Week 19 ~ Not much to report...

     Well it's only been 4 days since my last post so there's nothing much new to report.  We had our appointment with both the specialist and my OBGYN.  The babies are doing great, all growing at the rate they're supposed to, still so little!  Baby Boy A is missing an artery in his umbilical cord (he should have two), they say that this can sometimes (very seldom) cause issues in his kidneys, heart and growth.  He showed us all four chambers of his heart, apparently his kidneys are looking great and weighing in at about 9oz., he's our biggest boy, so the specialist is not worried, she will just keep an closer eye.  When I mentioned this to our OB, she said that in all her patients where the baby was missing an artery, she has never seen a case where this was an issue, all babies were born healthy and well, so that made me feel better.  Baby Boy B wouldn't show us all chambers in his heart, but since it was beating normally, the specialist just thinks it's because he's still so little (8oz.) so we should be able to see it next time when we go back in two weeks.  Baby Boy C is the one sitting on top of the other two and he's our most chill one so they were able to see everything.  At one point he was hiding his spine but like he knew what we needed, he did a little flip and showed us all we needed to see.  He's going to be a little rule follower like his momma.  So overall, all good news, the babies are great, my blood pressure was a little lower than last time but still good.

    My doc was amazed by the size of my feet and urged me to get my compression sock prescription filled, which I will do promptly tomorrow morning along with wrist braces to help with my carpal tunnel.  She said there's nothing much else we can do about that, it'll just go away when the babies get here.  No bed rest yet but lots of sitting down with my feet up.  We did our groceries today and that was my big trip of the day, I've been ordered by my dear hubby to sit down and do nothing while he finishes our errands. My feet are already swollen from that 1/2 hour trip... it's crazy!  My friend Neil said my feet were starting to look like The Nutty Professor... I thought that was hilarious.  We spent a good impromptu evening with our friends Neil and Alicia, it was great to catch up since they had been gone all summer and although they were our wedding photographers, there was really no time to catch up.  Our other friends came over last night to drop off a swing and a vibrating chair (thanks Mel and Julien!!) and brought their daughters (4 & 2 y/o) with them.  We were able to see what we needed to baby proof in our house!! It was an eye opening hour... I'm going to lose a lot of my decorations and my decorative rocks are going to have to go back to their natural habitat as little children like to try to eat them or try to force my dog to eat them... haha... Roxy (our dog) was really confused with these little people poking at her, but she was so good, so at least I'm thinking she won't be part of our baby proofing house cleanse.

  So all my teacher friends are going back to work tomorrow and as silly as it sounds, I envy them... I always loved the September return, meeting my new students, seeing my friends daily, and the overall normalcy of it all. I'm going to miss coaching my field hockey girls and I wish I could be there with them on the field for all their games.   I send good vibes to my friends Alicia and Mel as they go back after their maternity leave and have the hard task so say goodbye to full time motherhood.

  I'm definitely feeling my boys, not enough for Gab to be able to feel them yet, but I'm thinking soon he will be able to.  It's an amazing feeling and as hard as this pregnancy is becoming, I am growing three little miracles who are going to become my life, my loves and I can't wait to hold them in my arms and watch them grow into the people they will become.  I will enjoy these next few months as much as possible as I will never go through this again and I want to savour every pain, every gurgle and every kick as they will bring us our greatest joys...

Week 19 - Still 51" but a good 45lbs gain!!! Eeeeeek!!!!
Roxy wanted to be in this picture...

Here's a few wedding pics taken by Neil, Alicia and my brother in law Eric...

week 18 ~ Wedding!!

Well we did it, we're married!!! It was a long tough, but amazingly wonderful day.  We were surrounded by our closest 200 family and friends, and we wouldn't have had it any other way!  We are so blessed to have such a great group of people in our lives.  I was able to make it pretty much the whole night.  At one point I thought of leaving and then I saw my 82 year old grandmother still hanging around and I decided that if she could do it, I could hack it a little while longer.  The music was great, the food was great and above all, the people were great!  Just an incredible day overall!

As far as the genders, if you haven't already heard, we're having THREE BOYS!!!!!!!  My house is going to be crazy, me and my 4 boys, should be an interesting life.  We were a little sad that we didn't have a little girl in there but then I remembered that I had two amazing nieces in my life.  Besides, my sister can deal with the girl teenage-hood and I can walk away... hehe... I know three boys aren't going to be any easier, but as a high school teacher, I know that there's a lot more to do to please teenage girls than boys... haha.   I can't wait to meet my three boys!!! As far as names, we've started a list, but we're not going to share this with anyone until their birth.  My sister once told me that she didn't name her daughters until she saw their faces, just because she felt she could match them better, and I'd say she did a good job!  The names will be the last little surprise for everyone.  What we're finding tough is finding names that sounds good in both French AND English, names that go well with Arsenault, names that our immediate surrounding didn't already use, names that don't make me want to hurl (basically reminds me of a school kid! haha... some names have been permanently ruined in my mind...), and oh yeah, finding THREE!!!  We had such a long amazing list of girl names!  Maybe one won't mind being called Sophie? or Emma?  

My pregnancy is getting increasingly difficult on my body.  I'm really glad we got married when we did because my body has decided that it is no longer mine, the boys have taken over.  Firstly, my hands hurt, apparently due to swelling in my wrists causing carpel tunnel to appear.  They are almost always numb, waking me up in the middle of the night and preventing me from doing the most basic things.  I now have to ask Gab to open almost everything for me.  Secondly, my belly is now completely in the way of my bending over, requiring my new husband to have to put my shoes on for me quite often and making putting on pants very hard.  Speaking of shoes, my brand new shoes that were suppose to last me through this pregnancy are now starting to be too small and tight due to crazy swelling so I may have to bite the bullet and buy....I don't even want to say it.... CROCS.... yuck!  Finally, I'm definitely waddling now and walking quite slowly, which is annoying to me because I'm always the one getting annoyed with people who walk slow in front of me.  

These aren't even my new shoes, these have taken a hike a while ago,
but it's just to show how big my feet get by 11am everyday.  

I had to cut our mini Halifax honeymoon short as I just couldn't walk around anymore, I had to sit every 10 minutes to rest my feet and my back.  I knew it was time to come home when I broke down in tears in the food court at the Halifax Shopping Centre! haha... According to Gabe, this was emotional break down #3, and if you know me, you probably find that very impressive that I haven't had more!

As you can imagine, after our wedding, my house is in shambles and it's very hard for me to look around and know there's nothing I can really do.  Gabe is amazing, and he's forcing me to do NOTHING, while he does EVERYTHING.  That's tough because I'm sitting down on the couch watching him do everything around me while I have to put my feet up and feel useless.  He keeps telling me that my job is to grow our healthy babies.  Let me tell you, his first week as husband has been pretty stellar so far!  GO HUSBAND!!! 

I think I'm starting to feel little flutters, so that's really cool.  I'm not sure if that's what they are, but I'll pretend!   We have our next appointment tomorrow, they are going to start measuring all their limbs and making sure all is well, so that's exciting.  At 4 1/2 months, this week has shown me that this pregnancy is going to be anything but easy, but I know it'll be worth it in the end! 

18 weeks ~ 51 inches

Week 17 ~ Wedding T-6 days!

I'm so glad the wedding is coming soon... I'm just not sure how much more running around this body can handle!  My feet hurt constantly!  They're not used to carrying around about 75 more pounds than they're meant to! I'm not saying that I gained 75 lbs, I'm saying that I had some to lose before the pregnancy so add the baby weight gain and my feet are about to blow up, it's like putting a watermelon on top of a water balloon, a little more pressure and POW! They're currently looking like hobbit feet minus all the hair!

I'm really looking forward to the wedding though; finally being able to call Gabe my husband (although it'll be weird at first... it's just going to be awesome); hanging out with my awesome family that I only get to see at big family events like once a year (if that!); seeing all my friends and loved ones gathered in one place, it's going to rock!  With about 250 of us, we're going to blow the roof of the rec center!! I think most of everything is ready... I kind of forgot about the flowers though... oops!! If the flower shop can't get our bouquets done on time, you might see me walking down the aisle with a Dollarama special.  My ring no longer fits me, so I bought a fake one at Aldo, I may have gone a little too far with the fake bling, but hey, why not?

I worked my last shift at Bella Promessa today (http://www.bellapromessa.com/).  After a little over 3 years, it's really sad to say goodbye to a job I loved, but I have to follow doctor's orders!!  I'm going to miss my Bella family!

We are starting to purge more and more stuff in the house, we've donated lots to the Salvation Army, given away items that we just have no more room for, and continuing to look for ways to increase our storage.  Since we rent out the basement, we really have no room to store anything, so all the nooks and crannies where you normally store those "maybe one day we'll have need of it" items are now being liberated to make room for "where the hell am I going to put this toy?" spots.

