Life of a Gal Named Liv

Hey friends! It’s been a while since I’ve written. In truth, doing a social media break has been such a relief to my soul, but it has made me a bit more laid back with keeping everyone up-to-date! It’s been nice though…I always feel obligated to respond to every comment and message, I hate being pressed with political updates before I’m done with my coffee, & it takes up way too much time. I’m honestly quite tempted just to write on here, as we enter this new season [of life]. So, if you haven’t subscribed now is the time.

We have had huge waves of busy-ness the past few months, making life feel a little like whip lash. To start with the grandest news of all: I’m 23 weeks pregnant with a baby boy (Basil Wilder Lampman).

It has been a whirl wind, and I can’t believe we are over half way to the finish line. I’ve done things very much my own way, from mountain biking to backcountry skiing, to working out daily, to carrying heavy loads & helping with “hard” tasks, to reading book after book (basically treating this as a research project). I think I’ve been pretty lucky with the ease of this pregnancy, but I’m also grateful I’m stubborn enough to be able to do all the fun things I’d miss out on otherwise. Slowing down has been hard for my competitive brain, but I have been a lot more tuned into my body.

As you can tell I’ve just been livin’ my normal life, just with more water breaks & a bit more sleep.

If you aren’t interested in reading about the pregnancy, skip down to the selfie of me.

So far, I have read:

1. Birth matters, a midwife’s manifesta
2. The Simplest Baby Book *THIS is the book to give to new parents who aren’t keen on dense books or heavy research. It is laid out so nicely & even has free printable!
3. The Mama Natural

Partially completed books (yes… my ADHD self reads 5-10 books at once):

1. Ina May’s guide to Childbirth
2. Raising Good Humans
3. Hunt, Gather, Parent
4. Crib sheet
5. The first 40 days
6. Nine Golden Months
7. Hypnobirthing: The Morgan method

On the docket are:

1. Birth without Fear
2. Mindful Birthing
3. This isn’t what I expected

I have been able to maintain my workout schedule, as well as added some near-daily yoga routines with the help of my new (hot pink) exercise ball!

My favorite YouTubers so far have been:

1. @BridgetTeyler
2. @PregnancyandPostpartumTV

I’m also being proactive with my pelvic floor health, so I begun using the Squeezy app while I do the dishes! After listening to a lot of podcasts, it came to my attention that all humans need to pay more attention to their pelvic floor health- not just pregnant people!

I’m trying my best to not only enjoy my daily life, but to maintain my [good] habits that need to be carried through pregnancy into post partum.

Medically speaking, I have had a very straight forward pregnancy so far and am thankful for that. The hardest part has been my bi-weekly progesterone shots (that phin does for me at home) & every-other-week blood draws since I have naturally low progesterone levels (due to an underactive thyroid). With this, my daily thyroid medicine, and my 15 other supplements baby and mom have been getting along just fine!

I have been loving my prenatal care experiences- we are going with the Nest Midwives for an unmediated home birth (yes, Basil will hopefully be born in our living room if all goes well)! The midwives are so kind & respectful, and they even offer group appointments (spread throughout your pregnancy) that entail birth stories, labor prep, stretches, and the essence of community!

Along with growing a human & working full time jobs (well 2.25 part time jobs for me), we have done a few “fun extracurricular activities” !

We took our niece, Amelia, to the local Discovery Center:

We watched (& I photographed) her parents (my bro & sis in-laws) get married at the Colfax Courthouse:

We welcomed our newest baby nephew, Booker, into the world!

I photographed another soon-to-be-mama:

I helped to organize & MC’d the Wild and Scenic Film Festival for Sierra Club at the Kenworthy Theatre:

We have been expanding our culinary horizons in the kitchen:

As a volunteer this year, I organized and hosted a planting event for the City of Moscow… and came up with a pretty cool collaboration!

We took the pets on many a walk & hike, itching for the snow to melt in higher elevations:

Phin turned 30 & we celebrated with friends and family:

Rocky (the near 3 year old I nanny 2x a week) and I, made a lot of crafts & had fun in the sun:

I got started on Basil’s scrapbook:

Phin won “PhD student of the year” award for the University of Idaho College of Natural Resources.

I was featured in a national Sierra Club Earth Day video:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/sierraclub_why-join-a-sierra-club-chapter-activity-7313610561437474816-VcgU?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_ios&rcm=ACoAAEFo_qkBzWs2sWzLDUPbCfyJtuIsX2ipQBA

We rallied at one of the 1,400+ hands off rallies!

Here is the local newspaper link that I made it into: https://www.dnews.com/local-news/three-towns-three-protests-4f5592b3

We have taken up mid-day lap swimming to keep us sane & healthy!

I think that’s about all for now! We only have one big trip coming up this Spring, and that’s to go backpacking in Washington to an alpine lake with our friend, Eliza. I guess Callie & I will also be going to Seattle for a concert, so that should be a fun change of pace. Besides that, we will just be working, camping & hiking locally, trying to find Phin a job, & preparing for baby Basil!

Pregnancy Announcements will be sent out this weekend, so if you haven’t gotten one already in your mailbox keep checking! If you want to buy us a gift, here is our registry https://my.babylist.com/olivia-lampman!

Much love- the Lampman family