I got tagged!

Heh, I never get tagged. Or poked, or prodded, or whatever. I don't know what it's called, but Emily has sweetly reminded me that I haven't been around in awhile, so, ( here I am )

 Here's the baby today:



My Mom was with me so the tech was sweet enough to let us see the profile and double check that she is still a girl :)

My cervix is 1.8cm long. It was around 2.2 last time, so a little smaller, but not bad. The dr said to just keep doing what I'm doing and stay laying down as much as possible. We want six more weeks so she's full term, but I can probably ease off bedrest a little in five weeks if all goes well.

My cervix was 1.8cm at 26 weeks with Jack, so hey, we're five weeks ahead of that. That has to be good. 

I hate bedrest with a red hot passion, but we had a good babysitter interview last night so I'm hopeful we'll have someone coming in from 10-12 every day to help wear Jack out starting next week. The hardest part is knowing the only thing I have to look forward to is this baby being born and that I'm hoping that's 6 weeks away. I miss the little things like running errands, taking Jack to a new park, looking forward to just doing random shit with Matt on the weekends. It's a long time to just sit around and wait, and my hormones keep getting to me when I think about how my one-on-one time with Jack where we could run around all day and do stuff is over. Obviously, he's still here with me and we'll do fun stuff when the baby comes, but I feel like our life as we knew it ended too abruptly and before I was ready. 

Blah blah blah. Come on full term!!! 

 Like y'all saw on facebook, my cervix is behaving! It's at 2.8cm, so it's down from 3.2cm three weeks ago, but the important thing is that it's still over 2.5 so no bedrest! I go back in 3 weeks and until then, I'm taking it easy to hold onto those 0.3cm. I suspect it could even dip a little below 2.5 and we still wouldn't need bedrest because I'll be further along , but we'll see. At 26 weeks with Jack, I was at L&D finding out my cervix was down to around 2cm. By comparison, today is a wonderful, wonderful day. 

The doctor said right now my cervix is "slightly short" but it was practically an afterthought. He was much more interested in talking about how the baby is measuring spot on for 26 weeks and how my placenta had moved up (no more previa!) and how I'm clear to have sex. What?! What the heck is that strange little word? I don't know if we remember it around here. Actually, the word he used was "intercourse" and I'm grateful since Jack didn't even try to say that one. He's been mumbling "glucose" all day and I am positive he would've been fascinated by a word as cool as sex. 

So yeah, it's a GOOD day! I'm going to celebrate by going through the huge box of baby girl clothes that my Aunt Carla brought down last weekend. Fuzzy purple sleepers, flowery pink short sets, and white knit dresses with rosebuds on them. Love.

My grandmother brought her laptop - whee! It's superfast but I can't get used to the keyboard. Love/hate.

( Lots of pics )

Current pregnancy freak-out: from what I can find, my cervix length at the last appointment is in the 5th percentile. And the thing is, everyone's cervix shrinks throughout pregnancy. So, since I've got about 3.2-3.0 cm of length left when most women have 4cm, and most doctors consider bedrest when it gets below 2.5, I'm feeling like it's inevitable that I'll be laying down for a big chunk of this pregnancy. I have another appointment on the 22nd, so I'm going to ask them more about the plan then.

Two weeks ago, I was thinking I couldn't possibly do bedrest because of what it would do to Jack and how it would turn his world upside down, especially if I'm hospitalized, which is what this practice tends to recommend. Then, this little girl started moving more and more (oh my gosh, the girl can MOVE!) and my Momma-bear protective instincts kicked into high gear. Part of it is that we're still 3 weeks from even having any hope of viability and there is just a lot of time to go until full term. One way or another, my most important job is to keep this little girl safe and I'll do whatever it takes.

In happier news, we painted the nursery! Which is also part of what freaked me out - I hate tempting fate. But hey, I am promising myself to harness the power of positive thinking and visualize a happy future and all that other hokey stuff, so here is the pretty lavender place I've been sitting lately, picturing a sweet, small newborn snuggled up asleep with her head close to my heart:

( Nursery pics... )

In other happy news, we are outta here this weekend (well, once we get the house clean enough for the house/dog sitter, who isn't used to the mess of a  toddler and two dogs). My Mom and Grandmother rented a condo in Myrtle Beach and Matt, Jack, me, an in-car dvd player and a gazillion dvds are driving down Saturday to spend a week with them, the beach, and their indoor pool. OMG, it's our first family vacation--long car ride, possible mini-golf and aquarium trip, too much family time, and all. And I didn't even need to buy a maternity suit ;) Here I am rocking my pre-pg tankinis, and by "rocking," I mean "praying I don't bust the seems before the week is over."

( Even more pics... )

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Matt came downstairs from putting Jack to sleep and said he's sleeping in his big boy bed! What?   

Apparently, Jack "insisted," so Matt figured why not. He thought Jack would end up coming out of his room and we'd put him in his crib, but after a few minutes of chatter, there was silence. It's been quiet for an hour.

I need a video monitor!! I wasn't planning on him sleeping in there for another 6 weeks. The room is babyproofed and at least his bookshelves are bolted to the wall, but I would have taken the papasan chair out, locked the closet, moved his bed away from the window/curtains, etc.

I'm going to lock the guest room and bathroom doors before we go to bed, leave our door open, and maybe have Matt go in and check on him. Little noises like opening his door wake him up sometimes, but he's usually pretty deeply asleep around our bedtime. I don't think I can sleep if we don't check on him.

