IT'S A...week early!

In terms of Georgia OBs, it seems that the third time was, in fact, the charm. I LOVE my new doctor and all of his office staff. I felt much, much more comfortable the entire time I was there, and he even said that if he could cherry-pick his ideal VBAC candidate, it would be me. Score. I plan on seeing the midwives that work in his office, too, to get a good feel for who I actually want to request for my delivery, but either way, I'd be quite comfortable with him. Such a relief.

When I went in for my appointment today, I met the nurse practitioner. She was reviewing my file and noted that my ultrasound is scheduled for next week. I confirmed that fact and then added the comment, "Unless you just want to do it today. That would be ok with me." She said, "Oh, sure."

Wait...what? Seriously? We can do it NOW? Sweet.

During all of my pregnancies, Chris has come to my very first appointment and then the big 20ish-week ultrasound. The rest of the appointments are boring and have never seemed worth pulling him out of whatever class or job to come with me. Which means that for this particular nothing-special appointment, he wasn't there. I called him at school and, much to the amusement of all the nurses and office staff standing around me, asked if I could do the ultrasound without him since they had an open slot RIGHT NOW. (He was at Georgia Tech, which is downtown Atlanta, I was in Alpharetta, which is two towns north of North Atlanta...he was well over an hour away at best. Not reasonable to wait for him to come.)

He graciously agreed, on condition that I don't find out the gender without him.

So, I had the ultrasound and just turned my head away and stared at the wall while the technician did the gender check. She wrote it on a piece of paper, folded it up, and sealed it in an envelope for me to take home and open with Chris.

Then, AGONY.

Do you know how hard it is to hold onto an envelope like that without looking??  It taunted me all afternoon while Chris was still at school. Finally, FINALLY, he came home about half an hour early so we could open it all together.

Hooray! It's a boy! I had a dream a few weeks ago that really stood out. I have multiple long, involved, vivid dreams every night while I'm pregnant. This dream stood out because it was normal and boring. In my dream, I took my baby to church for the first time. It was clear from the clothes and blankets that it was a boy, and I walked around introducing my son to several people. I have been extremely curious to see if this dream would come true, and so far, yes!

I also told everyone his name in that dream, but that part is still up for debate. We'll see if the dream name wins or if we stick with the name we had already chosen...

Jane wasn't so thrilled about the gender in the video, but she acclimated very quickly and is totally fine with having another brother.

Just one amusing note to add. You know how Jane has a well-earned reputation for talking a lot? And how Ben really talks just as much as her? Well, we have this lovely ultrasound video clip in which the baby is...talking. Seriously, his mouth repeatedly opened and closed while we watched. Think this is an indicator of future loquaciousness?