25 weeks!! Only 15 to go??!!?!?

How can it be that we only have 15 weeks left!!?!?! The days are becoming warmer and we leave for our first camping trip this weekend. Not only does that mean summer is coming which is just glorious, but also that baby will be born soon. I find myself calling it HE all the time. I think this is my way of not having to call him an it, but also since I have two girls and no boys, it separates the familiarity that much more. Ali and Ben are coming camping with us this weekend and I couldn't be more thrilled. I'm excited to chat about our "birth plan", although it is more of a "baby plan" since most of it will be our preferences for after the baby is born or newly arrived. It will be nice to have some more concrete ideas on what we all want.

I had a dr's apt. today. It went very well. I drank that awful orange drink (last week), which I usually love, but really didn't this time and found out that my blood sugar is perfect. My hemoglobin is a tad on the low side so I'm back on iron supplements every second day. We heard baby's heartbeat and it gave us some nice variables so that is a good sign that 'he' is doing well. My dr advised me that they still consider this a high risk pregnancy soley for the fact that this is an unusual situation and although everything has been going perfectly come 32 weeks they will be monitoring the baby very closely. This is my last 4 week stint in between dr's visits b/c after that it will go down to two weeks in between and then at 36 weeks I'll go in every week. I will have an ultrasound at 32 weeks and then possibly another two after that and then again starting at 32 weeks I will go in for regular NST's (non stress tests) which checks the baby's heart rate and movements and also monitors any contractions. My life is going to get VERY busy in the next few months, but that's really okay b/c it's nice to know that we are all getting taken care of and that there are people on our side who are doing their absolute best to help Ali and Ben welcome their healthy baby into this world. Not to mention we will have a lot of nice pictures for their baby book :) My dr. also mentioned that his estimate for their baby's weight is between 6 and 7lbs which is a nice size and right now the belly is growing perfectly with the dates.

I asked him if IVF babies are known for coming early or right on their dates since conception is not a guessing game. He said no the statistics are similar to a 'regular' pregnancy, but that usually when people use IVF it is b/c of complications getting pregnant which may effect either the embryo itself or the mothers body and ability to carry children so this may point to higher risk more complicated pregnancy's and sometimes preterm babies. In our case there is no way to guess when the baby is coming since there aren't really any of the usual complications. Both 'his' parents are young and healthy and my body has carried two babies to full term already so our chances of making it close to the end or even past are pretty good. I'm still hoping for August 30th (which is my birthday), but as we all know we don't get to chose. :)

Here is another set of pictures of "the belly" at 25 weeks.