Twenty-Six Weeks

Six-and-a-half months, people. For reals.




Do you see those innocent jeans up there? Yeah, settle in for a story about them. This 26 week post might as well have been a separate rant about denim but I really don't have much else to say about the pregnancy other than this. So I suppose this whole week will be represented by my love/hate relationship with jeans. After all, isn't a part of being a woman all about the eternal quest for the perfect pair of jeans? I thought so. If you don't care to read my rant and want to hear a few more tidbits on the actual pregnancy progress, skip to the dotted line. Otherwise, here we go...

Nearly two years ago I wrote a blog post about my obsession with designer jeans. I admit to being a denim snob and blame it on the perfectly long inseams of the pricey designer brands. Plus I just adore the gorge washes, how the designer styles hold up over time, and the glorious fit to the big dogs. And you know what? I haven't had to buy a new pair of jeans in almost three years....I guess you could say my stock pile has quenched my thirst a fabulous denim wardrobe. Plus, with my post-wedding tight-wad-itis I can't justify spending more money on jeans when the pairs I own are perfectly fine. Life was good in the all-important jean department in this girl's life.

Well, then all of a sudden I got knocked up and my body is morphing at an alarming speed. A-LARM-ING indeed. I had a near break down today when I accidentally dried my new Tall Old Navy maternity jeans all the way. You can guess what happened next, can't you? As soon as Nate brought up that particular load, I had a sinking pit in my stomach as I spotted that dark wanna-be designer denim peaking out from the side of the basket. I plucked them out from the rubble and as soon as I held them in front of me I knew those bastards had shrunk. 34" inseam my left cheek....so I decided to torture myself further, pushing the brink of insanity, by trying them on right then and there. Sure enough: I was officially ready for Noah's Ark for the flood of the century. And not only that but my thighs suddenly resembled overstuffed sausages and I could feel my circulation becoming restricted.

Nate spotted the panic in my eyes and heard the sirens going off in my head, when it all came spewing out of my mouth: "I'm fat, nothing fits me, I hate all of my clothes, why is my body so freaking deformed, and since when do I qualify as chubby? I used to be a skinny person, and now look at me!" It was then that my head literally exploded all over the place. True story.

Now let's remember, these culprit jeans were exactly $20 after discount so it's not like they broke the bank or anything. They are the only pair of maternity jeans I've purchased thus far because I have 3 pair of borrowed jeans from thoughtful friends. However, those borrowed jeans are only suitable under boots because---surprise surprise---they are too short. But at that moment in time, life totally sucked because I had no jeans to fit my pregnant and tall body. {As a side note, when tall girls have a fat day it's anything but glamorous to be a giant. In fact, we feel like masculine, gargantuan, and awkward versions of ourselves.}

Nate performed damage control and said what any good husband would say, like 'You are not fat, you are gorgeous and carrying my baby, you are still a skinny person but just a pregnant one,' and blah blah blah. Then he spouted off the mother load: "Why don't you just suck it up and buy a pair of designer maternity jeans like you know you want. You should get a pair that you love, that make you feel good about yourself, instead of trying to save money on cheapie ones and then having them shrink"

Yes, the man is a saint.

I spent the next hour or so of my life scouring the internets for designer maternity jeans....discounted of course, because I seriously cannot swallow spending hundreds of dollars on a pair of jeans I can only wear for a few months. My love for designer denim does not go THAT deep, my friends. I found my pre-pregnancy buddies such as Citizens, Joe's, True Religions, Sevens, and those two brands I've always lusted after--Hudson and Rock-n-Republic in maternity versions. But the prices ranged from $190-275 which caused my innards to quiver, especially since there are no stores in the area that carry my fave brands. The thought of guessing the correct size when the price tag is that hefty is just insane, and every girl knows that the art of trying on jeans is something you can't simulate online. Whatever should I do?

I decided to take a deep breath and go back to my trusty Old Navy/Gap maternity website but this time I allowed myself the upgrade of perusing Gap's maternity jeans instead of her step-sister's version at Old Navy. Yes, they carry longs. And yes, some of their washes are cute. But of course, they are $70 which is a huge jump from ON but obviously quite a bit less than my coveted designer versions.

I called the Gap Maternity store at our local mall---aka the most chaotic place located on earth this time of year, where I nearly died the day before due to a regular stampede full of Christmas shoppers---and sure enough: they carried longs in the store, too, and had a few styles in stock. My lovely husband said he would accompany me on this quest and so we put on our battle gear and entered the mall.

After trying on multiple sizes of long jeans at Gap, I decided to err on the side of caution and bought a size larger than what truly fits me best right now. It's not like they are disgustingly baggy or anything, and I can still wear them during this current phase of pregnancy---but I'm trying to allow for some dryer shrinkage and stomach expansion in the next three months. I'm quite proud of myself for making this decision and not freaking out about the larger number on the tag. And holy hell, these puppies are so gloriously long they could dust our floors. LOVE it. No, they aren't designer jeans. But since they were half the price of the big names out there I can sleep a little better at night, you know?

Gap was also having a fab deal for their shirts, if you bought one you got one totally free. So I found myself two cute wintery turtlenecks and called it a day. I don't know why it was so hard for me to spend money on myself but it was physically difficult, and Nate could see it.

Which brought about a startling visual, when he said: "Baby, I worry about you and your money issues sometimes. It's not a big deal to spend money on yourself sometimes, and in fact--it's worse when you have 'nothing to wear' and feel ugly in your clothes. It's only going to get worse after the baby and I can just see you becoming one of those moms who never buys anything for herself, always getting stuff for the kids instead. Do you really want to be a haggard soccer mom who neglects herself?"

Now, just because I struggled with buying a pair of jeans doesn't necessarily equate me with a haggard soccer mom with bad hair and bags under her eyes...but I understand his point. It's okay to let go of the financial focus sometimes. The world will not end if we don't save every penny. Finding a balance between two extremes is sometimes difficult for me but I'm working on it. And I guess that's the moral of my ginormous denim story: I need to feel good about myself, especially during this time in my pregnancy when my body does not seem to be my own, and if that means forking over a little moolah so be it.

Whew. I feel better now.

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Back to the baby that is inhabiting my foreign body: he's supposedly almost 2 pounds by now and his testicles should be on their path towards descending into the scrotum. Sweet! He's still a kicking madman and I've noticed that he not only kicks the front of my uterus, but sometimes he'll kick down on top of my cervix or towards the back into my intestines. Not a big fan of cervix/intestinal kicks but at least he's moved up and away from my bladder at this point. In fact, I haven't had to go pee in the middle of the night in a whole week! Whoo hoo. I'm sure that fun process will return soon.

I also finished the book 'Happiest Baby on the Block' and loved it. So now I'm on to Jenny McCarthy's 'Belly Laughs'. So many books and so little time!

And what weekly post would be complete without a little nursery action? I found some paper lanterns on Amazon, for a total of $25 including the cord and all four shade. I really like how it turned out, even though the hanging process was rather painful and time consuming:



Nevermind that our new shelves are housing un-wrapped Christmas gifts right now. And I cannot wait to make some prints to hang on the blank wall. But it will do for now.

I guess that's it (if you've read this far): twenty-six weeks equates a dramatic denim hunt, body issues, lighting in the nursery, and a really long post. Next week marks the third trimester, baby. Eeek!