It's a girl...maybe...could have been a squished scrotum

That's the big news. It could be a girl. But it also could have been a squished scrotum that we were looking at. The kid was not being very cooperative when we got around to that section of the ultrasound and when they went back later she/he had changed position but they still couldn't tell 100%. So what does this mean? This means we won't know for sure until the birth. This is absolutely okay with us. Please restrain yourself when walking past some cute pink frilly thingy in some store...I think that we should all just stick with the neutral colors of green and yellow.

I actually know a woman who has been in a very similar situation. She was told that it was probably a girl and she REALLY wanted a girl. At the birth when they told her it was a boy she cried because she was disappointed. I don't want that to happen to me. I don't want to plan for one and have the other one appear. Of course this also means that we have to decide on a boy's name. The girl's names were easy to agree on and we have narrowed it down to 2 (Ava or Katherine) but we CANNOT agree on a boy's name so we'll have to pick up a baby name book and get crackin' just in case.

The good news is that whatever it is it is healthy and it gave us the #1 with it's index finger so it must already be able to tell it's place in the hierarchy at our zoo. She (he) was just making sure we knew. Heart, bladder, kidneys...all looked good. Brain hemispheres...cool. Spine...in good shape. And now I feel like I can finally get excited about this thing that keeps kicking me over and over and over. We could actually see it kick me several times during the ultrasound and when Eric saw it he asked if I could feel it. I couldn't because like all ultrasounds for this sort of thing I had a completely full bladder that was cushioning the blows.

Sorry people....

I know every one of you (read three) have been waiting for updated pics of my puppy. My puppy who has a serious deathwish this week. Eric and I came back last night from dinner with some friends to a house that smelled like dog poop and spent the next 45 minutes cleaning up my poor puppy's crate and bathing him. It was a messy and horrible job. Today, I came back from work and the same stench, the same filthy cage, the same poop encrusted puppy and the cleaning process began all over again except this time Eric wasn't here to share it. Lucky Eric was still at work. So after I vomited, I got to cleaning. I think the reason they make puppies so damn cute is so that you don't kill them when they do annoying, disgusting shit (like eating kitty roca and trying to lick you when they still have litter clumped on their nose). I love him though...

On the baby human front, let the genetic testing begin!! I give my blood again tomorrow...only these are the real deal tests. We'll find out about spina bifida, down's syndrome...all the fun ones. I'm looking forward to the results so that I can finally get excited about this kid that keeps kicking me. We find out about the rest of the goods (heart, spine, kidneys...) on the 16th and maybe we'll even know what it is by then. In the meantime, I haven't come up with some cutesy name for it (hello, who am i?!) and occassionally call it "the beastie" but mostly refer to it as "it". I do need to have Eric start taking pics of the progression though because those are always good pictures to have later on. In the meantime though, yes, I'm in maternity clothes out of necessity. I get bigger every single day but I only gained 5 lbs in 4 months which is good for a girl starting out chubby. However, my waist disappeared overnight and I'm getting large and there's still 4 months to go...