Little Baby Girl's Ultrasound Pics

The first one is her little girl parts! If you look really close, you can see 3 little white lines (the arrow points right between the first two lines). So yes, it's a hamburger-not a hot dog-or saugsage or whatever! :) In the second one, I think she's trying to tell us that she's going to be a little gymnast. She's got some long legs, that's for sure! The third one shows her little face straight on with her mouth wide open. I can already hear it. "Mooooommm!" or "I need money!" The other three are just some hand and foot pictures that I love. What is it about baby hands and feet? So darn cute! So that's all of our little baby girl we'll get to see for the next few weeks until she starts poking out from the inside-I'm looking forward to that crazy alien stage when we can see appendages roll across my belly!

It's a.............

GIRL!!!!! :-D Mama's first intuition was wrong! I had such a strong hunch that this little bean was a boy, I would have put money on it, but boy (or girl...) was I wrong! Tom said that he was prepared for a girl but I had started to convince him that it was a boy too. We definitely weren't let down by any means...it was just that much more of a surprise! The most important thing, of course, is that she is healthy as can be! She (it's so nice to be able to say she!) is measuring right on track. She has a very strong heart, no tube defects, no cleft palate, has 10 fingers and 10 toes...and she likes to bury her foot right in mama's bladder! She is long as a stick of butter and weighs as much as 3 sticks of butter (3/4 lbs). The ultrasound tech gave us about 20 pictures, so I'll get some up when I have some more time. So now we need to start thinking more seriously about names. We have a few in mind, but we're keeping that a surprise until she gets here! She measured exactly to my original due date, so we're still looking at May 21st. And the lucky little girlie gets a little girl cousin in May too! Andy and Laura (bro and SIL) are having a little baby girl too! Awww, two wittle baby gwanddaugters! We can't wait til March to find out what Ty and Ashlee are having! Are we going to go 3 for 3???

My Belly Has Popped Out!

Here are my latest belly pics. I had Tom take them yesterday-I was 17 weeks and 1 day (about 4 months). Time is flying now! It seemed like the first 4 weeks dragged on forever, and now little punkin is almost halfway cooked! :) I finally had to retire one pair of jeans, I'm still fitting into most of my other pants, but I think I'm going to have to break down and buy some maternity pants soon. I did treat myself and bought a few shirts a week ago-and I'm glad I did, because this belly came out of nowhere in just a few days! Most of my nicer shirts are fitted, so I would have looked a little uncomfy/skanky if I would have tried to wear one of those to Tom's Christmas party for work last night! I still don't fill them out much, so instead I just looked like I had on a baggy shirt. Oh well, we'll grow into them soon enough! My "weekly check-ups" with our little doppler are going great! Little punkin's heart beat is anywhere from the 120's to the 150's. I notice it's higher after I've had lots of sugar! That's all the news for now, Merry Christmas!!

New Pictures of T-Rex/Bean/Cletus/Punkin!

Yes, those will be the names we will be chosing from when this child comes into the world! So last week, one of my friends at work who works in Labor and Delivery let it slip that they have an old ultrasound machine up in the department...she had already done one on our other friend that's a few weeks farther along than me. So guess what...we decided it was time to play with the machine! In our last ultrasound we couldn't really see a whole lot of movement, and I was dying to know what was going on in there, so it didn't take much to twist my arm! The machine is pretty old, and we weren't looking for anything other than movement, so no, I don't know what the sex is. So here are the pictures! It was so amazing to watch it moving around in there. I could have watched it all day. It really had a fascination with its hand! In the second picture, it's just kicked back, loving life, just chillaxin with its hand on its forehead. I'm thinking that if it is a girl...drama queen. :) I wonder if the hand on the forehead thing will carry over to when it's out in this bright world!? And the third picture is a front view of the baby's face. Tom is convinced that he/she has a mohawk. Kaden and Cooper will be proud! :) So there's our sneaky little peek at T-Rex/Bean/Cletus/Punkin! Hope you enjoyed, we sure did! We have our next appointment on December 30th-that's when we'll find out the sex! And it's Dad's birthday-I don't think I could think of a better present! Although chocolate covered cherries are hard to beat! :)

