Baby Carly's Nursery Is Ready For Her!!!

As you can see from the pictures above, Baby Carly's nursery is all ready for her!!! As you can also see, Mandy thinks I bought that rug for her. She loves to hang out in the nursery.

It was my goal to have the nursery ready before I went into my third trimester, just in case my bed rest is upgraded to code red and/or Baby Carly arrives ahead of schedule. As of today my pregnancy countdown clock (just like those Y2K countdown clocks ... remember those?) shows exactly 90 days until my due date, so I made my self-imposed deadline.

Actually, I should say that WE made the deadline, because I certainly couldn't have done it without a lot of help from Storm and my Mom and Dad!!! THANKS SO MUCH!!!

And thanks as well to my friend Lori, who used to work at GSK, who is the one who scored the free crib and glider for me. How cool is that?!?!?

Plantation General Hospital Tour

Tonight my Mom and I went on a tour of the Labor & Delivery Dept. at Plantation General Hospital, where Baby Carly will be born.

PGH is exactly 4.65 miles from my house and it is a "level 3" hospital for babies, which means that type of infant emergency would be handled there. Babies born here do not have to be flown to other hospitals ... this is where they fly the babies that need emergency care.

It was nice to have a delivery nurse answer all my burning questions...

1. Do the delivery rooms have stereos/speakers set up for MP3 players? - The answer was no. They have CD players but they are not MP3 compatible, so you have to bring your own iPod speakers. An experienced mother at this point made the comment "the last thing you are going to want to do is change the music on your iPod between contractions." Well, duh! That's why I'm going to create a birthing playlist in advance.

2. If I'm in labor for a long time, can I order room service? - The answer was no. They suggested eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich in the car on the way over.

3. Can I use my cell phone in the delivery room to call all my friends to proudly announce "This is my moment! This is my miracle!" - Once again, the answer was no. No?!?!? I was really expecting a yes on this one ... I can't believe they won't let you use cell phones from the delivery rooms!

Strike 3. Oh, well. At least now I know what the delivery rooms look like and exactly what they are going to do to Baby Carly after they take her away after the initial hour of mommy and baby bonding time.

I also saw Dr. C today and I have gained 28 pounds. With 3 months still to go. Eeek gads!

Dr. C told me not to worry because he says I'm not allowed to do any of the activities that burn calories. Easy for him to say. He's not the one who's going to have to lose all this weight!

I am proud to announce that I resisted the free cookies and juice that were offered at the hospital as part of our maternity tour.

Dr. R. is "Super Pleased" - Baby Carly Yawns

The top picture of Baby Carly's profile at her ultrasound photo shoot today at Dr. R.'s office. The bottom one shows her mouth open while yawning. We caught her yawning about 3 times and it was super cute!

Dr. R. said he was "super pleased" about how my cervix looks 2 months after the cerclage surgery. The cerclage is still very tight in place, but even better is the fact that the walls of my cervix on the internal side of the cerlage are tightly pressed together. 2 months ago there was a visible gap with fluid inside so this is a huge improvement.

In simple terms, the cerclage isn't having to work too hard at this point to keep Baby Carly in.

Dr. R. attributes my activity level (or lack thereof) as a major contributor to this progress. It was nice to hear that all of my sitting around on my ass is working!

What was also nice to hear is that I'm not the only one in this body gaining weight. Today Baby Carly weighs approx. 1 lb 13 oz., compared to just 15 oz. a month ago.

She is also in the 54% percentile, which I'm told means that her body measurements, weight, etc. are 4% above average. That sounds good ... a little bit above average, but not too much. We want her to be a healthy size, but not necessarily massive, for obvious reasons.

They did comment that her legs look long suggesting that she will be tall, just like both her parents.

My next appointment with Dr. R. is scheduled for Feb. 12.

Tomorrow, I have to go see Dr. C. and step on that @*&! scale of his.

6-Month Belly Shot

All I can say is I'm not looking forward to stepping on Dr. C's scale in 2 days. My legs are in desperate need of some exercise that has to wait at least 3 1/2 - 4 more months.

After Baby Carly is born I'm going to rename this blog "Think I just had a baby" and I'm going to put up a series of photos of me shrinking back into my size 6 pants!!!