Eighteen

We have set our appointment to have our 20 week anatomy ultrasound. It will be at Emanuel Hospital. I've can remember the last time we did this with Hayden. I was the first one to see the male anatomy and I think it was the loudest I've ever screamed the word penis. We went into that ultrasound not caring what the gender would be.

This time we are a little more invested in the outcome. It could mean trying again for a girl or being done having kids. We haven't thoroughly discussed whether or not we'd want to have more after this. I know Nikki really wants a girl to dress up and play dolls with. Or maybe she just wants to watch me play with dolls. Above all, we just want the baby to be happy and healthy.

Nikki has thought a few times in the last week that she has felt the baby move, but she can't tell if it's just gas or not. It's been five years since she was last pregnant, but it may as well have been fifty years ago. Besides the traumatizing morning sickness and swollen ankles, there isn't much she remembers about being pregnant.

Don't know if I'll get a post in next week. I may just wait until after we find out the sex of the baby.

Edge of Seventeen

~ "Just like the white-winged dove..." ~

We had our monthly checkup on Thursday! Friday marked the seventeenth week of gestation.

Last month, Nikki had to have seven vials of blood drawn. Sounds easy enough until you discover Nikki possesses the veins of a scarecrow. All those blood tests came back normal, which is good news. This time around, she only had to have one vial taken to determine whether or not the baby is at risk for spina bifida. Her results popped up yesterday and again, everything checked out normal. She explained to the blood taker where to draw the blood (her hand) and there was no problem. We were in and out in about 5 minutes.

The doc attempted to listen to the baby's heartbeat and was unable to locate it using the handheld ultrasound listening device. This made us worry for a moment. We were taken to another room and we still couldn't see the baby. I don't know if the doc was having a bad day or what, but she was finally able to spot the baby on the screen and she was wiggling all over...again. No wonder we couldn't hear anything except the baby moving around. I think the three of us (Hayden included) are going to have our hands full in just over 5 months.

Speaking of having our hands full, Hayden was being a complete four year old during the 30 minutes we were with the doctor. He's continuously hungry, can't hold still for longer than 3 seconds and this is all accompanied by constant chattering. Sittting in a chair the right way is a near impossibility. He's gotta lay on his back and hang his head off the chair so when the door in the exam room opens it smacks him in the head. We tell him to sit up, he will take his time and comply for about 7 seconds. Then it's back to hanging off the chair. I think he's testing our will...like will we give him up for adoption or not? We realize this is typical behavior, but damn it if it isn't infuriating at times. He is also having some issues with sharing, but he needs to figure that out pretty quick because he's going to have a little brother or sister drooling and smashing all of his toys here in the near future.

We are going to be scheduled to have the anatomy ultrasound (the big one where I will continue to refer to the baby as a she, or we drop the "s") next week at Emanuel Hospital. Then we will decide how to tell people to evoke maximum excitement. My guess is that Nikki's face will give it away before she has a chance to open her mouth. We'll see. Nikki's sister, Cari has quite the streak of correctly guessing the sex of babies before the parents find out. I believe the streak is around 7 in a row. She correctly guessed Hayden would be a boy so she's 1 for 1 so far with us. She's predicted a girl for us this time so we will see if she is right or not.

Will it be Lucas or Averie?

Sweet Sixteen

We are approximately one month away from finding out the gender of the baby. I am not quite sure how we have made it this far without freaking out. We are eager to find out what we are having, but haven't decided exactly when we will tell everyone. We don't want to end up with a bunch of neutral-colored baby clothes, but we were kind of robbed of making our own special pregnancy announcement. We've discussed a gender reveal party, but when we started talking about it, it sounded like a lot of work. 

We have an appointment on Thursday and we are anxious to find out how our little bundle of joy is doing. Mom has had her moments of sickness, but they seem to only be triggered by weird food textures. Grisly chicken, chewy pizza and other random food seem to be the switch. Also the giant horse pills that disguise themselves as prenatal vitamins get her gag reflex going as well. Taking three of them a day is quite the task. She is still pretty tired at this point although it seems to come and go in waves. It could be attributed to the recent heat wave. We did spend most of a 98 degree afternoon at the park near our house, although we were under a shaded tree and had plenty of water to drink.

Also, we discovered that mosquitoes seem to love her pregnant blood. We spent Saturday night over at our friends' house and were outside after dusk. She normally gets more than her fair share of bites when she isn't pregnant, but now the bugs are extra ravenous. She was bitten 17 times on one leg. The bites are contained to a circular area about 6 inches in diameter. I've never seen someone bitten that much in that short a period of time. We may have been outside for 30-45 minutes after dusk and she was attacked!

Hayden has been extra cute during the pregnancy. Whenever Nikki gets sick and has to run to the bathroom, Hayden says something to the effect of, "Uh oh, the baby didn't like that food that mommy ate." He will randomly say he loves his "baby sister" in her tummy. We are confident that he is going to be the best big brother ever.

We are still too early to feel any movement as the baby is about 4-5 inches long and weighs about 3 ounces. She could start feeling things as early as now, but I don't expect her to feel anything for at least a couple of weeks. 

We are still narrowing down a middle name in the event it is a girl. We can't decide if we want to honor someone or come up with something original. If we have another boy (I've been threatened sufficiently that it better not be) the name will be Lucas Michael. A girl will be named Averie. 

Sorry I haven't written here for a couple of weeks. I've been caught up in a bout of laziness and World Cup fever. I will return to weekly Friday entries. The next entry will recap our doctor's visit on Thursday.