16 Weeks!

Woo Hoo! 16 weeks and today is the day (hopefully) that we find out what we are having! Our ultrasound is at 10 with an appointment after that and likely a trip to the mall for a baby outfit after that :) Soooo....expect a blog update tomorrow around lunchtime with the sex of Blueberry... as long as he/she cooperates and everything goes well... yay!

Blueberry is preparing for a growth spurt over the next several weeks. Blue's ears and eyes are situated in their final positions, giving blue a more “normal” appearance than he/she has had up to this point. Several of the more complicated body systems are also beginning to function including Blueberry’s urinary and circulatory system. Blue’s heart pumps around 25 quarts of blood per day. However, by week 40 this amount will increase to 1,900 quarts per day. Blue is now the size of an avocado!

Making Life Interesting

Micah has been picking up new "tricks" left and right this week and it is so much fun! He blows kisses now, says "all done!" when he is finished eating, can climb onto the couch and chairs unassisted, and bobs his head along with r&b music. He's my new favorite show :)

Dear Chuy's,

Thank you so much for the lovely lunch yesterday. Thank you for not using raw eggs in your creamy jalapeno therefore making it pregnancy safe. Thank you for your flautas and for always letting me trade you guacamole and sour cream for a side of queso. And most of all, thank you for NOT freaking out when I told you that we had 6 adults and 6 babies... you're the best :)

Love always,

To Be Frank

I walked into Hobby Lobby yesterday and ended up in line behind this guy! ~


If you don't know who he is, then you need to review your Trading Spaces trivia. Yes, these are the kinds of celebrities we have in Katy :) I am somewhat embarrassed to admit that I was excited to see him! Oh, and he was wearing this shirt and, of course, was covered in sweat :P

15 Weeks

For this week's myth, I am leaving the decision up to you guys. I have a poll on the right side of my blog for you to tell me what you think Blueberry is going to be! You have until 10 am on August 31st (the time of our ultrasound) to tell us what you think. My Micah poll has a clear leader, but I won't be revealing the results of that experiment until after the vote is in :)

Blue’s skin is very thin, and his/her blood vessels can actually be seen through the skin. Blue’s ears are continuing to develop externally and continue to look more like normal ears. Blue’s bones are beginning to ossify, which means that if an x-ray was taken the skeleton would be visible. Blue is now about 4.75 inches long and is the size of an apple!

I Love You Too

Micah LOVES his Daddy... and that's a good thing. It's a great thing actually :) Not that he isn't attached to me, he's just more attached to Nate. I think it's sweet and also it can be a bit annoying :P Yesterday, however, I finally got some serious lovins from Micah. He's sweet to me all the time and so when he came and laid his head in my lap and smiled up at me, it wasn't anything new. (although I never get tired of it :) I said "Hey Micah, I looooooove you!" and he smiled back. I repeated it and he babbled something back to me. On the third declaration, he said it back to me! Albeit, it was toddler pronunciation but it was clear what he was saying. I repeated the feat for Nate when he got home and Micah did it again! It certainly made me smile :) (and possibly prevented me from developing a complex :P)

p.s.- Mom, I checked everything out and it was a-okay!

Kids Say the Darndest Things

Anyone else out there get Parents Magazine? Anyone else LOVE the baby bloopers section? Here are some of my faves from the past couple of months for your enjoyment on this fine Wednesday :)

"When my 3 year old daughter threw a toy at her twin brother, he ended up with a small cut and a black eye. The next night, I was reading him the story of the Good Samaritan... when I explained that one of the characters had been beaten up, he said, "Maybe his sister did it!""

"Before bed one night, I asked my two-year-old if she'd like Mommy or Daddy to read a story to her. She said she wanted Spencer, our dog, to do it. When I explained to her that Spencer couldn't read she said, "That's right, he doesn't have hands."

"Worried that our kids were growing up too fast, my husband asked our 3-year-old if she thought our family could live together forever. She looked at him and replied, "Let's just make it through today, Daddy."

"My 7-year-old asked why my baby daughter was crying. I told him she was hungry and he said, "I don't know how you can understand her accent!"

"When my 2-year-old daughter told me she wanted to marry me, I said, "But what about Mommy?" She replied, "She's nice, She'll find someone new."