My mother has been an amazing help these last few weeks, she helped me paint our guest bedroom, the baby room, she did a huge (much needed) cleaning of the bathroom (she even cleaned the walls! Way to go Mom!) and has basically been helping me getting the house ready for the babies to come.  Yes, they are still probably 4 months away from being here, but in about a month, I will not be very mobile so while I'm still somewhat on my feet, I wanted to get most of it done and help out as much as I could.  Gabe has been pretty amazing too... installing the wainscoting, re-organizing our porch area, tending to me when I just can't get off the couch (also laughing at me when I'm stuck there and telling me that I have to figure it out because he won't always be around to help me up).  He thinks it's really funny to see me roll around until I land on all fours on the floor in order to get off our, what seemed amazing at the time of purchase, super comfy, cozy, soft couch... yeah real funny babe, really funny...

So we found out the babies' genders this week!! It's really hard keeping it to ourselves!! People keep asking us if at least we're happy, of course we're happy! It wasn't a question of happy or not, it was more of a curiosity thing.  Now I feel closer to them, being able to talk to them, feeling like I know them just that much more... I still haven't felt them kick but baby C, which is supposed to be the one I'll feel first, is the laziest one of the bunch... always just laying on his/her back, chilling around while his/her siblings are throwing a ho-down down below.  My pregnancy app is telling me that they're starting to hear sounds this week, so that's pretty cool too, knowing that they can start recalling my voice.  I would sing to them, but they might hate me coming out of the womb so I'll leave that job to their daddy.

week 17 - 50"
Leggings are my best friends... 

Next week... wedding details!!! I might be a little delayed as we're going on a mini getaway after the wedding.

Week 16 ~ Home Renos!

Week 16... technically, according to average, I'm about halfway through this triplet pregnancy, it's crazy to think that in 4 short months I could be holding my whole family in my arms... well except Gab, that would just be too much! haha! So this week my mom came to help me paint the babies' room, it's starting to look so good!!  Thanks Mom!

White wainscoting and dark grey up top, my vision includes lots of bright colors :-)

I'm feeling the pregnancy more and more this week.  It's really enjoyable, don't get me wrong, it's really neat to know that I'm growing three little avocados in my belly, but it's already starting to incapacitate me and that's the annoying part.  I have a hard time getting off the couch without almost rolling over on the floor to do so, my waddle is becoming more prominent, my feet hurt after 5 minutes of standing and my lower back hurts after 5 minutes of walking.  I went to work for two full 8 hour days at the best Bridal Boutique ever (INSERTING BELLA PROMESSA PLUG HERE) and I sure am glad I'm not going back to teaching in September. After 3 hours at the shop, my kankles were in full effect and I had to sit down all the time! We were so busy Saturday, thankfully I had a helper :)  I'm feeling much better as far as food wise, last week I regressed a bit, but I'm back to normalcy this week.  I can eat pretty much anything and feel fine after. I got my first stretch marks... :-(  I know I know, I'll get some oil and rub my belly, but I'm bound to get many more... I'm sleeping a bit better, still tossing from left to right to ease my hips one at a time, but I'm sleeping pretty much through the night which is great! We bought a King Size bed, man those things are HUGE!!! Just to give me a good night kiss, Gab has to roll like 10 times to get to me! haha!!  It'll be nice to have when the munchkins get here and start walking and jump in our bed because they're scared of the thunder storms! 

Today, we went on a boat ride, and with the wedding only 2 weeks away and all the work that needs to be done with that and the home renos, I felt like I was on vacation for the first time this summer, it was amazing to be out on the water!  The boat rocked a bit and the babies got a good scramble, but we all had so much fun!

I still haven't felt them move or anything, but I hear/read it's suppose to be soon, I can't wait!!! Or according to some of my friends, maybe I can because once they start kicking, the sleeping will get worse! haha... I actually don't care if they keep me up, at least I'll know they're in there doing ok! 

3 sleeps until we find out the genders!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I CAN'T WAIT to find out what's in my belly!!! Not that it matters at all, it'll just be nice to know :-).  13 sleeps for the rest of you, which is also my wedding day!! Everything great is happening! 

Busy week ahead... tomorrow is my dress fitting (cross our fingers that it'll all work out...) more wedding preps with friends on Tuesday, hair trial and stuff on Wednesday, more house stuff with my mom on Thursday, RELAX on Friday, my awesome friend Meg's Shower on Saturday (oh and Gab's bachelor party day/night) and another work day on Sunday (which I'm glad for as I won't be home to see Gab recover... haha)

Until next time.... xox

16 weeks, 49" wide :-)
Babies are suppose to double in size in the next two weeks!! EEEK!!!!