A Very Merry Christmas

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas this year. Joe, the boys and I had an amazing Christmas and are so thankful for everyone and everything this year. Besides alittle bronchitis and runny noses, everything went smooth this year. I wanted to share some pictures of the boys for everyone!

Making Santa Some Cookies

A Little Wii Before Bed

I LOVE This Smile

PRESENTS

Paige Got A DS

We Do Love Each Other

The Guys And The Turkey!

PaPas Boys

A Second Ultrasound

Just wanted to let everyone know that we received a call from our OBGYN on Tuesday December 23rd. The final report came in on sweet baby girls ultrasound and it stated "incomplete findings" on the babies lower spine and bowel. In the report it advised my doctor to order an more in depth ultrasound to check both of these. My doctor told us to try not to worry, that it could be that they just got a bad image of that part and couldn't "clear" it until they have a better picture.

See at our ultrasound its done in the office. Then it is sent up-stairs to special OB doctors that specifically went to school for reading sonograms. They send down a preliminary report within an hour, and that is what our doctor gave us. It was not stated in the preliminary report of these findings, and she apologizes for telling us baby girl was 100% healthy, and that she felt she was, but that we do need to come in for a more in-depth sonogram based on the final results (which usually take a week to get back).

So we go in on January 12tj and have our ultrasound and then it will be a week before we get our results at our next appointment on the 21st! Please keep little girl, hopefully to soon have a set name, in your thoughts and prayers. In my heart I know shes fine, it's just sad and scary when your told your baby is healthy and then its kinda taken back and your given a chance instead.

It's A Healthy Baby Girl!

We are over the moon happy to announce our little bean is indeed a little girl. She was shy at first, but with alot of shaking and rubbing from the ultrasound tech she gladly showed us the "goods" and there is no mistake shes all girl. The boys are already calling her sister and Joe and I still are in shock and feel so blessed she is healthy and doing great.

She is measuring right on time, weighing in right now around 11 ounces! She is currently breech with her head up near my left ribs. But she has plenty of time to turn and thats the reason I have been only feeling kicks and tingles on my left side. The placenta is covering the front and right of my tummy! She was so cute on the ultrasound, the tech was trying to get her to show us what she was and she litter ally takes both hands and grabs both butt cheeks, Justin got a kick out of that!


As for me I finally gained 1lb, now Im only 28lbs under my pre-pregnancy weight. I was super dehydrated again though and spilling alot of keytones. She lectured me to get more fluids in, but knew b/c of the stomach bug I have had this week is why I was so dehydrated. But Im chugging the water and we are not worried. Well here are some pictures of our baby girl. Now we need name ideas!!!!

IM a GIRL

She was rubbing the back of her head

Her little feet crossed at the ankles

Mouth wide open!

Snow Day

So the weathermen were calling for rain last night with a small chance the mountains in east TN might get some snow. Well we woke up to about 4 inches of the white stuff this morning. Both boys had their first snow day of the year. They had a blast playing in the white stuff and I wanted to share some pictures!

Getting ready to go PLAY

Meet Dorthy

So Pretty




Dixie and Layla were eating Justins mini-snowman

Dixie Gator

Warming up with some hott chocolate

Relief

Just wanted to update everyone on our quad screen. The test results came in today and all were negative for downs syndrome and chromosomal abnormalities. I am so relieved and thank you all for your prayers and well wishes. Now if I can only be patient till next Thursday when we have our big ultrasound and we can see this bean and stop (hopefully) calling it "it".. :)

Moving on up!

So I felt like the "belly" wasn't poking out front as much as before so I thought I would take another picture. Look what happened in 11 days. Looks like baby is moving upward, and can you say growth spurt!

1st Picture was taken at 15 weeks exactly, and picture 2 was taken at 16 weeks 4 days! 11 Day gap!

17 alpha hydroxyprogesterone

So I started my 17P shots today, and truthfully it wasn't as bad as I had thought it was gonna be. The actual needle part I barely felt, but I could feel the hormone going in, it was a weird sensation. Afterwards I had a brief moment of light headiness, but after it passed I was fine. If you don't know already the progesterone shots are to help keep me pregnant longer. With my history of preterm labor this drug was recommended because it has a great success rate in helping prolong pregnancy in women that have a history of early births. Justin was 4 weeks early and Nickster as most of you know came 6 weeks early and spent his days in the NICU at Vanderbilt. I was told on my first exam with this baby if I opted not to do the shots this little one would come before 34 weeks, and I DO NOT want that. So Joe now gets to give me 19 more injections (1 per week till my 36 week) in my booty.

Also today we had our quad screen. The quad screen test is a maternal blood screening test that looks for four specific substances: AFP, hCG, Estriol, and Inhibin-A.

AFP: alpha-fetoprotein is a protein that is produced by the fetus
hCG: human chorionic gonadotropin is a hormone produced within the placenta
Estriol: estriol is an estrogen produced by both the fetus and the placenta
Inhibin-A: inhibin-A is a protein produced by the placenta and ovaries

By checking the levels if they are off, either high or low can indicate certain neural tube defects or downs syndrome. We should have the results either Monday or Tuesday. Please pray all the test come back normal. I swear if this test comes back fine and our ultrasound in 2 WEEKS :) comes back great I will be able to breath and finally enjoy this pregnancy. For some reason since day one I have been worried and not able to just sit back and not stress.

Speaking of 2 WEEKS I can not wait to see our baby. Everyone keeps asking are you excited to find out the sex of the baby. A big YES to that one, but more than that I just want them to say baby is measuring on time and is perfectly healthy. For some reason though I have this gut feeling baby is gonna be shy. If not and we get the "toilet shot" Joe and I haven't decided if we will be spilling the beans right away. Since our ultrasound is exactly 1 week to the day from Christmas we are tempted to wait and make it a Christmas surprise, but that's only if I can contain myself..lol