Week 17

17 full weeks today.  Tummy is out in full force - I can't even pretend to squeeze into my non-maternity jeans anymore. Good thing I have my magical maternity jeans!  I didn't even eat a large meal before this photo! It's all baby (and a bowl of cheerios).

  I promise the chalkboard will be cuter next week.  I had Mat repaint it after this picture since every time I paint it the paint peels off when I try to write on it - wait till you see it, he should start a painting business ;) haha.

Mat had a three day weekend this weekend because yesterday was a bank holiday (basically a federal holiday where everyone gets Monday off work).  Considering Mat never gets any time off work, we didn't know what to do with all of our quality time! It was great!  We ate a lot, went grocery shopping, bought our wedding bands (mine is old and beautiful), went bowling, hung out in the garden, went out to dinner with friends, and watched football.  And today, Mat's only working a half-day (6am-3pm - a normal day for normal people but a half day for him) so he can come to the doctor with me this afternoon.  

I snapped a few gems of Mat this weekend.  He really does like hanging out with me, you just can't tell :)

Saturday was absolutely miserable.  It poured down rain all day.. and I made Mat use the flowery umbrella because the black one is bigger and I wanted the bigger one.  He's so good to me.

Mat going into our favourite store, Waitrose.  We always spend way too much money and have to carry our body weight in groceries home.  But we always have such yummy dinners afterwards!  We had homemade pizza for lunch and bacon-wrapped, mozzarella stuffed chicken with green beans for dinner.  YUM!

Our photographer Amanda was snapping away on our journey home after roast dinner on Sunday.  

Longest escalator in the world - Angel tube station.

Pretending to be in love on the platform.

Forcing me to hug her.

BFFs. Ignore my awkward stance.

Finally, I wore my baby on board pin for the first time yesterday!  And.... no one gave me their seat.  Further proof that Londoners are not gentlemen.

That's all.

MY DISSERTATION IS FINISHED!

THAT'S RIGHT PEOPLE. My dissertation is finished, bound, and ready to be turned in! FINALLY! I thought this day would never come :)

It's not a big deal really.. I just wrote a book. 

Okay fine, it's a HUGE deal and I'm SO excited about it!

I'm going to turn it in this afternoon :)

Not a lot else to report except that I have a real pregnant belly now.  It's kinda cute, but not so cute when I stare at my closet with exasperation every morning because I can't button a single pair of my jeans!  I bought a pair of maternity jeans but they're at the tailor until next week because they were about 4 inches too long.  So until then, I'm living in sundresses and leggings that suffocate my waist.

No cravings except still fried chicken.  I still want it all the time!  This week I mostly just want my bed because I have a cold and I feel awful.  I want to take so much Nyquil but someone in my tummy (ahem BABY) won't allow it.  So I'm sticking to orange juice and going to bed at 8 pm for a few days.

I'm having a bit of a crisis with the chalkboard.  The chalkboard part was coming off so I painted it with chalkboard paint.. but this week, when I tried to erase the chalkboard pens off the chalkboard, the paint came off too!  I think the answer is to just write with regular chalk but I need to repaint it again!  I'm going out to look for a new one today because it's getting to be quite labour intensive.  

Here's one more photo from this weekend.. I was crushing Mat's head with the umbrella because I'm selfish and was trying to keep myself as dry as possible.. oops :)

That's all I've got today!  Going to turn in my dissertation and enjoy doing no research, reading, proofreading, editing or referencing for the rest of the afternoon!

Week 15

Not a lot to report in the blog today.  Mat and I had a busy busy weekend.  We never see each other during the week so we have to cram a million things into the weekend and we never manage to get everything done!  

My dissertation deadline is looming.. only two and a half more weeks! I'm planning on printing the final copy and taking it to the bookbinder this week so I can turn it in a few days early.  I'm past the point of caring what it says.. I just want it to be done!

Baby will be 15 full weeks tomorrow.  I'm starting to actually look pregnant, a fact that Mat points out all the time :)  Pretty soon I can start wearing my "Baby on Board" pin on the tube without feeling like people think I'm lying!  I'm also going to have to start buying some maternity clothes in the near future because I can't button most of my jeans anymore.  I went into a shop the other day to look at maternity tights and they were £26 for ONE pair!  No thank you!  

Anyway, here's our week 15 photo (I finally managed to find chalkboard paint so the chalkboard is back!)

My pregnancy app says baby should be about 4.5 inches long at this point but Baby Horvath was 4.7 inches long at our 12-week scan... I think we have a future basketball player on our hands!

That's all!

Blogging.

I am blogging to avoid finishing my dissertation. I'm SO close.  13,849 words finished.. I need to get to 14400 at least but I just can't find the motivation to do those last 600 words!  I will be spending most of today in the library so hopefully it will be finished by tonight.

In other news, Baby is 14 weeks today.  My stomach is definitely starting to look a little bit pregnant.. not enough that strangers have started rubbing it or people have started giving up their seats on the Tube for me, but just enough that I can't button my jeans.  Also, I want to eat fried chicken for every meal.  Literally, every meal.  I have been practicing some serious self control or else I'd probably have gained an extra 10 pounds by now!

I realise this is an awful photo all around. Here's the story with the chalkboard. Basically it's a really cheap chalkboard (costs £10) and we write on it with chalkboard pens.  To erase them, you have to use cleaning spray.. which has also rubbed off the chalkboard.  So it's useless now.  We're going to get some chalkboard paint and paint it but we haven't had time yet!  So next week we should be back to cute chalkboard weekly updates.  But for this week, a piece of paper had to do :)

Mat and I went to Dorking this weekend to get out of London for a few days.  We hung out with Mat's family and friends and had a nice relaxing weekend!  And I hung out with my BFF's Alfie and Easy :)  I think I need a dog....

There was a huge bike ride (think 50,000 cyclists) going from London to Surrey (where Dorking is) on Sunday so all the roads were closed and there were cyclists going through town all day.  It was 100 miles from London to Surrey and back to London - pretty impressive ride!  I couldn't do it!  And even though that cloud looks quite menacing, it was actually a beautiful day.

I've decided to try a new library to finish off my dissertation so I've started going to the Senate House Library.  Because King's is part of the University of London Union, we can use other ULU libraries for free! It's nice to have a change of scenery.

For the final photo, here's a blue chicken (rooster? cockerel? one of those) in Trafalgar Square. I have no idea why it's there.

The end!