Once we found out Liam is a boy, I felt like we could start acquiring stuff for him. One of the first things I did was buy some blue onesies. It made this whole baby thing feel very real. It's still hard to imagine my son will be wearing those clothes one day...one day this year! Up until that point, all I had gotten were a couple of burp cloths (Liam's first gift) and a couple of kid's books I bought.
One way to acquire stuff is to have a baby shower. In order to let people who are invited to said shower know what to buy, you register for gifts. So I recently registered for baby gifts at Babies R Us, Target, and Wal-Mart. Registering is a lot of pressure. You want to register for good, practical stuff because you don't want people buying stuff you won't use. Then some humbleness comes in because you realize no one will be required to get you anything, so you should appreciate whatever you get because someone was kind enough to spend money on you. Therefore, they should be able to get you whatever they want. However, I for one enjoy having a registry to go by when purchasing gifts. That way I know the person will like and use the gift. I'm just happy to be having a baby shower at all. I have no idea if I'll have one in Texas, but I'm looking forward to having one in Louisiana and seeing my family and friends.
Last weekend, we mosied (is that spelled correctly?) up to IKEA to look at cribs. I honestly had no intention of buying one since it seems a little soon to be doing that. However, IKEA on a Saturday can make you never want to go back again, which is why Will insisted we not leave there without one. That way, he wouldn't have to go back. And so we bought a crib, and a chair for rocking and nursing as well. Big baby stuff!
Knowing that Liam's wardrobe cannot consist solely of 3 onesies, I've started looking at baby clothes on sale. I scored some Beatles onesies and a t-shirt for him at Old Navy for about $2 a piece. I had already bought one Beatles onesie at Target. He will probably have one for every day of the week. Also, my friend Amanda gave us a bunch (and I mean a bunch) of baby boy clothes a few days ago! Liam now has lots of clothes in various sizes thanks to her generosity. I love free stuff!
So yeah, lots of baby stuff acquisition going on right now.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Baby Pictures!
I remember waaaay back on October 25 (seems like forever ago), when we got visual confirmation that I was pregnant, being amazed at the tiny little baby inside me moving around. The first words the sono tech said were, "I do see a baby in there." And there he was swimming around and moving his tiny little arms and legs. Of course, we didn't know he was a he at the time. We called the baby Ponyo, because he looked like a fish doing all that swimming. I feel kind of bad about that now because Ponyo the cartoon fish is actually a girl. Oh well. Here are couple pictures from that day.
He was only an inch and a half long then, but still so cute.
Ten weeks later, he had grown to over 8 inches and weighed almost a pound. No wonder I was so hungry the previous 6 weeks. This kid was growing and growing. January 3rd was the day we found out he was a he and that he appeared to be doing great with his growing and developing. I'm so proud of him!
He moved and squirmed the whole time and didn't let us get a profile shot. He preferred to face us most of the time and lay his head on the placenta like a pillow. He did lots of moving those arms and legs just like before. I figure it must be his favorite thing to do. It looks like his has Will's long and skinny feet.
The sono tech was "as sure as she'd ever been" that we are having a boy. That was a good day.
We mostly got really short video clips of him that day. Here's one of him moving a little bit. It may not be possible on here, but it's more satisfying if you put it on a loop!
Ten weeks later, he had grown to over 8 inches and weighed almost a pound. No wonder I was so hungry the previous 6 weeks. This kid was growing and growing. January 3rd was the day we found out he was a he and that he appeared to be doing great with his growing and developing. I'm so proud of him!
We mostly got really short video clips of him that day. Here's one of him moving a little bit. It may not be possible on here, but it's more satisfying if you put it on a loop!
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Name Revealed!
Big week! HUGE week! We now know we're having a little boy...and now he has a name! Everyone needs one of those, right?
His name is: Liam Edward
You may or may not recall from the Baby Names post a few weeks ago that we were planning on naming a boy William (after his old man) and calling him Liam. We never actually agreed on a middle name.
Then once we found out we were having a boy, Will's dad suggested we give him the middle name Edward. It's Will's middle name, his dad's middle name, his grandfather's middle name... You get the idea.
