Living the Dream: Pregnancy Preparation

No, I am not pregnant yet. We haven't even started consciously trying yet, we plan to in January. However, I was seeing all these adorable pregnancy blog posts from some of my followers and it made me start thinking that I really want to be prepared when I do get pregnant. Not just of course for the obvious reasons like my PKU, which I'm already working on, but if it happens right away I will be in my final semester of school. That doesn't bother me at all, but there are so many cute ideas and things these days with Pinterest and the internet and everything else and I really want to do a few of the projects and things to make my pregnancy fun and always have things to look back on. I thought I should decide what I plan on doing now, so that if I do find out during a crazy time I don't miss out on any of the things I want to do. So I decided to make a blog post about what I plan on doing.

Pregnancy Apps

There are over 1,000 apps on iPhone dedicated to pregnancy. I looked at the reviews for some of them (no I did NOT go through all of them), and I have so far chosen 3 that I think I will definitely use.

Period Tracker to keep up with my ovulation and fertility.

Pregnancy Companion has a ton of features.

The Pregnancy Companion has a weight feature but this one is designed specifically to help you keep track of your weight gain during pregnancy. With working so hard to lose weight over the past 6 months, I definitely do not want to gain anymore than I am required to or what is considered normal pregnancy weight gain.

I may add another one later on, but for now I think these are great!

Definitely what I was looking for!

Home Pregnancy Tests

With having to monitor my Phe levels strictly during our trying to conceive, I'm going to have to really restrain myself not to take a pregnancy test every day. I want to know as soon as I possibly can, so that I can inform my dietician and my NP right away. I asked them at my appointment last week how often they recommend I take a pregnancy test and their response was, "As much as you want to or can afford to." I don't want to go off the deep end with it, but I do want to have a supply available at all times.

Pregnancy Announcement

I really really want to first think of a really cute way to tell D when I find out we are pregnant. This I haven't thought about too much yet, but I really want to think of a fun way to tell him. I will have to keep thinking, I have a few ideas so far. I also want to find a really great way to announce it to our families. Still thinking on this one as well.

Then of course I want to have a cute way of announcing it to all of our friends via social media. These are some of my favorites that I have seen on Pinterest so far.

Projects Throughout Pregnancy

I am going to blog about my pregnancy every week. I have seen a lot of people using a similar format for this, and I really like it. I will probably do a weekly bump picture too once I'm far enough along.

How far along Baby Size Weight gain Maternity clothes
Stretch marks Sleep

Gender

Movement Best moment this week Looking forward to Food cravings Anything making you queasy or sick Labor Signs What I miss Symptoms Nursery Belly Button in or out?
Wedding rings on or off?
Mood Workouts
If I am not in the middle of the semester and too busy, I also want to buy a pregnancy journal like from Barnes & Noble. I've looked at some of them and I'd love to be able to have it to look back on. It's totally up my alley with the organization and keeping track. These are two of my favorites.

Other Pinterest ideas I really want to do:

Maternity Pictures

I really want nice maternity photos. I'm not going to do any with like my belly showing or anything like that. I don't have a problem with it, its just not my thing. I just want cute pictures with clothes on and maybe some cute items as props if we can think of something (people sometimes do little shoes, etc).