18 Week Ultrasound

You know, there just might be a real live little person in there!  I don't know if its normal or if its due to the long road it took to get here, but during the days leading up to the next big appointment I start to fret about the welfare of the baby.  Crazy thoughts...that I won't even try to articulate here.  And amazingly, each time, there is this sweet little baby growing in my belly that is doing just fine.  We even got a little wave today!  Praise God!

The tech was able to figure out if it's a boy or girl and we managed not to see...so with the secret safely tucked away in a sealed envelope, it was given to the baker for the cake on September 10th.  When we cut the cake we'll all find out together!  Can't wait!

Aren't those the cutest little feet?

Here's the wave!  "Hi Mom, Dad and LB!"

Since we have both a neice (my side) and nephew (paul's side) we have an idea of what kind of babies our families produce. Paul has been hoping for a "squishy" baby like Abby. (Sorry Abby, if you are reading this someday, you were most definitely the cutest squishiest baby ever!) Noah on the other hand was an absolute doll with long wirey legs...nothing squishy about him!  And those look like Lindgren legs if I have ever seen them!

Profile.

First Ultrasound

As I was cleaning up my posts...I found this one unpublished from a few months ago...

Thursday morning Paul and my mom joined me for Baby's first ultrasound.  Turns out I am only 6 weeks pregnant.  I think that makes the due date the end of January. Dr. Harper says everything looks good.  We are cautiously hopeful that this baby will make it! But, I am still not out of the woods regarding a miscarriage and will have another ultrasound next week to keep checking that Baby is ok.

In the meantime, so much seems to have changed.  Foods I used to love, I can't stand the thought of.  Foods I would never consider having in my house are now a staple.  If it weren't for fruit smoothies seeming to keep my tummy happy, my diet would be most unhealthy!  All I want to do is sleep.  But then I can't sleep at night.  My dreams are insane.  I can't really remember most of them, but they are downright weird.  I cry at the drop of a hat - anything sentimental sends me over the edge. And Paul and I are now sleeping in separate rooms.  I toss and turn all night and have been keeping him from getting a good night's sleep so he decided one night last weekend to sleep in the guest bedroom.  I think he feels bad about how well he slept...every night around bedtime he carefully asks if its ok to sleep in the guest bedroom for another night.  And yes, it is just fine.  It keeps me from worrying about my tossing and turning and multiple trips to the bathroom.  And all of this is just fine...it reminds me that I am actually in fact pregnant.

Tonight I am going to try eating fish...we'll see how it goes.  I did have a salad last night and seemed to be able to keep it down.

Sassy Water

My dear friend Heather brought me a pitcher of anti-nausea water...and what great timing.  I try and not take my zofran EVERY day and today being a Sunday I decided it would be fine to be lazy and stay home if and when the nausea set in.  Thanks to the sassy water it has stayed away!

This water tastes amazing...fresh, cool, healthy and calming.  I asked her for the recipe and here it is!  I think I'll be keeping a pitcher of this in my fridge from now on :-)

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As I mentioned, my doc recommended this to help fight nausea. More recently it's popped up as an aid for people trying to improve diet and drink more water (you can find it repurposed online as sassy water.)


For the batch I brought:

@3 quart pitcher almost full of water

1 lemon, sliced
6 cucumber slices
2 peppermint "tea" bags (no tea in it, just dried peppermint) or a handful of fresh peppermint leaves
1 chunk of ginger, peeled and thinly sliced or 1 heaping tbsp grated (harder to strain grated)

Drop all the above in the water, cover, and stash in the fridge overnight to steep. Strain it, and drink it!

NPR's Baby Project

Paul sent me this link to NPR's Baby Project...a blog following a group of diverse women and their pregnancies. The stories and insights are fascinating and remind me of the long journey we travelled to get to this point and that many women and couples are still dealing with the devastation of infertility.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/babyproject/

No news is good news

I generally have a policy about my online activity...if I don't have anything nice to say, just keep quiet.  So, it has been real quiet around here.

That said, Baby is doing great!  Mom, not so much :-)  My litany of complaints goes on and on and on.

First off, the morning sickness that was supposed to subside by now, is getting worse and worse.  I cannot live without my zofran.  This, in turn, causes another problem, but I think I have figured out how to manage THAT particular side effect with daily doses of dried prunes, citrucel and fiber cereal.  joy.

Today, I decided that after a week of zofran I would try and live without it for a measly 24 hours.  No such luck.  Lunch came right back up.

Earlier this week, I came down with a lovely bout of bronchitis.  It started in my lungs, moved through my throat, nose, sinuses and now out my ears!  But, yay!  Today I don't feel like someone has inflated a balloon in my respiratory system :-)

Last week, at my 14 week appointment, I failed the glucose tolerance test so will have to go back for the 3 hour test.  Should be fun fun fun!  As a result, I finally owned up to the fact that we really should stop eating mac and cheese every night for dinner.  So, this weekend I plan to cook on Sunday for the whole week.  I'll post the menu and results. 

The cravings are so interesting...they change week to week.  I have consumed things that I never would have considered in my normal state of being...barbecue stuffed baked potatoes, chicken nuggets and fries, fried chicken sandwich, chic-fil-a anything, grilled cheese sandwiches, and lima beans are just a few.  The crazy thing, is despite this binge of junk food, I haven't gained any weight.  Week 15 and I haven't gained any weight????  Is this normal????  I have gained LOTS of inches.  Just no lbs?  Hopefully this is just fine as I started out significantly overweight. 

I am starting to feel movement or flutters.  I am a 100% it's baby wriggling around but it's fun to think so! 

We have cleaned out the baby's room (formerly my study) and I am really looking forward to finding out if it's a boy or girl so we can start decorating.  We find out with family on September 10.  Stay tuned!  I am ready to start calling baby by his or her name. If it's a girl we have a name picked out...if it's a boy we are 90% settled on a name.  We shall see.

Have a great weekend!