I'm becoming outnumbered very soon...

I too am excited about our little girl :). Here are some of the photos from the ultrasound today. I'm a little slicker with operating our scanner, so I figured I should go ahead and take care of this.



This one shows the heartbeat down at the bottom. That was fun to hear again. And then this one below here shows one of her hands, probably trying to push the ultrasound detector off of her. You apparently have to push pretty hard, and you could tell the baby wasn't ecstatic about it :).




And lastly, my favorite picture was this one of her face side profile close up, on the left side of the picture there. I think she's cute :). We can't wait to meet her!




That said, man I really hope that ultrasound lady is right. She said she was 90% sure it's a girl, but man, 10% wrong is pretty high. We'll choose to trust her for now though - I'm sure she knows what she's doing.

And the gender is...

We just had our 20 week ultrasound appointment which was pretty amazing. The technician said she is 90% sure its a girl considering we looked around for twenty minutes and couldn't find any male parts. :)

We got to see all sorts of things including her spine, fingers, face, nose, lips, kidneys, and heart chambers! According to the tech, everything looks fine and normal. She said the baby looks like she's about 11 ounces, and my due date might be a few days earlier then March 20th.

We will upload some of the pictures soon!

19 Weeks

Here's a picture of me at 19 weeks:

I don't see much of a difference between this on and the last one, but I definitely feel bigger. Lately my hands and feet have been swelling too.

We're excited for a couple different things this week:

1) Tomorrow I'm making a trip to Babies R Us with some of the other staff wives who are moms so scope out what we really need to register for. Later, Pete and I will go back to register together on our date night. :)

2) Our 20 week ultrasound is Wednesday morning! We're looking forward to getting a peek at how God has been forming our little one, and of course, excited to find out if the baby is a boy or a girl!

I'll make sure to update after our appointment on Wednesday!

Starting Our Week

Pete and I both had a relaxing day today. Mine was filled partly with much needed planning time for my week, and we both topped off the night with our student Bible studies that we lead. Here is a common Sunday afternoon activity for soon-to-be Daddy:


He's excited to play songs for our little one and teach him or her all about classic rock. :)

Both of us are feeling much better compared to a week ago, but we still have lingering coughs. Our hope and prayer is to get plenty of rest tonight and have a productive week on campus, relying on the Lord for our strength and effectiveness.

We are excited for a trip to Normal, IL scheduled for this Friday to visit our friends the Sfuras and look at an apartment we think we want. We also get to visit Pete's sister Elizabeth who attends Illinois Wesleyan.

Almost 18 weeks: Picture and Update

We just got back a few hours ago from this months prenatal appointment on this chilly October day. Dr. Herndon gave me some advice for getting over my cold completely in the next few days, and told me when to get the flu shots. She said the baby looks like its grown a lot in the last few weeks and sounds healthy.

Fun News: Our 2nd ultrasound is scheduled for Wednesday morning October 28th! This is when we'll find out the gender. We're really looking forward to that- especially since you all can't seem to come to a conclusion on whether you think its a boy or a girl. :)

Sad News: I got Pete sick. Who didn't expect that though? So he stayed home with me today and then drove me to my appointment.

Here's a picture of Pete taken last week. I made a yummy homemade carrot cake. He iced it and made the decoration, which he was very proud of.

Update on My Immune System

I am sick with either a bad cold or some kind of virus, but thankfully it is not the flu. I've pretty much been in bed sleeping for the past two days and Pete has been wonderful about taking care of me. Although I've had a slight fever and nausea (I think its just pregnancy related or induced), I've been progressing through the sickness just like a typical cold virus. The only bummer thing is not being able to take any medicine for relief or to help my immune system. I have however, at the prompting of Pete's mom, been drinking lots of fluids, and getting lots of rest. :)

I learned the other day that a pregnant woman's immune system is not as strong as normal because you're body needs to not fight off the baby (a foreign object). I thought that was interesting.

Well, as soon as I get better from this cold I'll get the flu shots. I'll also post a new picture soon along with an update on our appointment on Tuesday.

Something to pray for

I'm staying home from campus tonight (even though its our weekly meeting!) which makes me sad, because I'm feeling a little under the weather and frankly kind of exhausted. I don't think I have the flu, but I do work with college students and a lot of students have it now- its going around. Apparently pregnant women are much more susceptible to getting the flu, and the risks are higher after you get it. Im going to make an appointment to get both flu shots (regular and H1N1) very soon, at the recommendation of my doctor, parents, and in-laws. :) The prayer request would be that I would get a great night sleep tonight and feel better tomorrow morning- pray that I'm not in the beginning stages of the flu now... we have a pretty packed weekend of ministry that I was looking forward to taking part in.

Its official

We are moving to Normal, IL in December! Yesterday we signed a piece of paper to end our lease in Evanston at the end of November. As our new assignment with Campus Crusade for Christ is Illinois State and the surrounding universities, we thought it would be wise to go ahead and move before our new staff training (5 weeks in January) and before Im too pregnant to travel. That leaves December as the optimal time.

So we will finish our time here at Northwestern and Loyola, pack up in late November, and move. First we need to find an apartment and sign a lease in Normal. We have our eye on several nice apartments, all of which are way cheaper and better than ours here in Chicago, yet another motivation for leaving soon. :)

Im not looking forward to saying bye to people here yet though...

Our new apartment will obviously have a room for the baby and a little more room in general, which we are looking forward to. Also things like a washer and dryer, a garbage disposal, a dishwasher, and a parking space- all things we've done without for the past year!

16 weeks

I'm pretty sure there were moments this past week when I could actually feel my belly getting bigger. Other than that, some of my pregnancy symptoms include a stuffy nose and the occasional headache.

October has begun here in Evanston and has brought the cold with it. Most of the time I rush through my day meeting with and talking to students, forgetting that I have a baby growing inside me. Pretty soon there will be no mistaking that I'm pregnant- up until now I've been pretty good at disguising it while I'm walking around the dorms. :)

Lately I've enjoyed talking about birthing methods with some of my freinds and family, and reading up on them.