I'm going to regret this...

Here is our TENTATIVE list of boys & girls names. There's poll on the actual blog (for those of you who read this on facebook), so feel free to visit & vote.

A few things before I share the list.
1. Popular names are not guaranteed a spot on the final list.
2. If I am told "oh, I hate this name" I can GUARANTEE you that I will immediately LOVE the name. I am nothing if not ornery.

With that said, here are the *tentative* list(s)

Girls:
Calliope
Isadora
Milla
Athena
Ophelia

Boys:
Theodore
Milo
Parker
Xavier

Names will undoubtedly change before April...

All about New Baby

We had our ultrasound appointment today, and once we get around to scanning the photos I'll post them here.

Few things to note:
1. Anterior placenta - which is why the kicks I feel are faint. The placenta may or may not move to a posterior position, but shouldn't affect delivery.

2. Breech baby - so the baby's head is up closer to my bellybutton and it's feet are down near the cervix. Penelope was always head down, so I was a little worried but my midwives assured me that half of the time they see babies in this position and most babies flip on their own. If the baby hasn't flipped then they can help make that happen - I have no desire for a breech delivery.

3. Baby is curled up against my spine and even if we had wanted to know the sex, the baby wouldn't have let us :)

4. Placenta is low, but not obstructing the uterus. This actually makes me nervous and I may elect for another ultrasound when we get into the 30-ish week mark just to make sure everything is still as it should be. Placenta previa is serious and would mean a necessary hospital delivery. Hopefully the placenta doesn't move further down so we can have our planned homebirth.

5. Everything else looks good, we'll talk more about the measurements, placenta, and whatnot at our next midwife appointment which is in early December.

Thursday I'll be 19 weeks, which means the halfway mark is a little over a week away!

Ball!

This video is also posted on Facebook:



Penelope says "ball" and gives mommy some serious attitude - it's cute though :)

Things to post before I forget

1. Penelope loves soccer. We went and saw my cousin Riley & Macy's soccer games and Penelope wanted to get in on the action. That afternoon she also passed a ball back & forth with Riley and correctly identified the soccer ball as a "baa". My mom took video with her phone, so I'll try and clean in up on my computer today and get it posted.

2. A couple of days ago during dinner P turned to Bryan, gave him a raspberry, and then turned back to me for a bite of food. It was pretty funny.

3. My parent's dog K'Ehlyr (pronounced KayLar; aka, The Red Beast: TRB) loves to lick Penn... and Penn has taken to pushing TRB's head away and shaking her head no. I have a feeling one of her first phrases will be "NO Lar!"

4. Today Penny started saying "bar" when playing with her stuffed bears. I think we may count that one :)

5. We have a molar! Thank goodness! One down, 3 to go (well, until next year when she's supposed to get in her 2 year molars).

Gender prediction

So anyone whose talked to me about gender prediction methods knows I think they're all bullshit. All of the charts, old wives tales, and other such nonsense methods are typically only correct 50% of the time.

The Chinese Conception chart said Penelope was going to be a boy. Wrong! It was the only one I did for her since we found out her sex at 17 weeks.

This time we're holding out until the end, so I though it would be fun to do a couple of the gender prediction methods and come back after the baby is born to see how many guessed wrong.

Chinese Conception chart: Boy
Ring test: Boy
Heart rate: Girl (FYI, for this over 140 = girl, under 140 = boy)
Old Wives tales (it was a quiz): 67% chance of a girl, 33% chance of a boy

So 50/50 according to the unscientific gender prediction methods. Which is what I figured it would be.

Balloon!

Add these to the list of words:

Balloon, Doggy, Baby

Penelope is OBSESSED with balloons. Well, maybe that's too strong a word... nah, it fits. When we went to Red Robin the other day they gave her a balloon and she's been all about them ever since (she also loved the ones at Maddox's birthday party). Today at the store she kept saying "balla" and looking at the balloons - so we're counting it.

She also says "baby" when she looks at the pictures of herself on the livingroom wall. It's pretty hilarious. I'm going to try and teach her to say baby & point at my belly - of course this might backfire and she'll say it even after I give birth. I may want to rethink that one.

As for doggy, she's been saying "da" for Dad & dog until today when she clearly said "doggy" as she was attacking poor Harley-Quinn (well, Harley decidedly deserved it). Although she did go back to "da" later so "doggy" may or may not count at this point.

But balloon and baby are definitely words.

We bought some decorations and favors for her 1st birthday party today! Not a ton of decoration, but we'll also get a bunch of balloons to make the room more festive. I want it to be relatively easy to clean up, so we're keeping it pretty simple.

Exactly 3 weeks (tomorrow) until Penelope turns 1!

Pregnancy update

Today was our 18 week appointment.

Baby's heartbeat was 144, which is good. Marlene was able to find it right away (last time baby was moving around too much and it took a few minutes to find the heartbeat).

My BP was 100/60 which is better than last time (90/60) so that was good. I've lost more weight, but they don't seem concerned. They said I'll probably make it up next month or the month after, the average weight gain for the duration of the pregnancy is more important than the weight from month to month. I guess the biggest difference between this pregnancy and the last is the weight - with Penelope I consistently gained almost a pound a week and this time (so far) I've lost weight. Just goes to show that no two babies are the same :)

Everything else looks good, I'll make our ultrasound appointment today so we should have baby pictures (no "crotch shots"!) in the next few weeks.