Pictures as promised!

dad in training .....

10-10-2-2-1

So much has happened since my last post. Tim finished his test, we enjoyed a great weekend in Clearlake taking in a Rascal Flatts concert to celebrate the completion of his Masters, Jon, Emily, and Ella came out for a visit, we had our April 12th appointment, and went through a slight scare with our little peanut.

We had a pretty short appointment on April 12th. Tim and I went in with the doctor, asked a few questions, listened to the heartbeat, and I took an Alpha Fetal Protein (AFP) blood test. Well, yesterday I received a call from Kaiser's genetics department. Apparently, my AFP test came back positive. The AFP test measures for increased likelihood of Downs Syndrome, spine abiffita, and neural tube defects. If the test is positive, there is a possible increased risk of the above mentioned conditions. I knew this test was precautionary and that results could be affected dramatically if my due date was miscalculated (I have thought my due date was not entirely accurate since the beginning). Anyhow, Kaiser scheduled me for an ultrasound today to check out our little peanut piece by piece.

Tim and I showed up at the ultrasound with my mom. The procedure lasted about one hour and was quite possibly the COOLEST thing I have ever seen. We were able to see the blood flow in the womb, all the vertebrae, the organs and all of our peanut's little digits. There were 10 fingers, 10 toes, two ears, two eyes and one penis!! Yes, you read right, we are having a boy! There was no mistake that a stem was on the apple!

Tim and I were considering keeping the sex a secret, but I caved in the end as many people predicted I would (Tim didn't really care either way). We are, however, going to keep the name a secret so don't even try to pry that out of us! I have attached the G-rated picture of our little peanut. No fallice pictures of our boy on the Internet, thank you!

The doctor moved my due date from September 29th to September 21st. The ultrasound tech thought the due date should be somewhere around September 16th given the measurements (which, is closest to my calculations). However, we are going with the 21st for now! They said I am 18 weeks along and that is why the test came back positive - my levels were too high for sixteen weeks, but were within normal range for 18 weeks. I knew there had to be a good reason for why I am as fat as I am! LOL! All in all, the best news is that everything looks good and the baby appears to be healthy.

Anyhow, things are starting to get back to normal for us. We are both fighting off a nasty cold right now - probably induced from stress detox! But overall, life is pretty good!

I hope everyone is doing well!

Love ,

Jenn

P.S. I will post pictures of this past weekend as soon as I get my camera back. Jon, Emily and Ella were out from Virginia and we had a blast enjoying time with the whole family!!

Bye Bye Beer Gut!

Well, it has been awhile since I have given an update... things have been pretty busy for Tim and I lately. Tim's Master's test is this Friday and we have been anticipating the completion of that chapter in our lives!

I am feeling great! My energy is definitely back and I have enjoyed resuming my normal activities. This past weekend I finished tiling and grouting our bathroom. In a couple of weeks I will wire a new ceiling fan and light fixture in the bedroom, lay baseboard, and (hopefully) get a head start on the nursery! Although my energy has returned, I have noticed my stamina is not what it used to be. I am trying to take things slow on the weekend, but find myself completely tired out on Mondays!

My next appointment is on April 12th - I don't think anything too stellar is happening on that day. Of course I will get to hear the heart beat on the microphone thingingy (later discovered that it is called a "Doppler"). Our big ultrasound appointment is on Friday, May 4th. I am really looking forward to getting a decent picture of our little peanut! Tim and I have yet to decide if we are going to find out the sex of the baby.

Anyhow, that is all for now. I was going to post a picture of my growing belly, but I am in my PJ's and haven't brushed my hair since I got out of the shower about an hour ago.... yes, I am a lovely sight right now .... trust me, I am doing you all a favor!! I will say, that I think I am growing out of the "beer gut" phase .... I am starting to look like a pregnant lady! Hooray!

Ta Ta, I will update after my appointment next Thursday!

Jenn

Loving the microphone

Today marked one of many prenatal appointments to come. When I showed up at Kaiser, I expected to have another ultrasound completed. As of yesterday, I had yet to receive a due date from the doctors and I was absolutely sure they were going to need to do another ultrasound to determine my day-o-birthing! Well, much to my disappointment no ultrasound was performed. The assistant notified me that through a collective vote, the nurse practitioner and the doctor decided my due date was going to be September 29th (I wonder if they ro-cham-boed for that date). Like a pouty little kid, I asked the medical assistant if there was any way I could still hear the heart beat. She assured me that the doctor should be able to pick up the heart beat on her "monitor." I can't remember the official name of the "monitor" but it was some type of microphone devise they rub on my growing belly that picks up internal sounds and projects them through a small speaker.

Well, the doctor came in and did her normal poking and prodding. Although she was quick and efficient, (and many women can sympathize with me here) I wasn't entirely comfortable in my "compromising position" . Men, take your arms and hold them like Praying mantis legs - you will then see what I mean by "compromising position" ... and I digress. Back to my story - after the poking and prodding, the doctor whipped out the handy-dandy microphone. She squired the COLD GOO on my tummy (someone please invent an warmer for that stuff) which almost made me jump off the table. She started to rub the devise over my tummy, I was slightly afraid I would have a gas gurgle that project sounds resembling a cave monster .... but all of a sudden we heard it .. "swish swoosh swish swoosh" .. I have to say, it was one of the most incredible sounds I have ever heard. Yes, I got teary-eyed and I get a little teary-eyed just writing about it now! How could I not be emotional?! It was the life beat of our peanut! Anyhow, the initial disappointment of no ultrasound immediately disappeared.

After leaving the hospital, Tim and I grabbed a celebratory cup of Starbucks. We clicked our paper cups, gave each other a kiss, and floated on a cloud for the rest of the day.

Yup, I was loving the microphone!

I hope everyone is well!
Love to all,
Jenn

P.S. Don't forget to Spring forward this Sunday, set your clocks one hour ahead!

TWO peas, two pods?

One of the blessings my brother and I had when we grew up was closeness of family. Family bonding aside, we had cousins that were close to us in age that made family events fun for my brother and interesting and scary for the rest of us kids!

I am so happy that we will be having a little one that is close in age to family members such as Ella (my brother's daughter), Jake (my cousin Holly's son), Holly's pea in the pod (due April), Ava and Bettina (my cousin Allison's daughters), and from our surrogate family -Stephen (son of friends Crystal and Steve). I am even more excited that one more sweetpea will be added to the group .... and no, I am not talking about twins for Tim and I. Can you guess who is having a baby?

I was so excited the other night when I found out that Jon and Emily are pregnant again!!! I kept bugging Em to borrow her maternity clothes and she finally had to confess that she couldn't give up her clothes because she was going to need them!! Hot dog!! Who said that auntie couldn't possibly be MORE excited on the second go-around! I am just so extatic! Of course, it is a bummer to miss out on Em's cute preger clothes - but I would say the trade-off is good :o)

On a personal note, things are going well. I am starting to feel less tired - I still have tired days, but overall my energy is starting to improve. I am starting to show a little. I am down to unhooking parts of my pants and fastening rubber-bands to the buttons on my jeans. I think it will be time to cave and buy some official maternity clothes pretty soon. Also, results of my allergy screen came back and I am officially allergic to NOTHING! Apparently, it was just some freak pregnancy thing. Go figure!

Anyhow, I hope this finds each of you doing great!

Signed,
One pea in ONE pod

Yawn ...

Word of the day? Exhaustion. (noun) - 1. extreme fatigue, 2. serious weakening and loss of energy [syn: debilitation], 3. the act of exhausting something entirely.

Although exhaustion is the word of the day, it is the word that best describes the past two months of my life. I feel like a 5-year-old child in that I want to curl up with my blankie and pillow and call it a day! I did, however, have a freakish spurt of energy on Saturday! It was fabulous. I enjoyed some normal outdoor activity of cleaning up dog stinkies, weeding, and pruning! Honestly, I think I was solar-powered that day as it was sunny and in the 80's.

Life has been pretty decent as of late. It has yet to be determined what caused my hives. The doctor ordered blood tests as she thought it may have been a dairy or wheat allergy. However, I have been joyously eating my (and the world's) portion of milk, pudding, and cheese since the incident with out any reaction! My next appointment is on March 5th where I will find out a little more what the Dr. has to say about my test results. Honestly, I just think it was a freakish reaction to growing a little alien inside my body. My next appointment will also yield (hopefully) a due date and a better ultrasound picture of the little peanut.

Well, I probably won't have anything significant to contribute until after my next appointment! I hope everyone is doing great!

Jenn

Bees aren't the only ones with hives!

Many forms of media attempt to educate a newly-pregnant woman about the changes her body will undergo during the course of pregnancy. Although I am new to the pregnancy thing, I can already attest the "change factor" is a FACT!

This past week, I had an allergic reaction to something that caused me to break out into a serious case of hives! You think you ever had a mosquito bite? These hives resemble a welt-like mosquito bite .... like I was stripped down buck-naked and left for the eagle-sized mosquitoes of the amazon! Yes, laugh if you must ... it was quite a spectacle! However, on Thursday when I woke up, the hives had spread over much of my body and one of my eyes was swelled half-shut like Quasimodo! Luckily, I already had an appointment scheduled for these pesky hives to be examined. The doctor was able to put me on a round of steroids (that are safe for the baby, of course) that has caused my skin to slowly turn back to something more resembling a human.

I have to say, the rest for the last few days has been somewhat refreshing - the doctor took me off work Thursday and Friday and I have been zonked out most of that time from the antihistamine prescribed. Maybe that is why I woke up with Tim at 4:30am and have been unable to return to slumber-land. "Sleep while you can!!" the seasoned mothers exclaim! Well, I am trying :0)

Until the next saga of Timandjennspeanut!

Signing off -

Jenn (formerly known as Quasimodo)