Definitely Feeling Movement!

At 19 1/2 weeks my baby is supposed to be the length of a small zucchini, at 6 inches and 8 1/2 ounces. I have been remiss these last few weeks and failed to document the stages of Large Onion and Large Sweet Potato. So here is a visual aid for the last few weeks development:












We're going to have our ultrasound on Monday. We'll be telling the technicians that we really want to be surprised with the gender... although we won't be able to prevent our baby from making a show if the little one decides to. Maybe we can arrange with them to warn us not to look if there's something to see. I wonder if that would really work...


I have definitely been feeling movement this week. It's been gradually increasing the last two weeks from faint flutters, to vague bubbly feelings, to light plops, to miniature bumps.

Last night I had not taken my morning sickness medication, to see if I could do without. I had been in bed for about a half hour talking to Matthew when suddenly I knew: I had to get to the bathroom fast. I spent a good 5 intimate minutes with that toilet bowl, and my stomach muscles got more exercise than they needed to relieve me of my contents.

When I got back to bed I realized all that heaving must have stirred things up a bit for the kumquat--I was feeling mini poke after mini poke, plop after plop. I lay there a little while with my hand on my belly. I tried feeling for firmness to see where the baby might be sitting, and when I pushed a little I got a tiny little split-second push in the same spot a moment later! I tried it again in a different spot...and a moment later got a slight bump again right where I had pressed my fingers. It almost felt like a little bit of protest for all the kaffuffle, but I couldn't resist trying again and again as the little one and I exchanged our first conversation.

The personhood, the real existence of the little human I am carrying is becoming more and more vivid for me. I find myself getting little belly-hill flutters of excitement and anticipation when I look down at my expanding abdomen and think about the day we will meet.

My pregnancy is moving out of the realm of the theoretical and more and more into the realm of the existential present lived embodied immediate HERE AND NOW. Wow.

What a mystery! What a miracle!


And I'm not even cheesing myself out by saying that.

I AM, however, cheesing myself out in this picture:

We were at the Research Farm in Morden taking family portraits with Matthew's parents, and he and I were goofing around. I was already showing a bit so we thought we'd take a "pregnant shot." I don't actually look very pregnant at ALLin this picture, but I do look (as Momma Z. so aptly put it) like I'm trying very hard to...

If you are my friend and you live in the neighbourhood and you have a digital camera and a way to upload the pictures PLEASE PLEASE volunteer your services.


Now that I have something that will actually show up in a photograph, I want to show you all my belly.