Ending Any Suspense...

What a profile!

Last Monday afternoon, we made the trek up to Baltimore for our anatomy ultrasound!  We were both nervous and excited - and split evenly on whether we wanted to see girl-parts or boy-parts.  Hubs was dead set on BOY and I was imagining frilly dresses and finally PINK THINGS!  Of course, we were both hoping for healthy and symmetrical brain ventricles, 10 fingers and 10 toes, and all the other cheesy things you say about healthy babies.  What?  You don't wish for symmetrical brain parts when you're looking at your 20 week ultrasound?  Trust me, you should add that to your list.

Little Man came with us, and we managed to ply him with enough Cheerios, Thomas movies, and fruit snacks that during the entire process, which took about an hour, he barely made a peep.  Even the ultrasound tech was impressed.  She had a student shadowing her who did some extra pictures of Baby Vegas, so we have about 7 pages worth of blurry alien anatomy photos.

But of course, Hub's favorite photo is probably the one taken from underneath Baby Vegas' little tush, where there are BOY PARTS looking back at us clear as day.  IT'S A BOY!!!  He told me that was the point that his nerves/excitement finally settled down and he was able to relax for the rest of the ultrasound.  I noticed he tried hard not to gloat too much, but he really couldn't hide the ear-to-ear smile very well.  To be honest, I wasn't too surprised it was a boy.  We'd only picked a boy's name, and I'd been certain from the get-go that as much as I was hoping for a little girl,  it would be a boy for my brother.  I am thrilled that I will get to name Baby Vegas after him, and that he'll always know the story of his amazing uncle.  If you knew my brother, you'll laugh because we're using my brother's name as the middle name - perfect for whenever Baby Vegas is getting into trouble, just like his namesake!

My absolute favorite moment of the day was after we knew Baby Vegas was a boy, when I looked over at Hubs and he was fingerspelling our new son's name.  My entire family signs and so we've been teaching Hubs during our Friday night family dinners... so far he knows his alphabet and a few crucial nouns!

My least favorite moment was being told that my ultrasound was extra-long because it turns out I have marginal placenta previa.  I knew the gist of what it meant fairly quickly, from years of watching "A Baby Story", but it still was alarming.  Luckily most cases of marginal placenta previa resolve themselves before delivery as the uterus continues to grow, so they told me to go home and not worry until a repeat ultrasound at 32 weeks.  I'm still a little on edge about it all, but trying to reassure myself that everything will be just fine.

So there ya go - it's a boy, and we're so very excited to bring Little Man's little brother home in 18 weeks!!  I've been going through all of the newborn clothes we have stored away and it's making me all snuffly and ready for the new-baby snuggles.  Speaking of snuggles, there is a big brother who is ready for naptime and trying to wiggle his way onto my lap...