DIANE KNOX: Pregnancy is incredible experience coupled with surreal move to new 'nest', says Invernessian in America
It’s been a busy few weeks, and they certainly look set to continue. I’ll give you a quick update on life of late…
I’m almost 22 weeks pregnant now, and it’s really been an incredible experience. After the first trimester sickness started to ease, I’ve had a bit of an energy burst the last couple of weeks and feel fantastic now – my belly is just blossoming!
It’s really quite a crazy experience watching your body change so quickly, and at times I look in the mirror and feel quite unrecognisable.
I’m trying to avoid buying “maternity”clothes that I’ll never wear again (well, unless we have another baby) but have been buying some stretchy dresses and sizing up.
At this stage, and I know weight gain is inevitable and irrelevant, I’ve put on 18 pounds and my doctor is very happy with the progress.
The Florida heat makes it quite exhausting, but you don’t want to hear me complain about that.
Baby had his full anatomy scan last week and he looks perfect. If you follow me on social media you’ll know Baby Balas is a wee boy and we are over the moon.
We have his name picked out but we’re going to keep that private until he makes his big debut into the world later this year.
I went for blood tests and we found out, at 14 weeks, what we were having. Part of me really wanted to keep it a surprise, but Garrett was desperate to find out.
When the results came in, I actually opened them alone to find out – I went to our bedroom, opened the email and cried my eyes out.
I had to avoid Garrett all day, and later that evening we did a small gender reveal with my parents – even though I knew the confetti in the cannons was blue, it was a wonderful moment and special surprise for my family.
We’re actually going for a 4D scan today to see our little baby. We already know he’s big (in the 74 percentile) with extremely long legs (in the 98 percentile) and I feel those little kicks pretty regularly now.
It’s pure magic. I can already tell little man is going to look just like his daddy.
After the nausea comes normality
I have written about our house-building process over the past year, and next week we finally get to move in.
All going well, we close on Wednesday and should be spending our first night there at the weekend. It seems very surreal after 12 months of building, but we are very ready to get in so I can start “nesting”.
Until then, you’ll find me knee-deep in boxes and flat-pack furniture, basically telling everyone else what to do with them – the benefits of being pregnant and exempt from heavy lifting. Some may say I planned this very well…!
It’s an exciting week of work also, as The Open Championship is taking place in St Andrews. However, I feel very homesick watching the action on The Old Course and desperately wish I could’ve been there.
I feel very proud seeing our country dominate the world of golf, and if you are lucky enough to be heading south to enjoy the action, please take lots of photos for me.