"When my husband and I found out we were pregnant with our third child, we sat down with our oldest, Amelia, 4, and told her we were going to get another new baby. She immediately broke into tears and yelled, "But I want to keep Vivienne (our second)!"

"I told my 3-year-old that on the day she was born the doctor said, "It's a beautiful girl!" She asked how the doctor knew she was a girl, and I told her it's because she was born naked. She exclaimed, "Oh, so boys are born with clothes!"

Happy Wednesday :)

Hurts So Good

Woo Hoo! I felt Blueberry kicking around yesterday! I felt something I thought was kicking a few days ago, but I couldn't tell for sure. Well, yesterday after drinking some juice, Blue decided to do a 5 minute tap dance number that was unmistakeably baby kicking. It was light, but left no doubt.... it also gave me great hope for this baby having some wicked cool dance moves ;-)

14 Weeks

This week's myth tells us that if you are more moody while pregnant then you are having a girl, if you are the same then you are having a boy..... apparently something to do with the extra estrogen :P According to this, Abby is having a girl (poor Nate... I really am super moody) and Nate is having a girl (mostly from having to put up with me :P)

Blueberry has officially entered the second trimester! Blue’s arms are going to begin to lengthen and be more proportioned to the rest of the body. The liver is beginning to produce bile, while the spleen is beginning to produce red blood cells. The development of Blueberry’s brain enables blue to use facial muscles to grimace, frown, and squint. As for size, this week is Blueberry Lemonade week as Blue has reached the size of a lemon!

Bumpaholic

As in, "Hello, my name is Abby and I'm a bumpaholic." Well actually, according to the Today Show, I'm the only woman in my family who isn't a bumpaholic..... yet. My mom and I saw the most "interesting" segment on the today show on Tuesday. They were talking about a statistic that 25% of babies born last year were born to women having their third or fourth child. They gave these women the label of "Bumpaholic".

They then asked the question, "What would cause a women to want to have so many kids?" The answer? According to these two New York professionals, women who have more than two children are most likely doing it because they are attention addicts or they are trying to fill a void in their lives. Either way, they have psychological issues.

WOW. Ummm, is three kids really that many? I mean, so many that anyone wanting more than two kids has to have deep mental problems to have that many? We were dumbfounded. Well, I went on the today show website and pulled a couple of choice comments from the article that went with this segment. Let me know what you think...

"Women may like being pregnant a little too much, often driven to rapidly reproduce out of insecurity, a craving for attention, or feelings of abandonment by their own parents. Having babies isn't addictive in the way that alcohol and narcotics can be. But bumpaholics feel compelled to procreate for many of the same reasons that substance abusers turn to booze or drugs."

I do not argue that some people may have lots of kids for those reasons, but the interview implied that most women with 3 or more kids were having them for these reasons.

"Given all the psychological, physical, and social rewards associated with pregnancy, it's no surprise that so many women like it. But plenty of couples stop at one or two children, despite the fundamental drive to reproduce. This is because we can use our higher brain functions to keep those instincts in check."

I love that according to this quote, women with more than 2 kids lack the "higher brain functions" to stop themselves from having kids.... what?? Anyways, I just thought I'd share this with ya'll and proclaim that I do want three kids. Hello, my name is Abby, and Lord willing I will be a bumpaholic sometime in the future. :P

Happy Wednesday Ya'll!

From a very happy boy :)

The Week of Blah

Fortunately, the week bearing that title was last week... I'm not sure if I can take another one like it. It was a week when nothing went right. It was destined to be a great week and then most everything crashed and burned.

1) The Good- Apple replaced my phone! The Bad- I missed the delivery. The Ugly- I had to stay home the entire next day to make sure I was there for the delivery.. which came over 3 hours later than the "latest" delivery time and 5 hours later than they tried the previous day.

2) The Good- I finally was able to leave the house to go to the grocery store on Thursday. The Bad- My credit card was declined. The Ugly- I called Chase with a cart full of groceries and they told me they had shut down the account on a report that my number might maybe be compromised in the future. They finally called to notify me of the account being shut down two days later... ahhh, thanks.

