Ohhh, We're Half Way There...

*I would like the record to show that I hate Bon Jovi and I'm only using their song line to prove my point. Amen. *

Yes, my darling readers (is anyone left?!)... I am now at the half-way point of my pregnancy. At 20 weeks, my body has changed again! I really don't recognize it as it's doing strange things. Here are the latest improvements:

- I've clocked in 2 pounds of weight gain (after my initial 8 pound loss during the first trimester) overall.

- I posses a much thicker lower belly which seems to be slightly cone-shaped.

- I have an unrecognizably insatiable appetite. Although, I'm still unable to eat a full meal. I rather prefer tons of snacks. Snacks of choice lately include: clementines, grapes, pistachio nuts, Cheerios, Tootsie Roll Pops, and V-8 Juice.

- Baby Barrick is either practicing his future soccer skills, conducting a symphony, or swimming the butterfly stroke. Either way, I can feel him pretty consistently now and it's the strangest feeling in the world! My productivity at work has shifted from answering e-mails to holding my belly and waiting for the next in-utero soccer goal. Bobby was able to feel him kick a few days ago.

- My facial and chest break-outs have significantly decreased in the last week or 2. I had to kick my Mary Kay Timewise formula to the curb, and also my very favorite shampoo. Oh Redkin... how I will miss thee.

- My fingernails are growing like CRAZY. Who knew?!

Here is the 4 week difference... 16 and 20 weeks. Not a terribly big change, but lemmie tell yah. When it's YOUR belly that's growing that rapidly, it's a big change!

We went to register as soon as we found out that Baby Barrick is going to be a BOY! I have to say that I'm rather disappointed with the selection of baby items in the stores. I'm not into the overtly "baby" things like cartoony animals or bold, primary colors. We picked a very soothing color palette, which is surprisingly gender neutral. I always thought that I'd do something pretty gender specific, but turns out I didn't like anything I saw that was gender specific! Oh well, we'll be accenting this with bits of blue and green. Here is our inspiration for our nursery, and we've chosen a "woodland" theme to go with it: owls, foxes, birds, natural wood, etc. I can't wait to get going!

In other news, we had a fantastic Thanksgiving and also learned that Baby Barrick is going to have a new COUSIN! My sister, Christina, is expecting, too! She's exactly 2 months behind me at 11 weeks pregnant. We've talked about this moment our whole lives and now it's actually happening, so it's very exciting!