My Slowly Growing Baby Belly

So I'm 13 weeks now! Second trimester here we come! There haven't been too many updates to write about lately. I had an appointment on the 6th with the prenatal nurse. It was very basic, pretty much like a normal "first" appointment where we just chatted and she gave me a bunch of reading materials. That's it, not too exciting! I'll have my first appointment with my doctor on the 21st...you'll get a kick out of her name....Dr. Beer! Ha! At that appointment, we'll schedule my next ultrasound! That'll be the ultrasound we find out the sex! It'll be scheduled right around Christmas. I'm guessing somewhere between Dec. 18th and Jan. 1st. I'm hoping it's before we come home for the holidays!

Well, I have been very anxious about seeing some of my baby-growing progress. It has been slow-going! I know there are lots of people who didn't show for a long time, but I'm just getting so impatient! I guess I should enjoy it while I can. I'm sure I'll be miserable soon enough! Last Friday I was complaining to Tom that I couldn't see anything and explaining my impatience. I lifted up my shirt and his eyes got big and he said, "Um, you have a bump." So I looked in the mirror and low and behold, there it was, little but there! I can't see it at all when I just look down, but when I look at my profile in the mirror, it's a little more obvious. I've only gained a pound or two (depending on the day, lol), and all my clothes still fit okay. When I wear regular clothes nobody believes I'm 3 months preggo. I guess that's a good thing! My time will come... Anyhoo, here's some pictures. I took the first one at 6 weeks. That pooch is my pre-preggo pooch, I'm sorry to say! :) I took the second picture this morning at 13 weeks 1 day. There's not a whole lot of difference, but there's a small one! As soon as it becomes more obvious, I'll post another one.

Just truckin' along...

I don't have much to report, it's been a very uneventful week and a half! Thank god! I've had the same worries that every pregnant lady has at some point early on in pregnancy. Most of my symptoms started going away late last week, so of course, I started worrying that something was wrong. I had no other reason to think something was wrong other than the fact that hormones play dirty dirty tricks on pregnancy brain. So Monday night when I got to work, I took out our little doppler (it's kinda like the ultrasound without a screen-just a speaker) to see if I could hear the little heart beating. They say it can take up to 12 weeks to be heard by doppler, but it can be heard in some as early as 8 weeks. I was 9 1/2, so I thought I'd give it a shot. And it worked! Little Cletus the T-Rex angel-bean was whooshing away! Ahh the conviences of working in a hospital. I can hear our little punkin's heartbeat whenever I want!

Today is the 10 week mark! Only 30 more weeks to go! Like I said, most of my symptoms are gone. I'm still pretty tired, and I'm peeing all the time :) and that's pretty much it. Tom hasn't even had to suffer from the hormonal rage yet! I have read that that fun time may still be to come! Poor guy!

Oh, I have had some pretty bad heartburn already, so I'm gunna put in an early bet that little beanie is gunna have lots of hair! :o) My next appointment is November 6th, but it's just with a prenatal nurse. I'll see my new OB doc on the 21st. That's it for now!

We Got To See Our Baby Again!! Ultrasound #2

We had our 2nd ultrasound on Monday the 13th. Here's the first picture, it's my little angel!! It's got a little halo! :) If you look really closely (the yolk sac is the halo, the head is right underneath) you can sort of make out the outline of the beginning of a nose and a little eye dot! How cute is that! I can't believe how much it's grown, it has tripled in size in 2 weeks! I would read in all my books how much was changing, but it's a whole different thing to actually see the changes. It's absolutely amazing! In the second picture you can see the little arm and leg buds. The legs are the little white blurs at the bottom and the arms are right under the "chin". It was wiggling around in there! It gave us a little wave! It was too freakin cute! All Tom and I could think about was that dinosaur cartoon that came out not too long ago where the T-rex says "I've got a huge head and little arms"...it's hilarious! We laughed...a lot!! I found the video, you have to watch it to see what I'm talking about! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQ7rezDwqEI So now, after sharing this story with dear Heather, a new nickname has been given to Bean/Cletus the Fetus...he/she is now T-Rex! The third picture is the heartbeat picture. The heartrate was 183 this time! Up from 138. The nurse said this is pretty normal, the heartrate starts out slow then peaks around this time. It will go down again later in the pregnancy and level out in the third trimester. So we have a very strong little angel T-Rex!!

