no diabetes here

I took the glucose test today during my monthly checkup. Basically it consists of drinking a large glass of a liquid that tastes like Orange Crush but is of slightly thicker consistency. It isn't as disgusting as I thought it was going to be (I was picturing the barium Hagar has to drink in the Stone Angel). Anyway, turns out I do not have gestational diabetes. Hurray!

Now I can celebrate my 31st birthday in style, and have cake.

27+ weeks

"Your baby now weighs nearly 2 pounds/ 875 grams and measures 14.5 inches/ 36.6 centimetres from head to toe. Her eyes open and close, she sleeps and wakes at regular intervals and she may suck a finger or thumb.

Sweet dreams, little baby! Some experts believe that babies begin to dream by the 28th week. What do they dream about? No one knows for certain but the brain is active this week as well. The characteristic grooves on the brain's surface start to appear and more brain tissue develops.

Chalk up any rhythmic movement you may be feeling to a case of the hiccups, which are common this week and throughout the pregnancy."

-babycentre

So I apparently am in the start of the third trimester. Yikes!

heeelarious

A friend sent this link.

Every girl dreams of outfitting their baby in cute high-heeled shoes, right? Especially those girls who hate high heels and prefer cleats, right?

Seriously, who comes up with these ideas?

house pics

As promised, here are a few more pics of the new house. We headed over on Sat am to take some more pics so we could do some planning.


Living/Dining area



Entryway



Stained glass in baby's room



Upstairs bathroom & stained glass window

26+ weeks

"Measuring your baby from top to toe with his legs extended, he is about 14 inches/35.6 centimetres. He weighs a little more than 1.6 pounds/ 760 grams. Your baby's eyes begin to open around now. Response to sound grows more consistent toward the end of the seventh month, when the network of nerves to the ear is complete. He also continues to take small breaths and although he's only breathing in water and not air, it's still good practice for when he's born."

The time seems to be just flying by. Just a few months ago, September seemed so far away. And yet -- it's already on the later side of June. How'd that happen?

On Sunday afternoon Ian and I went to the mountain. I walked up to the stairs and did three sets, while he ran and met me at the stairs. Climbing stairs are much harder with extra weight! On Tuesday I did about a 25 minute walk and yesterday I walked home from work, so things are still feeling good on the exercise front.

We're aiming to go to the house either tonight or on the weekend so we can take pics, measurements, etc. Pictures will be forthcoming.

stoopider?

Ian sent me an article from The Atlantic magazine (online, of course) that asks some interesting questions about reading and the way that we process information in the...information age? The article is called "Is Google Making Us Stupid."

The author's discussion of "deep reading" is what interested me most. Here are a few relevant passages:

"My mind isn’t going—so far as I can tell—but it’s changing. I’m not thinking the way I used to think. I can feel it most strongly when I’m reading. Immersing myself in a book or a lengthy article used to be easy. My mind would get caught up in the narrative or the turns of the argument, and I’d spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose. That’s rarely the case anymore. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle."

(Given that his article is more than a few pages long, I found his commentary above amusing because it got me to thinking that if most people are like the author, they are likely to lose interest or focus before the end of the article).

"The kind of deep reading that a sequence of printed pages promotes is valuable not just for the knowledge we acquire from the author’s words but for the intellectual vibrations those words set off within our own minds. In the quiet spaces opened up by the sustained, undistracted reading of a book, or by any other act of contemplation, for that matter, we make our own associations, draw our own inferences and analogies, foster our own ideas. Deep reading, as Maryanne Wolf argues, is indistinguishable from deep thinking. If we lose those quiet spaces, or fill them up with “content,” we will sacrifice something important not only in our selves but in our culture."

Hm.

I definitely find myself skimming online articles, particularly if they are on the longer side and I am not "hooked" right from the first paragraph. Since I spend practically my entire day reading articles, I suppose this is not surprising. However, I do have to say that my "deep reading" skills are still intact. I am still able to lose myself in a book and read for hours at a time without getting distracted. I'm sure the medium (book vs. computer screen) plays a role.

