This pregnancy is NOT going to be the same as the first one. I don’t just mean because I can’t sleep all day and spend hours reading surprising facts about first-time motherhood since I’m too busy chasing down the fastest 13 month old on the planet. It’s going to be different because I learned my lesson the first time. I am both older and wiser now.

1) This time, I will NOT put on my maternity jeans until I absolutely cannot fit into my regular pants without cutting off circulation and/or creating a permanent dent in Sandy’s head. And absolutely no cheating and switching to full time yoga pants before the 2nd trimester!

2) I will NOT give up on any and all forms of exercise as soon as I get the least bit tired around week 8. I will keep going to Stroller Strides, participating in play groups, taking the baby for walks and going new places to ensure I don’t end up a flabby lump on the couch. My thighs still haven’t recovered from the last pregnancy and if they rub together any harder the National Park Service is going to raise the threat of wildfire to HIGH every time I walk outside. (Edit: I wrote this post at least 10 days ago. This morning I’ve been hit with full time morning sickness that had me breathing heavily through my mouth through all of SS. I may have to switch to my nice wussy gentle prenatal yoga DVD.)

3) I will NOT suffer through horribly ligament pain or sciatica or whatever the hell it was last time that had me moaning and sleepless. If the doctor tries to brush me off or tell me it’s just part of pregnancy I will kick her in the teeth until she writes a referral to someone who can help. Even if that someone is a voodoo witch doctor who sticks twigs up my nose.

4) I will NOT buy thousands of dollars worth of baby stuff I’m never going to use or need (granted, I didn’t know any better last time). New baby does not equal all new baby crap. My old baby stuff isn’t even old enough to be out of stores. Although if anyone has some baby stuff they’re trying to get rid of (say a double jogger or some newborn size cloth diapers, I am MORE than happy to take hand me downs).

5) I will NOT let the internet or my pediatrician make me feel bad for any of my choices regarding pregnancy, birth, infants, breastfeeding, co-sleeping, etc. Although I might not make the same choices I did the first time I am making them on my own. If you’d like to offer some advice on juggling second babies while wrangling a hyperactive toddler, feel free. If you want to tell me how drinking this Diet Coke is going to cause my fetus to grow gills and a tail then you can suck it.

What did/will you do differently the second time?

12 weeks ago I posted about the Get Fit Challenge at my Stroller Strides class and how pathetic I was for only being able to do 8 push-ups. Well 12 weeks is apparently more than enough time to see an improvement if you go to class almost every single day because this morning I did 20 PUSH UPS. 20 real, straight leg, not so wimpy after all push-ups. I still don’t think they’d pass boot-camp inspection but they certainly weren’t easy.

I also improved my plank hold from 1 minute 7 seconds to 1 minute 31 seconds, which was pretty good considering it was after those damn push-ups. Not so much improvement in my crunches (53 last time, 56 this time) but in my own defense ab exercises have been making me nauseous this week so I may not have tried as hard as I should. PREGNANT LADY EXCUSES, I HAS THEM.

I didn’t write down my time on the shuttle run last time but my time today was 10.3 seconds which sure SOUNDS impressive. We’ll call that an improvement too. I need all the positive reinforcement I can get from my actual fitness though since after 12 weeks of working out at least 5 days a week, making healthy choices like salad instead of french fries and not buying a single bag of candy I lost a whopping…zero pounds. Zero. I weigh exactly the same thing I did when we started. My SS instructor told me it was totally OK! I clearly gained muscle mass! I’m pregnant! (MORE EXCUSES, WE HAS THEM) but it’s still heart-crushingly disappointing. I was hoping to be down enough that this pregnancy’s weight gain couldn’t possibly put me over -insert own personal horrifyingly high number here- but no such luck. I guess I’ll just have to wait another 9 months before I can start a crash new diet.

Until then, I’ll just keep doing push ups.

Thank you thank you THANK YOU to everyone who donated! Your generosity will help mamas and babies have healthy, full term pregnancies. Although the walk is over (and thus your chance to make me suffer personally is past), donations and volunteers are always welcome.

Our weather on Saturday was picture-perfect – low humidity, hours and hours of sunshine, warm enough for shorts, which is unusual in Connecticut in April. Unfortunately, the walk was Sunday. Not such good weather – rain, rain, and more rain, but it didn’t stop tons of people from showing up. I briefly considered leaving Baby Evan home (with E of course, not tied to a chair or something) but decided marching with my baby would be more fun. And it was, except for the fact that my stroller doesn’t have a rain shield so I hauled his chubby butt 3 miles in a backpack carrier. It was…a really good workout. And I definitely think I deserve extra credit for doing it pregnant.

Here are the pictures I took and some of my live-tweeting. I was super excited when @marchofdimes actually tweeted back!

