The Evidence

The scanner at work was finally free this morning so I went ahead and scanned my pictures. They aren't fabulous resolution to begin with, so scanning them made them worse, but oh well. Here are the best ones:

Like I mentioned before, he was kind of facing my back so they couldn't get a good look at his face. Here's the best one they got - he kind of looks like Skeletor. It also looks like his head is at a scary angle compared to his spine (the line of white dots along the middle top). There's also his hand along the top, maybe its in a fist?


I had to drink 40 oz of water before hand because somehow a full bladder helps with seeing things on the ultrasound. I was IN PAIN. So after the ultrasound tech did all her important measurements, so let me go to the bathroom. Our baby then was stretching out his legs, luxuriating in the new space.


Here are his cute little feet.


And the money shot.... As Kevin told his brother - our fetus has a penis! From what I know, this is like a cross section looking down from his waist, so you see his legs and that there is indeed something between them. It looks to me like his legs are bent in this picture and you only see his thighs.

Its a BOY!

Yesterday we finally had our 20 week ultrasound to determine the gender of the baby. And we found out its a boy! All along I had kind of had that feeling, but then on Sunday I started thinking maybe it was a girl. But anyway, its a boy. I didn't get any fancy digital pictures or a cd or anything with the ultrasound pictures like some people I know, so I was going to scan the pictures so I could post them. But I've been trying to use the scanner at work all afternoon, and someone is always on that computer. I guess they're not that exciting anyway. The baby was turned towards my back so we never got a very good look at his face, so I don't have any good normal whole-baby-looking pictures anyway. Everything was perfectly normal though - 2 arms, 2 legs, 2 kidneys, a bladder, a stomach, 4 heart chambers, and he was normal size (although they never told me what that size was....but the books say he's about 6 inches and 9 oz by now).
Kevin is very proud - I guess he really wanted a boy. I was completely indifferent, I just thought a boy would be nice for my nephew John to play with, and also he could wear all of John's hand-me-downs, since they'll both have July birthdays. But I do feel a little sad it isn't a girl, although I think I would feel a little sad it wasn't a boy if it was a girl. Not that I expect that to make sense to anyone. Now we just have to talk more about names. Kevin is dead-set on Gus (August) but I'm not certain. He's trying to make the deal "If we name him Gus, then you can name the next one." But I don't know. I guess I have two issues.....first, when I hear the name Gus I think of a fat old man. Second, I do really like the name August, but does August Thole sound dumb? Having to alliterate those two T's? We'll see. I really like the name Owen, but it ends up its a lot more popular than I thought (ranked 56 in 2007). I'm just weird and don't want to do anything popular. So who knows.
Thursday I have another ultrasound to look more closely at the heart. I have no idea what to expect, so maybe I'll get some good pictures then I can share.

Time for a new pair of glasses.....

1. a bag of flour
2. the electrical cords of my waffle maker and my George Foreman grill
3. one size 2 bamboo double pointed needle
4. a 4 pound bag of potatoes, and all of my onions
5. my binder of recipes printed from the internet
6. countless dog toys (new ones and all of Satchel's)
7. a ziploc bag of valentine's day sugar cookies
8. the box of a 12 pack of Bud Light bottles
9. a few half-dead cacti
10. MY GLASSES

By now you might have guessed, I'm attempting to compile a list of all the random crap Lucy has ruined or almost ruined in the 4 weeks we've had her so far. In general, nothing was a major loss. I was very upset about the cookies (and all the sugar had the unfortunate side effect making her extra crazy for the whole night). But yesterday came the kicker - while I was in the shower, she ate MY GLASSES. I had put in my contacts while sitting on the couch that morning, and I left my glasses on the end table. When I came down from my shower, I saw them sitting on my couch, and I thought to myself, why did I leave them there? Then I saw one of the lenses sitting there. Then I looked at my actual glasses and saw the other lens and the frames were covered in teeth marks. GREAT.
Honestly it could have been worse. My glasses were about 5 years old, and 2 or 3 prescriptions behind, and I had been considering getting new glasses for about 6 months. So now I guess I can get a new pair. I just couldn't believe that after 4 weeks of unsupervision while I'm in the shower, suddenly she would eat MY GLASSES. Damn dog.
Other than that, Lucy is ok. She already getting bigger - I have a hard time throwing her out of my way on the bed. She only rarely is having accidents inside, partly because we are now keeping her in a kennel during the day. She is just so crazy wired when I get home in the evening, then she calms down just in time for Kevin to come home and it happens all over again. Its interesting to say the least.
Not much else - just catching up on work after being in Chicago.
I guess I officially have a belly of some sort too - I saw Jackie last night for the first time in a week and a half, and she immediately said 'Wow you look pregnant!' A coworker also said something about looking bigger yesterday, which I thought was funny. I'm just praying I can keep wearing normal clothes as long as possible....
On Monday we'll know if we're having a boy or a girl! Woohoo!

