17 weeks!

Yes, I know I just posted a 16 week picture when I am, in fact, 17 weeks pregnant right now, but I've been sick, and busy. :o)

At 17 weeks the baby is about 5 inches long from crown to rump, and would be about 9 inches if s/he could stretch out. I think that would be mighty uncomfortable, so thankfully for me, baby can't. S/he weighs about 5 oz. (think turnip) and no longer looks quite as alien as the eyes have moved from the sides of the head to the front. Light sensitivity is functioning, and baby can hear my heartbeat, although probably not much else right now.

I can feel flutters and light jabs at least a couple times a day, and Joe was delighted to feel a kick on Saturday morning. We were supposed to have a prenatal appointment last week, but our midwife had a birth, so we're rescheduled for this week.

We're still undecided on middle names, and have mutually agreed to just table that discussion for a while. I've presently got two dilemmas I'm puzzling. The first is deciding exactly where we're going to put the birth pool, since we're in much more confined quarters than our last two homebirths. It's going to have to go upstairs, since I want to have a bed on the same level, but there is no way it will fit in our room. Shortly after we moved in, we gave the boys the biggest bedroom since they spend more time the their room than we do. It also made sense considering they have way more stuff in their space than us. Our room isn't the smallest bedroom, but we have a king size sleigh bed in it, so unless we put the pool on the bed, it ain't gonna happen. I'm thinking we'll probably have to put it in the boys room (providing we get all the toys put away in early labor) but then we arrive at the other brain boggle I have, and that is where the kids are going to be during the birth.

At our other two births, we were downstairs in the lower level with a bedroom, sitting room, and bathroom, and the kids were upstairs in the main living space with my mom. Here, we don't have that option. The kids have already expressed a desire to see the baby born, which I'm fine with for the most part. The concern is whether having them here will distract Joe and take him away from the role he has for helping me birth. I've no doubt when I'm in "the zone" I wouldn't care if a marching band came through the room, but Joe is always very involved in helping me through labor, and we're not sure how the kids being present would affect his focus. I realize we have plenty of time to figure this stuff out, but I think if the kids are going to be here we need to start preparing them now.

How about this? Everyone pray I go into labor at like 9pm, and have the baby an hour or so later while they're all sleeping. After a 29 hour birth and a 27 hour birth, a one hour birth might be a nice change! :o)

15 weeks already!

I've been sort of distracted lately, and realized that I hadn't taken any belly photos, nor have I looked up the baby's development for a while. I'm in my 15th week, which means the baby is four inches long from crown to rump, is beginning to grow fingernails and toenails, and is able to sense light. I'm not feeling movement yet, but I expect to soon. I'll try to get a picture taken this week...the old saying that things "fall out" faster with subsequent pregnancies is very true in my case!

It occurred to me a couple of days ago, that as this pregnancy lines up with Mia's, it's been exactly four years since I was this pregnant. It's amazing how much you forget. Zack and Dom are 20 months apart, and Dom and Mia are 26 months apart, so this is a large gap for me. It's almost like the first time again. Joe seems to have also forgotten. He rubbed my already bulging belly the other night and said with a very large grin, "Wow, you're gonna get huge aren't you?" Not all the growth has been as...amusing for me. The women will understand...I went up three cup sizes in about a week and a half. Yeah...ow.

I had a blood test a few weeks ago, and am no longer anemic, which is a huge relief. I'm still more tired than I remember being in my other pregnancies at this time, but I think it's water and protein intake related...I often forget to drink and snack, so I've got to watch that.

We're pretty sure we've decided on first names for both genders, which would make this the easiest and earliest we've ever resolved that issue. Now the dilemma is middle names...that may take a while. We don't like to find out the gender before the birth, and I'm not one of those women who "knows" if it's a girl or boy during the pregnancy. Mia has decided it's a girl, and the boys say it's a boy, so no help there. They ask me every couple of days when the baby is coming out. A few days ago, Mia asked that and I told her Mommy's belly was going to get a lot bigger first. Her eyes got huge and she said, "Big like Daddy's?" I don't care who you are, that's funny. Joe thought so too.

Our family is growing!!

Joe and I were surprised, but thrilled to find out at the end of December that I was pregnant again. While we weren't trying for another so soon, we weren't abstaining either, and were open to the idea of another pregnancy whenever we were blessed with one. Our OB told us that there is no increased concern in relation to how close this pregnancy is to the miscarriage.

We had some wonky blood work at first, and there was concern about a possible ectopic situation, but everything turned out to be fine. I'm just reaching the end of my first trimester, and everything looks great. We had an ultrasound a few weeks ago at roughly 8 weeks gestation , and were told that if everything looked good at 8 weeks, there is a 97-98% chance that the pregnancy will be fine. We've got one baby, right where s/he belongs, with a good heartbeat! I've been dealing with a lot of anxiety over the last couple of months, but now that it looks like we're in the clear, I'm starting to relax and look forward to being pregnant again.

I've gotten several different due dates, and since I usually carry until 41 weeks, we expect the bean to arrive mid-September...right around Mia's birthday. I can't believe she's going to be 4!

I've been really, really tired, but part of that is probably still anemia from the miscarriage blood loss I had. We'll find out how anemic I still am when I get blood work done next week, but I'm back on the iron supplements and trying to eat as much as I can...I DO NOT recommend orthodontic treatment during pregnancy.

We're planning another home birth, which is a totally different ball of wax in a legal state vs. an illegal one...and a little more annoying, but I'll probably get into that in later posts.

I've decided we're going to keep schooling right through the summer, so that when school starts next year (right when the baby is due) the boys won't get behind when I slow things down for a bit after the birth.

I guess that's the pregnancy news in a nutshell!