Everyime I look at her, I'm amazed. I can't believe something that beautiful is half me. The half that is from him, I can see that, because he is that beautiful to me too. But she is half me.

Mist people actually say she looks the moat likeme, and I agree that her features resemble my baby pictures most than his. But I don't thunk she loos like me now.

First of all, I don't think I'm beautiful. Even wijiutnall of this pregnancy weight, and left over post pregnancy weight (yes, it's possible to have both at the same time) I've never thought o myself as beautiful. It isn't because people never told me I was, because they did, it's just that my two best friends were (are) supermodel beautiful and I was told how pretty they were a lot. By guys I had been hoping to date.

But she's here, half me, and absolutely georgeous. One thing she definately got from me is her laugh. Her daddy doesn't laugh outnloud much, it is one of my hobbies. Hyperventalating belly laughing. She does that too.

Her litle broter is growing inside if me right now, building up strength for the day very soon when he will be born. This pregnancy has been a lot harder in sOme ways, alot easier in others. It's hard now, hard not to worry about what is happening to my body, about what the consequenses might be if he is born too soon. Part of me wants to protect him by refusing, not matter what the dr says, to have him before I eiher begin labor naturally or hit 37 weeks. But the other part of me wants to be sure I'm here and healthy enough to watch him grow up. I'm not sure which is more selfish- I couldn't live with myself if he has some horrible health problems because he's premature, but I'm not much help sick or worse.

Amanda Moon

I’m in the middle of about 3 different pieces, and I don’t want to finish any of them because they are too personal. I want to write a novel. I remember always hearing that you write about what you know, but how do you get away from writing about your life? How do you use something as a starting point, but then move it quickly into it’s own thing.

Changing names and places doesn’t work for me. And the circumstances are the starting point. I don’t think my life story is all that unique, so I know that what I’m writing about other people can relate to, but really…I don’t want to write a memoir or auto biography. Or do I?

I do a lot of reading about writing. So much in fact, that I am right now inspired to put down my book and actually do some writing about writing. But maybe, instead of writing about writing, I should just write, and work on my project. So I’m going to. While I’m tied to this bed to make my child go to sleep, I’m going to write.

There’s this old Christian song that has a line that says “You’ve got a story to tell.” It’s specifically talking about how your testimony doesn’t have to be some super amazing I-used-to-be-a-drug-addict story, but that God worked in your life, no matter how simply. I’ve been thinking about that a lot as it relates to my writing.

I’ve got a story to tell. It’s burning inside of me, itching to get out. I don’t know what it is yet though. I don’t know if it has roots in my life story, or if it is something completely different, with different characters than I’ve ever known. But I’ve got a story to tell and I need to get it out.

This has been my reading time- the time when I just sit in Lily’s room waiting for her to fall asleep. But, I think I might be able to use it for writing time too. As long as the tapping at the keyboard doesn’t bother her. It’s still light enough outside that the light from the screen isn’t a big deal, which is nice.

I starting reading Julia Cameron’s book something about Paper…I can’t remember the name right now- Sound of Paper maybe? last night. I was just trying it out- I got it from the library to see if I wanted to buy it, but I got kind of into it. I’m trying to keep myself from starting anything new right now though, so I kind of made myself quit. I don’t know if that was a good idea or not, but between the two jobs and the almost 2 kids, I have enough on my plate. I don’t like starting things I can’t commit to, it makes me feel like I’m failing when I can’t complete it. I am excited to dive into it after the baby is born though- the way it’s broken up will work really good for my schedule- it seems like for each section you really only need 15-20 min, which is often all that I have.

Lily used to go to sleep so well on her own, now she lays and plays with her feet and just generally won’t stay in her room. I don’t know how I feel about putting a lock on the outside of her door, even though I’ve been told that’s what works.

So many opportunities right now to write: there are my blogs, there is “The Skinny On” writing contest which deadlines on July 2, there is the Ink Monkey which deadlines on October 1 and is for fiction only which would be a good exercise for me, there is examiner.com which I should fill out today, and there are the Pilates blogs that I could submit to. Oh- and HerNashville- I would love to get something published in there. It’s exciting to think about!

When people, at least the people in my close cirlces, talk about loosing their baby weight, they are talking about the physical act of giving birth and having their blood volume return to normal, because once that happens, they are back at their pre-pregnancy weight, give or take 5-9 pounds. Yes, their pants might not fit quite right, but give it a couple of months and everything is back to normal.

Me, I gained more than 50lbs with my first child, and only lost about 25 of that with the birth and everything going back to normal. Then my pediatrician’s nurse made me feel like I wasn’t producing enough milk because my baby wasn’t growing quickly enough her first week, so I ate more often and ended up gaining another 10 lbs. Then I had ankle surgery (yes, with a 6 week old new born) which put me on crutches for 6 weeks and in boot for 4 more. The weight was definately not falling off.

I don’t think I did too badly while I was pregnant. Yes, there were often times when I would eat more than was neccissary, but it wasn’t out of control. I wasn’t one of those people who constantly said “I’m eating for two” to justify what she was putting into her mouth. A lot of my now-at-pre-pregnancy size friends were those people, and somehow, they are just as small as they were before the baby. I, on the other hand, am not.

My weight has always been an adventure, if that’s the right word. I weighed 150 lbs in 5th grade. The reason I remember this is because I severly sprained my ankle that summer (it was actually probobly broken, but we didn’t learn that until I was 18) and we were living in our camper while our house was being built. My dad realized he couldn’t pick me up anymore and asked me what I weighed, and determined it was no longer safe for me to be on the top bunk.

