Peek-A-Boo!

Apparently The Littlest Wilson has figured out this whole ultrasound thing and has decided that he'd rather not have his picture taken. He may feel somewhat exposed after I plastered that perfect head-on shot we got at 20 weeks all the hell over the place. I should have asked his permission. In any case, he was definitely not in the mood to smile for the 3D wand this time around, preferring to keep his tight little fists where they usually are: directly in front of his face. The only trouble is, he's getting so big these days that it's harder and harder to sneak a peek around his hands and arms. The tech did her best, but this 2D profile was about as good as it got. It's not a very accurate profile in my opinion either, as he had just finished doing what could only be described as the yogic Lion's Pose, chin to chest, tongue out and all. So either he's got the lips all Sean's doctor's patients are after, or he's making a kissy-face.

I guess seeing this picture is a different experience for me having watched the live images on the screen. It was immediately apparent which gray fuzzy thing was what body part. But after seeing the reaction of several people to whom I showed the picture, I'm beginning to understand that this one is more like one of those Magic Eye images--no one has any idea what they're seeing at first glance. I think it's mostly because he is so much bigger than the last time, and his head and chest now fills up the entire screen, where the last picture showed all the way down to his little knees. What you are seeing is his profile. He's lying on his back, face up, head on the right side. His forehead and eye are somewhat in the shadows, but the bright area in the center is (from right to left) his nose, lips, chin, and the sharp dark pie-shape is the negative space between his chin and chest. The sort-of ball like shape just to the left of center near the top is his right fist and the shape all the way at the left edge of the image is his left arm and fist. We did confirm that he is currently in a transverse position with his butt and feet at the top right of my belly, and his head resting snugly (and I mean SNUGLY) between my hip bone and my bladder. There is a direct correlation between this and the facts that 1) I have a lopsided belly, and 2) I take no fewer than four trips to the loo a night. I sure hope he's enjoying that little pillow he's found. 

Very Real Birth...

This weekend, Sean and I attended childbirth classes at RealBirth in Chelsea. We were referred to the program by our neighbors James and Elana (parents to Chloe) and we're so glad we went! Of the many benefits of choosing RealBirth was that they offer the six-hours-per-day weekend course, which Sean was better able to fit into his travel-heavy schedule. Normally these classes are one evening per week spread out over several weeks. When able to be digested over that time, I wonder if the experience is a little less...intense? Too late now--we went the extreme route.

Two straight days of birthing education was somewhat daunting. There was a ton of priceless information. Almost everything our teacher Meredith said was noteworthy. But shockingly, I was the only person in the class with a notebook and pen so I self consciously kept my note taking to a minimum, thereby ending up with one page of short phrases double and triple underlined and employing the maximum amount of exclamation points. And despite our teacher's warning that we were likely to forget 99% of what she taught us, I am pretty certain that I committed the majority of the syllabus to memory verbatim. Trauma has that effect on me.

There were a few points at which I began to feel so incredibly overwhelmed and anxious at the prospect of the impending birth, which Meredith kept insisting we were all too committed at this point to avoid, that my palms started to sweat and tears welled up in my eyes. Sean noted that I kept turning to him and saying,"I love you," which he took to mean "don't leave me now, you bastard!" And poor Sean...until the first of several explicit videos, he really did think labor was like in the movies: the expectant mother's water breaks in the middle of dinner at a fancy restaurant, thence commences copious amounts of comical huffing and puffing during the madcap taxi ride, she is wheeled into the hospital where hilarity ensues until a free room is located and she is strapped into a bed at the very moment the baby is crowing, and with a couple of red-faced pushes and expletives, the baby is born. Instead we were informed that, unless the labor is yours, the process is long and boring enough to drive a person mad. I think it was a rude awakening, but he handled it well.

Did I mention that the title of our class was "Childbirth with Epidural?" Sean and I had no illusions going into this thing that medication would be entirely avoidable and wanted to know all options available to us. Another of the benefits to attending RealBirth as opposed to the classes offered by our hospital is that we were made aware of the instances when hospital policy might be cloaked as either the rule of the law or medical necessity. This will equip us to make informed decisions about our care while we're there, and to remain as much in control of the birthing process as we'd like. A good example of this is that, as it turns out, it is never too late to receive an epidural--a fact that screenplay writers everywhere completely ignore, much like the fact that the breaking of the waters occurs first in only a small percentage of births. Who knew? Much less dramatic, I suppose, and it would require searching out another comic device when most people are none the wiser. 

Aside from the specifics that we took away from the class, I think I can identify the two most important things that I learned. First, just having a rudimentary understanding of the physiology of birth will be invaluable in understanding what we are experiencing while in the moment, and opens up a whole variety of options to us for assisting the process and coping with the pain--be it with or without medication. The second, and probably most important, is that birthing is a natural process and, as Meredith really burned into my memory, one that works extremely safely and well in the vast majority of cases. 

It's so helpful to know which parts of the average birthing experience have been born of the institutionalization and sterilization of the process in our culture, and which we can choose to go with or reject. At this time when so much of our lives is up in the air, having a sense that the birth will be what we want it to be--however much of an illusion that is--gives us both great comfort and relief. But, lest you should be at all concerned, please know that we foster no illusions that anything will be in our control once the Littlest has arrived...

Great Brown Bob

The Littlest Wilson lost a great grandpa on Monday night.

We were so lucky to get back to Ohio for Thanksgiving while Bob was still able to spend time awake and talking. I wish he could have stuck around till the little guy came, but thankfully his battle was relatively short. 

Bob will be missed terribly by his colleagues and students at Case, his fellow sailors at Edgewater, his family and friends, and by my Grandma, his wife and companion of thirty years. 

He was a part of my life as far back as I can remember. I was always Missica to him, and he'll always be Brown Bob to me. To The Littlest, he'll be Great Brown Bob.

My Beautiful Boy!

Beautiful? We think so, of course. 

We've been staring at 3D ultrasound images since Day 1 of this pregnancy and making comments about how strange the babies look at the various stages of development. In the first trimester, though "cute" in their own little way, the fetuses look more like strange little creatures. You still feel a certain affinity for them, obviously, but it's kind of along the lines of thinking E.T. the Extra Terrestrial or hairless baby pandas are "cute." Then, as the ears position themselves correctly and the little beady eyes move to the front of the head where they're supposed to be and the legs grow more proportionate so the kid isn't all head and belly anymore, you can start to relate to the little guy as a parent. It's a baby PERSON!! Thank god. Except he looks more like an old guy instead of a pudgy little baby. If you've read anything on fetal development, you know this is because he has not yet developed the fat stores that babies need in order to survive outside the womb. I am already doing my job keeping him nice and warm, thank you very much. 

Maybe because of the lack of baby fat, his features are very distinguishable! From the beginning, this little guy has been a mover and shaker, and he lived up to his reputation during the 21 week scan too. The ultrasound technician was getting great images, but just as soon as the image would resolve clearly on the screen (there's a slight delay, like when a video is buffering on the Internet), the baby would move again, distorting the picture. So while it certainly is a more accurate representation of what the baby's face actually looks like than the usual 2D sonogram snaps that give cross-sections and great profile shots, it still ends up looking a little bit funky. Oddly, the feature that came out the best in every picture is the umbilical cord, which has an uncanny habit of getting right in the way of everything, and as the technician noted, was apparently irritating the baby causing him to try to move it out of his way. 

We've gotten mixed reviews of this latest portrait. Most people have been blown away at the picture. It is pretty cool. My mom thinks he's perfect (as usual, she is right). My step-mom thinks he has my cheekbones. My dad thinks he has my Ya-ya's nose (which my dad also has). My first thought was that he looks just like my brother did when he was little, who looked like my dad when he was little. Upon further scrutiny, I believe he has Sean's brow bone and the same pensive little look Sean gets when reviewing my latest credit card statement (or shooing that pesky umbilical cord out of the way). Sean was, as a good father should be, absolutely captivated and in total awe of this striking image of his son. Before this picture, we could only imagine what he might look like in there, and now suddenly we know the shape of his little mouth. His eyes have not opened yet (and won't for quite a while), and no, he is not preparing for Halloween as Pugsley Addams--that dark "widows peak" on the top of his head is actually the area where his skull has not fused together.

Baby Spasm

Okay, so I suppose I asked for it. 

The entire first trimester of this pregnancy, although I knew I was pregnant on an intellectual level, and dispite the assurances of several trained medical professionals, three or more pregnancy tests ranging from the pee-on-a-stick kind to the blood test kind, the aching Plantar fasciitus and arthritis flareups, the ever-expanding belly, and cravings for Apple Jacks and 'Nanner Puddin' and spinach dip, I STILL had a hard time believing I was actually pregnant. 

That is, until the last two weeks or so, durning which time the little bugger has put on enough weight that those dives and twists and squirms and kicks witnessed in the 11 week scan actually feel like something. The picture to the left will give you a good idea of what we're dealing with here (only that illustrated bitch's boobs are still sticking out farther than her stomach. Psha.). I've been told that "quickening" would be like having butterflies. Not so much. Butterflies are kind of tickly and happen higher up near your diaphragm, the mere proximity to which causes that lurching feeling (for me, anyway). This feels more like an involuntary eye twitch, only not in your eye. Like a mild muscle spasm inside, in a place where not much else has ever previously been felt, and that doesn't seem to stop. Ever. I swear, if this kid is already moving as much as it feels like he is, we're in for it. I joked with Sean this morning that all night I was getting it from both of them--Sean kicking me as he usually does, dreaming that he's playing a game of soccer as if his life depends on how hard he kicks the ball (my leg), and this little guy, doing whatever he's doing inside my belly, all night long. 

At this point, his little movements are still very vague. They sometimes feel like rolling and writhing, and sometimes like little tap-tap-taps. Before I was able to feel him, I was looking forward to our next scan as I usually do, to actually be able to see him, and to know that he's okay and everything is progressing well developmentally, and to see how much he's changed since the last scan. Now there's another layer to my anticipation. I can't wait to be able to see what he's doing, and to match that with what I'm feeling from the inside. I'm also wondering whether we'll be able to see him "react" to anything in this next scan. Like, will his head turn if he hears Sean's voice? Maybe we'll do a little experiment. 

Chuck Norris? No, Sean Wilson!

What's faster than a speeing bullet? SEAN IS!! Ok...maybe he's not faster, but he certainly has more stamina and determination. And he's no slow-poke, either.

Yesterday Sean competed in the Lake George Triathlon, which is an Olympic distance tri sanctioned by the USAT. For those of you not familiar with the world of triathlons (myself included), this means a .9 mile (1500 meter) swim, 24.8 mile (40km) bike ride, and 6.2 mile (10km) run, or in other words, torture on a stick. People do this for fun, you ask? Yes! Apparently large numbers of them. Just ask my uncle Josh and aunt Daran and our good friend James, who are triatho-masochists in their own right. In fact, we have James to thank for getting Sean involved in the triathlon circuit to begin with, but that's a whole other post...

Sadly, I had to work both Saturday and Sunday, so the Littlest Wilson and Sadie and I held down the fort and rooted for Sean via BlackBerry Messenger. Not very effective, but what can you do. Here is what I've pried out of Sean about the whole experience:

Going in to it, his goal was just to finish, seeing as how he's never competed in an event like this before. He did a lot to prepare. Already an avid runner, he loaded up on all the gear for the swim and bike legs. He trained at the pool at Stevens Institute and put in a lot of milage on this contraption that turns a road bike into a stationary one. He even read a lot about swiming and biking techniques, the best ways to rehydrate, and other helpful tips and tricks. When it came to race day, though he says he's not in the best shape of his life, he was incredibly psycologically and emotionally prepared, which in the end was what gave him a leg-up.

As for the race itself, the most difficult part was the swim, which was the first leg. Half way through he had to take a breather by floating on his back, but he powered through the rest and made it to shore in one piece. Apparently, having sprayed Pam on his thighs and neck did wonders for peeling off his wetsuit. Did I mention that it was pouring rain the entire time? This made for an exciting bike leg. Sean was advised in one of his books or magazines to let 10psi out of his tires in the event of rain, and to look out for certain obstacles on a slick road. The course for the race was very hilly, and paired with the rain, this caused several contestants to hit the pavement. Sean erred on the side of caution by not speeding through the downhills and managed to avoid any wipeouts--not even a skinned knee! The last leg of the race was the run. Thanks to James, Sean knew to expect to feel serious fatigue in his thighs which he might have mistaken for cramping. Luckily he was able to push through it, and by two miles into the run, he says he was feeling really good. He was even passing people left and right, and sprinted a little towards the end. His overall time was 3:21. 

Shockingly, Sean woke up today a bit stiff but totally energized and fully mobile. He said he might even go for a run. In retrospect, he thinks he can definitely improve his bike and run times by not being so conservative--and drier weather would have helped, too!  I'm pretty sure there will be future tris during which he can test these theories. We both foresee this being a family event in the future. The next tri posting will include a picture taken at the actual race, not here in our living room. 

No Place for Politics...

Sean and I very are lucky to have a family and friends who represent a diverse range of personalities and lifestyles and political opinions, and partly because of this, I decided when I started this blog not to venture into the dangerous waters of the current political scene. After all, this space isn't really intended to be just a venting vehicle for me, however much it may appear to be...

However... it's becoming increasingly difficult for me to NOT comment on recent and impending events! Putting aside my own ideologies informed by my experiences growing up in a rather liberal environment and studying what I did in school, I now have a totally fresh perspective based almost entirely on being an expectant mom with concerns for what my kids will inheret when it comes to our economy, the environment, the perception of America by the rest of the world, our basic human rights...the list goes on and on (and so did that sentance!). While I am so thrilled to be able to provide a life for our son where I will likely not have to work, where we can afford a lovely home and lots of luxuries, where he is surrounded by friends and family and is healthy and physically safe, still I'm very afraid of the things that are happening just outside our little comfortable bubble.

The upcoming election will determine so much about the world that our son will come to know, in, at the very least, his early years. Sean is so concerned about the outcome that he registered to vote for the first time in order to cast a ballot in the primaries, and we'll most certainly be at the polls first thing in November. I just hope that the growing numbers of people who are disgusted with the direction this country is headed, both here and afar, turn out to vote that day too. Of course, they did for the last two elections and look what happened anyway.

A Note About The Littlest Wilson Group

To those of you who've joined the Google Group to receive email notifications for updates to The Littlest Wilson blog, thanks so much again for your interest in keeping up with what's going on here in Hoboken! 

The whole point of the blog was to give family and friends updates in a unobtrusive manner....however, the email thing can get out of hand pretty quickly thanks to the "reply" button (I'm guilty myself). The last thing we want is for you to get tired of hearing from us!

So, please note that replying to any emails you receive from the Google Group will now ONLY come to me--or should, based on the adjustments I've made. This means that if you want to post a note for the group to see, or for anyone who logs on to the blog itself, just hit the little "comments " icon at the bottom of the posting at thelittlestwilson.blogspot.com and you can leave a comment directly on the site.

If you are a member of the Google Group, you can adjust your notification options by going to http://groups.google.com/group/thelittlestwilson, logging in, and selecting "Edit My Membership" on the right side of the page. There you will have a choice as to the number, if any, of email updates you recieve daily. I would suggest no more than one...

Again, thanks so much for being involved and caring friends and family. I've added some links to Wilson Family Photo Albums and updated the slideshow, so check in when you get a chance. Hope you're all having a wonderfully relaxing weekend!

Survey Says...

Loyal blog-checker-inners may have noticed that the poll on the right has closed a bit earlier than originally anticipated...

This is because we got a nice surprise at our doctor's appointment on Friday when we went in for our routine monthly check-up. After conning our doctor into putting us on the sonogram schedule (I said I was concerned about the fibroid the technician detected at my last sonogram...which is mostly true) so that Sean could experience a live ultrasound, we got an unorthodox 15-week scan that-- lo and behold!-- left no question as to the sex of our baby, even five weeks before we expected to find out. We're having a boy!

The second to last scan at the left is an image of the baby as though he's sitting on the camera. His bottom is to the lower right, his left foot is top center--what a perfect little foot!!-- and you 

can make out his right thigh bone and right heel parallel to it. You will notice an unmistakable "object" between his two little legs.

I haven't determined what, if any, the prize will be for those who guessed correctly. You might all just have to be content with one "nah-nah-na-nooney, I told you so" aimed directly at me, who (despite all those tales of motherly instinct and the like), really thought it was going to be a girl.

Sean's reaction to the experience of the sonogram was very similar to mine at that first one three weeks ago. Although I spent countless hours trying to describe in full detail my surprise at just how active the baby was and the surreal-ness of seeing the baby wriggle and squirm like a real, live little person on the screen, Sean was nevertheless completely blown away at the sight of his son. He could hardly keep it together. It's so amazing  to have the images from two scans just weeks apart--they show just how rapidly the baby is  growing! In the last scan, his head was about 1/2 the length of his body, and in this scan, he is already much more proportionate. We could see his heart beating and his arms and legs moving, but he wasn't quite as hopped-up and hyper as he was a couple weeks ago when he was literally bouncing off the walls. In fact, it almost seemed like he was napping, and he seems to like to keep his arms up near his face so that when they're long enough, they'll reach over his head, which is, incidentally, the way I sleep. Like mother, like son.

Another fantastic surprise is that our doctor's office has the ability to do 3D ultrasounds! This was totally unexpected, and even though I've been pouring over the book our neighbors gave us that has 3D scans of babies on each day of gestation, it was a totally amazing experience to see our own baby in three dimensions. The first two scans (actually the last two pictures taken) are the 3D images.

Now Sean and I are getting used to the idea of having a son. It's so strange to know! We have our next appointment in two weeks for another series of tests, and then another routine visit with the 19-week scan a few weeks later. So far, he looks totally healthy and "normal," and pretty darned handsome in these pictures...but then, I'm biased.

The Gnome Gnotebook: Current Events

April 1979

Daddy thought you might be interested in knowing about the goings-on in the world when you were 6 months old, so here's a brief and very general run-down:

Jimmy Carter is the President of the U.S.A., Dennis Kucinich is Mayor of Cleveland (ugh!)

A loaf of bread costs $.79, and regular gas is around $.72 a gallon. Daddy's paycheck is $225.00 per week, and our rent is $300.00 per month. Groceries cost approx. 50-60 dollars a week, and somehow we're always broke!

On the international money market, gold is worth $232.00 an ounce.

On the international political front, Israel and Egypt just signed a peace-treaty (after 30 years of war), China's invasion of N. Vietnam ended in a retreat, and the rest of the world is somewhat tense, but at peace.

Despite the loud complaints about inflation and nuclear power plants, this seems to be a time of general contentment and prosperity for the people in America.

And they still haven't found a cure for the common cold!!

The Gnome Gnotebook

In October of 2006, my mom came to visit as she usually does around my birthday every year. This particular visit was special because Sean and I had just moved into our very first home (the same one we're in now) and of course, we needed my mom's curtain rod hanging expertise and designer's advice (are you sensing a pattern here? I promise she's not ill-used). Come to think of it, my mom's birthday visits are always timely--the year before was pretty special too, as it was the weekend just after Sean and I had gotten engaged and we were able to go to Suky Rosan to pick out my wedding dress. Good timing, mom! Anyway...

She always brings a bag of beautifully wrapped birthday presents--usually handmade scarves and jewelry from her friend Carol's store, Badawang, or candles or a bound journal or a really great book or two. This time she also brought The Gnome Gnotebook. In the living room of the house on Briarwood where we lived from the time my brother was born until I went to college, I often saw this book sitting on one of the built-in shelves that flanked our fireplace. But I never really knew what it was, I don't think. It didn't have pictures, and therefore, it didn't interest me. And besides, we had another book of gnomes that was far more captivating.

In any event, I suppose she thought that the buying of our first home together signified that Sean and I were ready to start a family, and what better way to acknowledge that than to hand off the record of that very same time in her life? Er, actually, she definitely thought that, as I just realized that the inscription from October 2006 reads "...and now that you and Sean are getting closer to starting your own family, I thought this would be the right time to finally give it to you." (I'm very insightful.) There were no blogs in 1978, after all, and so she had to hand write everything in pen in this little hardbound journal. The pages are ruled in blue with pink margin lines and a little drawing of a reading gnome sits in the lower outer corner of each page. There are 100 pages all together. The first page lists the vitals of my birth--time and date, weight, length, location, a description of my hair and eyes, and this: "with all 10 fingers, 10 toes, and lungs in very good working order!" At the bottom of the page is a tiny lock of hair.

The first entry is dated April 30, 1979, when I would have been six and a half months old. It's a recounting of the day before (my aunt and uncle's wedding), the day of, and the day after my birth. Clearly, enough time had passed that her memory of events had been veiled in the haze of euphoria that is new motherhood (read: exhaustion or denial, or both). She writes, "...the doctor told me to "push." Then, at 12:06, POP! You showed yourself to us for the first time." She also describes my Grandma and Dad, red-faced and perspiring, and says, "as hard as we worked, they worked even harder!" Woah, mom. The truly amazing thing is that I bet she really believed that, too. She was probably even apologizing at the time for the terrible inconvenience.

My family's pediatrician, Dr. Sundaresh, told my mom a poem when he came to examine me. The poem goes a little something like this:

A son's a son
Till he finds a wife,
But a daughter's a daughter
The rest of your life!

Huh? Sweet, I suppose, for 1978.

There are so many revealing entries in this journal--I can't wait to explore more in future posts. And I guess it stands to reason that a lot of what's written is about my mom being proud of me as her daughter and about our relationship as mother and daughter. It would have been a completely different story if I'd been a son. Revisiting the Gnome Gnotebook and seeing it from this perspective has made me think really hard about the sex of our baby. There was a slim possibility that the tech could have determined the sex from yesterday's ultrasound, but it wouldn't have been conclusive until later anyway. I think about whether I have a feeling, one way or the other--whether I have the slightest inkling or instinct about what the sex will be, or whether I have a preference. Part of me, a very large part, hopes for a girl because I am girl--a first born to a first born--and that has so shaped my relationship with my mom, which has in turn been so central to who I am as a person. I think in so many ways and for so many reasons that I'd be a better mom to a little girl because I KNOW it, I lived it. On the other hand, every person is different. Even if my first born is a girl, there's no telling what my relationship with her will be like since her personality will be different than mine, and mine as a mother is different than my mom's was. We're also in such completely different places in our lives, my mom having me at 20 and me having my first at 30, and with completely different family situations, my mom being surrounded by her family in her hometown and me not having any family nearby at all. Too many variables to guarantee that anything would be the same.

Then there's the part of me that's always imagined having a son that I could raise to be tough and sweet, smart and wise, and who would teach me to let go a little more. I've often thought about what it would be like to have had an older brother to stand up for me and protect me and to look up to. I also think it would be an amazing insight into the secret life of my husband--the part of him that I don't know because I didn't know him when he was little. He is an oldest son, and to watch him parent an oldest son would be like having a window into his life that he couldn't possibly know how to open otherwise. Talk about a two-for. That would be a really amazing gift.

I guess the point is that it doesn't matter, which is probably the conclusion that most expectant parents come to nowadays (since hopefully there aren't too many people espousing the sentiments of my pediatrician's poem anymore). Still, it doesn't make me any less curious!

I KNEW it!

Mothers are always right. Remember way back (six whole weeks ago) when we went for our first ultrasound and the tech determined the age of the baby was 7 weeks 3 days? Remember how I insisted that the baby was actually 8 weeks old? Well, I was RIGHT! Today's ultrasound revealed the true age of the baby to be 13 weeks 1 day, meaning the first ultrasound was off by 5 days, making me right on the money. And five days is not a little bit of time in the life of a fetus.

So, I went today for the Nuchal Translucency scan at Hack. After, of course, doing just enough research on Down Syndrome and the other trisomies (not to mention Autism, for which you can't even test until the kid is like, a toddler) to get myself worked up into a mild frenzy. Luckily I had to drive myself (I really need to concentrate hard when I don't know where I'm going) and also there wasn't a whole lot of time in the waiting room, so I didn't get to think too much about it beforehand. Thank goodness.

It was my first time at the hospital and what I saw of it looked pretty nice. I wish I'd gotten the chance to look around more. The ultrasound tech was very sweet and very enthusiastic, which is fantastic considering that she takes pictures of strangers' fetuses day in and day out. She still managed to make my experience seem special. Or maybe our kid really is more impressive than others already. Hmmm...

Anyway, I walked in (Papouism) and laid down on the table, and she applied the gel and the ultrasound apparatus to my stomach, and even though I fully knew what to expect, I can't even describe the thrill I felt when the fuzzy, rolling landscape on the little black and white screen suddenly morphed into a dark, kidney shaped hollow with an actual baby floating in it! We've seen pictures of our neighbor's scans (see link at right to 'the 'cawens') and seen countless pictures in books and online of what ultrasounds at 12-14 weeks look like, and I was fully prepared and really excited to see something that resembled a human--leaps and bounds from the Lil' Bean of week 7 (week 8, ha-HAH!). But nothing could have prepared me for the actual experience of it. Even though my little book says the baby is constantly moving, and that, "using the wall of the uterus as a springboard, he leaps up and down," I guess I didn't quite grasp the...I don't know...literal-ness (literality? hehe) of that statement. As in, when you see the ultrasound of your baby, it won't just be a still, silent portrait. It will show him twisting and turning, jumping, flexing his legs, reaching with his arms... Babies aren't asleep all the time in there, even though it is small and quiet and dark and really, really comfy. Seems silly that I didn't put the two together.

Or maybe I did, logically, but the reality is something all together different and totally visceral. Our baby really was jumping. It almost looked like hiccups because his little legs are so short in comparison to the rest of his body, but when the legs came into focus it was clear that they were bending and flexing and pushing off, and then his little head was hitting the top of the womb, sending him back to the bottom again. He was reaching his arms over his head, then putting his fingers in his mouth, then throwing the back of his hand against his forehead in despair (it's tough in there, I tell you!). He kicked his legs all way out in front of himself, and then tucked them back underneath, crossed at the ankles, and rubbed them together like my dad does when he's sleeping. When the tech moved around to get a shot of the "lower extremities," there was a moment when the plane in focus showed just his feet--perfect little soles with teeny, tiny toes! The tech was trying to get a clear profile picture for Sean since he wasn't able to be there, but every time that little face would come into focus, he'd just as quickly squirm and twist and wriggle around. The tech jiggled my belly pretty hard over and over and over, trying to get him to flip over when he faced away. I turned to one side, and then the other, hoping he would flip around too, then finally she tilted the top of the table back so that my feet were higher than my head, and he stopped. Maybe it was just the strange orientation--I don't think there have been many instances since I've been pregnant when my feet have been higher than my head (except for at Pilates), but whatever it was, it worked. He relaxed and she got this fabulous shot, and I heard the heartbeat again: 162 beats per minute, very loud and very strong.

Lest all you who voted "girl" get your panties in a bunch, I'm just calling the baby "he" today because that's what the techs do before the sex is determined (and because, frankly, "it" is getting tiresome). Last week I was saying "she." I'm not committing just yet, and we won't know for sure for another five or six weeks.

The Baby is Out of the Bag!!

What a relief.

We spent a beautiful day in New Hope yesterday, stuffing our faces and enjoying time with family. And finally, we were able to tell Sean's brother and sisters, though unfortunately, two were by phone anyway. Grandma Diana is thrilled because she's been keeping our secret (along with Grandpa Len) for the last seven weeks, and now she can shout it from the rooftops! And the baby got it's first presents--a Big Bird doll like one Sean had when he was little, a beautiful frame with spaces for pictures of each of the first 12 months, and a baby bootie bank with a crisp $20 from Stef's dad. Today I'll email this link to as many people as possible, and hopefully they will all take a look at The Littlest Wilson and catch up on all the fascinating stuff that I've been writing about and write comments and VOTE on the sex of the baby. I know for sure that Derek can't wait to read all about my doctor's appointments and Fetal Nuchal Translucency...

The first thing everyone asks when we tell them we're expecting is "How far along are you?" I guess there are two schools of thought when it comes to breaking baby news. Either you tell everyone you know as soon as you find out, whether that be at five weeks or twelve, or you wait until you're out of the woods, which is commonly known to be after the first trimester. Turns out that Sean is from the former school, and I, the latter. I made the decision to tell my bosses at work much earlier than I would have liked, but in an effort to explain why I had been acting so strangely as of late (tired all the time, cranky, peeing every two minutes, and my memory and ability to multi task right out the window). And we told specific people like our moms and dads and siblings and grandparents and closest friends as soon as we reasonably could. But it was really important to me to be able to wait to make it "public" until now (and I'm not even technically in my second trimester yet, but we just couldn't keep it to ourselves any longer!).

The more I think about it, the more interesting the difference in the two ways of thinking seems to me. Stef (Grandma D's fiance, henceforth known as Papou Stef) said "the Greeks don't tell anyone till after three months, and after the baby's born, no one comes to visit unless they're specifically invited until the kid is a few months old." There's a profound regard for the sanctity of the new family, almost like intruding would burst a protective bubble. Of course, that only applies to non-family! It's funny because I always thought of it as a personal preference thing, but I'm sure he's right--it's got more to do with culture, and that's just how my family was. Even my mom's side, which is more Jewish than anything, subscribes to that way of thinking, but then my Grandma (and consequently, my mom) always had a really intense respect for privacy and a person's right to share what they want to share when they want to share it.

For me, there is a line (albeit fine, and seemingly arbitrary to others) between what I feel comfortable sharing and what I don't. Sean doesn't get it sometimes and thinks I'm just really sensitive, and I admit that sometimes I do go a little overboard. If someone asks me a question that I'm not comfortable answering, I'd think it was an inappropriate question, whereas someone who doesn't mind sharing that kind of information would think it was perfectly fine. It's a really hard thing to gage, so as a rule, I err on the side of caution. For example, I always felt comfortable sharing that Sean and I want kids...but not whether we were trying for kids. I feel comfortable discussing the emotions that are involved in trying to conceive in vague terms, but I feel really uncomfortable when someone asks me how long it took Sean and me to get pregnant, and I would never ask anyone else that question. I might be more sensitive to that than the average person, but what those uncomfortable situations have reinforced for me is that you just never know. You never know what a person's comfort level is, and you never know what private difficulties they're dealing with.

Luckily, we're beyond all that! Now I just have to get comfortable with people touching my belly...

Something's Going On In There...

I was taking a shower yesterday and bent over to shave my leg (oooh, steamy!) when something blog-worthy happened: I felt something in my belly! Not movement--it's way too early for that--but a thing. A mass. A something that wasn't there before. It was the strangest feeling. I straightened back up, bent over again, straightened up, bent over a few more times to make sure it wasn't a fleeting feeling (read: indigestion. Thank you, progesterone). It didn't go away. And lo and behold, it's still here today. I have an inkling that this is just the beginning.

When Sean came home last night, I tried to explain it to him. The only way I could think to describe it is that, on a daily basis, I never really think about exactly what is going on inside of my abdomen. The only time that I'm aware of my stomach, for example, is when I have a stomach ache; my diaphragm, when I have hiccups; my uterus, when I have cramps (whooohoo! no more!). Over the past month or so, I've basically just felt a constant state of uncomfortable fullness, like after Thanksgiving dinner. But it hasn't been such that I've been aware of any specific, particular changes going on in there, and I certainly haven't "felt pregnant." Sure, I stopped being able to suck in my stomach at all, and then it actually started sticking out...but it just felt and looked like I'd had "an extra big meal with lots of salt and liquor" (according to JLRB!).

Today, it's different. That feeling in the shower? That was actually being able to feel my growing womb. How come no one told me about this? I know it should have been a foregone conclusion, but let me assure you, it was not. Everyone told me about the amazing rush of relief and joy we'd feel when we heard the heartbeat for the first time, confirming that there really was a baby in there (that was true), and that finding out the sex of the baby would be another of those mind blowing, life changing experiences. And it should seem absolutely obvious that at some point along the way, I should actually being to feel the thing that's growing inside of me.

But it wasn't. It was a total surprise. And made me laugh out loud! I still don't really "feel pregnant," but at least this is one step closer.

Today we go to New Hope to spend the day with Sean's family. It's gorgeous--breezy and sunny and a little cool. After today, the baby will officially be out of the bag.

11 Weeks and Counting...

Ok, so once again my expectations for my most recent doctor's appointment were not met. Dammit! I think I've learned the lesson though, which is simply not to have expectations. Everyone's doctor is different and everyone's pregnancy is different, and I'll know better next time around I suppose, blah blah blah. Still, at this stage in the game when I really don't 'feel pregnant' yet, I'm totally reliant on the pictures of what in heck is going on inside of my body. And while pictures of strangers' uteruses (uteri?) are helpful from a logical standpoint, they're just not doing it for the illogical side of me (which, these days, is approximately 99.8% of myself). Hence the stock photo of some strange fetus in some strange womb in the 11th week, which is where Lil' B is now. It somehow reminds me of the Japanese flag. Cute, but not as cute as ours. This week you are to note the very well developed joints, which allow the baby to do somersaults and bounce around off the walls of the sac (no, I am not making this up), the budding fingernail beds (nails come next week), and that the eyes are moving around to the front of the head and the spine is straightening. Woohoo! Now that's progress. And it seems to be a little more than two inches long, or about the size of my engagement ring (just kidding). I'm looking around trying to find something comparable and I don't seem to own anything that's two inches long. How odd. Oh wait! My thumb is a little more than two inches from just above the first joint. Cool. Thumb Baby.

I'm exaggerating about the level of disappointment with my doctor's appointment. While it's true that I was hoping for an ultrasound and didn't get one (hmph!), otherwise it went really well. I wish Sean had been there to meet the doctor, who this time was Dr. Pat Robinson (she works with Dr. Weinstein and I'll see both docs throughout the pregnancy). Dr. Robinson said that they deliver more than 200 babies a year and only about two are delivered by the stand-by docs ("both boys," she said) when she and Dr. Weinstein are off for the Jewish holidays. Are doctors really allowed to take holidays? Aside from this apparent slacker mentality, she was really great--fabulous bedside manner, really took time with me to talk about concerns and take my history, and seemed otherwise like a perfectly normal person, which is always good.

The reason I didn't get an ultrasound this visit has something to do with the fact that the FNT (Fetal Nuchal Translucency test) has to be done at the hospital...I'm not sure why. The con of that is that it required making yet another appointment which won't be for another week and a half (optimal timing for the test is 13 weeks), but the pro is that we get to check out Hackensack University Medical Center, where we'll be having the kid.

Also disappointing this week is that we weren't able to go down the shore with Sean's family after all. When he returned from AZ he had hours and hours of preparation for the Dallas trip (where he is now), so there was just no way. More disappointing than not being at the beach though is the fact that we now have to wait another week to tell Eva, Courtney and Derek. We'll go down to New Hope next weekend for a cookout though, and tell them then. Can't wait till Sean is home tonight--should be the last trip for a while!

Oh--and in other news, Sadie is taking her role of preparing us for parenthood very seriously. Yesterday she ate half of a cake and a loaf of very expensive organic flax seed bread. Right off the counter. Better her than me, but still. She then proceeded to lose most of the cake right ON the new silk drapes in the office/baby's room. That will teach me.

Jacked Up in the City

So I was Google Talking with my brother ("Unka Ern") the other day about the likelihood of us moving to Ohio in the foreseeable future (not calculable at the moment). I told him that we're open to anything that comes our way but that I'd also be happy to stay right where we are until the kid's a toddler. To this he replied, "Well, if you stay in the Hoboken area, the kid can say 'I was jacked up in The City'...that's better than 'I was raised on the mean streets of Cleveland Heights.'"

A double-whammy: classic Papou followed by a quintessential dadism.

Then I got an email from my dad after he read the blog for the first time. His email-- and I can say with certainty that it would have been almost exactly the same even had he not just read the "Two Thing Day" posting-- was riddled with some of the best! I can't believe I forgot these zingers:

"stinker"
"fine combed tooth"
"youthenisms"
"foldo" (as in, "I'm hungry. I'm gonna go make a foldo.")
"halfies" (as in, "I just made a foldo. Wanna go halfies?")
"charged up" (as in, "you're gonna get charged up, you're gonna pile it up, and they're gonna capture you!"

Holy smokes. This kid doesn't stand a chance.

A Two-Thing Day

My dad is full of Lamprosisms, some that he's coined and some that were made famous by Papou (his dad), but all of which have become a part of my family's vocabulary and are used in casual conversation as though other people might actually understand what they mean. Sometimes the context of the expression belies the meaning (e.g. "Bear ate the last of the smokies and Jess was so pissed, she had a serious heenie! I thought she was gonna blow..."). Other times, the meaning is totally lost on the uninitiated.

I had this experience the other day. I was soooooo tired! I was so tired, I wanted to cry, and I had just gotten to work. I must have been pouting or slamming cash drawers or something, because someone asked me what's "wrong" (a euphemism for "crawled up your ass and died") and I said with an obnoxiously loud sigh, "It's a two-thing day. That's all."

A two-thing day?

Yes. A two-thing day. And it was! I had to go to work AND walk the dog! A prospect that, in my delicate condition, seemed utterly overwhelming. I'm not exaggerating when I say that I was on the verge of tears because of it, either. Poor Sean, because of all months, this month he's out of town three weeks out of four and he feels terrible for it. Anyway, the reasons for the sentiment are beside the point. It's the expression that I'm talking about. And it's such a good one. There really was no other way that I could communicate what I was feeling. "I'm tired" wouldn't have done it, nor would "Sean's out of town so I have to leave to walk the dog," nor would "uh, I'm pregnant, stupid." It was a two-thing day, and that's all there was to it.

The same goes for the aforementioned "heenie" or "heanie" as it is alternately spelled (my dad, as the conceiver of some of these phrases and a ghastly speller has a tendency to change their phonetic spelling regularly), and for the following:

"faat" (fot)
"lay dead"
"get the marmalade"
"gizminkus"
"going halfies"
"who you gonna tell?"
"hotter than Kelsey's nuts"
"how'd I know that? huh?"
"you're the best one"
"what are you waiting for, an invitation?"
answering a phone call with "Telephone?" instead of "hello"

Then there are other Papouisms that were just plain silly. My favorite was always the cheer he insisted that he and his friends actually used back in the day, that goes like this:

"Ra ra ree!
Kick 'em in the knee!
Ra ra rass!
Kick 'em in the....
other knee!"

That one always made me laugh. As did the telling of the only two dreams the man apparently ever had in his life. One was about falling off a very high cliff, and when he woke up, he was on the floor. (Bah-dum-dum.) The other was about eating the biggest, most delicious and fluffy marshmallow! And when he woke up, his pillow was gone. (Thanks folks...I'll be here all night. Try the veal.)

The list really could be a mile long. But a lot is in the delivery, so admittedly there's something lost here on the page. In almost every case, though, the phrase was born of necessity and really is the only way to express that particular sentiment. Funny how so much of the way my family feels has a Yonkers accent. Even my mom, The Jewess (it was affectionate coming from my Papou. Jesus was a Jew, after all. How'd I know that? I'm smart.) still uses Lamprosisms regularly, ten-plus years after she and my dad parted ways.

My Ya-ya had her own list of sayings that we razzed her about, and that we continue to throw around when we're together, mostly I think as a way of remembering her without having to be sentimental or mushy about it. When Sean and I walk into the house late at night after driving all the way from Jersey, my dad asks what he can get us to eat, and says "There's pizza, and I got a roast in the oven. I know, kiddo, that's not enough. Here--I'll put some rigatoni on the stove!" In fact, lots of the Ya-ya jokes are about being force-fed, like when my brother pushes his plate away after eating a full meal and my dad says, "What, you're not hungry? Let me get the sling-shot..."

Other Ya-yaisms were just plain mistakes--innocent ones--that we never let her get away with. The one I remember best is when she was trying to think of the name of a famous baseball player she'd just watched a documentary on. You know, the one who used to wear socks. Or one sock. Or a black stocking. That's it! "Stocking-foot Joe!" No..."Black Stocking Joe!" Wait...that's not it... I got it! "Footless Joe Jackson!"

I'm hoping that this kid ends up learning Lamprosisms by osmosis--just because they're a fact of his/her life, like they were mine. Hell, Sean doesn't need a translator anymore when we go back to Cleveland, and he's even started using some himself. It might sound silly, but it's even better than having pictures of Ya-ya and Papou around.

I will be delivered after all.

Praise Jesus (and April). I found an OB/GYN who is in our insurance network, who is a woman, who is taking new patients, who actually delivers babies, and who does so at Hackensack University Medical Center. It's truly a miracle.

Honestly, I had no idea this would be an issue. When I first moved to Jersey, I got a referral from one of Sean's accounts for a female OB who happens to deliver, and whom I've been seeing for a few years. I never though to be concerned with her hospital affiliation, and it never even occurred to me to ask whether she had ultrasound equipment on site until my first prenatal visit, at which point we were given a scrip and told to make an additional appointment on another date at some medical imaging center down the road a piece. So that was a little anticlimactic, to say the least, especially after we'd gotten so pumped up to get our first peek at the babe during that visit. Also, the ultrasound tech didn't allow Sean in the room with me initially (she said it was because she needed to be sure that everything was okay before inviting the father into the room....but that seems so counterintuitive, since the father has every right to be there WHILE that's being found out, doesn't he? Not to mention that if, *spit* *spit*, there actually was a problem, wouldn't that be when you'd most need one another? I really don't think that would have happened at a doctor's office. Whatever. Thank god everything was fine).

So we set out on a wild goose chase to find a good doctor in an effort to minimize the chances of something disappointing, or worse, happening again. We both agreed that we'd prefer a Labor and Delivery center within a hospital, rather than a birthing clinic. The Women's and Children's Pavilion at Hack really stood out to us, and it's a great relief to Sean that they have a stellar children's hospital to boot. All that aside, I'd be lying if I said that the Nicole Miller designer hospital gowns and the BEYOND Spa didn't play a part in my decision making process...

But all the OBs to whom we were referred were either not delivering anymore (not surprising, with the $50k+ malpractice requirement in addition to their regular premium) or weren't accepting new patients (also not surprising, since the pickins are so slim). Aaaarrrrrgh.

After casting a wide enough net we were successful at last, and in the nick of time as my new doctor, Melissa Weinstein, was able to squeeze me in during the window in which the first trimester combined screening needs to happen. This is the ultrasound and blood panel that help to determine the risk of Down Syndrome and trisomy-18 (er...gotta read up on that one).

Sadly, Sean will still be in Arizona (where he is now) for my appointment, which is this Friday. Boohoo. But I'll have an tasteful black and white of our brilliant little bean to show him when he gets home, and to show his brother and sisters when we break the news to them this weekend down the shore. I really hope we get a nice profile shot!

My Little Greek Olive

Or, more accurately, my little Greek-Russian-Irish-Welsh-Hungarian-Scottish olive. The "bean" has graduated to "olive" this week, but somehow that just doesn't sound as cute. And plus, it makes me think of martinis, dammit. Grape, maybe? Now I'm thinking of dessert wine, which strangely, I've been craving. Anyway, at somewhere between an inch and an inch-and-a-half, it's really hard to believe s/he can be taking up so much space in there, but my non-existent waistline is proof. I swear it's not that bag of Cheetos or the double order of tiramisu...

Not only has the little bugger been growing up a storm over the last week and a half, but there's been a lot going on around the house too. My mom was in town from Thursday to Monday. The visit was a birthday present to her from me and Sean, and what a thoughtful present it was! If it wasn't enough that she's working at Bray Whaler while maintaining her own business, she's also moving this Saturday. And it's not as though this trip was even a relaxing respite from her daily, crazy life. We did the marathon shopping thing, flipping though hundreds of rugs at ABC Carpet & Home, spending hours planning the interior of the PAX storage wall in the office/baby's room (well, she did, while I crashed on the MALM floor sample), and hitting every bedding and bath store in a 25 mile radius of Hoboken searching for THE curtain rods. We perfected the art of "honing," (driving in increasingly smaller concentric circles around the target while cursing out Emily, whose maps are shamefully out-of-date), and she did an amazing job not punching my lights out when I got cranky. All in all, I think it was a great birthday present.

