Pregnancy/home update - 35 weeks!

by Bex

Wow, 35 weeks already - these last few weeks have gone by SO fast!  I seem to have a never ending list of things to do and knowing the babies will be here in just a couple of weeks is pretty daunting now!  Most of the proper important things are done so it's just wee jobs and extra crafty bits I wanted to get done before they arrive.  If I can tick off the boring ones I should be able to spend the last few days chilling out hand-sewing felt hearts together to make a garland for the babies' room.

Obviously we are still at risk of early labour before our planned caesarean but the great news is that if they are born now they have an excellent chance of surviving and doing well.  YAY babies, well done for staying inside for so long!

As much as I feel we need these last couple of weeks to feel ready, I'm not sure the 'ready' feeling will ever come.  I am SO excited to actually meet the twins but that doesn't take away the anxiety of how we'll cope with TWO brand new babies at once!  I think the fact it was such a  journey to get here, (the IVF more than anything as I've generally had a pretty good pregnancy after I got past those horrendous few months of sickness at the start), has helped us feel less scared about actually having the babies.  We spent so long worried it may never happen that anything that's thrown at us (or projectile sprayed...) will be just fine.  We'll cope.

Anything is better than the alternative.  All of those things I was worried we might never get to do can happen and the parts that are hard will be worth it.  I cannot wait for what comes next!  I've thoroughly enjoyed being pregnant, despite my current aches & pains and a few moany days, I am so happy we were able to experience these few months.  I think you can tell I've tried to make the most of it :)  I only hope those I know still going through the tough times of IVF are as lucky as we ended up being.  I still remember those feelings of hope and despair, ups and downs but I hope they fade as we spend time as a family and embracing these twins we've been blessed with.  It's certainly not an easy thing to go through and neither will suddenly becoming parents to twins but we've survived this far together!

What I really hope will happen before the babies arrive is for the decorating to be finished - our fab painter has finished the living room, bedroom feature wall and the upstairs landing and will be finishing off the hall & stairs as well as the kitchen/dining room this week.  We do now want to change the rest of the walls in our bedroom though as they don't go as we thought they would with our new wall colour.  As much as I want the work finished asap, I also think it would be better to get it ALL done now than have a painter in again post-babies.  Luckily he does have a couple of days free next week so if we can choose our colour and get the paint then he can get that done for us too.  Plus, I don't mind having him around, he's from Glasgow (actually Pollokshaws really near where we lived in Pollokshields!) and it's nice to hear the accent again!  ;)

 I should really have made the bed but I'm far too tired for that nonsense at the moment!  ;)

(I'm sleeping with the giraffes so that they smell like me for the twins.)

The big hole through to the dining room is now looking like a proper opening, it's beautifully plastered and will be dry enough to paint now.  I can't wait to see it finished!  We have to find some tiles which match the kitchen floor to fill the space where the wall was before our builder can come back to finish it off by repositioning the skirting he saved from the old wall.

All in all, the work we've been getting done hasn't been too stressful as we've been lucky with tradespeople.  When I write up the before & after posts of the rooms, I'll be writing about both our builder (+ his team inlc. electrician, plasterer & building surveyor) and our painter as they've both been fab and the loveliest workmen I've ever come across.  I've been pleasantly surprised at how friendly, chatty and super tidy they all are as well as charging reasonable prices of course!

Anyway, as for the pregnancy at the moment, here's the latest news:

How far along: 35 weeks

Size comparison: Honeydew melons!

Weight gain: I'm now 202.6lbs having put on 5lbs in the last 3 weeks.  I still feel comfortable with my weight and body and was actually more worried that I hadn't put on enough weight for someone growing twins!  Total weight gain is now finally over 1 stone at 17.6lbs and I'm still enjoying eating lots of yummy things!  ;)

34 weeks

33 weeks

Cravings: I've become a little obsessed with coke.  The last thing I want to be drinking lots of due to not only the caffeine content (although it seems you're allowed quite a few cans in a day according to NHS choices) but the acid and sugar being horrendous for my teeth!  Luckily being very aware of this, I am managing to avoid too much damage and I never have more than one can in a day!  (Was relieved to get registered at a dentist down here a couple of weeks ago and had the all clear, still no fillings, phew!)

I've been eating fairly healthily because Mum & Nik are taking such good care of me and doing all the cooking (and other chores) so I have proper meals.

Mum brought me this awesome bacon & hard fried egg sandwich for breakfast in the bath the other day!

I did chop myself up A LOT of fruit recently though and thoroughly enjoyed munching through the massive bowl after my veggie sausage wholemeal sandwich.  We did have a nice greasy chinese that night mind ;)

Mango, strawberries, pear and passion fruit.

Signs & Symptoms: Lots of stretch marks now but they're still pretty localised.  Mostly on the right side which if you saw my instagram is easily explained by this:

They like to curl up on the right in the evenings!

Other than that, just the usual you would expect at this late stage - major waddling, lots of waking up to pee in the night, sore bump, sore hips, always hungry, always thirsty, always hot and too much excitement and anxiety about what's coming next.

Middle of the night snacks! 

Even snacking in the bath
(Admittedly I always do this anyway but usually with wine!)

Things for babies: I think we pretty much have everything we need now although I still only have one carrier and I've decided to buy a Moby wrap too as hopefully I'll manage to carry them both myself in that at first (I'll be practising with teddies!) so I'm still bidding away on ebay!  I just need to finally choose their coming home outfits (and mine - bearing in mind my section wound!).

We received some lovely gifts at my baby shower last week as well and Caroline sent us some more of these fab Funky Giraffe dribble bibs!  Great minds and all that ;)  I'm assured you can never have too many and she'd bought them before I blogged about them, she obviously knows my taste very well!  Nik went through them telling me I should have ordered those designs too (which I had to point out wouldn't be a good thing as we'd then have doubles!), lol.

And my Auntie Ali sent us these gorgeous outfits from France where she lives:

I've been working on some pretty fripperies to get the nursery finished but we have all the essentials now, I'm just concentrating on the last few crafty projects I wanted to do before I have no time to do them anymore!!  This hot air balloon mobile being one of them:

Various paints for another project you'll hopefully see tomorrow (if I get done editing the pictures)!

And just on Sunday we had our final photo shoot with Laura which was so much fun!  I'm so glad we arranged one for after we moved towards the end of the pregnancy and in our new home.  The lovely Laura has actually edited them already so I'll be sharing my favourites (almost ALL of the 44!) very soon but for now, here's one of my ultimate favourites: