2nd pregnancy recap

38 weeks + 3 days.
I think the angle makes my belly a lot smaller than it really is but for sure it isn’t as big as it was when I was pregnant with Emmett.

~33 weeks
Hard to believe she’s curled up in there.
My OB ordered ultrasound measurements just like they did with Emmett. Looks like she’s measuring a lot smaller than he did. He came out at 8lb surprising us all. Super curious how she will measure at birth.

~34 weeks
I originally had plans to fly to AZ to have maternity photos taken by a super talented photographer I’ve admired but COVID-19 pandemic happened. But I’m also really glad we were still able to take these along with some as a family of 3. Memories I’ll forever cherish.

I honestly feel the most beautiful pregnant.
So sad to think this is highly likely my last pregnancy. It’ll be super selfish to want a 3rd just to be preggo again right?

Also, super random but sorta related because we managed to pull off painting our cabinets during my maternity leave. It took us 2.5 weeks and everyday I was a little anxious but thankful that little lady decided to stay put.

Here’s a before. Such a big difference!

It was certainly not easy and took a lot of work. Primarily because we initially thought all the cabinets needed to be sanded. Spoiler alert. It didn’t.

When my sweet coworker dropped off baby shower gifts. Didn’t get a chance to have a baby shower because of COVID-19.

My 2nd Mother’s Day at ~32 weeks.
Baby girl was a flip flopper. Found out she was breeched around this time and I think she may have been breeched the majority of my pregnancy.
I was super anxious she’d stay breeched or if she did flip that she’d flip back again.
Especially during our cabinet project I felt her flip flopping assuming because she was scared from the loud noises while I was sanding.
Thankfully she was confirmed head down at 36 weeks and have been head down since.

~31 weeks.
Overall this pregnancy was such a breeze. For the most part I hardly felt pregnant.
Little to no nausea, no crazy cravings, no swelling or aches/pain. Slept great with just a tiny pillow between my legs.

Little lady is super active. I thought Emmett was active but she definitely is giving him a run for his money. Her kicks in the beginning can be sharp, something I never felt with Emmett.
I didn’t develop any stretch marks. Just had faint ones from my pregnancy with Emmett. Although I did moisture more so that likely helped a lot. My skin responded well and didn’t breakout similarly to Emmett. Though I did have a zit or 2.
My kidneys surprisingly responded well to this pregnancy too.

Can’t wait to meet this sneaky little lady.

Emmy’s last few days of being an only

Happiest boy because of bubbles. and cars. He loves cars. Book with cars. Tiny cars and big cars. He’d probably name his sister car if we let him.

I love his smile. I love his face.

So glad we took a plunge and had family photos taken of just us 3 before baby girl arrives.

We had to turn him around in order to fit a 2nd car seat and his expression likely foreshadows his mood when his sister arrives.

Fancy gift from his aunts and uncles. He’s so loved.

He’s been practicing big brother duties on little cousin Iris. He has his moments of wanting to hold her and feed her for about 2 minutes, then wants nothing to do with her for the rest of the day. Hah, needless to say we don’t have high expectations for his reactions with baby sister.

This boy loves to eat!

We had a period of hot days in spring and it felt like summer.

“Mo mo” and “chu chu” as he calls them is licking ice cream off his hands. Machu adores him. He’s the first to run to his room when he hears Emmett wakes up. Naimo doesn’t care much for him unless he has food.

Banana spinach smoothie “ice cream.” He calls it “ice.”

I love him so much.
My favorite age so far at 18months+. It’s especially fun hearing him catch new words, a lot of times surprising us when he uses them correctly. Like telling us when something is too tight (I.e his diaper, shirts, pants.). Telling us he wants to go outside or take naimo and machu on a walk. Or when he tells us he wants to sit at his table to eat instead of standing on his stool. But there are also a lot of times we don’t understand him in which we ask him to point to it or show us. I’m so amazed by him everyday. I’m in constant awe of him and I know why now how people have so many kids because this feeling of adornment and awe is kinda addicting. I’m excited to experience the same with baby girl.

Emmy’s second trip to Hawaii!