We hadn't really thought about the middle name Edward before then because William is the name we were going to use, and then he'd be William Edward, which is Will's name, which would make him a junior. No juniors allowed, so it was pushed aside.
Once we realized it's a family name, we reconsidered it and liked the idea of carrying it on. Therefore, we decided to not name him William, but just Liam. It will make his life much easier that way, anyway. He won't have to correct teachers on the first day of school and stuff like that.
So yeah, Liam Edward. Close enough to Will's name without being a junior.
In case you're wondering what our girl name was, it was Penelope Jane. It's going in the vault for a future daughter if we are so blessed one day.
His name is: Liam Edward
You may or may not recall from the Baby Names post a few weeks ago that we were planning on naming a boy William (after his old man) and calling him Liam. We never actually agreed on a middle name.
Then once we found out we were having a boy, Will's dad suggested we give him the middle name Edward. It's Will's middle name, his dad's middle name, his grandfather's middle name... You get the idea.
We hadn't really thought about the middle name Edward before then because William is the name we were going to use, and then he'd be William Edward, which is Will's name, which would make him a junior. No juniors allowed, so it was pushed aside.
Once we realized it's a family name, we reconsidered it and liked the idea of carrying it on. Therefore, we decided to not name him William, but just Liam. It will make his life much easier that way, anyway. He won't have to correct teachers on the first day of school and stuff like that.
So yeah, Liam Edward. Close enough to Will's name without being a junior.
In case you're wondering what our girl name was, it was Penelope Jane. It's going in the vault for a future daughter if we are so blessed one day.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Gender Revealed!
As I think all of my readers are directed here from Facebook, this is probably already old news. But I'll say it again: We're having a boy!!
Not that I wouldn't be just as excited to have a girl, because I totally would be. I'm just glad I was right for once on a gender prediction. I thought I was having a boy, and lo and behold, I am. It makes me feel smart, or intuitive, or motherly. Something like that. I also don't have to worry about getting buried under a mountain of pink. Blue I like; pink I can't handle in large doses.
So I'm now 20 weeks along: halfway through. Everything still seems to be going really well. Thankfully that was confirmed with the ultrasound yesterday. The ultrasound lasted 30-40 minutes, mainly because we have a little stinker on our hands who refused to cooperate for the requisite profile shot. The sonogram tech was determined to get it, but eventually she had to give up. In the meantime, she looked at and photographed all his organs. They all looked great and were doing what they're supposed to. His heart has all 4 chambers and was beating at 154 bpm. His brain, kidneys, and bladder looked normal. She measured his head, femur, and overall length. All were in the normal range. He is 8.1 inches long (which I think is actually a little shorter than I expected) and he weighs 13 ounces. He has two hands and two feet, with what appeared to be the correct number of digits on each one. It's not the most detailed thing in the world, afterall. He does not have a cleft palatte, and overall his face has the normal features. Using the colored doppler, we got to see the blood going to and from the baby through the umbilical cord, exactly as it's supposed to. We got to see him lay his head down on the placenta like a pillow. We got to watch him move around alot. He especially likes to move his arms above his head. We got to see him open and close his mouth and kick his legs. She took a good picture of his foot, which is long and skinny like Will's feet. I envision size 15s in his future. Poor kid will have to order his shoes off the Internet.
Overall, he was just completely perfect. Nothing to be concerned about. I'm healthy too. I've gained 12 pounds so far, with 10 of that being gained in the last 6 weeks. I don't know if that's normal or not, but I have been extremely hungry since the beginning of December! I hope the weight gain does slow down, though.
I'm very happy to know that my child is healthy and growing at a normal rate. I'm excited about having a boy. God is great! I really am blessed to carry this child.
Not that I wouldn't be just as excited to have a girl, because I totally would be. I'm just glad I was right for once on a gender prediction. I thought I was having a boy, and lo and behold, I am. It makes me feel smart, or intuitive, or motherly. Something like that. I also don't have to worry about getting buried under a mountain of pink. Blue I like; pink I can't handle in large doses.
