When we were trying to come up with a name for our third child, I browsed a ton of baby name sites. I thought I’d share my favorites with y’all. They’re in no particular order, since there is something to love about all of them! 🙂
1. http://www.babynames.com/ I love that this site gives the meanings, similar names, popularity ranking and a ton of search options to choose from. It’s super easy to navigate, too, which is a huge plus when you’re suffering from pregnancy brain!
2. http://www.babynamewizard.com/ This site is awesome if you want particular sounds in your child’s name or want to avoid certain sounds you don’t like (i.e. wanting it to start with “Sh” and not to end with “lee” or whatever your little heart desires) or looking for a particular type of name (i.e. Biblical or Jewish or traditional or a variety of other types).
3. http://www.thinkbabynames.com/ One of the neatest features on this site is that you can actually search for names by meaning, which I find totally fascinating and unique. I don’t know about you, but it was extremely important to me that none of my children have negative meanings to their names.
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For my older children, I searched online a little, but I mostly went with the conventional baby books. Want to know a few I recommend? Best Baby Name Book In The Whole WorldThis has a lot of different names, and helps you think of things that may inspire you in a direction for choosing your child’s name.
What is most important to you in choosing a name for your little one?
For a creative announcement for a fall pregnancy or third baby, please look at my last pregnancy announcement here: Another Thanksgiving Blessing. It was featured on Parents.com! 🙂
Anyone else have some crazy pregnancy phobias? Tell me I’m not alone! I had a huge fear with my first pregnancy, and I’m sharing with y’all how I managed to prevent that fear from coming true.
Let me start by saying I’m not a medical professional or a scientist, nor am I being compensated to review the products mentioned (unless you are nice enough to use my affiliate links to order through and help a mama out a bit). I’m just a mom with my own experiences to share in hopes that it will help someone else. I know that they say there is nothing you can do to avoid or treat them. I’m also aware that they say it’s all genetics. Who knows? They may be right. I don’t think that is entirely true, based on my aforementioned experiences, but I’ll get to that. There, now that I have that out of the way, I can share my trick for a smooth mommy tummy… 😉
Something many women seriously dread is stretch marks. With my first pregnancy, I was absolutely horrified at the thought of getting stretch marks. I started out my journey into motherhood with defined abs and zero stretch marks, and wanted to at least keep the latter part of that statement true. While I know many women have them, and are still beautiful, it was just a phobia of mine, and something I’d rather avoid if I could even now. Lucky for me, I had heard from my stretch mark free Mom and Nana about how they helped their tummies appear unscathed!
From the moment each of them found out that they were pregnant, they lathered their bellies down with oil every day. They mentioned coconut oil, vitamin E and olive oil, varied, as well as cocoa butter layered over it. They did this religiously throughout pregnancy, increasing the frequency as their tummies got fuller and their skin grew tighter. Since they both had beautiful skin of completely different types (Nana’s skin is quite dry, while my mom’s was like her dad’s & very oily), I thought there was a good chance of their regimen working for me, since I fall somewhere in between on the skin type scale. My biggest concern was that it might not work for me because they were both in their teens and very early 20s during their pregnancies, while I brought my first child home from the hospital on my 28th birthday. I was concerned that my skin might not have the same resilience theirs did.
I’ve been pregnant four times (once ended in an early miscarriage). Each time, I started immediately oiling my as-yet-unchanged pregnant belly with Palmer’s Cocoa Butter Formula with Vitamin E Skin Therapy Oil — 5.1 fl oz
. This is a little embarassing to admit, but the first pregnancy I neglected to start oiling my breasts until they were swelling and itchy, since noone warned me about that, and got some mild stretch marks on them. This is where I was convinced that the oil works! I still have zero stretch marks on my stomach or sides over six months into this pregnancy, which I ALWAYS oiled. You can see that from the current belly pictures I took to prove it. Excuse the selfies. I don’t have a photographer on staff here. 🙂 (The bruise is because I’m a klutzy pregnant woman and never seem to adjust to having a tummy blown up like a hot air ballooon. LOL) Those mild ones came up on my breasts before I realized I should be oiling them, too. Time and the continued use of the oils throughout pregnancy and the first several months of breastfeeding each time seems to have faded them to nearly undetectable, though. You’ll just have to take my word on that one. Modesty prevents me from sharing proof of that one! 😉
Will this work for you? Honestly, I don’t know. It isn’t likely to hurt, and is sure to relieve the dryness and itchiness that comes along with pregnant skin. I have definitely had positive results. I don’t know if the genetics thing is part of it, since my mom and my nana don’t have stretch marks, or if it’s to be credited to the skin care regimen we’ve all used, or a little bit of both.
