The First 16 Weeks

I'll apologize now for the length of this entry... I have 16 weeks worth of information to catch up on. :)

Before we jump right in to Week 16, let's back up a little bit. I've been SOOO LUCKY in that I've had such an easy pregnancy so far. I had no nausea or sickness what so ever. WHEW! The worst part has been the exhaustion. There are some days that I get home from work, or after a long day of chores on the weekend, that I can barely function. To make the exhaustion worse, I have to get up and pee like a million times a night. (I guess this actually lends to me being tired in the mornings...)

After the infamous "pee on a stick" (like 3 times... I won't lie), we had to decide who to tell, and how to tell them. We decided to only tell the immediate family until we got the results of the first sonogram at 8 weeks. Our way wasn't overly creative, but it worked out for us. With each of our parents and Rusty's sister, we had them pose for a picture, and as we were preparing to snap away, we told them, so we could capture their first reaction on camera. It worked out, kind of. I think everyone was so shocked, and because of it, their reactions were extremely delayed in coming out. No doubt what we captured was great, though.

Our first sonogram was at 8 weeks. It was really neat to see, but weird at the same time. At this appointment we got to see our little bean for the first time, complete with heart beat. We were given a due date of May 30th based on the measurement of the little bean. Our doctor told us a few things to expect and so on.

At 12 weeks we went in for a genetic screening appointment. We got another sonogram. Going in to it, we were told the doctor would likely be able to make an accurate prediction of boy or girl. (This excited us, obviously.) The sonogram was so neat because we could actually see a baby... a head, a body, 2 arms and 2 legs. While we were in there, the baby was moving so much - it was so cool to see! One of the sonogram pictures actually captured the baby kicking it's legs up and it's arms extended. Because the baby was moving so much, the doctor couldn't get an accurate "read" of anything in the private regions... BOOO!

Immediately following the genetic screening, I had an appointment with my regular OB/GYN. (She's the best by the way... her name is Leslie...) She asked if the doctor was able to see anything, and we told her no. She told us we weren't scheduled for another sonogram until 20 weeks, but that if she wasn't busy when we came in at 16 weeks, she'd do a quick sonogram to see if we could tell anything. We're trying not to get our hopes up, but we really want to sneak a peek this week. :)

This brings us to current day. I've (approximately) entered my 16th week... that's 40% of my pregnancy. It's crazy to think I'm nearly half way through, but anyway... I get an email every week letting me know what's new, what's going on, what to expect, etc. This week, the email informed us that our little baby is about the size of an avocado. I was also informed that over the next few weeks the baby should nearly double in size, and that I could possibly start feeling the baby move...

We go to the doctor this coming Wednesday. As previously mentioned, if our doctor isn't busy, she might do a quick sonogram to find the sex of the baby. I don't want to wait 4 more weeks, but I guess we may have no choice. We're mostly ready to start doing some planning, finally. We are ready to start working on the nursery, but obviously need to know boy or girl...

We do have names picked out, for all those that are curious. If it's a girl, she'll be Caylee Marie. If it's a boy, he'll be Rylan Ray. As far as the first names, we've had them for longer than we've thought about having a baby.

When the time comes, hopefully naturally at the end of May :), we'll be delivering at Frisco Baylor. (Assuming everything goes according to plan, that is.) I've heard nothing but wonderful things about this hospital, and am so excited that we'll be delivering there.

We'll be sure to keep the updates coming, as we get new information. Also, below are a few pictures of my "progress" through these first 16 weeks. (One of the other OK things is I'm not gaining too much weight too quickly. I've only gained about 5 pounds, thus far. I'm pretty sure most of that is in my chest, but based on the pics, you can see some other growth, too.)

Here I am at 4 weeks:


Here I am at 8 weeks:


Here I am at 16 weeks: