Getting In The Swing of This Pregnancy Thing

Well I feel like maybe I am finally getting into the swing of this whole pregnancy thing. I have had a few visits with my midwife, Alanna Rubin and feel very comfortable and established with her. My belly is very obviously pregnant by now (I really need to get out the camera) much more so than at this point last pregnancy. I have been feeling the baby move around a lot over the last two or three weeks and over the weekend as we were sitting on the couch watching a movie Dave was even able to feel the baby kick! Pretty exciting considering I couldn't even feel Luke moving around until I think something more like 23 weeks. But I guess what they say is true: you feel and look pregnant much sooner after your body has already been through pregnancy once before.
Now my big kick is to start doing some pregnancy fitness stuff. Like I said before I was good at walking and doing some workout stuff at home before I got pregnant but since the whole first trimester "I feel like dying" phase I have fallen off the bandwagon. But I am ready to climb back on. Luckily I found a local fitness center that offers yoga and fitness classes for pregnant women as well as new moms. I am just waiting for my registration process to go through (they have to get a form from Dr. Punger to confirm I am "allowed" to participate) and then I am going to start taking the yoga classes. Thankfully they are in the evenings so Dave will be home to watch Luke so I can get away for an hour. I would love to take both the yoga and the fitness class but the classes are a little expensive for our budgeted family so for now I think I will stick to plan A which is take yoga in a class setting and do my prenatal excercising via home video. I would do both from home but I am not good at doing yoga alone and I never feel as relaxed and rejuvenated after a video yoga session as I do after an actual class. I think this is well worth the money.
I have also found someone to give Dave and I a hypnobirthing class. This is something I first heard about through Alanna, my midwife and after reading more and more about it and stories from other mom's who used this technique in their births I knew this is something I wanted to pursue. The only problem was the closest class I could find was all the way in Boca! But I had told Dave about it and was prepared to make this trip for the once a week - five week course. Then luck struck and I found a midwife in Jupiter who is certified in teaching hypnobirthing. Even better - she comes to you! So for two Saturday mornings in October Dave and I will be learning about the technique of hypnobirthing right here in our home. I am very excited about this. Again, for our family on a budget it will be hard to swing financially but I feel very confident it will be well worth it. When I was first considering a home birth I had always planned on having a doula and then when I read about hypnobirthing I decided I would make the choice between a doula and hypnobirthing and obviously I chose the latter. I feel confident I will have plenty of support available to me in my birth and the hypnobirthing technique is irreplaceable (and cheaper which makes my husband happy).
So that's where I am at. Oh wait I almost forgot! I got an ultrasound a week ago. We were going to get one ultrasound because Dave was so adamant about making sure the baby is healthy and okay. In fact if it was up to him we would have one every week. He is very paranoid about the health of the baby (I think I mentioned before he is still worried about Luke and SIDS!). Anyway, we got the ultrasound at the last minute because I had some bleeding the day before (a pretty scary instance!) and we wanted to check my placenta and the baby. Everything looked great! other than my partial placenta previa, which really isn't too big of a deal and should resolve itself soon. It was exciting to see the baby. At one point the baby even did a nice stretch for us which was really cool to see. Up until then I think I was in denial about feeling the baby move around and all but once I saw that I knew all that I had been feeling was definitely the baby and not just gas! No sneak peeks at the gender though! We really want to be surprised when the baby is born.