Skeptical baby is skeptical about getting out of the car in the rain

Once I got the baby in his bubble he was warm and dry. Don't worry, it has air holes.

See? Festive!

Sarah with Baby C. She's one of my crazy hippie friends. You can tell by the baby tied to her chest.

Baby A in her Stroller Strides t-shirt. She's not in a cage, just under a bug/rain cover.

Most of our team, ready to get going! Waiting for the "official" start at 10 am was actually the most unpleasant part of the day.

"Low tide" is the nice way to say it. Although one little girl caught a whiff and accused her brother of pooping.

He says he doesn't hate babies, he's just too smart to go wander around in the rain.

Here we go! The backpack worked really well (and was the only one there) but DUDE, my kid is a CHUNK.

True story. And I tripped like 14 times.

Our fantastic Stroller Strides team!

The view from the end of Bluff Point. Nice today, FANTASTIC in good weather.

Bonus backpack feature: it has a stand so I can put him down for a few minutes. THANK GOD.

In the home stretch on the way back! I don't think walking backwards up a hill to take this picture was a wise choice, but it all worked out.

I've never been so happy to see a stupid balloon arch in my life.

And then we all went for Mexican food and lived happily ever after. Except I’m not sure I’ll be able to pick the baby up at all tomorrow. I think I’ll spend the evening researching what kind of heavy duty muscle relaxers are safe to take during pregnancy. There’s got to be some, right?

I have to say, it was a really great experience and such a good cause. I will definitely participate again next year, although I will being praying extra hard for better weather!

I thought Thursday was going pretty well when I woke up and the weather was gorgeous again. That was the only positive part of my whole day.

Apparently, three days of sunlight has totally fried my brain and I am DONE y’all. Totally finished with…everything. Don’t be surprised if someone else shows up here on Monday to explain that I misplaced my entire head since it turned out not to be screwed on after all and she’ll be taking over the blog from now on. Her area of expertise will probably be something like the migrant patterns of indigenous fruit flies during alternate leap years. Those posts will still be more fun than this one.

I was so excited to have Stroller Strides at  my local park (instead of the one 30 minutes away or inside at the mall) that I procrastinated until the very last minute and forgot to eat breakfast.

After class I was starving and in a hurry to grab a coffee and a muffin at Dunkin Donuts before Baby Evan’s signing class when I realized I had forgotten my wallet.

I was in such a hurry to pack up the car and run home for my wallet I dropped my BRAND NEW DSLR CAMERA BAG out the back of my Jeep. I broke off a couple of the plastic pieces that hold the lens to the body so although the camera works I have to hold the lens in place with one hand and can’t zoom. Basically, it’s totally f***ed. I bought a new lens on Ebay at a great discount but my stupidity still cost me almost $300.

After signing I bought some new baby shampoo at Papoose to try and cure Baby Evan’s horrible dandruff, which is making his very grumpy and bitey. Then I left my credit card on the counter.

When I got home and started trying to plan dinner I realized I forgot to take anything out of the freezer last night to defrost, so I had nothing to make. I couldn’t go to the grocery store because I didn’t have my credit or my Personal Debit Cards.

Because I was so pissed at myself about all the stupid stuff I did all day I yelled and pouted and snapped at both E and Baby Evan all afternoon and then acted surprised they didn’t want to go to the park with me. So I pouted some more.

It was a terrible horrible no good very bad day.

Today I’m trying to undo all the stuffed I screwed up yesterday. So far, it is not going so well.

Our house has been invaded by those horrible anthropomorphic snot creatures from the cold medicine commercial. Daddy, Mommy and Baby Snot Creature have all taken up residence in Daddy, Mommy and Baby Evan and are settling in for an extended stay. If only I could remember what the commercial was actually FOR I could go buy some of it and maybe we would feel better.

So far the cough is my only symptom but E claims he also has an overwhelming sense of ickiness and the baby is a little bit grumpy (although he’d feel a lot better if he would just let me WIPE HIS NOSE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD). Otherwise, no fevers, no pains, no need to see a pediatrician, no idea when it will go away. We’re trapped in a miserable purgatory of being too sick to go to group activities  where we could possible contaminate people but nowhere near sick enough to lie around sleeping all day. I’m making an effort to still make it to Stroller Strides as much as possible, just because it breaks up the monotony of 14 straight hours of snotty baby care, but today we were supposed to RUN and running is just not possible when you have to stop and cough up a lung every few feet.

I’m going to feel like an idiot when I realize in a month we aren’t sick, we just have allergies and this self imposed quarantine was pointless. But I would feel even worse if one of the littler babies ended up with RSV because I couldn’t handle playing with my kid at home for a few days. Which I will definitely do as soon as I can find him under all that snot.