We wanted Emmy to grow up knowing both grandparents very well so when we saw that flights were at a record low back in October after his first visit to Oahu, we booked his second visit for 4 months later. We FaceTime with them every week and it’s nice to see how familiar he’s gotten with them. Lately he’s really enjoyed face timing and chatting with them on his own despite his babbling are just adorable jibberish. 

This was the day after we landed and he didn’t quite get a good nap in yet before heading to the beach and it shows. Haha

Still getting used to the sand.

Promptly resumed his nap after the beach. Can never get enough of this face. 

At times he’s been more clingy than usual to me and I’m sure he has a sense his days of being the only baby is coming to an end. 

24 weeks here with my baby daddy.

Three generations of guys. And Emmy still obsessed with pulling this cooler.

Emmy loved these koi fishes and all the other farm animal. He wasn’t such a big fan of the zoo animals though. 

Kallen was thrilled when he later found out I took this. He loves it when Emmett holds his hand.

He wasn’t a big fan of the beach but enjoyed the little kiddie pool.

Knows how to say “cheese” and it’s giving me school photo feels.

What most of his mornings consists of since he woke up around 5am Hawaiian time (7am CA time).

Love him so much. Don’t know how I’m going to love another one just as much.

My baby is getting promoted

To big brother!

I have so many mixed emotions about this. We were really torn when we first found out I was pregnant. It’s not what we had planned. We wanted at least another 2 years or so with Emmett to ourselves before even considering having another. We felt we were in a good spot finally. We paid off our loans. Emmett is sleeping. We’re sleeping well. We were finally making future plans for international travels after 2 years. 

Then in late October I started feeling really exhausted. I thought it was a latent reaction to drinking really strong coffee. Then the food aversions came. I hated the smell of leftover food we had cooked from the day before. Again I didn’t think much of it until my coworker and I started joking about me being pregnant. So then I tried to recount the last time I had my period. I was a little late but my cycles were usually long. I debated for a few days on whether to get a test because it took me awhile to get a positive with Emmett even while pregnant. Finally decided to buy 2 tests because I was so sure the first will at least be a negative. 

Boy I was so wrong.

Clearly pregnant. So pregnant. I cried. 

So Kallen and I spent the next weeks debating and made a pros and cons list. Seems that there were more cons than pros. 

But ultimately it came down to my own feelings about going through a termination. I’m all for pro choice and whatever a woman wants to do with her body. But for me, every time I thought about terminating this baby, even though it was likely only cells at that point, I was overwhelm with sadness. I was sad I’d become regretful. I was sad I’d become depress not knowing who this person will become. 

We debated for so long. But I don’t think Kallen and I ever verbally agreed. We just acknowledged that my repeated sadness whenever we considered terminating was enough reasons to keep. 

So… I guess we’re having this summer babe!

We’re getting really excited (now that the initial shock is sorta over). But regardless, we’re scared shitless. Pls send helps. Lots of it. Many thanks. 

Thankful for…

My baby who’s almost 14 months but looking and sometimes acting like he’s going on 5 years.

My family for putting together the best thanksgiving meal a starving mama can ever ask for. 

Not pictured is Kallen. He’s been so supportive and involved and helpful. With no complaints. It’s been good over here. 

Start of toilet training

Honestly, we didn’t anticipate starting toilet training Emmy this early at only 13.5 months but something very unexpected happen and now we’re hoping he’ll be somewhat trained by 18 months. Crossing our fingers. Initially we expected to start training around 2 years when it typically would take just a weekend or so to complete. But luckily, I came across the cutest training potty ever to help lighten the mood on this can-be-stressful transition. We’re not wanting to put too much pressure though so we’re taking it very slowly and following his cues for signs of readiness. This past weekend we introduced him to it. Initially he was apprehensive. And to our surprise when we asked him does he think he can sit on it, he did! The next step is trying to get the timing down. A couple of times this weekend we had a few missed opportunities by a few minutes but it was good to know our guesses for timing is not too far off. I’m super curious to see how he does in the coming months. 

We drove down to Napa to have brunch with some old friends and surprisingly he did pretty good in the car. It’s a hit or miss sometimes. 

