Finally, One Of The Boys Listened To Me!

By that I mean Pearson.  Yep, I'm still pregnant and no signs of labor yet.  Which is good because we've been waiting for Grandma and Grandpa Maguire to arrive.

And they did today!

After a nap and some getting settled, it was time to play.  The boys somehow convinced Grandma and Grandpa to push them around:

After a few hiccups Grandma realized that McColley's legs are now too long, so she made him throw them over the side:

When Grandma and Grandpa got too tired to push it was time to switch to soccer:

As expected, the boys are over the moon to have Grandma and Grandpa here!

A Shower For Pearson

Tonight some of the ladies from Playgroup threw me a baby shower!

There was a fabulous buffet:

With adorable cake pops as dessert:

And the two ladies who hosted the shower made me a diaper cake:

It was very low key and super fun.  I had only asked for diapers since we have so much stuff from when the boys were newborns, but I still ended up with some extras (like baby lotion) and a hand-knitted onesie!

28 Days (More Or Less)

So, I'm 36 weeks today - as in, four weeks to my due date.  Given that McColley arrived a week late and Brayton arrived a week early, I figure my due date isn't really a 'hard' deadline.

I guess the real question is: Do I look more like I strapped a beach ball or a watermelon to my front?

Only Two To Go!

Two months that is!  Yep, today is two months until my due date (although I am only 31 weeks and 1 day, so I still have over eight weeks left).

Do I look like I'm well into my third trimester?

When I first started taking these pictures, I took them with my laptop.  Unfortunately my laptop is effectively dead.  Now I take them with my iPh.one. 

However, there are two issues with this - 1) it appears that our ovens have flipped sides - they haven't, the laptop just took a 'mirror' picture and my phone doesn't. 2) I can't take the pictures myself anymore because my phone doesn't have a timer.

I tried to have the boys take the picture for me but they wouldn't take a picture without themselves in it:

Luckily B came home for lunch and so HE took my picture!

Helping Baby Brother

McColley and Brayton 'helped' Daddy do some final work on Pearson's swing.

Two-Thirds Cooked

Today I am 28 weeks and/or 7 months and/or beginning the third trimester:

Usually the 28th week is a flurry of activities... but not this time!  I'm supposed to have a midwife appointment (but she's on vacation) and get my RhoGam shot this week (but the hospital scheduled it for next Monday... and they call it the Anti-D shot).

So, next week will be the flurry of activity!

I'm On The Edge...

Of Viability!

Today I hit 24 weeks exactly - only 16 weeks left!

Tomorrow I have another prenatal appointment with the military midwife.  Then in the evening I will be taking a tour of the British hospital's labor and delivery ward, I will actually be touring with another military wife who is 35 weeks pregnant while B watches our combined four kids - hopefully the two pregnant ladies can remember all the questions we've been compiling!

A Hypothesis

My hypothesis: The Maguire men have mutated a protein that kills all X-chromosome sperm in their bodies.

Proof: Generation 1 - 3 boys out of 3 total children

Se.an, Mich.ael and Br.ian

           Generation 2 - 4 boys out of 4 total children (so far)

McColley, Brayton, Dr.ew and Pearson

Yep.  We're having our third boy!

 We had our 20 week ultrasound today and to quote the tech, "There's a willy!"

He will be named Pearson Bruce.  Both of these pictures show his profile.  You can see his hand (with thumb sticking out) better in the upper one.

He was pretty good-natured throughout the ultrasound.  The tech only ran into trouble trying to get a good view of his stomach.  After I switched my position a bit, she was able to get all the views she needed.

Right now his chest and head growth are a few days ahead and his femur growth is a few days behind, but everything is within normal range.  She got a good visualization of all his major organs and they are all where they are supposed to be.  He also has a good strong cord and a healthy placenta.

Now we just have to wait 20 more weeks to meet him!

Also, please click on our baby pool link to place your guess as to when he will arrive.  The link is located right under the picture of his growth on the left sidebar.