So I'm now 20 weeks along: halfway through. Everything still seems to be going really well. Thankfully that was confirmed with the ultrasound yesterday. The ultrasound lasted 30-40 minutes, mainly because we have a little stinker on our hands who refused to cooperate for the requisite profile shot. The sonogram tech was determined to get it, but eventually she had to give up. In the meantime, she looked at and photographed all his organs. They all looked great and were doing what they're supposed to. His heart has all 4 chambers and was beating at 154 bpm. His brain, kidneys, and bladder looked normal. She measured his head, femur, and overall length. All were in the normal range. He is 8.1 inches long (which I think is actually a little shorter than I expected) and he weighs 13 ounces. He has two hands and two feet, with what appeared to be the correct number of digits on each one. It's not the most detailed thing in the world, afterall. He does not have a cleft palatte, and overall his face has the normal features. Using the colored doppler, we got to see the blood going to and from the baby through the umbilical cord, exactly as it's supposed to. We got to see him lay his head down on the placenta like a pillow. We got to watch him move around alot. He especially likes to move his arms above his head. We got to see him open and close his mouth and kick his legs. She took a good picture of his foot, which is long and skinny like Will's feet. I envision size 15s in his future. Poor kid will have to order his shoes off the Internet.
Overall, he was just completely perfect. Nothing to be concerned about. I'm healthy too. I've gained 12 pounds so far, with 10 of that being gained in the last 6 weeks. I don't know if that's normal or not, but I have been extremely hungry since the beginning of December! I hope the weight gain does slow down, though.
I'm very happy to know that my child is healthy and growing at a normal rate. I'm excited about having a boy. God is great! I really am blessed to carry this child.
Monday, December 27, 2010
Boy or Girl?
On the right hand side, I added a poll so you can vote on whether you think this baby is a boy or girl. We find out one week from today! BTW, I'm not tech-savvy enough to make "your title" go away, so I think it'll just have to stay.
If you want to base it on some old wives tales: I haven't really been sick at all, I don't really care for sweets (usually...sometimes I do want something sweet), no heartburn. Just ask if there's something else you need to know to make a prediction.
If you want to base it on some old wives tales: I haven't really been sick at all, I don't really care for sweets (usually...sometimes I do want something sweet), no heartburn. Just ask if there's something else you need to know to make a prediction.
Monday, December 20, 2010
Baby Names
One of the most important things we get to do is name this baby...who will become a child, then an adolescent, then a teenager, then eventually an adult. It's not like picking out a stroller or crib bedding. Those things only affect the child for a little while. But a name is something they will keep for the rest of their lives (unless they hate it so much they change it). It's a big deal. It's something we've been putting a lot of thought into.
The name can't be only baby or little kid appropriate. This mostly applies to cutesy or trendy names. You know, the names of kids who have not yet grown up so their name still sounds like it belongs to a baby. For boys, I put most of the names that end in -aden or -ayden or some other variation of that in the category. They're not bad names at all; it's just hard for me to imagine adults with those names, even though it will inevitably happen.
The name can't be too wierd. I'm sure there are plenty of people in the world who give their kids some crazy strange names, but of course the people we only hear about doing so are celebrities. If you name your child Pilot Inspektor ( like actor Jason Lee) you have the potential to limit their career options. Although, I suppose if they're the child of a celebrity, jobs and making money may not be such a big deal. I don't think all wierd celebrity baby names are bad, though. Apple is kind of a cute name. That doesn't mean I'd ever name my child that.
The name can't be too popular. I experienced it first hand. I was one of many Jennifers. My name is the most common one for my age group. Nowadays, I think there is enough diversity among names that a strong concentration of one or two names doesn't really happen anymore. Unfortunately for us, the name we want to use as a boy name is extremely popular now. That wasn't the case a few years ago. The same goes with the name Mia. We've liked it for along time, but now it's like in the top ten baby names all of a sudden. It's not a bad thing. It just makes me think twice before naming my child that. By the way, we will not be naming our child Mia if we're having a girl.
