I miss my ankles

Health-wise (so far), I have had a relatively uneventful pregnancy. That is, until the edema set in. "They" (doctors) say that your blood volume doubles during pregnancy and peaks at about 34 weeks, which is where I'm at. This picture doesn't quite do justice to just how sausage-like my toes are, nor are the sock lines really conveying the overall swollen-ness. And notice that I'm barefoot--I have one pair of shoes that will fit after having loosened the strap out to the farthest hole. I feel like one of Cinderella's ugly stepsisters trying to cram her foot into the glass slipper every morning when I get dressed.

But if this is the worst of my pregnancy symptoms, then I feel lucky. And it makes the idea of more snow and slush that much more tolerable knowing that I won't have to go out in shorts or a skirt anytime soon. Plus, maybe I can inspire an artist like Botero:


PS Apologies to anyone surfing for sexy foot fetish photos online...these must have been a disappointment

Almost 8 months

On Wednesday we'll officially hit 31 weeks. Almost eight months down, nine weeks to go.* It's hard to believe I'll get nine weeks' worth of bigger...yikes.

*Some clarification: Apparently, a full-term pregnancy is measured at 40 weeks, which sounds like 10 months but is really still closer to 9 months because most months have closer to 4.33 weeks in them. That's why you hear everyone talking in weeks instead of months, usually, so as not to confuse people. But I know I'm confused just thinking about it. Here's a link to a site that offers some explanation and related math: http://www.babiesonline.com/articles/pregnancy/a10monthpregnancy.asp. Bottom line that I saw somewhere in all of the explanations: Your baby will arrive when he or she is ready.

On an unrelated note, here's a picture of Zeeb doing her "Cat from Outer Space" impersonation: