Basketball

...is not a sport I necessarily play. Or really love for that matter.

But it's what my little sister Addie thinks is under my shirt. (She is turning 2 this week.) When I see her now she points at my stomach and repeats "basketball, basketball" to try and understand why there is a large bump sticking out of my body. A few people have tried to tell her there's a baby in there, but she really doesn't buy it. She just looks at them like, "yeah like I'm really gonna believe that" and then continues to think I am just sporting a basketball under my shirt. Sometimes she'll try and lift up my shirt but she doesn't need proof anyway. She knows it's a basketball.

(Meet Addie. She eats Dora off of her birthday cake. She doesn't care if it's plastic or not.)

My little 3-year old nephew Tayden doesn't think it's a basketball. He knows there is a baby....somewhere. He doesn't quite understand that it's actually inside of me but he knows two things. There is a baby somewhere and it's a boy. Whenever we see him he'll ask, "is that boy at your house?" or sometimes he'll just ask, "where is that boy?" If I try to tell him it's in my tummy, he immediately needs to see and will start trying to pull up my shirt, so we've stopped with that and now we just say he isn't here yet. He's pretty content with that answer.

(Meet Tay. He poses for every picture ever taken with a face very similar to this.)

Pregnancy is weird.

I guess I like it since I like the little boy in there, but sometimes I still can't wrap my head around the fact that there is really a human inside of me. And better yet, a human that is a little piece of me and Mike. I can't even imagine what he will look like. It could get a little scary with the vast gene pool we've got going. He could be dark, or light, or blonde, or black-haired... the possibilities are really endless. We even have red-haired genes on my side of the family. What if we have a brown red-haired baby? I can't really imagine that combo being cute... but I would hope that we would at least think it was.

You know what else is weird?
How the general public starts to take so much interest in the fact that I have a human inside of me.

I feel like any old lady I see puts their hand on my stomach and does a little "ohhh." The funny part is that every time they ask after they have already put their hand on my stomach, "Oh you probably hate when people touch your stomach huh?" Well if I did it would be a little too late now. I actually don't really mind at all. It's not like I love it or anything, but I don't really care if they need proof that there's something in there.

One thing I don't really love, but can get a laugh out of are the "Poor girl..." comments that I can hear. Okay so I've only heard one. But I'm sure there have been more! And it was a pretty "poor girl" type sight so I understand. I was trying to follow my very quick-walking brother in law and Mike as they crossed the street and I started to sort of jog across to make sure I didn't miss them. I must have been jogging weird because all the sudden it felt like my back was about to go out. Or break. Or both. So I had to slow it down and waddle across instead. I heard a guy behind me say quietly laughing to his wife, "poor girl.." haha I guess it was pretty pathetic looking.

The ones I don't mind though are the sweet 30-40 year old women who take the time to stop and tell me I look cute. This mainly happens at Target or Walmart in the check-out or parking lot. I totally don't believe them, but it's sweet because they have probably been in this situation before and know how it feels. If they could see my ankles (or lack there of..) though they would probably retract their comments.

All in all,  it's been a good experience though. I've learned how to eat a lot healthier. (even though I don't put that into practice all the time..) I've built up about 9 months worth of motivation to get back into shape after this baby too. Hopefully that sticks. It's also been a fun little experience to go through in our marriage. Mike's been so good to be supportive and making sure I'm feeling okay when we are out doing things. We have had a lot of fun getting excited about putting his room together too and imagining how things will be once he finally arrives. I can't say I'm gonna miss it. Maybe when it's over I'll miss it.. but right now those words and thoughts are definitely not coming. I'm just so excited to have my ankles back, stop the weight gain that seems to never cooperate with my wishes, and most of all to meet this little guy and be able to see physically that he's healthy and happy.

7 more weeks...7 more weeks...7 more weeks.