The Oddness Continues

Today I am 17 weeks and 4 days pregnant, which makes it exactly four weeks since my last belly picture:

OK, that picture is of me 'sucking in' as much as possible... this is really what I look like since I don't think to 'suck in' all that often:

Definitely pregnant in that second one!

I had a pre-natal exam last week but it was completely basic and all is well.  I should have my big ultrasound in about two or three weeks, but I'm still waiting for the appointment letter.

As for the baby, I am feeling movement.  It helps to know what the sensation should feel like, however I did get a nice jab to the diaphragm this morning, so I guess the change from cartilage to bone is really happening!

Three Things In Today's Post

1) Test Results

The test I mentioned in my last post actually involved more than just the ultrasound.  After the ultrasound was finished I had to go and get some blood drawn.  The lab then tested my blood for something and combined the blood results with the ultrasound results to give us the risk of the baby having Downs Syndrome.  I didn't know that the test was specific to Downs, I thought it encompassed all neural tube defects.

I was told that if the result was bad, I would get a phone call. If it was good, I would just get a letter.

On Monday I got a call from a number my phone didn't recognize.  They didn't leave a message.  I tried calling back but my phone dropped the call.

Yesterday we got a notice that we'd missed the postman and there was a letter we had to sign for.  They'd try again throughout the week.

Is anyone surprised that doubts about the baby's health started creeping in at this point?

Today I saw the postman ride (yes, our postman rides a bicycle on his rounds) past our house three minutes before I had to leave to pick up McColley from preschool.  I decided to wait for the mail to arrive even if it would make us a few minutes late.

Luckily the mail was pushed through the slot just a moment later.  And right there on the top, marked "Private & Confidential" was a letter from the hospital.

The test result: the baby's probability of having Downs is less than 1 in 10,000.

I am awesome at making myself paranoid.

Although I still don't know if the hospital letter is the one I was supposed to sign for.

2) The Census

After taking the 2010 US census we arrived here just in time to take the 2011 UK census!

It's actually much more involved than the US census.  Not only do they want to know who lives here, they also want to know exactly what kind of house we have.

I looked around the house and realized how tired I've really been.  Any box that wasn't in my direct way has been ignored for the last month.  For example:

That obstacle course is how you get in and out of the Le.go room.  I don't go in the Leg.o room.  I would write it off as B's responsibility, but he's the one who unpacked the actual Leg.o room (along with the kitchen and office).

Now that I'm feeling better, it's time to tackle the places I've been ignoring.

3) Seed Catalog

We have a yard and garden area that we need to maintain.  It has issues. B ordered a seed catalog online to give us some idea of what grows around here.

Now we just need to figure out what in our garden is a real plant and what is a weed.

Pretty sure this flowering stuff is supposed to be there:

We know that everything in here needs to go because we want to plant some vegetables:

We have no idea what any of these plants are or what to do with them:

However we did find one plant with its marker:

The backyard highlight for the boys though is just the space:

Getting Odder Every Day

We are becoming an odd family... as in odd numbered.  Yep, Baby #3 is on the way!

Today I went in for my first trimester ultrasound.  Thanks to socialized medicine, I got a neural tube translucency scan thrown in too!

We saw one baby with two arms plus hands and fingers, two legs plus feet and toes, a strongly beating heart, a substantial umbilical cord and a 'small' neural tube space.

Based on measurements the baby is 13 weeks and 4 days along which means my 'official' due date is September 5th.  So, yes, if this baby decides to arrive exactly on schedule, I will be in labor on Labor Day.

When Brayton saw the sonogram he decided it was a baby owl.  What do you think, human or owl?

 This is a profile full-body view.  The baby's face is on the right side, you can see the two brighter white lines which are the baby's jaw.  On the other side is the baby's leg.  You can also see the baby's neural tube (soon to be spinal column) on the bottom of the picture.  It looks like a long white line with a black line running parallel.

McColley decided, based on this ultrasound, that we're having a boy.  His reason?  Boys' heads are round like the baby's and girls' heads are flatter.  Yeah... we have no idea where he learned this anatomy lesson.

This is what I look like right now (with the soon-to-be Big Brother):