6 Months!!

I absolutely cannot believe I have been pregnant for 6 months. Depending on the book, some say I've been 6 months for a week or two already, but I calculate it as 4 weeks in a month, 24 weeks, 6 months. That is also 2/3rds of the way finished with this pregnancy. It's so crazy to me that I'm closer to being finished that I am to the beginning. I still feel like I just found out this week. We went through an entire holiday season being pregnant, from Halloween to New Years! Crazy. A lot has happened, I know, but it still doesn't change the fact that it all feels so new still! So for this ever special 6 month milestone blog, I figured I would relive some of my favorite and most memorable moments of the last 6 months. I'll start at the beginning...

• Tuesday night before I took the test. Nothing had happened, if you know what I mean, and my mind started racing. Wednesday morning, still nothing. Let the incessant interpretation of everything I was experiencing begin. Am I tired? Am I emotional? Do I have to pee more than normal? Is that heartburn? I talked to my sister and my friend Elizabeth non.stop. that week asking their opinions of everything. They must have hated me. By Wednesday I had clued Kyle in and also given myself a deadline... Saturday morning I would take a test. And as we all know, nothing happened. 
• Saturday morning. After a sleepless night Friday, I woke up at 6am. I have never been more nervous and anxious in my life. I debated for a while if I should wake Kyle up before or after. I decided on after. I walked downstairs. Unwrapped the test, hands shaking... here goes nothing. There is no way it is going to be positive. Did my thing. Set it on the counter. Glanced over 10 seconds later on accident... pregnant. What happened to three minutes?! I needed those three minutes! I'm not ready to see that word yet. Cue panic. And excitement. My sister and my friend both knew my deadline, and were waiting to hear. So my dilema became, go wake Kyle up (mind you it's 6:15 on a Saturday) or call them first. I went with them. I actually texted them, ha. First a text to Aunt Lauren which promted an immediate call. Then a text to Elizabeth that prompted a text back of a million exclamation points. That, along with sitting and remembering every beer and glass of wine I had had the weekend before at a wedding kept me busy until 8. 
• I walked upstairs, slowly. Crawled into bed, slowly. Kyle rolled over, slowly. And we had the most delicate conversation:
• Kyle: Did you pee on the stick
• Me: Yes
• Kyle: You did? What'd it say?
• Me: Pregnant
• Silence. 
• That first month we took a lot of walks. It was just turning to fall so the weather was perfect. We talked about our "plan." We talked about if it would be a boy or girl. We talked about money. We talked about nursery's. We talked about everything under the sun. Those walks were the best. And I remember feeling a little nervous, but so happy during them knowing there were actually 3 of us walking.
• For a couple weeks following that, I felt great. Kyle had gotten more comfortable with the idea. He was always happy, just shocked. I was thinking about everything imaginable from car seats to what he or she would look like. Luckily, at the time I didn't have a job so I just sat at home and day dreamed. I would have been useless at a job. I walked every day, I ate spinach every day, I avoided cleaning supplies, I researched car seats, I pictured "him" just knowing he was a boy. 
• I remember the time I cried in Target. Why? I had picked out a book to buy for the baby called, God Gave Us You. It's seriously the sweetest book, and a message every baby/child should hear. So I was reading it in the store and came to the page that read, "Umm, Mama? I was wondering... Did you ever want a different baby? One like Samuel the seal or Fredrika the fox?" "Never," Said Mama, "Never, ever, ever. Your papa and I wouldn't trade you for the world." "Why," Little Cub asked. "Why? Because God gave us you." and I broke down. How absolutely sweet, and those were my thoughts exactly. She was our gift. She was planned and formed perfectly by God and made perfectly for our family.
• I remember the one time I got brave enough to clean with chemicals. I tried to be So careful. I didn't want to inhale too much, or get any on me. I had my rubber gloves on, and would have added a mask if I had one. I was getting the mop out to clean the floors, and I knocked over the bottle of pine sol! Absolute panic set it! Do.Not.Breathe. Wait - you have to breath, the baby will go brain dead. Open all the windows! Mind you, it's now November and cold. I was sitting on my couch 30 minutes later shivering, still smelling pine sol as strong as ever. I decided to go for a walk. I was seriously afraid I was killing my baby breathing that stuff in. I froze that entire walk, came back to a freezing house, but thankfully the smell had left a little. I think it's safe to say, she survived. 
• The first doctor's appointment was so exciting. We didn't get to hear a heartbeat or anything, but just being there was good enough for me. She confirmed I was pregnant, asked a million questions, and I got to fill out hospital paperwork! Things started getting real.
• Then all hell broke loose. Just when I started to think I wouldn't get sick, it hit me. I remember the first day I felt bad. I kept thinking it was in my head. Everyone says you get sick, so I believed I was just imagining it. But it got worse throughout the day. I lied around all day wondering if this was the "morning sickness" I'd been hearing so much about.
• It was. And from that day until 14 weeks I.Was.Sick. I remember the first time I puked. I was feeling so sick, and it was close to dinner time. I assumed I was mostly sick because I was hungry. I asked Kyle to get me some peanut butter crackers. I ate them all, and felt even sicker. Two seconds later I was in the bathroom throwing them all up. I remember coming out of the bathroom, making eye contact with him, and thinking to myself, "here we go."
• My worst memory of puking is the night I decided I was feeling "good" and decided to get steak and shake chicken strips. Not 5 minutes after I was finished with them, I was in the bathroom. I threw up harder than I ever have in my life. Chicken was literally coming out of my nose to the point it hurt. When I got done, what seemed like an hour later, my shirt was covered in it, it had splashed on the bathroom floor, and I noticed I had popped the blood vessels under my eyes. Is that tmi? I'm sorry, try living it...
• My absolute favorite memory to this day happened the day after Christmas. I blogged about it, so if you keep up you will remember. I was laying in bed, not sleeping as usual and put my hand on my belly for a minute. It landed on the smallest, hardest little ball. That was my baby! I poked that ball for what felt like hours. For the first time I realized she was real, a real being. And she was growing. Sure, she was tiny, but she came from nothing and was now the size of my palm. I was smiling from ear to ear like an idiot. It was the first connection I made with her, and I will never ever forget it. I didn't want to move. That moment still beats out her first kicks for me. That was the day I fell in love. 
• The appointment where we finally got to hear her little heartbeat was the best! I was sooo nervous and hoping and praying that there was a heartbeat, and that it was strong. The nurse put the doppler to my belly, and there she was. If I had known then what I know now about how active she was, the fact that it was so fast would not have surprised me in the least. It was so fast and strong, and the coolest sound. 
• Her first kicks. Happened right after a shopping trip, and had I known then she was a girl, that would have explained her excitement. Sitting on the couch all alone and feeling four thumps coming from inside was the most magical thing in the world. She was alive and kicking... literally. I questioned it, but knew what I was experiencing was her. I would have loved for her to do that all day.
• Kyle feeling her kicks. We were watching the Cardinals Winter Warm up late at night. I was laying on the couch, and Leah was going crazy! I'm not usually up that late, so I wondered if she is like this every night and I'm just sleeping. I figured if Kyle was ever going to feel her kick, the best opportunity would be now. I told him to put his hand on my belly, and we just waited. I felt a couple really small ones, but he didn't move, so I figured he didn't feel anything. I didn't want to say anything, I wanted him to feel it all on his own. But not too long after, she gave us a good kick, and we both turned and looked at each other. "Hey dad!"
• Cleaning out our office and making it her nursery was another one of those big things that made me realize how real this all was. We used a Friday night to do it, and Kyle moved all of the furniture while I mostly sat and watched. Hello, I'm not supposed to lift heavy things. When he was done moving everything I vacuumed it up and arranged her stuff into a neat pile. I just stood in there when it was all empty thinking, "I can't wait to see this room with a baby in it." I still go in there almost daily and look around, say hello to Leah, and imagine it with her in there. I cannot wait to walk in there in the mornings and get her out of her crib!
• The day we found out she was a she! I couldn't even stand the anticipation. Seriously, the week leading up to this day was torture. Not to mention our appointment wasn't until 2... longest day ever. I just knew she was a boy though, so I figured there wasn't much they would tell me that I didn't know. I got nervous that morning about them finding something wrong, which was added torture. Waiting in the lobby was maybe the worst experience ever. We waited for so.long. Meanwhile I had a full bladder, and was torturing myself with bad thoughts. But the ultra sound tech put the doppler to my belly and all was well. I was instantly at peace. And I saw her heart beating. And I teared up. It's one thing to hear it, another entirely to see it. There she was. With two arms, two legs, a big belly, a perfect spine, and a perfectly round, small head, topped with a perfect button nose. Then she flipped over, and... girl. Absolute shock. I would have bet anyone money that she was a boy, but obviously someone had other plans for us. But it didn't matter, I was in love with whomever I was looking at and precious girl thoughts have consumed me ever since.
• The night we played with her ranks really high up there in the memories for me. She was beyond active. Seriously, I don't know what she was doing. She was kicking or flipping or punching up a storm and I was just laughing at her. I would poke her and she would kick back. We could see it all. And as a bonus she let us feel one of her limbs. I'm not sure which one, but it was long, slim, and firm. So I'm gonna go with leg or arm. I poked it for a while and then she moved it to where I couldn't feel it anymore, haha. She probably hates me. And will come out with dimples all over her body from all the poking. 
• The flattening of my belly button. Kyle came up behind me one day and put his arms around my belly, under my shirt... jumped back, and said, what's that?! Uh, excuse me... you know I'm pregnant, right? But he wasn't talking about my belly, he was talking about my belly button! He said it felt different, and he was right! I started feeling it, and the top of it had definitely flattened out! O.M.G. The true sign you are pregnant, the weird belly button, was upon us. I did, and have continued to obsess about it ever since.
• Another favorite has happened only lately. Kyle refuses to believe me, but I know it's true. When he comes home from work, I'm usually sitting on the couch. When he walks in and says something, she kicks. Not every time, but 90% of the time the second he says something she kicks. I love it. And he won't believe me, but she knows his voice and gets excited when he talks to her. 

I'll end our trip down memory lane with that one. There you have it. I hope you've had as much fun as we Proebsting's have. Six months ago she was the size of an apple seed, and today our little girl is the length of an ear of corn, and weighs a pound and a third. Also, my uterus which was the size of my fist, is now the size of a soccer ball. Which explains the new pressure on my ribs which I'm thoroughly enjoying. Leah's face is complete now! She has everything she needs, and it is as it will be at birth! It might just gain a little fat - I can't wait to see it!!! Whose eyes did she get?! Whose ears?! What color is her hair?! Sadly, because she is so big now, she can't do her somersaults anymore. Her inner ear is fully developed now, which means she can tell if she's upside down or right side up! How cool! I hope she doesn't get motion sickness like me! She is also working very hard on getting her lungs ready for her first breath, and focusing mainly on gaining fat. Which means I am also mainly gaining fat, sweet.

She's been a real joy these last 6 months, and I already don't know what I did or thought about without her. My life must have been so boring! I cannot wait to see her, and hold her, and kiss her, and show her her room. But it's a little early, and she's got some more baking to do so I also hope she waits patiently (unlike her mother) to come out and meet us. Until then we will continue to be beyond excited, we will continue to talk to her, we will continue to poke her, and we will continue to pray for straight bones, a strong heart, and working organs! 16 weeks and counting!