Thursday: Day of News & Appointments
Anyway, we returned from Alaska on Wednesday night and had several appointments the next morning including our mid-pregnancy ultrasound.
As most of you know, John and I are waiting until the baby is born to find out what it is. Luckily, we only had to turn away once during the ultrasound (while the femur was being measured). Just to clear the air, nobody but the ultrasound technician knows what our baby is! She didn't even put it in her report so our OB doesn't know either.
Our baby's heart beat is strong as usual and everything looked great. They check brain, neck/spine, heart and take lots of measurements. In fact, the technician said our baby was measuring a full week ahead a time. I am pretty sure that our due date of Dec 8 is pretty accurate (and our OB concurred) so it means that we are likely having a larger baby. That doesn't surprise me given what I know about John and I. I expect that we will have a long baby. :)
During that ultrasound, I felt the baby move for the first time. I felt two little movements and then had the technican tell me that the baby had hiccups. :) It was cool and the baby pretty much started moving regularly from that point forward (several times a day).
The next appointment we had that day was with my rheumatologist. I think most of you know that I suffer from an autoimmune arthritis that in the past has made my life a lot of fun. Luckily, I've had it under control for the past few years and my pregnancy was suppose to stay in remission for the length of my pregnancy. Unfortunately, I'm part of the 20% that this doesn't happen with so I've been dealing with with some flare-ups the last couple of months. This last month has been the worst of it. Luckily, I'm back on my meds and it's slowing going back to normal. Just giving me a taste of the need to slow down...
Lastly, and also before lunch, John found out he passed his CISSP exam. I knew he would. I am very proud of him and I know how hard he worked/studied for that exam.
Since then...
Since that Thursday, John has continued his job search and has definitely noticed an increase in the number of IT jobs he is qualified for and interested in! Please pray that God will open one of these doors soon. It's been nice to see him excited about the possibilites and somewhat contagious. Who knows where he'll end up.
As I mentioned above, Baby started moving regularly and noticably from about 20 weeks until a week ago. It got to the point that I actually saw the baby move under my skin. It was a little crazy to see it out of the corner of my eye and then actually watch my skin move on it's own. John got to see it, too. In fact, last weekend, I told John to say "Hi" to the baby and see if Baby would jump. He didn't think anything would happen...but lo and behold, he said "hi" and a split second later, the baby kicked in that vacinity. John's been able to do that a few more times with similar results.
In the past week, the movements have become less noticable but I am also noticing that my stomach is getting higher. I read that the decreased movement is likely due to the fact that the baby is kicking higher and therefore less noticeable (more to cushion) or the baby is kicking in the other direction. I do want to say that I am still feeling movement. The other day, I was driving home from work and started singing a really great song. As soon as I started, Baby started moving/kicking too. It almost made me cry (yes, I've been a little hormonal this week).
John and I are still working on cleaning our own clutter and our office. It helps that my arthritis is starting to feel better and I can move easier and pain-free. It's still slow but we are making progress. Luckily, we've cleaned out enough to set up the changing table I found on Craigslist last week. That was exciting. We finally have somewhere to put some of the baby stuff we are accumulating until we get the nursery set-up.
We're trying to get this project wrapped up by Labor Day weekend so we aren't having to try to deal with it the last few months of my pregnancy and when work and normal activities start to pick back up. So at the end of the month, our office will be cleared out, our bedroom will house a single desk and our nursery/guest bedroom will house a guest bed, changing table, and baby storage set-ups. We'll just be missing the crib and some other odds and ends.
Before we know it,it'll be December. Other than that, we are just trying to make sure that we take it one day at a time and not look too far forward or too far back. I'll write more in a few weeks.