My attempts at taking more photos with him because he’s so darn cute. 

He never sits still anymore so brunch with this guy consists of not eating and lots of chasing him around. It’s really adorable to see him so curious about other people and other things though. So even though my empty belly complains at least my heart is content. Haha

Two words

Debt free. 

(Except for our mortgage)

Feels nice. Can’t believe we did it in less than 2 years. $380k. Dang that’s a lot of money. Gonna have Emmy promise me and won’t have insane amounts of student loan debt like we did. 

Not sure how we should celebrate. Feels weird. We haven’t gone anywhere nice to spend a good chunk of change in awhile It’s difficult to even imagine doing that now. 

But I do know one of the first things I bought were warmer clothes for Emmy since winter is coming. Thankful he has uncles and aunties to spoil him with cute outfits like above though. 

Em’s first trip to Hawaii

It irks me that it’s a little out of order but too lazy to edit. 

He was not a fan of the ocean.

But the kiddy pool he loves.

His daily uniform. Nothing but a diaper on.

The sand was also enjoyable to him.

Took him to the zoo but he was fixated on pushing this cooler around.

Shoulder rides with Papa.

It was super cute he was interested in pushing our suitcase until he wanted to also push around someone else’s.

Napped but an hour and it was heaven. I made the mistake of adjusting my wedgie. He woke up soon after I shifted.

He was pretty content with pretending his milk carton was a toy car until he wanted to take it into the aisle and across first class.

Witnessing his first landing.

7 months since they last saw each other.

Emmy wearing his Aloha outfit for his birthday shindig.

A whole year with Emmett

He’s the love of our lives, no competition. 

I’ve been conflicted about what to say when this day came because a part of me is in denial. It’s so hard to look at him each day witnessing how much he’s grown/changed/evolved and not yearn for the days when he was a helpless immobile chunk of cuteness. It’s true, I’m so sad. I’m living in a constant state of nostalgia. I give him so many hugs and kisses in a day as if I want the feelings permanently imprinted. The feelings of holding his tiny body with his arms hanging around my neck, and the plump softness of his baby cheeks. 

If I can come up with a way to bottle up all the stages and somehow get to experience it all just for one day or even an hour, it’d probably be pretty great, and also, I’d probably be pretty rich. 

If I had to confess the one thing I love most about being with him is just watching him do all the things. I love watching him dance, babble (someone needs to come up with a baby translating app ASAP), attempt at mastering his fine motor skills like screwing and unscrewing bottle caps, give hugs and kisses to all the pets, waving, mowing the lawn (but not well), throwing away dirty diapers/trash, pushing/pulling/twisting/turning all the knobby things, attempt at jumping, singing “round and round” from “The wheels on the Bus” song, try to say his name, say “mama” and “me me” (mom in Vietnamese), psych out everyone around him, attempt at feeding me, and the list goes on and I don’t think will ever end. 

The hardest part for me is the parenting. To not just parent but to act/say/do in a ways that’s conducive in raising a respectful, competent, confident, and (mostly) happy child and eventual adult. In which I’ve found requires so much patience, communication, and research/reading. It’s a work in progress. Emmett is only a year and I wonder a lot how much (or little) our style of parenting has played a role in his demeanor and personality thus far. But either way, it’s been such a joy (and also very exhausting) seeing him become one year old Emmett. Curious how the next year’s growth will surface, but not too curious because I still want to enjoy carrying him and not be completely winded. 

33 years

I turned 33 and my only regret is not having this cutie in my life sooner.

I’m so obsessed with him it’s rediculous. And I’m glad my family feels the same. We’re all obsessed. My sister is putting together a video and my brother made t-shirts, all for his birthday coming up.

I took some photos to commemorate him turning 1 soon and I died when I put this outfit on him. So frkn adorable. Now I understand why some families have a gazillion babies. 

Less than a week before sister gets married and we celebrated her wedding shower this past weekend. Emmett participated in one of the games and was the highlight of the day for me.

And in case you’re wondering, my ovaries are screaming “yes, have a another!” But my brain is putting up a hard no. Brain wins. For now. And maybe for a few more years. And maybe forever.