We Finally Got to Tell My Side of the Family!

After three long weeks of keeping quiet (which was absolute torture) we finally went to Holdrege over the weekend to tell the Coxes and Buettners! I'm so glad I don't have to keep it in anymore! It was especially hard to talk to Laura and Andy and hear about their pregnancy woes-I just wanted to say "I know what you're talking about! I'm preggo too!" But I had to wait, I love to see surprised faces! Dad walked right into it when we got home on Thursday night. He was just then giving Laura and Andy their congrats card (even though he'd known for almost a month-hmmm, I wonder who I get my horrible procrastination from :) ??) Well, our scheme was to have him read a congrats card that he thought was just for Andy and Laura (which it was of course). So I handed Andy and Laura their card and gave Dad his and told them I just forgot to get them in the mail. I made Dad read his out loud. So he's reading this long congrats poem, then at the bottom, I added a little poem of my own. It said "They say being a grandparent is such a joy and a treat, we sure hope so cuz you will be twice in one week!" He read the last part like he was asking a question-it didn't quite register at first! But Jenny got it right away, so I'm pretty sure the screams gave it away! :) Then we told Grandpa Buettner and Grandma Cox. They were pretty happy too. Grandma kept saying how "exuberant" she was, and of course, she started stopping people in the hallway right away to start spreading the news! It was a fun weekend. I'm definitely turning into a party pooper though! I can't stay awake past 9:30! I'd say the fatigue has officially kicked in!

First Pictures of Baby Clements

This is our 6 week ultrasound taken 9/29. The little bean measures at 6weeks and 5 days. It's a cute little blob, isn't it?! The little blob between the x's is actually the baby, and the little circle thiny below it is the yolk sac. I think the little guy already looks like a little monkey! Kinda like one of those sock monkeys with the x eyes! Lol! Katie (Tom's little sister) said it looks just like Tom! Ahh, how cute! It was pretty unreal to see this for the first time. Tom said that this was the coolest thing he'd seen or heard. It's just going to get better and better! The second picture is the heartbeat picture. The heartbeat was 138, nice and strong! The lines at the bottom show the actual heart beat, and if you look carefully, there are two little white lines outlining the heart! It was just beating away! This definately made everything more real! I'm feeling fine. I haven't had any morning sickness yet. I've felt a little queasy every now and then, but nothing awful. I'm hoping it will stay this way! We're already scheduled for another ultrasound in 2 weeks! So we'll get to see the little bean again on October 13th! Then it will actually look something like a baby!

Spreading the news to Gramma Nissen & Grampa Clements!

We went to South Sioux City this last weekend to share our news with Tom's parents. We went to Peggy's house first. When we got there, we sat and talked for quite awhile. I didn't tell her right away because we had a plan. The right moment just wasn't coming. So we ate dinner and visited some more. I was getting so nervous! I have no idea why, I think it was just because I was so anxious to get the news out! Finally, after at least an hour and a half, I said, "Hey, we're finally going to start repainting our guest bedroom and I need your opinion on the color." So I pulled out 2 color swatches, one pink and one blue. I handed them to her, she took them, kind of cocked her head a little and put them up to my blue shirt (this is when I thought she had caught on) and said, "Hmm, I think I like the blue in your shirt better." ***pause pause pause*** Then it was like a light bulb switched on! She snapped her head up at me with her eyes really wide (I will never forget that face! I wish I had a picture!) and said, "Are you pregnant?" I just nodded and the screaming and hugs began! It was super cute! Andrew, Tom's little brother was there too. I think he's pretty excited to be an uncle twice! As long as he doesn't teach them to bang their heads on the floor, we're good! :-) The next morning we woke Katie-his sister-up from her deep dark slumber way too early in the morning to tell her the good news. She perked up pretty quickly! We made it short and sweet so she could go back to sleep! ;-)

