24 Weeks

Wow! I feel like I/the baby has grown a lot in the last four weeks. I finished working at the end of January (I was on a contract) and I wasn't showing so much, but now I feel like I am huge! I can still fit into some of my jeans but I may need to invest in some new gym tights and some longer tops soon.

How far along are you? 24 weeks

Sleep: I am used to sleeping on my side so that hasn't been a problem. I am sleeping through the night again which is great! Getting up around 6:15 or so which is pretty normal for me.

Movement: The baby is rolling around and jabbing me at all times of the day now! She is getting stronger and sometimes if I poke and prod a bit, I can sort of feel where she is lying inside.

Favorite moment: When we actually saw my stomach bounce from her kicking (or punching)!

Cravings: No real cravings still! I have been loving pineapple this week though.

Looking forward to: Buying and making some new things for the baby! We bought her a little onesie and a little jean dress the other week. I've been eyeing some little mocks from minimocks and minimoc.  I'm also planning on making a little tassle mobile for her room one of these days.

Changes to the home: The husband and I have started purging our closet. We have a walk-in closet that we will turn into a mini baby room so we need to downsize a bit and in the next few months and move the actual closet into our bedroom.

Boy or Girl?

At our 20 week scan (almost a month ago now), we got to see our little baby again! We found out what the gender of the baby is, and more importantly, they checked that the baby was developing and growing as they should and they are!

Last Friday, the husband and I made a little gender reveal announcement, and here it is!

I was not expecting to have a girl at all! We have a few friends are also having babies this spring, and they are having girls. The husband's cousins had little girls last year as well. And a bunch of people on Facebook were also having girls. So I pretty much concluded that because everyone else was having a girl, that we would probably be having a boy! I come from a family of all girls so I had no idea how it would be with a boy, but I had come to think of the baby as a boy and had begun to think of different names and had started using my favorite name on the baby. But nope! I wasn't shocked at the scan, just surprised that it wasn't a boy and that we were actually having a girl! I secretly love all the baby girl fashion so this was a welcome surprise and the husband secretly wished for a girl too. He even asked the midwife at the scan if she was totally sure the baby was a girl and not a boy!

We can't wait to meet this little girl! She is getting bigger (as in I am getting bigger) and more active with each day. I am a little over 23 weeks today so there is still quite a ways to go but we're starting to pick out little clothes and decor items for her!

Overnight Cardamom Buns

At the bakeries here, you can find these little soft buns called "teboller". They usually come plain, with raisins or chocolate chips. Obviously I love the raisin and chocolate chip ones! When I do make raisin teboller, I usually use Claus Meyer's recipe from his giant baking recipe book, but my one complaint is that they take forever to make. You literally need to set aside half a day to make them. We had a friend over for breakfast last Sunday and I wanted to make some soft buns, but buns that would not be as time consuming. So! I found another Meyer recipe! This one comes from his magazine and is actually for a "fødselsdagsboller" but it's pretty much identical to the teboller in look and taste. I stuck to his recipe and only spiced it with cardamom, but I am sure you could throw raisins or chocolate chips in there too (and omit the cardamom if that's not your thing). The beauty of this recipe is that you can do the first rise in the fridge over night. Major time saver! So just in time for the weekend, here is the recipe for Claus Meyer's Fødselsdagsboller or what I now call Overnight Cardamom Buns. 

Overnight Cardamom Buns / Fødselsdagsboller (recipe from Meyer's Magazine)

Makes 18 - 20 small to medium sized buns

4 dl / 400 ml lukewarm milk

15 g fresh yeast

1 tsp salt

2 tbsp sugar

100 g unsalted butter, softened

2 egg yolks

1 egg

1 tsp ground cardamom (I ground my own - fresh cardamom is always better!)

650 - 700 g all-purpose flour

1 egg for the egg wash

In the bowl of your stand mixer, crumble the fresh yeast and mix it with the lukewarm milk, salt, sugar, cardamom, egg yolks, and egg. Stir until everything is combined and the yeast has dissolved.