25+ weeks

"The baby now weighs nearly 1.5 pounds / 660 grams and is approximately 13.5 inches/ 35 centimetres long from crown to heel. He makes breathing movements but has no air in his lungs yet. At 26 weeks, fetal brain scans show response to touch. If you shine a light on your abdomen, your baby will turn his head, which according to researchers, means his optic nerve is working."
-babycentre

Last night she was pretty active, bouncing while Ian was talking to her. It was quite amusing!

times they are a changin'

How depressing is the news that they need to update some of our favourite characters and cartoons from the 80s to appeal to "modern" children. Poor TMNT, the care bears and every girl's favourite, strawberry shortcake.

Here's a short excerpt:

"On top of her new toy line, Strawberry Shortcake is getting a new computer-animated movie and a new TV series, starting next year. This time, in keeping with contemporary nutritional concerns, the franchise will downplay the sugary dessert theme and move, as Mr. Conrad put it, “fruit-forward.”

“It’s also about creating a cohesive line,” Mr. Conrad said. “We’re downplaying characters that were part of Strawberry’s world but who didn’t immediately shout out fruit.”

In related news, apparently the Sweet Valley High twins have now dropped from a size 6 to a size 4.

step two three four

It ended up being really hot today in Montreal (with a big thunderstorm after lunch that had such high winds it apparently knocked over some trucks on the Champlain bridge!). I decided to walk to work instead of walking home, since it is generally cooler in the mornings.

Once 6 pm came around, however, I was still feeling restless so I met up with a friend and we walked up to Beaver Lake and back with the dog. It was still pretty warm, but it started raining ever so slightly about 1/2 way through the walk which kept us (and the dog) pretty cool.

Overall I figure I walked approximately 12 km today. I definitely needed it after all the stressful running around last week where I neglected to do much exercise (ok, I didn't really have time).

There is now a "vendu" sign on our house!!!

new home

So, we managed to pull it off and buy a new house in the last 10 days. It is not an easy or stress-free process, that is for sure. So now all that's left is to sell our condo and move. Not that either of those things are likely to be stress-free, but, maybe they will be less rushed that the - make an offer- get bank assessor to examine house and condo - find an inspector - have house inspected within 7 days of offer - secure mortgage within 10 days of offer - sign a million documents - process.

We escaped up north on Sat, while our agent showed the condo and we got a chance to relax a little and destress. The baby got her first swim in a lake, which she seemed to enjoy (no surprise there, since Ian and I spent many years swimming competitively).

Here's one of the main reasons I fell in love with the house. It's the north- (using Montreal orientation) facing window on the staircase:

24+ weeks (6 months)

"Your fetus weighs more than 1.3 pounds/ 600 grams. Though she still has little body fat and her skin is thin and fragile, she's now well-proportioned. Her brain is growing rapidly, and she is starting to fill the space in your uterus. From crown to heel she could measure 11.8 inches / 30 centimetres."
-babycentre

good times

So, here is the Traf contingent representing at the wedding we went to this past weekend. This doesn't give the best idea of how pregnant I look, but you can tell there's something going on with my body that isn't standard operating procedure!

I've known the bride since we lived on the same street when we were 2 years old. We also used to play soccer against each other each Saturday after I moved towns, and then ended up at high school and CEGEP together. The man she married is a real gem, and I couldn't be happier for the two of them!

Congrats Kate!

Ferme Morgan

On the weekend, Ian and I headed up north for a wedding at Gray Rocks, which was very enjoyable despite the rainy weather. We decided to drive home by a different route so we could stop in at Morgan Farms.

I'm in the midst of reading the Omnivore's Dilemma, and it is really making me think about eating meat that you get at the supermarket. Ian and I don't eat a lot of meat regularly, and if we do we try to buy it from the market at Jean-Talon. However, after reading this book, it really makes you think twice about where your meat comes from and if you really want to be supporting the type of system used to farm beef in North America on an industrial scale.

So, Morgan Farms is an organic farm but not only that, their animals are grass-fed for the most part, rather than grain-fed. A lot of "big organic" still uses feedlots and gives their animals "organic" corn as food. Anyway, we bought a bunch of meat to put in the freezer and I figure it'll last us two or three weeks. Best of all, Morgan Farms delivers once a week to three locations in Montreal, so you can call up an order and they'll bring it to you in the city.

These types of things really start to matter when you are considering bringing a new life into the world. I don't really want this new baby to have to eat meat that has been pumped full of antibiotics so it won't get sick because it's crammed in with thousands of other animals in too-tight cages.

It's more expensive than supermarket meat, that's for sure. But, for now it is a price I am willing to pay.