Does anyone else have any tried and true tricks for preventing or treating stretch marks? “Penny Pinching Peach is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com”
Oh, the fickle nature of morning sickness! One morning I couldn’t stand even the sight or smell of the food I was fixing for my family for breakfast. The next I’d be scarfing down leftover Mexican food first thing in the morning. One day I wake up feeling like I was hit by a mac truck and spun around in circles 50 times. The next I wake up energized and ready to run. One day my morning is miserable. The next I’m fine all morning and feel like death all afternoon. More often, until the past couple weeks, miserably ill all stinkin’ day long! Btw, does anyone else feeling punching the guy who called it that right in the stomach, because he got it soooooo wrong and you’d love for him to experience a bit of your agony??? LOL JK Really, though, if you only got it in the morning, you are one lucky gal!!
With my first (our daughter), “morning” sickness was an all day, pull-over-on-the-side-of-the-road-to-throw-up, repulsed by all odors regardless of whether they were pleasant or nasty, frustrating kind of business. With my second (our son), I hardly had any at all, just some occasional and very mild nausea. With my third (which I miscarried) it was a mild all day thing. With this one, it’s been completely neurotic and unpredictable, but for several weeks it was an all day misery of sickness and loss of appetite, resulting in losing five pounds while simultaneously developing a noticeable baby bump (not the same one as I’m sharing below).
Some things I found that helped with nausea a bit were:
Anything with real ginger in it. Real ginger ale. Real ginger tea. Real candied ginger. Real ginger drops (bonus points because holding a piece of hard candy in my mouth also helped some). I’m going to post a link to some real ginger candies at the bottom if you want some. Yum for relief!
Crackers, especially sucking on them. I’d even keep them by my bed to suck on occasionally before I got up to lessen that overpowering wave of nausea when I first stood up in the morning.
I have heard those pressure wrist bands are great for morning sickness, although I’ll admit I didn’t actually try it. Dunno why, except maybe the fog of misery prevented it. Link at the bottom to a cute pink one!
Slowly sipping warm drinks or even broths can be soothing at times, especially safe herbal teas. Do your research before you indulge, because some herbal teas are not recommended during pregnancy. Red raspberry is one of the more popular, but I’ve heard good things about the Earth Mama teas, so I’m including a link to their morning sickness tea below.
Lemon drops and lemon water seemed to help me, but I have absolutely no scientific backing for that. It just did, okayyyyy?? LOL
Was/Is your morning sickness on any kind of pattern? If you have multiple children of both sexes, did you notice worse or milder sickness with the different genders? Any remedies to share? I am so glad my sickness is slowly subsiding! There is nothing fun about “morning” sickness, except maybe accidental weight loss, Read on for the promised handy links to helpful products.
Earth Mama Angel Baby Organic Morning Wellness Tea, 16 teabags, 2 pack “Penny Pinching Peach is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com”
Did you know that you can create online registries at Amazon.com for your special occasions, just like you could at a brick & mortar store? It’s very convenient for you and your friends, and offers a huge selection of items to choose from! There are also some great savings attached, which is probably the biggest attraction for a penny pinching mommy like me.
With your Shop Amazon – Create an Amazon Wedding Registry, there are a few cool perks, such as a universal registry allowing you to add selections from sites other than Amazon and a 10% off gift after your wedding date for savings up to $100!!! You can register from anywhere you are, and your friends can easily shop via a site most of us are already familiar with. Win win!
With your Shop Amazon – Create an Amazon Baby Registry, you are eligible for a 10% discount (15% if you are an Amazon Mom member) 30 days prior to your child’s due date (not available for 14 days after your application), 90 day return policy on Baby Store purchases, and can add to your wish list from sites all over the web. It is pretty neato!
Have you ever done an online registry? Do you plan to? I just did an in store registry for my wedding, and not much of one. I did some online for my babies, but didn’t know about this program with either of them. You can betcha I will next time around, though! This is a great deal! 🙂
“Penny Pinching Peach is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com”
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