Well darn it.

We had our re-check this morning and last week wasn't a fluke. My cervix is shortening. Today was 2.8 with a little stretch in Cindy's measurement - she was pulling for us. It's nothing too serious, one of the things we were keeping an eye out for. Dr. Mernitz happens to be on call this week so he knew the labor & delivery schedule and suggested we go ahead and schedule for tomorrow morning. 7:30 we go in and will be home shortly after. Doc says I'll be back on my feet, no bed rest required. Yay! Pray all goes well, minimal cramping afterward and I'll keep you updated.

Quick Madi pics

We were playing outside the other night and she was cracking me up. She'd grab a little stick that fell from our tree and pull all the leaves off say "leaf" each time. When all the leaves had been pulled off she'd hold it up to show me and say "bye bye leaves." It was too cute to not try and grab a few pictures. Her hair is so light it was glowing in some of the pictures. I know it's getting a little long in the front but I have nightmares about getting it cut and it ends up butchered so she ends up with bangs that are 2" long and spike out from her forehead. I know, silly Mom worries. We try and pull it back into a barrette but they usually slide out of her hair as she runs around. The metal clippy ones work best and I like them because they're super easy. I can grab her and have one in in just a few seconds which is awesome because she really doesn't like her hair messed with. Can think of another little blondie who wasn't crazy about getting her hair done either...

15 weeks

How far along?  15 weeks
Total weight gain/loss: our scale= +5lbs, doctors scale= -2lbs

Maternity clothes? A couple tops here and there.

Stretch marks? Nope.

Sleep:  not always - sciatic nerve is nutso this time around
Best moment:  ultrasound

Miss Anything? a beer 

Movement: I think I felt him/her move today. We see tons of movement on the ultrasound. This time we saw the baby open and close its mouth several times, plus the usual feet up, feet down, arms up, arms down, twist sideways.
Food cravings: dairy

Anything making you queasy or sick: Not really, had some cooked broccoli this weekend and survived.
Have you started to show yet: I like to think I'm past the "is she fat or pregnant?" stage.  

Gender: They're there. From our ultrasound techs - one vote girl, one vote boy.
Labor Signs: Maybe, see below.
Belly Button in or out? in

Wedding rings on or off? On.
Happy or Moody most of the time: happy

Looking forward to: Al's visit this weekend.

Our Halloween alien saying Hello.

 So, our bi-weekly appointments have been to keep an eye on cervical length as we don't know what caused Madi to come so early. Monday we went through all the fun stuff - heartbeat, movement, brain development - and then got to measurement time. Cindy, our regular ultrasound tech, measured 3.1cm. Two weeks ago I was 4.1cm which was in the acceptable range. As soon as I saw we didn't get anywhere near 4cm I knew that wasn't good news. Cindy was great to explain that yes it was shorter but she'd be more concerned if she saw the cervix was starting to open, said it would look like the end a duck bill on the ultrasound, but that both sides were still together and closed. We met with Dr. Moore afterward the ultrasound. Dr. Moore was the lucky guy that met us at Carmel St. V's and told us Madi was on her way but they'd do everything possible to keep her from coming so we have a bit of history with him. He suggested we not wait until our regular two week appointment and do a repeat measurement in a week. Also suggested we stop rotating amongst the doctors in the practice and pick one other doctor to be on our case, our "secondary." They'd wanted us to start rotating in case things did start earlier than March and my regular OB wasn't available. We completely support both of Dr. Moore's suggestions. As long as schedules allow we'll keep Dr. Mernitz and Moore as our secondary. The follow up is this coming Monday. We're the first appointment of the day, ultrasound first and meet with Dr. Mernitz. Both Dan and I are grateful for the shuffle they made so we could meet with Dr. Mernitz, increased level of comfort knowing if we have to devise a game plan it'll be with him. Between now and Monday please pray with us that 3.1cm was an error and all's well.

We pick up Al from the airport tomorrow morning. While I still can't do too much activity we're planning to have a good time while Al's in town. Military life makes scheduled vacations a bit tough so we're thankful for the time we do get to catch up in person. Sunday we'll be cheering for the Colts from the lower section. If we're up to our usual shenanigans, you'll probably see us on the big screen. Hee hee.

cravings

My appetite is all over the place with this baby. Sometimes I’m not hungry at all and other times I swear I could eat enough to turn out the Open sign at an all you can eat buffet. Last night for dinner I couldn’t finish ½ of my plate, and it was a normal helping. Today I’m not back from lunch 30 min when a coworker comes back with lunch and I’m hungry all over again just smelling their food. It’s crazy! Some days I feel like all I do is eat. The desire for dairy has turned out to be a full-fledged craving. I remember the same thing with Madi. I’m buying milk more often than usual and our fridge now has cottage cheese, two types of yogurt and two kinds of pudding. And I guess I have bought several new kinds of cheese. Oh, and the time I ate only queso for dinner… Yep, officially a dairy craving.

 

Monday afternoon is our next appointment so I’ll have stats and pictures to share. And family pictures are tomorrow so hopefully I’ll have those to share soon as well. Until then!

 

We passed 12 weeks!

How far along?  13 weeks
Total weight gain/loss: our scale= +4lbs, doctors scale= -3lbs

Maternity clothes? Not yet but it won't be long.

Stretch marks? Nope.

Sleep:  sometimes an early morning bathroom break brings an end to sleep for the night
Best moment: Convention week was a doozie this year so it was beyond wonderful to see Dan and Madi at the end. Had a wonderful mini-vacation in Grapevine, TX.

Miss Anything? Activity. 

Movement: Can't feel any yet.
Food cravings: Not really. I'm not one to drink a glass of milk but I have a couple of times recently.

Anything making you queasy or sick: cooked broccoli, was the same with Madi. Sometimes it sounds good and other times just thinking of it makes me queasy.
Have you started to show yet: Sure have.  

Gender: those parts are still under construction
Labor Signs: No. Hallelujah!!
Belly Button in or out? in

Wedding rings on or off? On.
Happy or Moody most of the time: Neither, tired most of the time.

Looking forward to: feeling baby movement

So far we've seen nugget/pebbles/squirt 4 times. The first ultrasound was August 17th at 6 weeks and we heard the heartbeat! Little squirt wasn't measuring as big as they wanted so we went back the week after and tada! right on track. The third ultrasound wasn't until 10 weeks and the fourth was yesterday. The tech switched it over to 3D before we had a chance to say anything. She wanted to show us just how much the baby was moving around. While it was neat to watch the baby turn side to side, put hands above the head/across the chest, legs up/legs down - I still think 3D is a bit creepy. Thankfully she didn't do any real close-ups of the face. I loved feeling Madi move all the time and am really looking forward to when I can feel this little one moving around.

So far things have been boring which is what we've been praying for. Very few pregnancy symptoms too. There were a few weeks when I'd get queasy from time to time but Sprite or simply water with lime would help. I couldn't figure out what would trigger it, other than being pregnant. With Madi I needed to have something every couple hours or I'd start to get queasy. It didn't have to be anything big, a hard candy or juice would work. Not the case with this little one. I have noticed an increase in appetite recently. Several times I've woken up hungry in the middle of the night and can't make it to breakfast so there I am rummaging in the kitchen at 3am. I've had an early lunch and a late lunch a couple times as well. I'm usually a straight out of the tap water kinda girl but water with ice has become more popular. So like I said, not many pregnancy symptoms or not many of the "usual" symptoms. Fatigue is the new one and man, when it hits, it hits! Get me to bed stat.

We're still on a schedule of ultrasounds every 2 weeks so they can check cervix length. They're watching to see if it starts to shorten which would indicate the beginning of pre-term labor. If that starts to happen we get to implement the "fun" parts of the Preemie Prevention Plan. Yesterday we talked about the likelihood of starting hormone shots somewhere around 16 weeks as a just-in-case. We all know I can't stick myself and Dan says he's out so I'll be looking for volunteers! And between now and the next appointment I get to do a 24hour urine test. Let me show you just how excited I am about this one:

Every time I pee during a 24 hour period I'm to collect it in a jug, store it in the fridge between trips and then bring the jug back to the lab for testing and submit to some quick blood work. I've already come up with so many disasters that could happen in that small 24hr timeframe - jug topples over, confusion in the fridge, questions from guests... But this is another pre-term labor test to determine protein and creatinine levels so I'll do it as many times as they want if it helps keep baby healthy and safe. Just need to figure out a good time to be a shut-in for 24 hrs because there's no way I'm traveling with a jug.