It feels like only yesterday I wrote my 26 weeks post - time is really flying! Yesterday I had exactly three months' left until my due date, and by the end of my 27 weeks, I officially enter my third trimester. Which I may now rename 'the finally looking pregnant trimester'.

On Saturday I had serious heartburn all day, and weird aches and pains all around my abdomen and stomach. Everytime I ate something I had to swig from my Gaviscon bottle (really nice that, the top is now encrusted with dried up bits of Gaviscon, which, unsurprisingly looks like little flakes of chalk and get stuck in your teeth/lipgloss). By the end of the day I was lying prostrate on the bed trying desperately to stretch my torso out somehow - it felt as though everything was being pushed around and together and rearranged when there simply wasn't enough space for it all.

I thought maybe this was what everyone told me to expect and that it would now be like that until the baby is born. But then on Sunday I woke up feeling much more comfortable, and then I realised, I had POPPED.

My bump, to me at least, is suddenly huge. My tummy button is now being stretched sideways and looks a bit like an old man's drooping mouth. Nice. We had a day out in Chiswick on Sunday and I spent the whole time walking around feeling a childish sense of pride in my bump. It's a proper bump - look!

It's a proper bump that also now moves of its own accord. I think I'm the only person related to this baby that likes this side of things, but you can very clearly now see decisive ripples and kicks appearing under the surface of my skin - much more so than before. I find it quite cute, and really reassuring. Oli is less convinced and my sister got completely freaked out when she saw my stomach rolling around in waves over the Bank Holiday.

I'm not quite at the stage yet where I can identify a hand or foot being flung outwards, but the other day I was lying down on the sofa and I noticed a very obvious dome shape on one side of my tummy - undoubtedly the head! That actually did freak me out a bit. It was so small, but then also not that small really. How can a 14-inch-long baby be living and (practising) breathing in my tum?! Mindblowing no matter how many times you think about it.

This week the baby finally opens his/her eyes, and he/she can very definitely hear now, so I've been trying to play lots of music to it (mostly Oli's of course) and have been singing along quite vociferously. Not that I'm trying to hothouse the little mite or anything but, ahem, he/she is clearly destined for musical stardom, what with my Grade 6 in clarinet too. I have yet to get Oli to give the bump its own recital but I'm still working on it, so watch this space...

Other than that, this week has been relatively non-eventful. I've been more tired than usual but I'm not sure if that's normal post-holiday work stress. The situation that was stressing me out before is now in limbo for a while, so I've been trying not to think about it, which is working out alright so far (touch wood).

More excitingly, when it comes to buying baby things, we had always said we would hold off until the beginning of June, which means that next week is officially shopping time! Squeak. I'm very bloody excited, I have to say. We've been proper grown ups and opened a joint bank account just for the baby, which we've been putting money into every month, so that all the baby stuff doesn't come as a huge shock financially. I'm a little overwhelmed about exactly how much there is to buy, but shopping has always been one of my strong points, so I think I'll cope...