Weeks 10 through 18

Where have I been the last 8 weeks? Hmmm, let's see. Hovered over a toilet, or in some awful cases - throwing up in my bathtub while taking a bath, or throwing up on myself while trying to get to the toilet. Yep, gooooooood times have been had by me! The "magical" week 12 has come and gone and my morning sickness is still hanging on strong. Baby Rags is a strong little baby and I sometimes find myself feeling like Bella in Twilight when she was pregnant. Yes, I've seen that movie, no I'm not a Twi-hard. While feeling like poo has taken up most of my time the past 8 weeks, it's not the only thing that's been happening. During these 8 weeks, the baby has grown in size from a tiny olive to a sweet potato!

On October 5, I had an elective gender sonogram done. At that time, I was 16 weeks 1 day pregnant. I was so excited that day to finally find out what we were going to be having! Before we started the sonogram, I told the tech that I wanted a little suspense and told her not to find the goods right away. Well, I definitely got a little suspense. Baby Rags was hiding their goods behind my placenta pretty much the whole time. There were a couple of instances where the tech saw what she thought were girl parts, but she couldn't say for certain. I was disappointed to hear her tell me I needed to come back the next week for another scan. While she couldn't give us a 100% guess, she did tell us there was a 90% chance it was a girl. Well, this was all I needed to further convince myself it was a girl. I mean, I've been sick as a dog and I just *knew* it was a girl. So what did I do? What do you think?! I went out and bought some cute girly clothes, picked out a name and started planning my baby girl's nursery! Meanwhile, Daddy Rags was still holding out for that 10% chance of it being a boy. I had no doubt in my mind we were going to be having a girl. It did shock me a little because I honestly thought, even before getting pregnant, that me and Daddy Rags would just have boys. I never saw us with having baby girls. So a week rolls by, during which I'm singing to my baby girl, because she could now hear my voice, and calling her by her name. We go into the second sonogram and I am more focused on making sure we could see her full body so we could confirm and move on! This time around, the placenta wasn't the problem, but the baby was just NOT moving or in a favorable "goods shot" position. I downed a full bottle of Pepsi beforehand and the baby was just chilling and taking a nice nap! We jiggled and moved around and finally the baby opened it's legs and all I remember is Daddy Rags saying something like "that's a penis" or something like that. I looked at the screen and she took a picture of it and said "I'm calling it, it's a boy!" Immediately, Daddy Rags is on cloud nine and I'm laying there in complete shock! I am happy and laughing but at the same time I was so confused! I just kept laughing and I may have cried a little just out of pure shock! I was so sure the baby was a girl and it was so hard for me to wrap my brain around a little boy! Daddy Rags was the happiest I have ever seen him and I am so happy to see him happy. I am happy and excited to have a little Joel running around.

We have not settled on a name yet, I have a feeling it's going to take a while until we can both come to an agreement. Daddy likes the name Bruce Wayne (is he serious?!) and I like the name Asher Cole. We have plans for the nursery, which once we start working on it I'll post pictures.

Today I am 18 weeks and 5 days pregnant. I haven't thrown up since Sunday, but I am still taking Zofran on a daily basis. Some exciting things:

I felt the baby move for the first time on Friday (10/19). I thought I had been feeling him for about a week, but I could never really tell for sure until Friday. I drank decaf coffee for the first time in months on Friday and after I finished my cup, I felt a 'tap tap tap' and I just knew it was my baby boy kicking me. I can't wait for Daddy Rags to be able to feel him move. Joel thinks it's really cool I can feel him move, so I'm sure he will be stoked once he can feel it.

My belly is continuing to grow on a daily/weekly basis. Here is a shot of me at 16 weeks and then 18 weeks.

I have my anatomy scan on November 6 that will further confirm we have a baby boy on the way.