Our Girl - 21 Weeks

How your baby's growing:
Your baby now weighs about three-quarters of a pound and is approximately 10 1/2 inches long — the length of a carrot. You may soon feel like she's practicing martial arts as her initial fluttering movements turn into full-fledged kicks and nudges. You may also discover a pattern to her activity as you get to know her better. In other developments, your baby's eyebrows and lids are present now, and if you're having a girl, her vagina has begun to form as well.

from (http://www.babycenter.com/6_your-pregnancy-21-weeks_1110.bc)

Note from Jen: she has been practicing martial arts (hence the nickname Ninja baby) for weeks now. The poor ultrasound lady could hardly get the pictures she needed since the baby was constantly flipping. We can even see her moving across my belly already.Abby, her dad, and I have been working hard on figuring out a name for baby sister. Abby has also been working hard on designating which things are hers and which belong to baby sister. So far she's doing pretty good at understanding that she has to share things, but I'm sure that will change the minute the baby is actually here. One of the things she is excited to share is the new Disney princess table and chairs that we bought with her Christmas money from Great Grandma Lorraine and Great Grandpa Harley. She has been so excited about her chair and baby's chair and keeps asking us to take them from her room downstairs and back again, based on where she is (we are not obliging, since she already had a table downstairs).
Abby got her H1N1 booster yesterday, so she should be officially protected from getting the swine flu. Unfortunately I think they also squeezed in a little grouchy vaccine too, because she has been having random meltdowns since the shot. She was really cute after getting her "poker" - she looked at me after they put the band-aid on her leg and said "poker time all done uh-huh". She was totally over the crying before we left the exam room and besides reminding me that poker time was done, she didn't seem to be affected at all.

One Baby On The Way

The ultrasound was conclusive - only one baby on the way! We are very excited about that. Our due date is basically the same, so we are right on track for another tax day baby. They made us some pictures on a disk, but we can't get them off to share - sorry! Our computer is too old to run the program that would allow us to save or print the pictures.

Abby did a great job at the appointment. She initially cried a bit, mostly because she was so sleepy and wanted to cuddle with mom and not sit on dad's lap. She eventually ended up falling asleep. And then she came home and crawled right into bed without any crying about nap time. She is sure a great kid.

And now... on to packing for our little adventure around Lake Michigan. We are heading to Hastings tomorrow, on to Blissfield on Monday night or Tuesday morning, and then to Milwaukee on Thursday and back home through Wisconsin on Saturday. Should be fun!

The BIG News

Just when we thought we had things figured out and under control, Sparky threw us for another loop. While a normal infant at week 34 would be 4.9 pounds or so, Ms. Sparky is well over 7 pounds. The ultrasound technician said the doctor would be able to give us the official weight, but she only knew how to get within the range. When I came home and tried to calculate the weight based on metric conversion I came up with 8 pounds, 1 ounce. Either way, Sparky is at least 2 pounds heavier than the average baby and will likely be here sooner rather than later. Based on her size, she is equivalent to a 36 week old baby, which would put a revised due date around April 7th. We are hoping to get some better information on the new plan of attack next Wednesday at our weekly visit.

So... other than that, week 34 is off to an uneventful start. My knee is bruised from the fall on Sunday, but not hurting. We now know why I feel like I have the world's largest baby in my belly. We have most of the essentials ready to bring Sparky home and now we just play the waiting game.

Congratulations to Becky Rasey for being the first to figure out that Sparky's name is Abigail Grace. Steve and I originally were debating between Elizabeth and Kathryn, but neither really ever really just seemed to fit Sparky. So after much debating and consideration we decided that Abigail was going to be the best name for our little gal. So, Abby will be joining our family shortly and you can all pray for a safe delivery and for a healthy little girl.

Also... on the above ultrasound photo Steve and I are trying to decide whether Abby's arm bones look more like a pirate skull or the ginger bread cookie from Shrek. Feel free to add your interpretation of her interesting photo to the mix.

The Doctor's Visit

Steve joined us for Sparky's visit to the doctor's office this week. It wasn't really a very eventful visit for Sparky and I, so I'm sure Steve found it much more interesting than we did. We heard Sparky's heartbeat and we were measuring at the right size for 33 weeks. The doctor said we have been doing so well monitoring my sugar level that he thinks we can probably go all the way to week 39 before inducing labor. I was not too excited about that idea - I was thinking 37 or 38 weeks sounded just fine to me. Of course, that is why he is the doctor and I am not.

We are scheduled for an ultrasound next Tuesday to check Sparky's height and weight. I am really excited to get another peek of her. We're also going to be sure to have the technician confirm that Sparky is a girl - if she's not then she will be a little boy with a lot of pink and purple clothing. But they were 99.9 percent sure Sparky was a girl at 20 weeks, so I'm sure we won't have any surprises.

We have continued to have an uneventful pregnancy. Sparky is moving a lot, but it is a very different movement now that she is so big. We've started to get things washed, set up, and assembled for her big arrival. Last weekend we created a baby first aid kit just in case our little girl needs a band-aid or has a fever. My afghan is coming along well - I have 2/3rds of it sewn together.

Steve is taking his licensure boards this weekend, so Sparky, Maize, and I will be cleaning and catching up on rest.

SPOILER ALERT - IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO KNOW THE GENDER OF SPARKY DO NOT READ

Today was Sparky's 20 week ultrasound so that we could make sure everything was growing well and in the right places. The ultrasound technician was amazed at Sparky's cooperation and said excellent photos and measurements were taken. Of course we are very proud of our little one for her excellent cooperation this morning. That's right folks - Sparky is a she. We will now have to apologize to her for the first 20 weeks of refering to her as a he.

The techinican said Sparky looked very healthy and was right on track for growth and development. And the technician was very sure that Sparky was a she - so were Steve and I from the very first image we got of our little one.

Our baby is a very active little gal - there was lots of moving and stretching and kicking going on during the entire ultrasound. We are hoping that she inherits her father's more mellow personality and calms down after she's born. My belly didn't grow this week and I'm still feeling great. Below are the official shots of Sparky from her ultrasound.

Peek-A-Boo (Or... The Story of an Obstinate Child)

Sparky did not feel very cooperative this morning. Steve and I arrived on time for our appointment with the obstetrician, but Sparky was not feeling friendly and decided it would be an appropriate time to hide from the Doppler heartbeat monitor. So, the doctor was rather worried that we couldn't find a heartbeat and decided that an immediate trip over to the ultrasound room was in order. A few minutes later Steve, the doctor, and I met Sparky for the first time. He was moving around quite a bit - especially with his little arms. The end of the story is that everything is fine, Sparky is in fact 10 weeks old and due April 21st or 22nd, and apparently I am going to be in for a few months as a human punching bag in the very near future.So, rather than post a picture of how big I look at 10 weeks, we will post a picture of how big Sparky looks at 10 weeks. Sparky is about 3.42 centimeters long and very active. He has also inherited the Hodges stubborn streak. Our next check-up is in 4 weeks and we will be checking in on Sparky's growth in another 10 or 12 weeks.