Even though it took two tries to put it together (thank GOD for Sean on Saturday night), the Great Wall of Storage tripled our closet space and made room for baby and anything else we might acquire in the coming months. There's no way I'd have been able to plan it the way she did. She's also really good at installing hardware like curtain rods, which requires the confidence to make permanent holes in walls that I just don't have. And before her visit, I might have been content with a several hundred dollar "hand tufted" rug from Home Decorator's Collection, whereas now I know better and will be satisfied with nothing less than a hand-knotted Tabriz in the rarest of colors with 110 knots per square inch. Dammit again.

So, her visit really tied up a lot of loose ends around here and got us extremely organized. But there is one dilemma that it raised: what will the baby call her? It's not too early to think about this either, because if we knew, I'd already be referring to her as "_______" in this blog. We went over several options but none of them seemed right. We ruled out "Grandma" and "Nana." Beyond that, we're stumped. Any ideas?

Pictures?

I'm trying to put together a slide show of pictures to add as an "element" to Lil' B's blog (this whole thing is still rather new to me and I have no idea what I'm doing). I wanted to include pictures of Sean and me sans bebe (obviously) and pictures of all the cool people in our lives who will eventually play an important part in the life of the little bean...

But in compiling this slide show, it became glaringly evident that there's a huge lack of picture-taking going on here! It's like an epidemic. Not only are we guilty of it--Sean and I are know for having had some really fabulous experiences and either forgetting the camera all together, or coming home with one grainy, blurry, wide-angle shot of us there to show for it--but EVERYONE is! With maybe the exception of my mom, who is a picture taking fool. And Pop Len, though most of his pictures are of scenery and the friends he and Patty make on their globe-trotting adventures, rather than of themselves. And Grandma Diana, who is the queen of disposable 35mm film cameras, and Courtney and Sean and Dana and Paul, who are practically or actually professional photographers....

Wait a minute here. There are obviously pictures being taken. We just don't have any.

Hence the montage of pictures from our wedding. Sigh. (Yeah, I am being a little dramatic here because I never really do get sick of looking at pictures from our wedding. It's true.) But I really feel self-conscious about it, much in the way that I feel self-conscious about starting this blog...like it's a little self-indulgent. Or a lot. I will have to keep reminding myself that this is for posterity. In any case, it will hopefully be the kick in the butt that I need to make picture-taking a priority so we have documentation of all the great people we know and things we do and fun we have.

While our friends and family take digital pictures that are easy to share, most of them are posted on those photo-organization websites like Snapfish and Flikr and are shared that way, and I can't get them off there! I suppose that's the point.

Anyway, I guess this is a call to our friends and family: if you have any nice pictures of yourselves or of family gatherings and you find yourselves with a little spare time, can you send them to me? NOT by inviting me to "view your Snapfish album," but as email attachments. Just a couple, so that the most recent pics we have of you are not from two years ago (no matter how I cherish the memory of that glorious day in Mexico.....).

Thank you!! XOXOXO

Smarter than the average bear...

I may not have a scanner, but I DO have a digital camera! So I took a picture of the picture of the baby, who will affectionately be referred to henceforth as Lil' B. The print out of the sonogram is high-gloss though, so it was really hard to get a pic without some nasty glare (which is why the annoying angle). At least you can make out the general outline of the little Lima bean chilling in its comfy womb chair.

There really is a baby in there!

I just sent the first Baby Update email to a few family members, having not yet committed to the idea of a blog...and then created a blog. So rather than reinventing the wheel, I'm going to copy and paste the email I just sent.

8:46am July 15, 2008
Sub: Ultrasound--Not ours, but can you really tell?

Hi, guys!

So we had our first ultrasound yesterday and everything's looking good. Actually, looking quite like a Lima bean, but sounding human anyway. We heard the heartbeat, which was really amazing! I sort of wish they didn't make you hold your urine for these things, because I would have enjoyed the experience much more if my teeth weren't floating. In any case, it was certainly memorable and it made it very real for both of us. Until we got proof, I think we were both a little apprehensive. But there it is--hanging on tight, little heart pumping away.

I thought our printer/copier had a scanner option, but alas it does not, so I'm sending a link instead to some stranger's ultrasound that looks remarkably like our baby! Go figure. According to the calendar, the baby's age is 7 weeks 2 days, and according to the crown-to-rump measurements, the baby's age is 7 weeks 4 days, which puts us at a due date of February 27. But I'm sticking with my story that the kid is 8 weeks and just really, really petite. I'm almost positive. Time will tell, as the measurements get more and more accurate the bigger the baby gets. Right now taking the measurements is literally like splitting hairs, but at this stage, just a couple days here and there makes a huge difference! We're talking the difference between toes and NO TOES! Or TAIL and no tail! Huge, I tell you.

So it was really important that Sean and I tell as many people as possible IN PERSON, which is why we are waiting until our weekend down the shore with Sean's family to tell his siblings. Of course, his mom and dad know already. That will mean that most of our close friends and family will know by the first week of August, but we're waiting until the end of the 1st trimester, AUGUST 15th, to make it public knowledge, and at that point you can all feel free to tell whomever. Thanks for keeping it to yourselves in the meantime!

We're toying with the idea of keeping a blog because so many of the important people in our lives don't live near us. I'm still trying to get used to the idea. We'll keep you posted if we do.

Here's the stranger's ultrasound. Seriously, the only difference is that the stranger's baby looks like it's swimming in the middle of the sack, expending a whole lot of energy, and mine is chilling like the sack is a womb chair (huh...), like a smart little bean.
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://bp2.blogger.com/_OFODEphY20A/RqVs3bves1I/AAAAAAAAABI/SPLDOh8RxEo/s320/baby%2Bcanar0003.jpg&imgrefurl=http://babycanar.blogspot.com/2007/07/our-little-peanut.html&h=236&w=320&sz=16&hl=en&start=14&sig2=RiHplVxUEtV0CZcgoOkDjw&um=1&tbnid=E9n4f7g3bRA_gM:&tbnh=87&tbnw=118&ei=xpJ8SIDXOYXOggL--pGaDw&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dultrasound%2B7%2Bweeks%26ndsp%3D18%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26sa%3DN

And here's a cool picture of what it looks like close up. Much more endearing than the fuzzy gray spot in the ultrasound.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_IFYXp_KJ0YM/RlCRKftxZjI/AAAAAAAAAAk/gpzMHpQh9LQ/s1600-h/7weeks.jpg

Hope you're all well and that we get to see you soon!!

Love,
Jessica, Sean & ?