Bump-a-licious Part 2!

For all of my faithful bump groupies...here are some more photos :-) Not the best quality - lighting or our digicam?? but hopefully you can see the ever growing bump. The sleepy puppy photo snuck in there - I accidentally uploaded it first and we thought we should leave it in :-) It's one of his favorite places to take a nap, thanks to BigD...who has also introduced G-Pup to some other fun habits :-P

Happy birthday Kyle!

Another quick birthday post :-) Just wanted to wish my older brother Kyle a happy birthday tomorrow! Hope you took the day off to relax and do something enjoyable!!

31 Weeks

Just a quick post on this week's baby development from baby-gaga.com...

Your not-so-little-one is just a bit closer to their birth weight and height at a little under 4 pounds and 17 inches. With each added layer of baby fat, your baby's skin starts to look more and more like it will when they finally get to see the light of day. The heavy news: you can expect your miracle-gro muffin to gain about a half a pound of weight per week from now until about two weeks before birth. That's just what you needed. Even more weight to carry around! (As long as Noah's healthy, that's all that matters! Can't believe he's almost 4 lbs already!)

Your baby's still-developing immune system has gained substantial strength over the past few weeks getting them in full gear to face our disease-ridden world o’ wonders. Obviously, a large majority of your child’s immune strength will be derived from exposure to breast milk as well as the outside elements. Their cute little noggin’ (which could already be covered with luscious locks), is still soft because the skull bones have not yet fused together. As much as that sounds a little too vulnerable, their “skull softness” allows for a much smoother passage through the birth canal during labor—something both you and your little swimmer will appreciate when it’s finally time to “go!” Also, some babies will have that “soft spot” on their head for up to one year after birth.

Happy Belated Birthday Abby!!

This is a few days late, but we wanted to wish our wonderful friend Abby a belated happy birthday :-) We are lucky to have such a great friend!!
We hope you had a fun and relaxing birthday!

The big 3-0

Yayyyy - 30 weeks, time is ticking on faster now (sometimes too fast, with all the things we have left to do and buy and prepare!) I will have to post new photos soon, since my 'bump' has amazingly grown to the size of a small hill (soon to be a small mountain I am sure :-) Hope this means Baby Noah is packing on some good ol' poundage...grow baby grow! P thinks it's great fun to come home at the end of each week and see how much bigger the bump is (I think he just secretly envies the big belly... ;-)

We have decided to take a mini-trip this weekend after all. It is unlike us (okay, unlike me) to plan a trip without tons of planning, but we are looking forward to just relaxing and not having a schedule. It is our last hurrah before our lives are changed forever, and P really, really needs a break from his grueling schedule (December can't come soon enough!) Will post on how it went when we get back...


Week 30
The light is visible at the end of the tunnel! ( Yayyyy - looking forward to meeting our little man!) Your oversized self and amazing growing baby have finally reached the single digits (in terms of weeks till birth)! The fine lanugo hair that has been growing all over their little monkey-like body is going to start falling off this week in preparation for the big day. But don’t be shocked if they’re hairier than you’d anticipated, some babies keep their lanugo until after birth. Still, it’s not any cause to be concerned as it will fall off eventually. No surprises here: your little porker is getting even cuter with increasingly pudgy arms and legs this week thanks to the ever-growing layers of subcutaneous fat. In terms of numbers, your baby should be weighing in at around 3 pounds 12 ounces (or more!) and be nearly 16 inches long.

Week 29

I'm digressing a bit from baby updates with a few random blurbs...

It's so hot here...another heat advisory today - 105 degrees with humidity :-P So thankful for AC! We had been hoping to get away for a quick 'babymoon' weekend but every place that's close to travel to is really hot as well. I've also been feeling very fatigued and tired the past week (the third trimester blues :-) We may still take a quick trip somewhere since P really needs a vacation and we both love to travel. Since we've been here, we've tried to travel as much as we could fit into our schedules and budget within the southeast and part of the northeast, and we hoped to take another mini-trip before the end of September.

P is gone this week in Greenville, SC...and I was just getting used to being spoiled having him home for the past 5 weeks. And this time he is 4 hours away, so he'll have more driving time and less time at home on the weekends. After this rotation, though, unless his schedule changes again, he should be home with us until the end of his program (and for Noah's grand entrance :-)

G-Pup has his girlfriend staying this week while her parents are in Colorado, and she will be back for 2 weeks a little later on. She's a yellow English lab (one of my favorite breeds!) and very sweet. When she's here, they are almost constantly playing...it's fun having two dogs, but we'll have to wait a while...

This week's update...
This week, your baby weighs not quite 3 pounds and is about 15 inches long. Brain growth is rapid. If you’ve been feeling butterflies moving around in your belly, it’s not just your run-of-the-mill pre-birth performance anxiety. No, it’s your amazing baby with a case of the hiccups: a fairly common occurrence at this point resulting from practicing breathing for their big birthday. In addition, to getting a round of butterfly-like hiccups, your little swimmer has arduously managed to accumulate enough baby fat to account for nearly 3.5% of their overall body weight. Yeah, compared to adults, it’s not a lot, but when they’re little like that — it’s certainly a healthy (and warming) accomplishment in its way. Another fantastic accomplishment: your baby's spleen is now in charge of hematopoiesis — the 10 dollar name for the process involved in building up certain important blood components.

Week 28

Here's the weekly update from baby-gaga.com and a few other websites ...
You’ve got yourself a baby in the business of collecting fat and lots of it! In the past 11 weeks, your baby has increased its weight more than 10 times in 11 weeks! Other good stuff from inside: their eyes are doing lots of blinking this week because they’re now able to respond to light and dark. Also, their industrious little bone marrow is now a major construction site for developing red blood cells, while their super-cute adrenal glands are actually producing androgen and estrogen—which will stimulate your hormones to begin milk production. Can you say, “Moo?”

Your baby's crown-to-rump length is approximately 10 inches and the total length of your growing baby is 15.75 inches. Your baby weighs about 2.5 pounds at this point. Hair on your baby's head is growing longer. Your baby's eyebrows and eyelashes are likely formed.

Middle name poll results

Placenta brain kicking in again...I just remembered I neglected to post the results of the middle name poll. Picking the middle name was as quick and natural as picking the first name for us...it just fit. We decided on Noah Christian - it was a random choice and the only one P happened to like (which made it easier, since I liked them all ;-)

We had our third (2D) ultrasound at our OB appointment last week to check up on the potential placenta previa and found out the results of some other prenatal tests. Baby Noah was having a blast during this ultrasound - not as active as during our 3D one, but very fun nonetheless. For part of it, he was actually looking right at us :-) He also was playing with his toes ~ so adorable! We are so completely in love with him already, and it grows by the minute!!

Baby Noah now weighs 2 and a half pounds and is in the 50th percentile size wise. We also found out the good news that the placenta previa no longer exists. As for other test results - my gestational diabetes test came back negative, and my hemoglobin was low...so all in all, with the exception of slight anemia, a great appointment :-)

So, until our next posting...
Hope everyone has a great Fourth of July!!