18 Weeks - Baby 2

Pregnancy Update January 25, 2014

How far along: 18 Weeks.

Size of baby: 5.6 inches, 6.7oz. A sweet potato! :)

What developed this past week: His bones are starting to harden (from cartilage). One of the first are the inner ear bones, which means he may be hearing more of my heart beating and stomach growling. 

Weight Gain: 8.8 pounds

Maternity clothes: Maternity. Haven't been able to button my pants in 6 weeks now... 

Gender: A sweet boy! :) 

Movement: Baby moves a few times a day. Love knowing he's alive and well in there!

Sleep: No problems. Just weird dreams! 

What I miss: Summer! But that has nothing to do with pregnancy... :)

Cravings: Whatever sounds good at the time.

Best moment this week: Getting to see our baby and find out his gender! Love to know that he is on track developmentally and has all his parts and pieces! 

Caleb and I decided to celebrate the same way we did when we found out we were having a boy the first time - dinner and some baby shopping! My wonderful sister in law and niece, Laurie & Emilie, came over to watch Bryson for an evening while Caleb and I went to Olive Garden for dinner and ran into a few different stores. It was great to be able to focus on baby 2 at dinner - talking names, nursery ideas, etc. 

We ended up at Kohl's and bought these cutie outfits:

Since B2 will be born in the summer, I figure he'll mostly be wearing just onesies a lot of the time at home. So I thought these were a wonderful alternative to the plain white onesie - they have some character and look like a tee shirt with a pocket! So cute!

Of course we had to buy him a few outfits as well:

Love the camo shorts! oh boy stuff... no bows, but they still come up with a few cute ideas! ;)

Caleb picked the next 2 "matching" outfits - one for B2 and the last one for Bryson! Hysterical... LOVE all 3 of my boys!!

Baby 2 GENDER REVEAL!!

WE KNOW! WE KNOW!! WE KNOW!!!

We were able to go for our gender and anatomy scan at 17w5d (same as with Bryson) to check out our sweet baby 2! First and foremost, all the baby's parts and pieces were accounted for and in working order! Praise the Lord! Secondly, we came prepared with an envelope and a "girl" card and a "boy" card at the ready (we learned from the first time when the Sonographer had to write the gender on a post it!). This time, we had Laura put the correct gender card in the envelope that said "COMING JUNE 28!" so we could open it later when we were alone.

Caleb and I went to the same parking lot we were in when we opened Bryson's gender post it note and opened this baby's envelope! As an aside, we went into the sono convinced baby was a girl, but during the sono I changed my mind to boy. Caleb stuck with girl. We were so anxious to know - SO FUN!!!!

We found out on Thursday, January 23rd, and had a gender reveal party with both of our families at our house on Sunday! Here are a few pics from the party:

Caleb made our new refrigerator box into a fort. The kids LOVED it!

Bryson and his cousin Grayson! With the mamas of course!

The hosts! Family of 4!!! :)

The big girls playing with baby toys - oh the novelty ;)

Bryson loving the heck out of Grayson! Poor kid! lol

Baby 2's stats! Measuring a few days smaller, but probably just caught him between growth spurts. I do not expect anything less than a chubby baby! :)

AND HERE IS THE BIG NEWS!!!!!!!!!
We're having a:

A BOY!!!!! We're so excited!!! Bryson and B2 will only be 19 months apart, so this will work out perfectly! Forever best friends and roommates! :) 

I told Caleb that we should name B2 "Isaac" because it means laughter (as Sarah, in the Bible, laughed when God told her she'd have a baby in her 90's.) Obviously, I'm not in my 90's, but we screamed and laughed when we say the boy card come out!! We were so sure it was a girl for the last 14 weeks! lol We are surprised and totally over the moon!

Right from our ultrasound appointment, we went to JCPenney to get family pictures done. We received the picture package as a Christmas gift, and figured this would be a fun way to reveal the baby's gender! Unfortunately, since the package expired the same day, I had to have both pink and blue props ready! It worked out though - I like how they turned out! I just had a lot of pink returns to make! :) 

As you can see, I used the tag that was put in the envelope by the Sonographer on the ribbon "belt" around my belly. Planning to put it in B2's baby box (once I make one! :)) Also, Bryson's shirt says, "I love my brother"!

Someone asked Caleb if Bryson is excited about having a brother... Caleb laughed and said, "No - he just found out that everything that was once his is now only HALF his! lol Get used to it kid... ;)

If nothing else, this boy is definitely excited about balloons! :) Love those teeth and whole face smile!!

Belly Pic Make-up

I'm starting to feel bad for this child - s/he already is experiencing the 2nd child syndrome in many ways.
One of the things this child will not have (though s/he may not ever care, I do!) are weekly pictures of him/her growing in my belly.
Caleb and I are working to remedy that, but until then, all I have is a few pictures I took of myself in the bathroom at work. Gotta love a good bathroom selfie! Lol

To catch us up, I started showing around 8-9 weeks. By 11-12 weeks, I could no longer button my work pants. It was quite the task trying to keep the bump a secret!  Here's what I looked like at 13 weeks when I finally got to tell my coworkers and stop trying to hide it!

December 19, 2013 12w6d

2 weeks later, you can tell my shirt is not maternity, as it is coming up shorter in the front. Classy.

January 7, 2014 15w4d

And another 2 weeks later, I have finally broken out the maternity clothes! I actually did try to do that around 16 weeks, but none of my old pants fit me because I lost more weight than I gained after Bryson! So I had to wait for a shipment from my sister and a shipment from The Gap to come in and save me!

January 20, 2014 17w2d

In case anyone is wondering, you do start showing earlier the second time... Check out this 15 week belly with pregnancy #1. YIKES!