Lincoln update

Here's what's happened with Lincoln the past couple weeks...

• Lincoln weighs in at 1 pound and is nearly 8 inches long, about the size of a small doll (or a really long carrot) :) A doll with developing senses, including touch, sight, hearing, and taste.
  


• Lincoln can now perceive light and dark. If we were to shine a flashlight over my belly, we might feel our baby react, perhaps trying to turn away from the bright light.


• Lincoln can now hear the sound of our voices, my heart beating, the whoosh-whoosh of my blood circulating through my body, those gastric gurgles produced by my stomach and intestines, Rufus barking, sirens, a loud TV.


• Amniotic fluid differs from day to day depending on what I've eaten (hot chili one day, sweet banana another), and now that our baby is swallowing amniotic fluid each day (for hydration, nutrition, and also to get practice swallowing and digesting), he will be getting a taste of--and a taste for--whatever's on our menu.


• His arms and legs are finally in proportion, neurons are now connected between the brain and muscles, and cartilage throughout the body is turning to bone. Which means that when our baby makes his moves, they're much more coordinated--no more jerky twitches.

As for me, I've started experiencing my first aches and pains of pregnancy in the past week. I've been waking up in the middle of the night with horrible charlie horse cramps in my calves. They are so bad that I'm sore for days after having one. I read about them in What To Expect When You're Expecting, and I guess some women experience that during pregnancy. I've also developed a new love for stretching, which can help prevent those leg ramps I've been having at night. I have absolutely loved being pregnant. All of the aches and pains will be well worth it once we have our sweet little Lincoln! Lincoln has been moving like crazy here lately. Chris can feel him pretty much all the time now.

I've really started showing in the past few weeks and people are starting to treat me like I'm pregnant. A guy bumped into me the other day, looked at my pregnant belly, and started apologizing like crazy. Then, Chris and I were at the mall the other day and we couldn't find a restroom. So we went into a hair salon and they allowed me to use their employee only bathroom because they said they could tell I was expecting :) Maria and I are going maternity clothes shopping tomorrow morning and I'm super excited!

In other news, I awoke from a nap today to discover that Chris had rearranged some of our Christmas decorations. It's a little game we have going. It started out a few days ago when I noticed he had used our "Merry Christmas" blocks to spell " We Crasy." I cracked up when I saw the table. My husband is one CRAZY cookie!