What a crazy day!

January 6th started out as a crazy day when the power in our apartment went out when we were getting ready in the morning. Then we drove through cold rain and crappy MD drivers to my 12 week ultrasound. Although it turned out not to be my ultrasound. I didn't realize that I had to call a special number for the ultrasound, and the main schedulers just scheduled me for a regular Doctor's appointment. Since I was there anyway, they weighed me (still haven't gained a pound since they first weighed me at Week 6), and listened to the baby's heartbeat (~160 bpm).

The Doctor's office felt bad and they were trying to squeeze me in as soon as possible to get the ultrasound. (They do some measurements and a blood test to check for chromosomal abnormalities during the 12 week, so we had a deadline to make.) At first we thought that we'd have to go to the Johns Hopkins hospital in downtown Baltimore, which would have been a major pain. Howard County General Hospital (an affiliate of Johns Hopkins where I'll be giving birth) didn't have any emergency ultrasounds that day, so they gave me their emergency spot. Yeah!

So I followed their directions to have a full bladder, which made the beginning of the ultrasound very uncomfortable, where she was pushing against me with the wand. After a few minutes, she told me that we could do the rest of the ultrasound with an empty bladder, so I ran off to the bathroom. That's when Steve showed up. He had to race to the hospital after a meeting at work, and he thought that he had showed up just as it was over! He was very relieved that he only missed a few minutes. Then the ultrasound technician (who was VERY pregnant) gave us a lot more images of the baby. They also confirmed the heartbeat at 157 bpm (I know - the high heartbeat is supposed to indicate that it's a girl!) We saw both arms and both legs, the mouth opening and closing, and full body convulsions that I can only imagine were hiccups. :) The genetic counselor came to take some blood and we were done. I'll scan in some of the sonogram pictures when I get a few minutes.

I ended up leaving the hospital to go get more blood drawn in a lab, since it turned out that they didn't run all of the tests that the Doctor wanted them to a month ago.

We had chicken tetrazzini for dinner, since it was my brother's birthday, and that was his favorite dinner. We always have tetrazzini on January 6th to remember him. I also think that it is fitting that I saw my baby on my brother's birthday.

After dinner, I had done a load of laundry, my clothes were in the dryer, and the power went out again! I was in the middle of talking to my Dad on the phone. Luckily, it was only out for about an hour. Steve and I were relieved that our crazy day was over, but we were happy that we were able to see our little one and how its growing.