A few of my favorite (pregnant) things...

With Christmas 12 days away and our due date 10 days away, I thought now would be a perfect time to share a few of my favorite things...for being pregnant (otherwise, at this point, this post would be all about wine...). I have had a lot of friends who have gotten pregnant in the past couple of months and of course I can't resist giving the type of unsolicited advice I hate getting. Though there are a handful of people who are always welcome to advise me - I'd say they can give me unsolicited advice but I don't think I've left them alone long enough to (Allison!).

I have sent a handful of emails where I intended only to share a link to a body pillow and of course they ended up 3 pages long. Shocker. So I figured I would try to put the majority of it here so I can just send THIS link when I'm being nosy and rude to my friends during their exciting times. I really don't mean to kill the magic and mystery so if you have no interest in this or don't want spoilers, stop reading!!!

The single most important thing that I possess that has gotten me through the past nine months is my body pillow - affectionately referred to as "Body Pillow".
http://www.amazon.com/Leachco-Snoogle-Total-Body-Pillow/dp/B0000635WI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1292340222&sr=8-1
Amazon does free shipping on orders over $25 - a curse and a blessing.

I would strongly recommend getting the ridiculously expensive covers, too. They aren't hard to put on and the pillow gets a little gross after sleeping on it every night, so the pillow case is a definite necessity to help cut down on the acne that if you are like me is going to come no matter what you do to prevent or treat it!

Another life saver has been maternity leggings (Gap has my faves - extra comfort worth the extra $$) and Old Navy has some great maternity jeans, even skinny jeans! Target has good maternity tees and tanks that are longer and cover the belly as it grows. I invested in some PJ shorts from Motherhood Maternity that I have probably worn about 6 nights a week...I've done laundry around the timing so that I can have them dry before I go to bed... I've been able to get through a lot of the colder weather with sweaters that are really short sleeve sweater dresses - I just wear long sleeve tees under them. Super comfy and I've gotten a lot of compliments. Clothes are a pretty personal thing, I guess. I just had no idea where to shop and a lot of places are mostly online. Plus it's hard to try things on because you honestly have no clue how big you are going to get or what the weather will be like when you do!

Along those lines - Bella Bands! They were great for the first part and I plan on using them again after Rhett gets here. I think I got them on Amazon, but you can just Google them. I got one in white, one in nude and one in black. They look like tank tops coming out of the bottom of shirts or sweaters and can buy you a few extra weeks in your normal clothes!!

I wish I had a cure for the nausea - that almost did me in. Aside from trying to keep my blood sugar from dipping, I got nada on that! A lot of snacks throughout the day, fruit especially. The headaches - those were terrible. Sadly the only thing that made them better was to move around and get some exercise. But of course it hurt to move around. Catch 22! I do believe that exercising as much as I did (and please know I could have done MUCH more) was super helpful. It also made me feel a lot better about getting bigger. It's a mind trip for sure!

I have no idea about the next chapter - nursing accessories, post pregnancy clothing, etc...but I'll try to keep yall posted on that, too. I don't have a whole lot of advice or key items at this point, just the handful I've mentioned above!!

Good luck to all of our friends who are on their way down this crazy path and thank you to the ones who have gone before us who gave me the tips that I used!!