Glad to be Home

Phew.
That was a long exhausting trip. Nothing overly exciting, and I guess not overly useful, but parts of the conference were interesting and it was fun to spend a few days in Chicago. I'm not sure if I said anything about going to this conference, but it was the annual meeting for AAAS, the people that paid for my internship this past summer. So they paid for my registration for the meeting, leaving me only to find a way there and a place to stay. I stayed with one of my old college roommates (Shannon) who lives north of the city, and I took the El in each day. It was very nice and very convenient, and it was great seeing Shannon for the first time in more than 2 years.
The meeting itself was pretty overwhelming. There were so many different career workshops, scientific symposia, and other seminars going on that I could hardly think straight. There were at least a few highlights: Al Gore spoke on Friday night, and he was excellent - the perfect amount of entertaining and intellectual. We ended up having to watch his speech from the overflow room though - the room he was in was packed immediately. Oh well. Another entertaining seminar I went to was about people who do science consulting for the entertainment industry. One of the guys that talked to us works for the show The Big Bang Theory, which I watch and enjoy, so it was interesting. Those are basically the highlights.
I was hoping to get a lot of career advice out of this, but that didn't happen. I won't bore you with specifics about the career workshops I did go to, but they were useless. I also tried to go to a job fair for science writing internships just out of curiosity, but when I showed up I discovered it wasn't a normal job far but was instead a series of one-on-one interviews that people had to sign up for with the media outlets they were interested in. Oh well. I've resigned myself to the idea that I don't remotely have the drive to be a science journalist. Oh well.
Other than the conference, I did a few fun things. I had lunch with my oldest friend, Scott, which was nice. I went to the Illini/Northwestern game (previous post...). I went with another AAAS fellow friend to a yarn store and bought some fun sock yarn that I'm excited to use soon. After that I walked very very far - basically from Grant Park to North Michigan Ave and back to the conference at Michigan/Wacker - and did some shopping. I rationalized buying myself a new purse since I wasn't spending any money on food (Sarah and I found enough receptions with free food to fill us up every evening; I think I had to buy lunch twice). I also shopped for maternity clothes for the first time ever - I don't need them yet but figured I'd look for deals. So at least I had a bit of time to do un-conference stuff.
Sarah and I drove back yesterday afternoon and got back just in time to have dinner with Travis while he was in town. Kevin met us at dinner, and I was SO HAPPY when he showed up with a clean-shaven face!!!!! I guess that was my Valentine's day present. I'LL TAKE IT! He had also done a good job of cleaning up the house and doing laundry, for which I was grateful.
Now its back to work....

How Did They Pull That Off?

I am currently in Chicago for the AAAS annual meeting. Tonight I ended up going to the Illinois/Northwestern game with my college friend Shannon who I'm staying with. Anyway, I had reasonably high hopes for Illinois to do well....but the game was HORRIBLE. We were tied once in the first half, and never ever had the lead. But somehow they pulled it together and won it by one point with two seconds left. After NEVER leading the whole game. I still don't believe it.
If I'm bored tomorrow maybe I'll try to post more. The highlight will be lunch with my oldest friend, who is a new dad. Weird.
This is also my first post ever from my phone. It certainly makes me a bit lazy about typing but it's good to k ow I can do it.

Snow, Mud, Baths, and Worms

Life continues to be more interesting with Lucy around. Last week we had a considerable amount of snow for St. Louis, and I ended up staying home on Wednesday. Satchel is always a little confused by snow, but he doesn't mind it. But Lucy really didn't care for it. The first time I tried to get her to go outside, she really didn't want to and she peed on the back steps. She finally went outside after Kevin shoveled off a little bit of the sidewalk/patio, but she hated the snow because she immediately sank 7 inches. By Thursday she was fine because the top of the snow had hardened enough for her to walk on. Here they are enjoying the snow:



By this weekend, the snow had melted, making my backyard a mud pit. So every time the dogs went outside, they'd track in muddy footprints all through my kitchen. They were muddy enough that Kevin even decided to give them a bath, and he put them both in the bathtub at the same time. This was quite entertaining. Then I washed my kitchen floor (although it already looks like it needs to be washed again...)



In general, Lucy continues to be much better about not going to the bathroom inside. She has been successfully contained in the kitchen while we're gone during the day too....with a few minor incidents. Friday while I was at work, she found my potatoes and onions, and chewed a little bit on every one. Thanks. Saturday while we were in IL at my parents, she was able to jump up on the windowsill and knock over her bag of food and she ate so much her stomach was HUGE. But she's been pretty good.

Kevin woke me up at 3:30am on Monday morning screaming 'Lucy has worms!!!!' I guess he had woken up to take her outside, and he saw some worms crawling around her tail and butt region. He proceeded to do internet research about what kind of worms she might have, and he decided she had pinworms which are really bad and could be on our bed. So Lucy was banished to the kitchen, where she cried all the rest of the night. Kevin and I stripped the bed, and tried to go back to sleep but we were both worried about whether Satchel had worms too and if Lucy would be ok. It was great.
Yesterday morning we got into the vet right away, and Lucy just has tapeworms, and we got dewormer for both Lucy and Satchel. And we learned its not very easy at all for humans to get tapeworms from dogs, which was good to know. Hopefully everyone will be fine.