What's a girl?

Our ultrasound went great! I came down with a cold over the weekend, so I was too miserable to obsess about our big appointment! But it finally came and luckily I was feeling much better! The u/s tech didn't seem surprised or say anything about being there at 18wks instead of 20wks, so I guess it is normal - not sure why they tortured me for two more weeks with Jacob and Brody! We told the tech right away that we wanted to know the sex - with Jacob we kept mum the entire appointment (thinking it was obvious we wanted to know) and after about 40 minutes she turned off the machine and said "Ok, you are all set" and was ready to send us on our way when Aaron and I both about jumped through the ceiling trying to let her know we wanted to find out if baby was a boy or girl! So this time around she tried to get a peek right away, but baby had it's legs crossed - I thought for sure it was a sign of a polite little lady ;) So the tech said we will take some measurements and peek later. She measured everything and checked out all the organs and everything looks great! The baby was moving it's arms and legs around a ton, it was super cute. So then she went back for a view of the goods, froze the image and said "see anything?" I'm like "... a penis." Sure enough. So she checked out a few more baby parts and a few more organs and was about to say we were all set when I asked her if she could just check one.more.time. Sooo, we looked again. And there it was again. Another penis. She then found the umbilical cord for me to show me how they are different so that I didn't think we were just getting a cord view. Definitely a boy. I am going to be the mom of three boys. Three years old and under. Deeeep breath... I am excited to be having a healthy baby boy, but I am a little sad that I will never have that mommy-daughter relationship. No little girl to shop with or go get a manicure with or plan a wedding with, but as Debby pointed out, I will never have to work outside, ever. And I won't have to share my throne with any little princesses. And oh do I love my boys... more than I ever thought I would... and boys sure do love their mammas. :) I would feel kind of bad for a little girl, too. Not only would she have 2 older brothers and 3 older male cousins, but most of our friends have boys too... she probably would have been quite the tomboy and not wanted to get manicures with me anyways!! :P

Back to our ultrasound. Sooo, baby boy #3 is looking great and healthy! He measured 10oz and his estimated due date based on measurements was right on target with the January 5th date that my ob is going by (must have just been a growth spurt at the nuchal scan when he measured 5 days ahead). Oh and he was laying transverse with his head at my right hip and his bottom on my left hip. His heart looked great and his heartrate was 153. She confirmed that my placenta is posterior (which is better for feeling movement) and is far enough away from the cervix (over 3cms). With Brody it was a marginal previa (within 1cm of the cervix), which thankfully for me only meant that I got an extra ultrasound (some women experience bleeding with placenta previa and a slight few have to get a C-Section if the placenta doesn't move - ours did and 90% of them do move). He was moving his arms and legs around like crazy and even sucked on his fingers a bit.

Jacob is still not convinced. When we arrived home, I showed him pictures and explained that he has a baby brother on the way. About 15 minutes later I asked him what was in my belly and he said "Baby sister!". Oh well, he has a few months to adjust!

Oh and one other thing... As of Saturday, I've definitely started feeling good movement! The little kicks are consistent enough that I know for sure it is the little guy! I'm loving it and can't wait for Aaron to be able to feel him moving too :)

Hopefully the pics are clear enough for you. They looked a lot clearer to me on the laptop than the PC. She gave me 6 photos and then a CD, I could NOT figure out how to share the CD which I'm bummed about because you could see him moving and such - it's super cute. But, I was able to freeze images so that is what I used instead of scanning the photos she gave me. I think I'll try scanning the photos too to see if they come out better, but it will have to wait until I am back at my mom's house!