Susan and Mark to share gold medal for "Nesting"

Mark here. Wow, less than 100 days to go. Nine months seemed like an eternity at first, but now we're starting to realize how much we have left to do to prepare ourselves (and our apartment) for this new, little human being.

As little as they are, babies seem to come with many accessories and so we've been making room by cleaning (I believe the technical term is "nesting"). We had numerous boxes of "stuff" in the basement. Here is a sampling:

• Every single page of school notes from elementary school to college
• Every greeting card we ever received
• 6 boxes of books that are either no longer relevant or that we'll never have time to read
• VHS tapes - movies and home videos
• 3.5" disks
• 5.25" disks
• Iomega ZIP disks
• Old decorations we'll never use
• Ancient electronics like film cameras and cassette players

We've spent the last couple of months either scanning, digitizing, converting, donating, giving away, recycling, or trashing all of this stuff. After that, we completely reorganized our basement to make room for the inevitable overflow of toys, clothes and other baby accessories.

With the basement all cleaned up, our next step is to start cleaning out the office, which will become the nursery. We'll get rid of even more things and move a few things to the living room. Then, we'll paint the nursery and start buying some new baby furniture.

Phew! Who knew this baby thing could be such hard work?

It's (going to be) a...BOY!!!!

Today was the day for the fetal anatomy sonogram when we could find out if Giblet was a boy or girl. From the beginning of my pregnancy, I was convinced that Giblet was a boy but this would give us the answer (or so we hoped). Mark and I thought though that the baby might not cooperate and that it would be mooning us the entire time. But Giblet was very well behaved (for 97%) of the sonogram.
Our wait was short this time and the sonographer asked us if we wanted to know the sex. We answered "yes" and we got started. The sonographer started at the head and brain and she worked her way down, checking out the arms, hands, fingers (5 on both hands), stomach, umbilical cord, legs, feet, and toes (5 on both feet). I noticed something when the sonographer got to the legs and she mentioned that she saw the sex of the baby. I said, that I thought I saw too, that it was a boy. She said "you saw right." The baby's little bits n' pieces were as big as day on the screen.

"Censored for privacy :)"
The last part of the sonogram was to check the heart. The sonographer was able to get three of the four views but the left side proved impossible because the baby didn't want to turn over. She and the doctor on call checked the images and said everything looks good though.
Mark and I are really excited that the baby looks healthy. Now we get to start thinking of names, picking out blue items and starting to work on the nursery. But all that will wait until we return from our "babymoon" in Bermuda.
In the meantime, here is another picture of our beautiful baby boy.

Feeling the baby kick! (Susan)

Mark and I were just watching some TV this afternoon when I felt some twitches. I felt about 4 of them and I said Mark I'm feeling something weird. He put his hand on my stomach and felt one of the weird twitches too. We think it's the baby kicking or hiccuping. COOL!
The interesting thing is that when I look at info on the Internet, it seems like I'm feeling the baby earlier than normal. We can't wait to see what is growing in there in two weeks.

Third OB Appointment - June 13, 2008 (Susan)

It's Friday the 13th but that proved to be lucky for us today. There was almost no waiting to see Dr. V. for this morning's appointment and we had a great visit. Dr. V. gave us the results for the neural tube defect blood test. Everything came out well and there were no problems. I told her I had felt the baby moving around but not too much since last Friday. She said this was pretty normal since the baby is still small and it depends on how it's positioned. Then we all listened to the baby's heartbeat which was beating "strong" she said. All seems to be progressing well.
We have our fetal anatomy sonogram in two weeks and (fingers crossed) we'll find out the baby's sex. COOL!

Feeling the baby move! (Susan)

It's happened a few times already and today quite a bit. I'm feeling bubbles and they aren't air. It's the baby moving around! It started a few weeks ago and I wasn't completely sure but after the past few days, I would say this baby is quite active.

Second OB Appointment - May 16, 2008 (Susan)

I had my second OB appointment with Dr. V. this morning.
She went over my tests - the blood tests from the first OB appointment came back fine. She also went over the nuchal sonogram and blood test - everything was fine with that as well. Mark and I were relieved.
Dr. V. then listened to the baby's heartbeat with a microphone. It was going strong and fast. Giblet even moved for us during the test. I think this baby is going to like the spotlight.
My next appointment will be a blood test in two weeks to check the baby for neural tube defects (such as spina bifida). Then two weeks after that I have another appointment with the doctor. This is a lot to keep track of. Luckily Mark is here. He is a real trooper and comes with me to all of the appointments and helps me to remember them (or at least put them in his Blackberry).
That's all for now.

Our Cruise (Susan)

Last week we booked a cruise to Bermuda for the end of July/beginning of August. We were thrilled to find this cruise because it leaves right from NYC (so no flying) and would give Mark and me a great chance to relax before the baby arrives.
Today, I was getting very eager for vacation so I decided to check how to get to the pier. While on the cruise line's website, I noticed a link that said "What if I'm pregnant." Dreaming that they would have people rubbing my feet and feeding me grapes, I clicked the link and found out that they do not allow you to travel or take a cruise if you have entered your 24th week. I quickly calculated that I would be in my 25th week by the end of cruise! "OH NO!" I said. That wasn't really what I said but I want to keep this G.
I called the cruise line and spoke with a woman who was very nice and said that it was within a week since we booked and that we were still eligible for a full refund. I thanked the woman and told her I would call back and then quickly called Mark and alerted him to the dire situation. He told me to cancel our current reservation, get the refund and we would try to find another cruise tonight. I called back and spoke with another woman at the cruise line and told her what was going on. She was very kind and congratulated me on my pregnancy and told me she was happy I happened to check the web site today so that she could give us our refund which she did. PHEW!
So anyway, to make a long story short, Mark and I just booked our cruise (same cruise line). Everything is basically the same except now we will be going about a month earlier. It should be fun. It's already proving to be quite an adventure.