When I graduated from high school I think I was around 180. I topped 200 during my freshman year of college when I hit the two hundred teens, but I lost 20 lbs during Christmas break by reading some book and journaling my food. My weight stayed pretty steady then for a while, hovering somewhere in the 190 range until I got married.

Not sure what happened then…wait…yes I am. My now- husband and I spent most of our dates going out to eat. I worked ridiculous hours that messed with my metabloism, and I ate simply to stay awake at some point on most days. The summer after we were married I topped out at 225 I believe, and realized I had to make a change. I started journalling my food again and got down to 202 in about 3 months. I joined Weight Watchers and 6 months later I broke the 170 mark on the scale for the first time since sometime in junior high. I was getting frustrated with Weight Watchers by then tho, first of all because as I lost weight I got to eat less and less and I was at the point where I truely felt like I wasn’t getting enough food. I was training to walk a marathon and desperately hungry all the time. Plus, my goal weight was 150 (I’m only 5’4″) and I didn’t think I’d ever actually get there seeing as that was my weight when I was 10 years old. So, I decided to save the money each week and I quit.

I stopped tracking my food, but I continued with my exercise. I gained about 5 lbs back pretty quickly, but it stopped there. Until I got pregnant.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t give up my fantastic daughter to be thinner, but the thought of having to loose it all over again is daunting.

After my ankle surgery I joined Weight Watchers again, but as a nursing mother the points system didn’t work for me at all. First of all, the numbers were completely arbitrary- if I ate everything I was allowed to I would gain a lot of weight. So, since I was getting essentially no guidance, I quit again. I started exercising again on a regular basis, and decided to do a triathlon. The training was successful, I didn’t loose as much weight as I was hoping with it but I did make huge gains in my fitness level. I successfully completed in the first weekend in October. A month or so later, I became pregnant with our second child.

This pregnancy has been much better on the weight gain side- so far I’m only at 25lbs and I’m 8 months along. However, I started this pregnancy almost 30 lbs heavier than I started the last one and that’s causing some problems- for one thing, my joints hurt. Secondly, the high blood pressure problems I had during my first pregnancy are multiplied by the fact that my weight is so much higher this time (no one has medically confirmed that for me, but it just seems to make common sense.) So even as I’m planning for this baby to come out and how life with two kids and two jobs is going to look, I’m also planning for how I’m going to loose this weight. All of it. I had some really cute clothes before I got pregnant with Lily and I want to get back into them. Or something similar. I’m not unrealistic about my body type- a body that has had a baby is not the same as one that hasn’t. Unless there is surgery involved, but I don’t have that kind of money.

Sitting here, listening to my daughter cry hysterically, I wonder if it’s really the right thing to do. I mean, I enjoy reading, can’t I just sit in there and read until she falls asleep like we’ve been doing for the last week? Is it really fair to her that, because I’m having another baby, she doesn’t get the comfort of knowing we’re right there?

Except that she used to be fine with it. And we’ve lived in this house for 2 weeks now, it’s not all that new. It shouldn’t be so scary for her anymore. She just thinks she’s missing something if we’re not there with her.

Knowing that doesn’t make me feel like any less of a bad mom though.

1) Pick another publication and plan an article for it (the actual article to be finished by the end of next week.
2) Eat no more than 2 meals out (I’m not counting lunch today, but I’m not giving myself a get out of jail free card for Tuesday and Wednesday either).
3) Walk at least 3 days for at least 30 min- this is harder than it sounds 8 months pregnant when the highs are in the 80s and 90s all week.
4) Get up at least 2 mornings and either swim or do yoga.

What is it about Saturday mornings that make people think they don’t need to shower or wear clean clothes? I’m guilty of it too, as is everyone I know. You don’t really plan on doing anything, so you don’t really get dressed. Then you end up needing to run and do one errand, which turns into 2, which turns into being out all afternoon in yesterday (or last week’s) dirty clothes with your greasy hair either pulled back in a pony tail or hidden underneath a baseball cap, neither of which really does any good because the fly-aways give away the fact that you didn’t even brush it this morning.

Is it weird that I only wash my hair about once a week? Shouldn’t my body produce more oil than that? I’ve heard that the oil production on your head is dictated by the amount that you wash- the more you wash the more oil you produce and vice versa. That might be true, because i had cut back to washing every 2 days, then 3, now it’s really like once or twice a week. It might also be because I’m not exercising much, when I was getting all sweaty and gross I think I needed to wash it more.

Who is this blog for? What is the point? It’s definately for me to “journal” in, but do I want it to do any more? I don’t think so. My pilatesformommies blog is definately for a wider audiance, but I don’t really care if anyone ever reads this one. Actually, I probobly prefer if they don’t. I guess I could make it private, I don’t really want to do that either though, I’m not sure why. If it was private I could not sensor myself at all, I do to a certain extent now but it’s not all that serious.

I don’t know what to do about work. Pilates work I mean. Now I’m sensoring myself. Interesting how I just typed about not doing that and then moved on to a topic where I feel it’s neccissary.

Austin is moving so much- he’s a lot more active than I remember Lily being. I asked Chris last night if I was this uncomfortable with Lily and he said I was, I just don’t remember it. I guess that means I’ll forget how uncomfortable I am now too. I don’t remember what labor pain was like at all, which is fine, except that I’m starting to get scared of it again.

I hope we can finish getting the house put away today. That would be amazing!