22 weeks, 2 days: Moving Along (Slowly)

I'm in love!! In love with a big, purple, birth ball. Mmmm... I bought it as a birth ball, but it is heavenly for a sore back! I don't know how on earth I lived without it.

We've been working on this birth ball purchase for about a month now. I had wanted a specific brand that my friend Laura recommended and which I loved (the Thera-Band ball). She lent it to me last time, but I ended up using it mainly as a foot-rest, and completely forgot about it during our birth (I think it'll be different this time!). Anyhow, we could only find it online and DH didn't want to pay shipping (which increased the cost of the ball by about 50%). So DH has been on a "ball quest" to find the perfect ball... which has taken a while! He finally found "the ball" on Thursday night and brought it home for me (spending, I might add, a good $5-10 more than he would have on the Thera-band, including shipping, LOL)! It's definitely a really good ball, and I love it. It's great for exercising, for sitting, for doing pelvic tilts... I'm living on the thing right now. Now if I can only keep my cat and my toddler away from it!

I'm beginning to see that I should have set an earlier date than 20 weeks for my "start preparing for birth" date. It would have been fine if I'd hit the ground running at 20 weeks, but that seems to have been my "start easing into preparations" date... meaning that I'm really behind on most things. Last time I was calling childbirth educators at 4 weeks... this time I'm really behind the times.

So far I've started a few exercises (not much), some reading, some walking, buying my birth ball, and interviewing doulas. I have so much more to do!! (Not to mention last-month things like gathering my birth supplies and ordering my birth kit.) Let's see... I need to:

- Finalize my doula
- Really start exercising
- Choose a method of childbirth ed and WORK ON IT
- Start listening to my hypnobirthing tapes (just in case they work better this time!)
- Find a chaperone for DS (our midwife requires that so the daddy is free to catch/participate)
- More reading

And a ton of other things that I'm not remembering right now! A year or so ago I made up a huge pre-baby to-do list; I should probably get it out again and update it so that I can feel slightly more organized. Having a move in the middle of everything does complicate things!

Other than that we are doing really well... I am gaining more mobility daily, though my back still hurts quite a bit, and we are moving our way slowly through the first days of home-ownership. However, I quite seriously believe that we won't be moved in and finished with our initial projects for at least a couple of years. But that's okay with me!

I'll check in soon! Have a lovely Sunday, everyone!