Baby Prep and Countdown!

So, among Halloween etc. we are slowly preparing for baby #3, who is "technically" due Thursday (though with my track record we could still have 11 more long days after Thursday like with Catherine)!  Much like the first two we opted not to find out the gender.  I have NO instinct about these sorts of things, so I turned to some old wive's tales to help me figure out what it might be : )  So far, the Old Wive's are 73% team blue!   As far as comparing it all to past pregnancies, it's quite the toss-up.  I've had some very similar symptoms to Matthew's pregnancy (mainly sciatica) but the baby is constantly moving as well as moving around enough to make me nauseous, which was Catherine's M.O.   However, once I looked back at the pictures, the bump definitely looks more Catherine-like, but that could be my body just giving up at holding it in the 3rd time around. 

However, it's been a totally different pregnancy in that I'm showing/carrying much differently as well as I experienced some crazy migraines early on that were new.  The only thing not new at this point is not delivering early, even though I technically hit the "it could happen any day" mark weeks ago.   Anyway, here are our very scientific results about the baby:

Old Wive’s Tale	Answer	Prediction
Heartrate	>140	Girl
Carrying	low and out	Boy
Ring Test	back and forth	Boy
Face Shape	long and narrow still	Boy
Mayan Birthday	odd	Boy
Cravings	Salty	Boy
Moodiness	Extra moody	Girl
Bread	Eat the ends	Boy
Chinese Gender Chart		Girl
Gracefulness	Clumsy	Boy
Sleep Side	right	Girl
Dad’s Weight Gain	None	Boy
Skin	Dry	Boy
Belly Shape	Basketball	Boy
Nausea	only mild	Boy
Total: 4/15 for Girl, 11/15 for Boy

And for those of you who wish to play along at home, here's the current bump:

Two days before I had Matthew:

 A few weeks before I had Catherine:

And here's the ultrasound from a while back.  This should also give my incessant family a chance to scour the pic for that hidden twin that doesn't exist :-)  Happy guessing!

Anyway, luckily I'm in the hands of a very skilled physician as we go along.  She loves to listen to the doppler heartbeat at my appointments and checks up on the baby anytime she's near a stethoscope.  This day she said the baby's heartbeat was going 'beep beep', so maybe that explains why this pregnancy is so different - it's going to be a(nother) dancing robot! :-)

And speaking of things that are new, in the past 5 years of photography and the era of the smartphone, I've become slightly more comfortable around cameras and decided that I would not only try not to shy away from pictures but actually take a few (or have generous friends do so!).  It helped that the baby (or as Matthew put it to everyone at the dentist "my mom's big, fat belly") got its own death star costume to go with the "dancing robot" and Mr Darth Vader:

And then when my favorite photographer came to town toward the end of pregnancy, I had her snap a few as well.  I've always been uncomfortable with the idea of a whole maternity session "about me" and it also felt odd taking family photos knowing we would be expanding very soon, so a quick session was perfect and now I have some nice photos to commemorate the end of a pregnancy era of sorts and a few last shots of our family of 4!  These were some of my favorites (of the belly at least, there were quite a few more cute ones of the kiddos to be shared later)!

Speaking of our family of 4, the kids are so excited about the baby!  It's amazing the difference in bringing home a baby with a 3 year old compared to when Matthew was 2 and Catherine was born.  Catherine is probably the most excited of the two and is constantly announcing there is a baby in my tummy, tickling it and telling it it's soo cute and sharing that she wants to name it Baby Margaret.  While Margaret is a better name than Apple Cider, Donut, Lamp and Froggy which have all been thrown out before, we probably won't name the baby after Catherine's favorite cartoon.  Catherine's favorite TV show is Daniel Tiger, who had a baby sister recently, which has been helping her prepare.  She spent a few weeks wandering around singing "when a baby makes things different, find a way to make things fun."  She also spent another week singing about counting to 4 when your mad, but sang it while simultaneously punching her brother, so I'm not putting to much stock in Daniel Tiger's advice actually changing some expected 3 year old jealousies/behaviors when baby gets here.  I do think Catherine will blossom into her role as big sibling as she's struggled a bit with Matthew's big brother transition to Kindergarten.  Hopefully she'll enjoy taking on the leadership role with the baby.

I know Matthew is excited about the baby as well, but he is much harder to gauge.  He probably feels he has his hands full with Catherine already!  One of his classmates at school is quite the proud big brother of a new baby, so even if Matthew is less than thrilled, I'm already predicting there will be quite the Kindergarten-style one-upmanship between the two!   At least the baby gives him an "excuse" of sorts to talk about poop and diapers and other 5 year old style humor, so he's all over that!

The kids have both helped decorate for the baby.  Catherine painted an "ipad" for the baby and the kids both colored some pictures at their big sibling class.   "Nursery" done!

And because I'm feeling nostalgic, my babies!  Can't wait to see what this one looks like when it makes its grand appearance!  Long and lean like Catherine?

Or short and chunky like Matthew:

The only old wive's tale (plus history) I'm putting any money on is another hairy baby.  Lots of heartburn both times around and plenty of heartburn this time.  Hopefully confirmation is coming soon!