14W3D appointment

I had my monthly appointment today. Everything looks good. The baby was hiding low in my belly, and the nurse was brand new and had never looked for a heartbeat before so it took a while to find it. But we got it. The heartrate was 153bpm. Everything else was fine as well. I've lost 10 pounds--partially due to the morning sickness, but I always lose weight in the beginning of my pregnancies. My blood pressure was 100/68.
That's really it for now.

We have an ultrasound on July 18th. It's an additional ultrasound that my doctor's office offers beyond the regular ultrasounds that are billed to the insurance company. We should be able to find out the baby's gender then.

Our 20 week ultrasound will be August 4th, so that one will be the one that tells us the health of our baby.

Geneticist

I got a call from the Geneticist at the Perinatal Center. My results are very good. The nuchal scan came back at 1.8mm, which is excellent. I knew that when I was there for the ultrasound. We were waiting to hear about the bloodwork portion. Everything came back great! :) Here are the results:

Down's Syndrome
prior risk for 30 yr old: 1/600
my results after b/w and nuchal u/s: 1/12,061

Trisomy 13 or 18
prior risk for 30 yr old: 1/1071
my results after b/w and nuchal u/s: 1/21,401

Nuchal Translucency Scan results

Little Baby with it's hands up to it's mouth

We went back for the repeat NT scan today since the baby wouldn't cooperate on Monday. I am happy to report that the baby cooperated today. :) The measurement is 1.8mm, which is very good. They want it to be under 3mm at this point in pregnancy, so they said 1.8mm is excellent. :) YAY! I should get my blood test results soon, which will tell us our risk of having a baby with Trisomy 13, 18, or 21. I expect my risk to be low, but i'm sure i'll feel much better when i hear back from the doctor.

The baby looked good. He/She wasn't very active, but at least turned in the position we needed him/her to be in. And we did see the baby moving his/her hands and arms and stretch his/her feet out, which was so cute! :) This baby is so cozy and calm in utero...hopefully this means i'll have a nice, easy, calm baby. ;) lol The heart rate was 160 bpm, which is good.

GUESSING GAME

If you haven't made your guesses, make sure to go to this link and make them! :)
http://www.expectnet.com/index.php?t=0
For game name type: Partyof5

Thanks! :)

Trip to the City Museum

We went to the City Museum a few weeks ago! It was a lot of fun. The kids had a great time! They loved riding on the Metrolink on the way down!

Ally and Tommy love this rolly slide!
I can't believe my little ones are that high up!!!! What is holding that thing up there?

My cousin's wedding

A few weeks ago, we went to my cousin's wedding. It was really nice. The wedding and reception were held at the same location. It was very pretty. They had a beach theme. The music was very beachy (jack johnson, beach boys, margaritaville,etc). The tables had shells and colored stones on them. It was very nice. My cousin's dress was beautiful. Ally thought she looked like a princess! The bridesmaid's dresses were very pretty. Long, flow-y, pale yellow with spaghetti straps. The cake was even beachy looking!

Here are some pictures of the wedding and below these, there are pictures of the kids

Lauren's dad (my uncle Scott) walking her down the isle

Lauren and Steven lighting the unity candle

Cutting the cake

Lauren with Shannon (her sister)

Gary (Lauren's brother) and his girlfriend
Parents of the Bride (my uncle scott and aunt kim)
Grandparents of the Bride (my grandma and grandpa "Keema and Keepa")
My mom and dad


Ally

Tommy
Funny faces

Me, Matt, Ally & Tommy (and baby to be born in December!)

ally giving tommy a kiss on the noseDancingMy mom dancing with AllyMy dad dancing with ally and tommy

12 Week Ultrasound ~ Nuchal Transclucent Scan

I just wanted to update everyone and let you know that I had my 2nd ultrasound today. In case I didn't mention this before, they do a new test called the Nuchal Translucency Scan along with blood work. This is where they measure the amount of fluid in the baby's neck to see if there is a risk of Trisomy 13, 18, or 21. They used to do this at the "big" 20 week ultrasound, but over the last several years, they have found that there are more false positives when this test is done at that point in pregnancy. In the last year, a panel of doctors and researchers (ACOG) determined that this test is most accurate when done between 11-13 weeks along with measuring the amount of beta-HCG and PAPP-A in the blood. The two tests together help to reduce the false positive rate, which then reduces the number of amnios or CVS tests.

Since this research came out, most insurance companies are now allowing this additional ultrasound along with blood work in lieu of the Triple Screen/Quad Screen that used to be done at 16-17 weeks.

So, I had my blood work and ultrasound today. The baby's heart rate was 163bpm. He/She is a stubborn baby and would not move into position for the tech to get her measurements done. She was able to get the crown-rump measurement, which shows that the baby is on target with my due date. And she was able to determine that the gestational sac, etc., is all looking good. But she was just not able to get the one measurement she really needed of the Nuchal Fold. So, I have to go back on Friday. Hopefully the baby will cooperate. :) I did get some pictures of the little one. For those of you who are wondering, it's still too early to tell if it's a boy or a girl. We'll probably do that in early August.

10 week appointment

Everything looks good. There really isn't much to report from this appointment. It was more informational and to get my yearly well woman appointment out of the way. I go to the 1st look ultrasound in 2 weeks, so I will have more to report then.

She decided to keep December 26th as my due date. She said that at this point it's normal for the u/s to be off by a week and that they aren't 100% accurate. She said if I wasn't so regular she would be more leery, but my periods are consistantly 26 days. She said that she would rather go with my LMP because I had difficulty delivering ally and tommy since they were angled sideways and she feels they may have fallen into that position b/c I am short waisted and didn't have a lot of room for them to turn the correct direction. The bigger the baby is, the more likely it is that you'll have trouble with them turning in strange ways. The only way to get them to come out is for the doctor to reach up and turn them, which has its risks (and is really painful even w/ the epidural, trust me).

If future ultrasounds keep pointing to me being behind, she may change it, but for now she feels confident there are more reasons to keep the earlier date than not to.

So, that's all for now. I get my next ultrasound on June 16th. :) I'll update then!