babies grow so fast!

On Thursday we got to see Baby moving! Baby was jumping around and waving its arms. Pretty amazing. Something else we found out (after I had to sit in a dark ultrasound room for over half an hour and almost fell asleep) was that the baby is closer to 13.5 weeks so Baby's expected birthday is now November 28.
We met our doctor. She was professional, direct, and attentive. We won't meet with her again until the 30-somethingth week.

Week 12: Reflexes and heartburn

This week Baby is developing reflexes! Fingers flexing, toes curling, eyes squinching, mouth sucking. Baby will also respond if I push on my belly now (though I won't feel the response from the 2 incher). According to my dentist, I should be careful stimulating the baby too much because I run the risk of having a stimulus-needy child if so. So we're being careful not to prod too much.

I love that people like to compare baby size to food. Right now Baby is a cross between a fig and a lime. Mmmmm tasty.

On the not-so exciting side, I was feeling nauseous over the weekend. I may have entered the heartburn stage. Let's hope I have similar luck like I had with morning sickness (i.e. none).

On Thursday we'll meet the doctor for the first time and get another ultrasound! So we'll get to see if Baby looks more like a fig or a lime.

Appetite

I've really lucked out (knock on wood) that I haven't gotten morning
sickness yet. After I eat I often get "on" quickly (not sure how to
spell that in Vietnamese) and up until this week haven't even had that
much of an appetite. I find myself craving chao and other things
ricey. And of course pickles, but that was no different from before
Baby came along!

I suspect, though, that my appetite may be turning around. I'm
blogging from bed still and could go for some banh xeo...!

Happy Mother's Day

Got my first mother's day card from Minh and Jessica! We spent the day
celebrating by window shopping baby room ideas (IKEA was heaven).

Art

We have all of one piece of art in the house and already the baby has matched us. We bought this piece from a baby store near us. It's called Bat Reading Hemingway. We're planning on having a redwood forest theme for the baby's room. No doubt literature-hungry bats fits that.

Prenatal Orientation and Official Fetus Status

Mike and I went to our Prenatal Orientation. Overall we didn't learn much that we didn't know, which at least made me feel good that we've done decent research. At the beginning of the session I found myself tearing up thinking about the baby. I imagine this is only the beginning of of joyful tears!

We picked Dr Rincon as our doctor. We don't get to meet her until the 27th, so hopefully there'll be tears of joy that day too (otherwise let the research continue!).

Week 9: Happy Fetus Week! It seems I've officially transitioned from carrying an embryo (up to 8 weeks) to a fetus (8 weeks until birth). Mike and I noticed, according to our virtual baby, that there are fingers developing! Crazy.

Baby's 1st March and Gift

Yesterday we joined a May Day march from Story and King to downtown to show unity and support for worker's rights. In particular there was a lot of buzz about the recent legislation in Arizona. Saw signs and shirts with messages like "I'm brown. Will you stop me?". Ringing inour heads and bellies were these chants:

"Obama, escucha! Estamos en la lucha"
"Un pueblo unido jamas sera venzido"
"Si se puede"

The 3 of us walked a total of 6 miles and rewarded ourselves with a bacon-wrapped hot dog and a container of mangos and cucumbers with chile, sal, y limon.

Also got baby's first gift from Hushi. This was after a celebratory ice cream sundae she and Damon treated us to on Friday when we shared the good news with them.
"tiny little fingers tiny little toes"