.

I’ve put on quite a few pounds this past couple weeks, making up for the weeks before when I didn’t put on anything. I think the eating binge has finally subsided, I’m no longer starving 2 minutes after I eat a full meal. I’m still frequently snacking, but not to quite the extent I was last week! I can tell I’m carrying extra weight now too, I think my face is starting to round out just slightly, like it does at the end of every pregnancy. And I won’t talk about my butt… it’s been larger for quite a while now.

My belly just feels so huge! And I don’t mean when I look at it – it’s still a smallish, compact bump. But it feels big – so rounded and stretched. I’m at the point where I look in the mirror and wonder how our bodies manage it, all this growing and stretching with really not many effects all considering. Growing a person is still just so crazy and amazing. I’m so glad I got to go through this one more time. I will miss it… well, this part at least. (I doubt I’ll ever miss the puking several times a day.)

I am 34 weeks now… just 6 more weeks! Which means I have only 1 month until Kate’s birthday party. Yikes! I had better get moving.