This is such silly timing. We're going to the beach for a week starting Easter, and Jack has to sleep in a pack and play. You know that'll mess up his sleep regardless. We also spent today cleaning out the guest room for baby#2 and I think that's part of why Jack wanted to sleep in the big bed. So many changes around here, he's probably a little unsettled. Twice this week, he's called little girls at the playground by our baby name, and he seems to be thinking about the whole baby thing a lot (and has just started saying that she can't come live here, though other times he says nice things too).

Everyone place your bet. Will Jack make it through the night in his big boy bed? And if he doesn't, will I make Matt deal with him alone, or will I cave and go in to help?

I have my dr's appt this afternoon to get my first cervix check and shot. Jack saw me getting my meds out and has been running around ever since yelling "medicine doctor BUTT! medicine shot Daddy! Daddy shot BUTT!" And whacking me in the butt for extra effect. Niiiice. He also offered up "Jack help." Aha ha ha. Yeah, that sounds perfect. Maybe if Matt has to work late one night, I can just hand Jack the needle and ask him to do it for me. That should work, right?

I had told him a little about the shots when we thought he was going to be coming to the office with me because I wanted him to be prepared to see it. I was worried it might upset him. I don't think I needed to worry. If anything, he's going to be crushed if he realizes he doesn't get to see it. I just hope he doesn't try whacking me in the butt after I get the shot.

Lesson learned today: When you want to make an erupting volcano at home, don't spend half an hour watching volcano videos on youtube telling your toddler how scary and hot the lava is.

Jack's new playrug has a volcano on it and I realized he didn't know what it was. So since we had nothing else going on, I decided to make it volcano day.

( Volcano Day )

Sarah, I was thinking of you yesterday. Jack and I were in the basement doing laundry. First he walked into the laundry room and said "messy Mommy!" because my laundry room floor is less than clean. Then, while I'm folding CLEAN laundry, he picked up one of my white socks and told me it was dirty. Next he found a scrap of paper on the floor and proclaimed it "yucky, Mommy, keen up." Yeah. My kid really should've been born to you, huh? At least he knows where the garbage is so he could throw the offending paper away by himself.

***

In other news, Jack's choice of pre-bed conversation with Daddy last night was to tell him "Girls Penis? Noooooo!" Hmm, maybe I started the boys have a penis and girls don't conversation a little young but he seemed curious. He likes to tell me that Daddy and PopPop have a penis. Should be fun if that comes up at a family gathering. 

So I wrote about Jack the other day because what I've really been wanting to write down are a few thoughts about this pregnancy. Then I got to thinking how I've been wanting to write about Jack and how cool he is, and I felt guilty giving the unborn attention-stealer more press than the funny, wild boy I've already got. But now that Jack's been covered...

I'm still not sure the shock has worn off. Our plan was to start TTC around now because we thought we'd like Jack to be at least 2.5 before he became a big brother. I was on the pill for awhile, but it gave me the worst anxiety, so I went off in late September. We were super careful in October and then November came along. And they had the sexiest song on Grey's Anatomy that I just had to download and play right away. And after we'd thrown caution to the wind once, I saw the cutest little baby on Lipstick Jungle, aaand... Long story short, I wanted a baby, Matt thought the process could be fun, and we both thought, hey why not? It took us almost two years, surgery, clomid, progesterone, estrogen, metformin, and I don't remember what else before we conceived Jack. Surely two silly joyrides early in my cycle wouldn't matter.

The next day, I thought I saw some ovulation signs. A week later, I had a terrible headache and google gave me a bunch of hits for "headache and implantation." The day after that, I had some strange cramping that felt eerily familiar to the day before I found out I was pregnant with Jack. That night Matt came home and said he wanted to quit his job and I, very anticlimatically, blurted out "don't do that, I think I'm pregnant." The next day, I was at the mall taking Jack to see Santa (and by "see" I mean stand twenty feet away screaming "Nooo, Ho Ho, Noooo, Ho Ho.") and figured why not buy some tests at CVS. Half an hour later at home, I had my two lines and jubiliantly told Jack there was going to be a Baybee, hopefully, maybe, oh my God I'm pregnant. Baby baby baby! I tried to convince Matt to come home early and when he refused, I somehow managed not to tell him my news... by calling Alison and telling her instead. Then, when Matt finally got home that night, I had Jack hand him the pee stick and say "baby." It probably would have worked better if I let Matt take his coat off first, but whatever. I was excited.

And I still am. I can't believe I've made it to the second trimester (depending who you ask. 13.5 weeks works for me.) and so far all is good. Things are going so much faster than last time. There are entire days I barely have time to think about it, then I see the cute little ultrasound pic hanging on the fridge and it's like "right, you, you're here too. How are we going to fit you in?" But I know we will. And I think it'll be great for all of us. Okay, Jack might take some convincing when he finds out baby isn't just a fun word we like to yell in excitement, but I'm confident.

Obviously, this is old news. I just wanted to write it down for me because I've been wanting to write it down for so long now. Plus, now that the shock is starting to fade a little, I want to make sure I don't forget how cool and amazing this semi-surprise has been. I mean the odds of this baby being conceived like this were so low. I have never, not even on clomid or metformin, ovulated that early. But I did. And I have the growing belly bump to show for it.
( Belly pics... )

Jack is 21 months and 2 days old.  ( 3 months until he's two. )

I know I'm in great company around here :) Actually, I know so many women who conceived in November and are due in August that Matt and I are calling it the "Obama baby boom." Here's to a happy, healthy 2009 for all!