If it's a boy name, it has to sound distinguished. At least my husband thinks so, and I agree with him. We've actually looked at a list of English kings to get baby name ideas. We don't want it to sound too pretentious, though. My husband actually has a good, strong, English king type name, but I'm not on board with the whole junior thing. If the baby is a boy, we're leaning toward giving him the same first name as my husband, though. The toughest thing has been picking out a middle name. Nothing sounds perfect yet.
I like the idea of literary names, as in names from books we love. The middle name we have picked out for a girl comes from my favorite book. For a boy middle name, we've discussed Holden (as in Caulfield from "Catcher in the Rye"). However, I didn't just love that book and the character is kind of strange and the whole associated with John Lennon's death thing turns me off to it. Lennon's killer had a copy of "Catcher in the Rye" on him when it happened. Now I know most people don't know that, but I do and I think it would bother me! Biblical names are good, and we've discussed some of those for boy middle names. Nothing has really stood out, though.
So all that to say, I think we do have a girl name picked out. However, I don't want to share it yet in case we change our mind or if we're having a boy. I think we have the first name of a boy picked out, but it could change. I keep thinking we'll come up with something better although it never happens. We do not have a middle name for a boy picked out and that has been THE hardest thing to decide on. So if you want to help, we're trying to come up with a middle name for William (he will go by Liam, which is the super popular name).
The name can't be only baby or little kid appropriate. This mostly applies to cutesy or trendy names. You know, the names of kids who have not yet grown up so their name still sounds like it belongs to a baby. For boys, I put most of the names that end in -aden or -ayden or some other variation of that in the category. They're not bad names at all; it's just hard for me to imagine adults with those names, even though it will inevitably happen.
The name can't be too wierd. I'm sure there are plenty of people in the world who give their kids some crazy strange names, but of course the people we only hear about doing so are celebrities. If you name your child Pilot Inspektor ( like actor Jason Lee) you have the potential to limit their career options. Although, I suppose if they're the child of a celebrity, jobs and making money may not be such a big deal. I don't think all wierd celebrity baby names are bad, though. Apple is kind of a cute name. That doesn't mean I'd ever name my child that.
The name can't be too popular. I experienced it first hand. I was one of many Jennifers. My name is the most common one for my age group. Nowadays, I think there is enough diversity among names that a strong concentration of one or two names doesn't really happen anymore. Unfortunately for us, the name we want to use as a boy name is extremely popular now. That wasn't the case a few years ago. The same goes with the name Mia. We've liked it for along time, but now it's like in the top ten baby names all of a sudden. It's not a bad thing. It just makes me think twice before naming my child that. By the way, we will not be naming our child Mia if we're having a girl.
If it's a boy name, it has to sound distinguished. At least my husband thinks so, and I agree with him. We've actually looked at a list of English kings to get baby name ideas. We don't want it to sound too pretentious, though. My husband actually has a good, strong, English king type name, but I'm not on board with the whole junior thing. If the baby is a boy, we're leaning toward giving him the same first name as my husband, though. The toughest thing has been picking out a middle name. Nothing sounds perfect yet.
I like the idea of literary names, as in names from books we love. The middle name we have picked out for a girl comes from my favorite book. For a boy middle name, we've discussed Holden (as in Caulfield from "Catcher in the Rye"). However, I didn't just love that book and the character is kind of strange and the whole associated with John Lennon's death thing turns me off to it. Lennon's killer had a copy of "Catcher in the Rye" on him when it happened. Now I know most people don't know that, but I do and I think it would bother me! Biblical names are good, and we've discussed some of those for boy middle names. Nothing has really stood out, though.
So all that to say, I think we do have a girl name picked out. However, I don't want to share it yet in case we change our mind or if we're having a boy. I think we have the first name of a boy picked out, but it could change. I keep thinking we'll come up with something better although it never happens. We do not have a middle name for a boy picked out and that has been THE hardest thing to decide on. So if you want to help, we're trying to come up with a middle name for William (he will go by Liam, which is the super popular name).
