23 Weeks

THIS WEEK
I am 23 weeks pregnant, we had our big echo ultrasound on baby girl's heart and the tech was amazing - going over every detail of her heart and even reassuring us that her heart is perfect (which was the biggest concern for her single atery umbilical cord). Feeling much more reassured that this is just the Lord's way of making sure we have extra follow up for our baby girl. So grateful that she is growing strong :) We also got to see our baby girl flexing her little arm during the ultrasound she also had one of her legs stretched out with the other tucked tightly under her bum, it is so amazing to see how much personality she has already. I don't know if I've mentioned it before but at all of our ultrasounds she has kept one arm close to her face, which our son - her big brother also did during his ultrasounds & something they both get from Daddy :)

BABY UPDATE

Baby girl weighs approximately 1lb and is about 12 inches long from the top of her head to the heel of her feet - you'll notice I used egg plant again this week, the reason is that all of the places I reference for the weekly fruit/vegetables are keeping the same weight/height for weeks 22-24, while some just used one fruit/vegetable to represent the weeks others used a few so when we went to pick up our fruit/vegetable for the week we didn't like that it didn't really make sense (for example the spaghetti squash we would have used last week was larger than the pomegranate for this week or the grapefruit for next week, despite our efforts to keep them around the same weight).

During the next five weeks baby girl will go through a major growth spurt and due to the continued formation of fat on baby's body the bones and organs will soon become less visible through the currently very thin skin. Baby girl's brain is continuing to develop and the cerebrum, the part responsible for memory, motor skills and intellect is preparing to be able to conduct communication between cells. Rapid eye movements (REM) have started to occur during baby's sleep (which is still averaging between 12-14 hours throughout the day) and her hair and skin are beginning to darken.

MOMMA UPDATE

Feeling much better since the big echo ultrasound and just waiting to hear from my ob, we are just so in love with our little girl. I'm still having the same aches and pains, lots of stretching going on and depending on the time of day my belly button is almost completely popped haha! I've had a little more heartburn than before and it seems my nausea has come back this week. Still experiencing the stuffy/runny nose nightly - which only adds to the recent difficulties I've been having sleeping (just having trouble getting comfortable more often now). A craving for a donair with garlic sauce hit me at midnight during the week and I couldn't shake it for a few days which I found funny because I haven't had a donair in at least a year or two.

Belly is measuring 41 inches, still.

DADDY MOMENTS

With all of the additional monitoring comes the privilege to see our baby girl frequently and it was adorable to watch how enamored daddy already is with his baby girl.

FAVORITE PART OF THE WEEK

Getting reassurance from a very skilled ultrasound tech that baby girl's heart is doing just what it should be.

LOOKING FORWARD TO

Thanksgiving dinners with our families, not only for the delicious holiday goodness, but also having our baby girl be apart of the holidays.

xo, Anne.