Our latest portrait

Blueberry's family--30 weeks by Corinne S.

Here's a photo of us from today. Blueberry is 30 weeks old now in gestational age and, as you can see, the nursery is now functional, if not complete. I posted some related photos as well that you can see at these links:

• Family portrait series
• Baby "Blueberry" set

Butternut baby

Butternut baby by Corinne S.

This past week--week 29--the baby was supposed to be the size of a butternut squash. When at the grocery store the other day I decided to get a sense of this size relative to my belly. To clarify though, I think BabyCenter's baby-fruit comparisons are based solely on length and don't take mass or weight into account. I think our baby is still a little under 3 pounds. (Sorry about the crappy perspective, BTW. It's hard to get good photos of one's own pregnant belly without aid of mirrors.)

Oregon roads

Oregon roads by Corinne S.

Benjamin and I are making a circuit in NW and central Oregon this weekend. While the scenery is beautiful, the hours in the car are wreaking havoc on my now third-trimester body.

We've also had hellishly bad luck with traffic on our journey, at least whenever I5 is involved. Friday we drove from Seattle to Salem and it took us 7 hours (4 hours is the expected travel time). We got caught behind two different major vehicle fires--one a Metro bus, the other caught the entire I5 median on fire and closed the freeway in both directions for a couple of hours. We also hit every misc and typical backup I5 has to offer. We were 2 hours late for the wedding that instigated this entire trip.

Yesterday we drove from Salem to Bend to meet up with my brother and sister-in-law who're living in John Day, OR. What little time we spend on I5 was a trafficy mess. My mom and Rich were at the wedding in Salem and drove to Bend, too.

In Bend we visited with my family, ate at McMennamin's, and had dessert at Goody (yummy, hard, cold ice cream). Then this morning we all ate breakfast at our B&B before disbanding.

The whole weekend it's been over 100 degrees during the day. Though I haven't been out in the sun much at all, I think I got dehydrated yesterday so I was pretty miserable last night.

Today we're driving from Bend to Portland for one last night in OR before we head home.

Today's best thing

My mom likes to ask what your "best thing" is each day. When she asked me this question at 11:30am today all I had to offer was snuggling in the bed with the dog this morning.

While my day is still pretty far from over, I have a much more substantial "best thing" to offer now: Amazon announced this morning that, effective August 1st, they're increasing the percentage of salary paid and extending the duration of pay during maternity leave. That's great news at a great time for me. Woohoo!

I welcome additional great things to continue happening for the rest of the day (and beyond).

Week 24

Blueberry's family - week 24 by Corinne S.

Here we are 24 weeks into the pregnancy. I know this still looks like a messy office, but with Piper's help I am making incredible progress on cleaning out my stuff, moving into Benjamin's office, and turning this room into a nursery. Seriously.

Claire's baby is here (on the outside)

Claire & Erik's new son Dashiell Alexander was born this morning at 10:10 am via planned c-section after an amniocentesis yesterday to confirm that his lungs were ready for the outside world. The c-section was necessary due to Claire's placenta acretia, but the surgery went quickly and flawlessly and mom and baby are now resting comfortably.

Dashiell weighed in at 7 pounds 6 ounces with a length of 19-3/4 inches. Head circumference was 13-1/8 inches. He cried a little on arrival and has since had his first bath and he's enjoying snuggling with mom on the outside of the womb.

I'm going over to the hospital later today so I'll take pictures and hopefully get some posted tonight.

Thump, thump

Birthday belly by Corinne S.

It's official--Blueberry is in there and she's an active little berry. Last night Benjamin felt her move for the first time. Up until a few days ago her movements were pretty indistinct and I only felt them sometimes. It's still not super dramatic, but I've noticed lately that when I eat she does sommersaults--yowza. I think that might hurt when she's bigger.

So last night Benjamin and I were watching Buffy and had jsut eaten a late dinner. I was feeling her move around a lot and started trying to see if I could feel it from the outside. She started repeatedly kicking the side of my belly in one spot and I could feel it a bit from the outside so I quickly put Benjamin's hand there. He was skeptical that he'd really feel anything, but he did.

Go little berry go--start kicking your parents and letting them know who's boss right from the start. ;-)

Here we are

Blueberry's family (week 17) by Corinne S.

Though I'm hanging onto my regular pants by the skin of my teeth, Blueberry is starting to peek out (in the form of my belly). Here we are--17 weeks into the pregnancy--in my insanely cluttered home office, which will eventually be Blueberry's room.

Yummy baby

This week the baby is about the size of an avocado, according to BabyCenter.com's fruit-oriented size comparisons. This is an especially pleasing size to me since I'm a big avocado fan. Just remind me not to eat the baby.

My belly is starting to show a bit and my pants are getting tighter. Now that we're officially 4 months in, it might be coming up on time for me to start wearing maternity pants. But I'm still in that awkward transition phase where I mostly don't need them and they feel funny and tend to be a little big (or just fit really oddly) so I will probably continue to push the boundaries of my pants a little longer. ;)

To learn more about what little "Blueberry" is up to developmentally this week, check out Your pregnancy: 16 weeks on BabyCenter.

PS> I stole this picture from Becca's Baby Blog.

This time, the baby photo is mine

Our little "blueberry" at 10 weeks by Corinne S.

If you read this blog at all, you're used to seeing me post photographs and ultrasound pictures of other people's babies. This time, it's all mine (okay, Benjamin's too).

This is our future baby, code named blueberry. While you've probably seen a million ultrasound images before and they don't look like much, it's completely different to see this miniature baby-like being on the monitor--moving! To realize there is a tiny human inside me that can move of its own accord. Well, it's just astounding.

Blueberry's ship date is November 7th, but s/he reserves the right to make schedule changes without notice.

On Wednesday morning when this picture was taken, blueberry was 2.9cm long (~1.15 inches) and 9 weeks and 5 days old by "gestational age."

We'll get to actually hear blueberry's heartbeat in mid-May, but we won't *see* him/her again until June, which is when they do the "big ultrasound" (aka fetal survey) and we'll also hopefully learn his/her gender.

Claire's got a little boy on the inside

Claire had her gender-revealing 20 week ultrasound this week and found out they're having a little boy. Pretty exciting! Good work on managing to get one of each naturally, guys.

Another baby is here

I just got an announcement today about another baby in our circle of friends. This little beauty was born to Benjamin's friend since childhood, Jonathan, and his wife Yuka. Their baby girl is nearly 2 weeks old now. And if you're wondering, the answer is yes: we have more pregnant friends. ;-P Felicity Natsumi was born on July 18th at 7:32 pm. At birth she weighed 7lb 6 oz and was 20 inches long. According to her mama, the name Felicity is based on the Roman goddess of good luck and success, and also means happiness. Her middle name, Natsumi is a Japanese girl's name, meaning 'summer beauty'.

Come out of there!

Our friend Sylvia is now more than 40 weeks pregnant and ready for her baby, Sabrina, to join us in the outside world. Maddy took this fabulous picture of Sylvia, who says that this is "what I really do all day now that I’m not at work." ;-)

You can see more beautiful pregnancy photos of Sylvia, taken by our friend Ola, on Flickr. Sorry, the sexy photos are marked as private. So there! ;-P

In utero

Pregnancy Favs by Amelie81 So many women in Benjamin's social circle and mine are currently pregnant. There are actually four that I am aware of, but that feels like a lot. I think our "group" is about to explode with babies, as it were.