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Almost 17 Weeks
I'll be 17 weeks pregnant in a couple of days. So far, so good. Of course, pregnancy has its quirks, but overall this hasn't been bad at all. Knock on wood. I've had a lot of years to think about what it would be like to be pregnant, and I always thought it would be...not so pleasant. As in I'd be sick all the time or I would worry all the time or there'd be something wrong with the baby. Stuff like that. I know there is still plenty of time for something to go wrong and bad things to happen, but I'm thankful so far that all has been well. It has far exceeded my expectations.
I can't say I was one of those people who had to experience being pregnant or their life would not be complete. In fact, I was totally ok with the idea of never being pregnant. I've always wanted to be a mother, though, so I'd figure we'd adopt...which we may still do one day. But since I've been blessed with this opportunity, I'm very thankful that I'm getting to experience it. Now I can't believe I was fine with missing out on this. I think the timing is quite interesting. It certainly changed, or delayed, our plans. Since I've been pregnant, the main Bible verse I think of is Proverbs 19:21: "Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails." Even though life is kind of crazy at the moment (mostly because I don't have a job...still), I know it will all work out in the end. I'm hoping someone wants to hire me soon. I was hoping to land something before I was showing, but that's not going to happen now. My belly popped last week. So while this whole baby thing is the most significant thing I've done with my life, I'm feeling discouragement like I've never felt before. Unfortunately, I think being pregnant will work against me now, even though it shouldn't. If I can't get a regular job, hopefully I can string together enough temp work until I have the baby. I would've never thought it would take me more than three months to find a job. This is one time when I wish God would let me know the plan. I would probably feel much better then.
HOWEVER, I'm thankful I have a husband with a full time job and that I"m working at least half of the month of December at a temp job, even though it means getting up at 5:00 in the morning. I"m thankful that this pregnancy has been so easy so far and has not kept me from doing anything or prevented me from working. This baby knows what's up. He/she totally helped me out with not showing for as long as he/she could so there's no hard feelings that now he/she needs more space. (I'll be so happy after December 28 when I can just type he OR she.) I like my belly. I admire it every time I look in a mirror. It's not that big yet, but it's a baby bump for sure. It literally happened overnight. I woke up one day and my pants (that were already 2 sizes bigger than what I was wearing) didn't fit. Crazy. Maternity pants are awesome, though.
I can't say I was one of those people who had to experience being pregnant or their life would not be complete. In fact, I was totally ok with the idea of never being pregnant. I've always wanted to be a mother, though, so I'd figure we'd adopt...which we may still do one day. But since I've been blessed with this opportunity, I'm very thankful that I'm getting to experience it. Now I can't believe I was fine with missing out on this. I think the timing is quite interesting. It certainly changed, or delayed, our plans. Since I've been pregnant, the main Bible verse I think of is Proverbs 19:21: "Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails." Even though life is kind of crazy at the moment (mostly because I don't have a job...still), I know it will all work out in the end. I'm hoping someone wants to hire me soon. I was hoping to land something before I was showing, but that's not going to happen now. My belly popped last week. So while this whole baby thing is the most significant thing I've done with my life, I'm feeling discouragement like I've never felt before. Unfortunately, I think being pregnant will work against me now, even though it shouldn't. If I can't get a regular job, hopefully I can string together enough temp work until I have the baby. I would've never thought it would take me more than three months to find a job. This is one time when I wish God would let me know the plan. I would probably feel much better then.
HOWEVER, I'm thankful I have a husband with a full time job and that I"m working at least half of the month of December at a temp job, even though it means getting up at 5:00 in the morning. I"m thankful that this pregnancy has been so easy so far and has not kept me from doing anything or prevented me from working. This baby knows what's up. He/she totally helped me out with not showing for as long as he/she could so there's no hard feelings that now he/she needs more space. (I'll be so happy after December 28 when I can just type he OR she.) I like my belly. I admire it every time I look in a mirror. It's not that big yet, but it's a baby bump for sure. It literally happened overnight. I woke up one day and my pants (that were already 2 sizes bigger than what I was wearing) didn't fit. Crazy. Maternity pants are awesome, though.
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