3) The Good- Chase sent me new cards overnight! The Bad- They said the delivery would require a signature for security. The Ugly- The cards were instead left on my doorstep without a signature or even a knock on the door to let me know they were there. I happened to see the truck drive away.... that's safe :P

4) The Good- I started my Christmas shopping full force with some Amazon orders! The Bad- The packages (2) were shown as delivered and never were... I was here all day... I know :P The Ugly- They were left on the doorstep of an out of town neighbor 6 doors down where they were rained on, sprinklered on and left until the neighbors returned yesterday. Some items were slightly water damaged.

Anyway, I have HIGH hopes for this week.. starting with a grocery trip yesterday... woo hoo for food the entire week! Things have been great so far :)

13 Weeks

This week's myth is one that people LOVE to try. It involves hanging your wedding ring from a string over your belly. If it moves from side to side then you are having one gender, in circles then you are having the other. The problem with this one? I can't find a consensus on which movement means which gender. In fact, I have searched ALOT and found about 50% of sites say one thing and the other half say the other thing. Well, I tried it anyway and the ring stayed still, then moved back and forth... stilled briefly.. then moved in circles. Soooooooo... ok then. Some people say that this test tells you the gender of past babies too with pauses in between. Anyhoo, if that's the case, then my results mean girl (since it moved both ways, so one must be Micah and the other says I have a girl inside.... or something like that). Whatever :P

Up until this point, Blueberry’s head has been the largest part of his/her body, but that is beginning to change. Blue’s head is now only about 1/3 of his/her total body. Unique fingerprints are now located on the tips of Blue’s fingers. The kidney and urinary tract are completely functional which allows the amniotic fluid he/she has been swallowing to be excreted. Covering Blue’s skin is a fine, soft hair called lanugo.

Blueberry is now the size of a very cute, fuzzy peach... (for the "fuzzy" explanation, see above :)

Mama's got a brand new phone!

A week ago I sent my iphone in to Apple for the final effort to get it fixed... the result? They concluded that I didn't damage my phone, and that it was covered by the warranty! Take that humidity!! The phone was also unfixable, so today I received my replacement phone in the mail. I have high hopes for this phone and hope that it behaves a little more like this~

than like this ~

I am thinking that for this phone to survive in Houston might take some special accessories. What do you think of this fine option? ~

Truly my 4th grade Microsoft Paint skillz have not diminished with time ;-)

It is set

We are having an ultrasound on August 31st to (hopefully) determine the sex of Baby Blue. I say hopefully because I will be 16 weeks at that time which is on the early side to find out and also because if you get a really modest baby that won't uncross it's legs, you just might not find out until the bashful babe is delivered :P

Which leads me to an interesting moment I had yesterday... as I was leaving my OB's office, I was scheduling my next appointment and my ultrasound (yay!) and the receptionist asked me what the ultrasound was for.

Me- "Oh, it's for gender determination."
Her- "15 weeks is too early for that..."
Me- "I'll be 16 weeks on that day..."

This led to a conversation wherein she tried to convince me that I was currently 11 wks along and I tried to convince her that I was 12 wks along. Anyways, she scheduled the ultrasound without really believing me and I rushed home to look at my calendar, charts and what not and confirmed that I am in fact 12 wks pregnant.... shocker. So now the control freak part of me (a major contributing aspect of my personality) is debating whether to call the office today and make sure we're all on the same page.... I'm pretty sure I'll give in :P

Update

The heart rate was 154, which according to our old wives tale makes Blueberry a girl! I am, of course trusting these results conclusively as I have with all previous results (once again, the contradictions in said results does not concern me :P).

Jill, I have no idea what Micah's heart rate was when he was "on the inside", but I have no doubt that it could just as easily have been above 140 as below it ;-)

12 Weeks!

Our myth for today is one that several people I know swear by. It states that if the baby's heartbeat is slower 140 beats per minute then you are having a boy, if the baby's heartbeat is faster than 140 beats per minute then you are having a girl. According to this myth, I am having a ______. That's right, I don't remember the baby's heartbeat from my appointment 5 weeks ago :P Good news is that I am going to the OB and am going to try my best to remember to PAY ATTENTION when they say the heartrate. Sooooo... results to be added later :)

This week Blueberry will begin to take on more of a normal appearance as the eyes move closer together and the ears move closer to their final position. The intestines have grown so fast that they actually extend into the umbilical cord, but they will begin to move back into the abdomen. The kidneys can now secrete urine, and the nervous system is continuing to mature. Blue may have developed more complicated reflexes such as sucking. Blue is now the size of a big lime :)