13 weeks 1 day

So, today (friday, Feb 14th!!) was technically my 12 week appointment. At this appointment you can choose to do genetic testing. We chose not to do so with Rhyan, mostly because Jeff was pretty freaked out and worried about having a baby with special needs and I knew there was some chance that there could be a false positive, so we decided to just skip it.

With Mack, I found out that the "test" was actually an ultrasound. A big, nice ultrasound! So I decided to go for it! ;-) And same this go round. I mean, I already get a LOT of ultrasounds because of being high risk but what Mama doesnt want to see her baby anytime she can?!

With the ice storm that hit on Wednesday, the drs office called and asked to move my appointment to Friday, which was fine. And as it turned out, Jeff was off work on Friday, as well, so he got to come with me! Mama kept the kids for us (thank you mama!) and we were off :-)

We got there pretty early, which is Jeffs pet peeve. He's always lecturing me about how it only takes one patient running late to ruin the entire schedule for the day. Like I'm not in the healthcare profession and Im not aware?! haha. But he really gloated because when we got there the ultrasound tech was running late so the Dr went ahead and got us back to see us since we were there early. I about died because I KNEW i'd never hear the end of it ;-)

So far, I've still not gained any weight according to our scale at home AND according to Dr Pohls scales.

But before Dr Pohl could come in, Nikki (ultrasound tech) was ready for us so we played musical rooms.

The ultrasound was pretty cool. The baby was on its back for the first minute or two (although we didnt get a profile shot! BOO!) and then bam, flipped to hands and knees kind of position. It was crazy! haha. And then I asked "why does it keep jumping like a frog?!" and Nikki told us that he/she actually had the hiccups so it just looked that way. So cute. (I wont lie, i was getting worried about having a crazy amphibian-ish baby... haha).

The nuclefold is this space behind the skull around the spinal cord that they measure to see if its within normal limits. Our baby's was 1.1 and they like it to be 3.something or under. So that was all good.
They also look to be sure there is a nasal bone, which there was. So everything looks good so far! :-)

We tried to look at the baby's booty to see if we could make any guesses for fun but he/she was shy! Actually when she got close to the baby's bootie, it flipped over. Hmm. ;-)

After switching rooms again, Dr Pohl came in just to review the ultrasound findings and confirmed that everything looked good. The heart rate, according to the ultrasound machine, was 150. Go ahead and guess that its a boy. Last ultrasound it was 172 ;-). It varies each appointment and I think is partially related to if I'm well hydrated or not. Yesterday, I was pretty low on fluids and was feeling it. I've got to work on that.

So all is well and I'll go back for a 16 week check up.

And here are the 14 week belly pics, also (after a long days work):