Add the flour to the wet mixture a third at a time (starting with 650 g of flour). Using the dough hook and your mixer on the lowest setting, mix in the flour gradually. Depending on how wet the dough looks, you may need to add more flour.

Add the softened butter and mix until combined. This took about 8 minutes on my stand mixer on the lowest setting. The dough should be very smooth and glossy looking. 

Place a piece of cling film over your bowl and place the dough in the fridge to rise overnight (8 hours or so). 

In the morning, take your dough out and divide it into 18 - 20 pieces. My dough was a bit sticky so I floured my work surface and hands to form the 20 pieces into round balls of dough. Place the dough on baking sheets covered with parchment paper and let it rise at room temperature for another 1 to 2 hours.

Preheat the oven to 220 C. Whip the last egg for the egg wash and add a splash of water. Using a brush, brush the egg wash over each bun and sprinkle with oatmeal or chia seeds on top if you'd like. Bake the buns for 10 minutes. When they're ready, let them cool off a bit and then enjoy! If you don't finish all of the buns the same day, make sure to freeze them. They defrost and reheat well.

20 Weeks

I am really tempted to call this a "bumpdate" but I won't because it is sorta cheesy (even though I am secretly loving the word). But this IS a baby bump update!

As of Friday, I am officially halfway/20 weeks into this pregnancy. I read quite a few blogs, a handful of which are baby/mom blogs, and I've seen quite a few people do these weekly updates and I think they're fun to read. I haven't recorded so much of this pregnancy so I thought it would be fun to do updates every once in awhile. Some people do really long extensive bump updates, but I've just picked and chosen what I like/feel like sharing so here we go!

How far along are you? 20 weeks +1 day

Sleep: At the beginning of the pregnancy I was sleeping really early (like 8:30pm) but things are back to normal now. I have noticed that I haven't been sleeping as well or as deeply as before though. A bit more tossing and turning these days.

Movement: The baby has been kicking the last two weeks. There aren't any set patterns or anything, but I do notice them more in the evening and sometimes after having something to eat.

Favorite moment: I told the husband to put his hand on the little bump earlier this week and I told him the baby had kicked and he said he felt it so that's pretty special!

Cravings: I haven't had any outrageous cravings this whole pregnancy. Mostly craving things that I already liked before getting pregnant. This means chips and fries! Although I try to control my chip eating a bit and sometimes shake things up and have popcorn instead.

Looking forward to: We have a scan on Monday night where a midwife will examine the baby from top to bottom and we'll get to find out whether we're having a girl or a boy, so we are really looking forward to that!

Changes to the home: Nothing so far. We might go look at some sofa couches tomorrow for my parents to stay on when they come visit in June but otherwise, all of the major changes will happen after I finish working (and after more visa applications - story of my life here).

Be Back in Five

So the blog has totally been abandoned the last few months. It's not that I intended on taking a break, but sometimes life just happens and the blog gets put on the back burner. But don't you worry, I am coming back!

Lots has happened this fall/winter. First, the husband and I found out we were having a baby in October! We had "planned" it (as much as you can plan something like getting pregnant), so we are really excited to meet this little person in June. Going to work and then going to sleep super early the first few months meant that not a whole lot of exciting things were happening in the fall. And secondly, we went to Japan! We were in Japan for two weeks late November. We traveled with my parents and went to Tokyo, Osaka, Fukuoka, and Kyoto. It was a whirlwind trip and we got a nice taste and sample of Japan. Although, and I never thought I would say this, I got really sick of ramen. And I LOVE ramen! So anyways, go to Japan, but try to space out your ramen eating days. Besides that there was Christmas and the holidays and now it's January and I am finishing up at my current job. So, besides looking for a new job, getting back to the gym, and preparing for the baby the next few months, I will also be back here! 

I can't wait to share my new favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe, write about some new restaurant finds in Copenhagen, write about Aziz Ansari some more (check out his clip from my last post), and an advance warning, there may be many baby posts coming up! 

I hope your 2016 has been off to a great start! This will be one exciting year!

(P.S. We got a fiddle leaf fig. And we love it! It's only like the trendiest and most blogged about plant ever! It was a real hunt finding one here in Copenhagen!)