22 weeks!

Only 18 weeks (or less) to go! That's around 126 days or 4 months. In the next few weeks, it will be Halloween. 3 weeks after that, it will be Thanksgiving. And a little more than 4 weeks following Turkey Day will be Christmas. I think it's safe to say that the next 2-1/2 months are going to fly by, as busy as we will be. I am already mentally aware that the final month will go by slowly, so I'll take whatever I can get. My 3rd trimester starts a few days after Thanksgiving, and I'm really not supposed to travel anywhere during the last 3 months. We plan on having Christmas here in Houston and probably Thanksgiving as well. Shawn & I are going to visit his family down in South Texas the weekend of October 26th. It is a 6-hour car ride there, so I hope my bladder makes it. I predict that we will be making lots of pit stops along the way!

This week, Shawn was out of town for work. On Tuesday night, as I kept feeling the normal poking & jabbing movements inside, I could have sworn I finally felt it on the outside as well. So I kept my hands on my lower stomach for a while and finally felt a couple of little thumps. Go figure Shawn would be out of town when that happened for the first time! When I told him about it, he couldn't wait to get home on Thursday to feel for himself. Well, ever since then, he has been trying to feel it. Unfortunately, I think it's easier for me to recognize because I can also feel it on the inside. To anyone else besides myself, it's probably still too subtle to notice. We are hoping in the next few weeks, BGK will be big & strong enough to kick past that dumb anterior placenta for her daddy to feel it. If I haven't talked about my anterior placenta on here before, it basically means that it lies between the baby & the uterine wall. It's pretty common and not a problem, other than it muffles a lot of the baby's kicks and makes them harder to feel. On the other hand, a posterior placenta is located behind the baby and does not affect the ability to feel movement. Regardless of where the placenta is located, I am thankful for every little thing I can feel!

How I’m Changing

Total weight gain: 11 lbs (up 1 lb since last week)

Maternity clothes? of course

Stretch marks? no, thank God

Sleep: sleeping through the night

Best moment this week: see the "movement" comment below

Miss Anything? no

Movement: feeling baby kick from the outside! (only I can feel it, since it is still so subtle. shawn is still patiently waiting.)

Food cravings: not really -- didn't even have pei wei once this week (although it always sounds good!)

Anything making you queasy or sick: no

Gender: girl

Symptoms: swollen feet

Belly Button in or out? in

Wedding rings on or off? on

Happy or Moody most of the time: depends on the day

Looking forward to: our showers on Nov. 3 & Nov. 10. just registered today -- whew!

Baby Kirby Week 22 Update:

your baby's the size of a papaya! During month five, the average fetus measures about 10.5 to 11.8 inches and weighs about 12.7 to 20.8 ounces. Now that she's got more developed eyes and lips, she's looking even more like a newborn. Baby's settling into sleep cycles, snoozing about 12 to 14 hours a day. It shouldn't be hard to figure out when -- just pay attention to those kicks as they start and stop.