Is the Bean a thumbsucker?

Looks like it to me. At our last ultrasound, we witnessed more movement. This time the baby was waving an arm around. Pretty amazing! But in this picture, it looks like we might have a thumbsucker in our midst (or is that in Laura's middle?) The tech gave us nine pictures at the last ultrasound, but only in three or four can anything be made out. Remember, you can double click the picture to see it full-size. And feel free to leave your vote on thumbsucking in the comments.

The Bean says "Hi!"

Sorry it has taken so long to get this post up. I have been a bit tired lately, probably from my constant need to feed myself and the bean! I have never eaten so much in all my life. The belly is growing but thankfully nothing else...at least so far. On Monday, we had our third ultrasound. This is a picture of the little one waving hello. We could see all of the fingers and toes. We were also able to hear the little heartbeat again. Down to only 150 beats a minute now. The tech said things look great and the baby is actually a little ahead of schedule in growth. Maybe all the eating is helping. We are scheduled to see the doctor again on the 5th. I hope we get encouraging feedback from her too. I'll try to add a few more snapshots soon!

Our Second Ultrasound Part 4 (or, I am ready for my closeup)

This is the fourth and last picture from our last ultrasound. The tech zoomed in a bit for this one. Remember, you can click on the pictures to see them full-size.

We have another ultrasound on Monday because the doctor wants to keep close tabs on the development. More info after then!

Our second ultrasound part 3-Look at how adorable I am already!

This is Mommy's favorite picture of me! I was looking right at them when they did the last ultrasound and decided to show off a little so they knew I was okay. I am 11 weeks old today (only 9 weeks and a few days in the picture). I will double in size over the next 3 weeks. Tune in later for more pictures of me hamming it up. Lima Bean

A bicornuate what????

By now those of you that have little ones of your own may be wondering how we have had the fortune to have two ultrasounds at only 9 weeks! Well, the short version is that a have a bicornuate uterus, which is fancy doctor speak for a duplicated uterus. This is something we had never even heard of so when the ultrasound tech started talking about it as you might guess we were very concerned. The best way I can explain it is that when my uterus was forming in my own mother's womb it formed with two separate chambers rather than as one, which I have learned is the most common anomaly of the uterus. Sometimes people call it heart shaped uterus. This puts the bean and me in the high risk category so we get extra special attention from the doctor and lots of ultrasounds to track our progress. The lima bean is in the left "horn" of my uterus.

The good news is that the complications that I was having early on were because the right side of my uterus is confused because it has all the hormones and no baby! The ultrasound tech said it has baby envy. :) The doctor's office called me on Thursday and scheduled another ultrasound for April 24. So we will get another chance to see our darling little lima bean and more pictures to share. The fact that the baby only has half a uterus to grow in may cause additional issues in the future such as early labor or a breech presentation that requires a cesarean. I will keep the blog up to date so everyone is in the loop. But Dave is taking very good care of us so I don't think there is cause for concern.

Back to the Future

Back in 1996 or so, Laura and I were at Block Party. They had a photo machine that takes two people's faces and then predicts what a child will look like. Since we were engaged, we decided to see what it thought a future daughter would look like (some of you may remember it from the website I made for our wedding). So this is the result. Let's hope that machine is not very good.

RSS feed added

I added an RSS feed to this blog last night. This means you can use an RSS Feed reader (like Mozilla Thunderbird or many others, check google, who also has their own) to get posts via the reader instead of visiting the site to check for new posts. The feed address is http://ourlimabean.blogspot.com/rss/ourlimabean.xml


If you use Mozilla Firefox as your browser, you can also use the RSS Feed to make a live bookmark (note the icon on the right side of the URL). See the Firefox site for more about live bookmarks. Internet Explorer 7 has some similar features, but it is on Beta Preview Release 2, so not generally available yet.

Our second ultrasound, part 2 (or, Check out the Big Brain on Bean!)

Another picture from the second ultrasound. This visit was pretty amazing, and in some ways more than the first. The bean moved a fair bit, and we could see its head moving forward and back. It was pretty exciting! Also, the dark area of the head is apparently the brain. Amazing stuff.

Our second ultrasound

Here is another picture from our second ultrasound, just five days after the first. The doctor ordered the second ultrasound because she had some concerns from the first. I'll let Laura explain some of that later, as she understands it better. As you can see, the bean is easier to make out in this picture. I guess five days is a long time when you are a lima bean.

Another picture

So here the second picture from our first sonogram. A few days after this we had another sonogram because the doctor had some concerns. We'll get those up soon. If anyone watches Scrubs, we have not done the Village People test yet. By the way, you can click on the pictures in the post to see a full-size version.

Love at first sight...

How is it possible to be so enamored with someone you have never met? Swish, swish, swish the sound of our baby's heartbeat (168 times a minute!) filled the tiny ultrasound room. Here's the first look at our darling little lima bean. 8 weeks and 5 days old. The ultrasound tech had quite a bit of trouble getting our little one on the screen because my uterus is tilted. I always knew I was a little off....

And away we go...

Wrapping up law school, preparing for the bar, and moving were not enough life-changing events for us. We also have the biggest event of all: we are having our first baby. Our "lima bean" (as Laura nicknamed it) is due early November.

We decided to create this blog to chronicle our adventure for our family and friends. So tune-in and follow along as the bean grows (along with Laura's belly) and we learn the hard way what parenting is all about.