Almost There

At my last check up the nurse practitioner reminded me that I had an appointment scheduled on Monday if I was still pregnant.  Things are progressing!  On Monday Brian and I went for a few walks and had pizza for dinner.  I had contractions that night every 7 minutes for several hours, but then labor stalled out.  It's a pizza and long walk night again tonight!

Pictures of the Buddha Belly

April Showers

I'm a little behind the times with updating the blog. This picture is from our ultrasound on the 30th. The tech printed off a 3d picture, but it's still a bit hard to see. Through most of the ultrasound he had a hand and foot in front of his face. In this picture his hand is in front of his face- the hand looks funny, but that's just an artifact from the 3d process. Things are looking good. At that point he was one ounce shy of 5lbs and at the 18th percentile. His belly moved up a couple percentiles in the ranks... so things are going well. If he continues gaining at this rate he should be around 7.5 if he makes it to the full 40 weeks. I'm gaining weight and for the most part feeling really well. I have a very hectic week ahead of me as I finish up my semester and have a lot of assessments scheduled... after that things will slow down until Baby makes his appearance. I've been having Braxton Hicks contractions which are getting more and more frequent and obvious. Pretty exciting!

We had some great showers and visits with family and friends. We received pretty much everything we will need and some really cute, fun stuff. I had a suprise shower at the Learning Diagnostic Clinic; a dinner with my fellow clinical students; a joint shower with my cousin Brice's wife, Katie, on the Markway side; and a joint party with Andrea's new son, Jayson. While the gifts have been great, Brian and I were most impressed by how much support everyone has given us. This is one lucky baby. For some reason I just have photos of the Markway shower:

Doc Appointment

I had my regular appointment today. The doctor said the baby is at the 20th percentile overall (not tiny). He was pleased with how the ultrasound went. We are going to do one more growth check in 2 weeks just to make sure his growth hasn't slowed, but expect things to go well. It was a relief to get some feedback! Also, I gained 4 pounds. I've been drinking nutritional shakes and they seem to be doing the trick.

Baby has been very active. It's actually kind of painful- he can somehow manage to jab my rib, bladder, and side all at once. It feels like he is doing cartwheels! Even though it's not completely comfortable- it lets me know he's doing all right. He also gets the hiccups several times a day. This morning we listened to him hiccup with the stethoscope. Pretty cute.

Second Peek at Baby

We had a second ultrasound this morning for a growth check.  The first picture is of him yawning and and the second is a profile of his face. His cheeks have filled out since that last u/s.  We could see him blinking, hiccuping, and practice "breathing."  Very cute. His movement looked great.  The tech measured his head, abdomen, and femur to make a weight estimate of 3 lb 11 oz (which is good).  We're still a little concerned that his little belly was so small in comparison with his other measurements and other babies at this stage.  We are eager to talk to our own doctor!  It will be a long wait until my appointment next Friday, but they would have told us at the appointment this morning if something was wrong. If we hear anything but good news from our doctor, I think it will just be that we need to continue monitoring.   I'm trying to bulk up as much as I can- doing my part to fatten him up!

Tomorrow we hit the 32 week mark!  8 MONTHS!

We're still here!

It's been a long time since we have posted.  Things have been busy!  Last weekend we went to Jefferson City.  Riley turned 3 and bonded with uncle Brian over her current interest in Batman.  They tackled some bad guys together and Brian was even invited into the Batcave (a blanket fort).  We also got to meet Andrea and Todd's new baby, Jayson!  So cute and tiny... it was pretty exciting to know that we will have one of our own soon!    Brian's parents gave us a pack 'n play, which will be great.  We did a little rearranging in our apartment, but it will be a tight fit until we can move into a bigger place.  I have an ultrasound 

scheduled for Wednesday morning- looking

forward to getting to see the baby again!

Sweet!

Second round of glucose testing came out normal. Phew.