21 weeks... Flashlights and Fetoscopes
So... we passed the halfway mark without a hitch, without any blood and without a barfing episode. (well at least for a week!) All is progressing well and the belly continues to grow and move. I feel good 99% of the time. I still have occasional nausea, but am lucky not to have any of the other crap that lots of pregnant women have to deal with.... no heartburn, no constipation, no (regular) headaches, not much physical discomfort at all. I'm truly loving being pregnant. It's fun, it's exciting and I'm so happy to finally be here.

Thankfully, since the most recent bleeding incident, all has been well. Lots of movment, which leads to reassurance. Did you know that at this point the fetus can sense light? So if you shine a flashlight on your belly it will respond? Yep! quite fun.... We play scrabble often in bed at night (on a travel scrabble board) and I rest the letters/board on my belly. The first night we played the flashlight game, the little goonlet was kicking so hard the letters were jumping around. We got a quite a laugh out of that.... Of course Ryan freaked out and thought we were going to blind the little goon with the light. Dork.

After the last bleeding episode, I was considering renting a doppler, but in the end I decided to buy a cheap fetoscope. I figured we wouldn't hear anything for a few weeks, but then could listen any time we wanted without worry. The first few nights, we could only hear my stomach gurgling and the occasional kick or punch. The ear pieces were hard and uncomfortable, so I decided to bring home one ofmy expensive stethescopes from the office and trade out the top halves.... and there it was. Took-a took-a took-a took-a took-a. I actually like the took-a took-a better than the swoosh swoosh swoosh.. cause I can hear it ANY TIME I WANT. (well almost, the little bugger likes to roll over a lot) So now our nightly routine involves significant time listening to the belly, then watching the kicks and rolls, then we fall asleep with Ryan's hand on my belly till I desperately need to roll onto my side.

I honestly can't think of anything better.

And somedays, I actually believe we're going to have a baby.... how bizarre is that?

Not much change from last week, but we'll give you a pix just for fun :)



Next time.... a name!!