Later in the night, we went out to the river to break the news to RC. We pull in and he, Ty, and Val were eating at the picnic table. So we sit down and of course the first question asked at the river is "What do you want to drink"-drink meaning an adult beverage :) I, of course, said no thanks. RC said something like "Last time I asked that, there ended up being a pregnant girl at the table". Hah! I just smiled at him, he looked at Tom who just gave him a little shrug and said, "Well, what can I say?" The "last time" he was talking about was Ty (Tom's brother) and his darling girlfriend Ashlee's big news last month. So now the poor guy is going to think that every girl that turns down one of his cocktails is preggo! Two grandbabies in two months, whew! It was a great night and such a weight off the shoulders to finally get the news to some of the family! We also got to tell a bunch of Tom's friends that we played in a softball tournament with. And his Grandma and Grandpa came to watch us play a game (bless them for sitting through our butt-whooping), so we got to tell them too! It worked out perfectly!

Now we still have to wait 1 1/2 more weeks to tell my side of the family and it's going to be torture! It is absolutely driving me crazy that I can't tell them right now, but I really really want to do it in person. That's it for now! My first ultrasound is Monday! Woo Hoo! So I'll have pictures up then!

The First Nicknames :-)

So the first actual nickname that I've given the little bean is just that...the little bean! But some new, more creative ones have been thought up by none other than my little sidekick in the ER...dear Heather. What has she named our little bean?? Cletus the Fetus. LOL! Yes, Cletus Clements. Or otherwise known as CTF squared. Thanks Heather!

My HCG Levels...

I had my blood drawn for my quantitative hcg level when I was 4 weeks and 1 day (Friday). My level was 214, which is great for so early in the pregnancy! Then the doctor wanted to draw it again 2 days later to make sure the number was rising adequately. It needed to increase by 66%. I peed on another stick :) on the day in between to see if the line got darker to try to settle my fears, and of course it did! My level on Sunday was 530! So it was perfect! I did some research, and those numbers are acutally kind of high. You know what high hcg level means?? Twins!! Nah, I'm not having twins, but I'd thought I'd scare Tom a little! :o) There was one study done that showed that many women with higher hcg levels end up having girls, and if the levels are lower, they have boys. That's just one study, so I don't know how much I believe it! I guess we'll find out in about 15 weeks or so! Oh, yes, we are going to find out the sex of the little bean!

Holy Crap I'm Pregnant!!!

Ahhhhh!!! After 14 months, I could hardly believe my eyes! I got my big fat positive!!!
Thursday, September 11, 2008 at about 5:00 in the afternoon (after I woke up from my daytime slumber), I decided it was time to take a test. Well, actually I couldn't wait any longer! I knew at this point it would be really really early in the pregnancy, but it should at least show something. I had gotten so used to seeing negative tests that I refused to look at it until I counted out 2 minutes.
So there I am, sitting on the toilet, actually mouthing the numbers, not wanting to look because I had this feeling that it was going to be negative. When I finally looked, I just said "No Way!" And I just started laughing! I started kissing the dogs because Tom was on his way home from Cedar Rapids. I called to see where he was-he told me he was an hour away. It was a perfect amount of time for me to rush out to buy something to I could tell him in a fun way. I had a perfect excuse so he wouldn't think something was up. His birthday was 3 days away, so of course I just told him it was an early birthday present! Luckily they had just what I needed at the Copper Cupboard-this little "me and my dad" picture frame. So I grabbed my scrapbooking supplies and finally used these baby stickers I've had since 8th grade! I got it all wrapped up just in time-he walked in the door about 10 minutes later. So I wasn't tortured for too long! I told him I wanted to give him his b-day present early, so we sat down on the couch and he opened it up. It seemed like it took him forever to get it (of course it didn't-it just felt like it to me)! He snapped his head up really fast and said "Huh uh! Seriously!" And he tackled me! Gently of course! It was more of a jumping onto the preggo wife and her falling backwards...We were all smiles the rest of the night. We went out for dinner to celebrate! And that was my first day of my pregnancy!