15 Weeks...

...and all is well! Insert sigh of relief. :)

My 9:00 AM appointment today was rescheduled for 1:30 PM because of the ice this morning, and my knight in shining armor carried me safely there on his gallant steed (AKA his antique Jeep with rusty holes in the floorboard and a passenger door that doesn't quite meet the roof, letting in cold raindrops if they happen to be falling from the sky, which they were today...but you know, it sure is fun to ride in that old contraption; and if you hold your legs in a certain position, they don't get wet--well, not very wet anyway!).

The appointment went quickly and smoothly, and the best part was undoubtedly hearing the sweetly galloping heartbeat--144 beats per minute today which is in the middle range for normal. As we talked about the old wives' tale of heartbeats predicting the gender, the midwife (Donna) said she predicts a boy. I predict a boy, too, as would most betting people, I think, whether they knew the beats per minute or not! :)

My weight was 155.8 pounds, actually down a pinch from my last appointment; and my blood pressure was 134 over 68. I did mention to Donna that the past few days I've had some cramping and just general feelings of abdominal discomfort. Although preterm labor has never been a problem for me in the past, I did want to make sure she knew about it in case she had any advice or showed any concern about it. She told me that one of the other midwives, who had 5 pregnancies, felt that by the 4th pregnancy, she was contracting throughout the whole pregnancy! I vividly remember that I had waaaaay more Braxton Hicks contractions during Tobin's pregnancy than with the first two, so I suppose I might as well expect a lot with this one, too.

As I've been thinking about the possibility of having our fourth son, I was struck by the thought that there's something special about the way a family of children of one gender can relate to a family of the opposite gender. For example, it has always (since we moved here) seemed like the three daughters of our next-door neighbors, the Shanks, are sisters to our boys; and now that we've gotten to know the Sacra family during the past year or so, it also seems like their four daughters are sisters to our boys. I wonder if my sons value those relationships even more because they don't have a sister. I don't know, but maybe? I know Josiah and David tend to be affectionate, but it seems like they have an extra dose of that when it comes to these seven "sisters" of theirs: being oh-so-eager to play with "the girls" (the Shanks) whenever they get a chance to be outside, excitedly embracing the idea of watching Jenny Sacra play volleyball last fall, running to give Emily a hug when they see her at co-op, LOVING their babysitter Kate (a two-way street when it comes to affection, as evidenced by her recent blog post)...and when it comes to Joelle, David thinks the sun rises and sets in her. In fact, he thinks the whole Sacra family should just move into our house and live with us!

Anyway, if this baby is a boy, we will rejoice; and if it is a girl, we will rejoice! Four sons is a great family, and three sons and a daughter is a great family! It's a win-win situation, because God Himself is the author of this little life, and we trust Him completely as a giver of good gifts.

Before I scramble upstairs to warm up by the woodstove before crawling into the comfort of cozy flannel sheets, I want to write about the dress I'm wearing in the above photo. It's the same one that I'm wearing in my week 14 picture, the one taken at Hillary's wedding; and I'm happy to have it, even if it was a surprise. The way I acquired it is that one day a few weeks ago, I went into Gift & Thrift to look for some larger size jeans that I could wear now and also postpartum; and as I was standing in line for the dressing room, I "happened" to be standing near the rack of maternity clothes. Well, I had to do something productive rather than just stand there! So I casually looked through the maternity clothes; and lo and behold, here was this dress. I tried it on, and it fit (but won't in a few months...or maybe weeks!). However, I figured that I could wear it to the wedding and also to church and it would be worth the $4.00 price! So I splurged and got it. :) Since then, I've also realized that I can wear it to our church's Valentine's Day Banquet; and if I find one more occasion on which to wear it, I'll have brought the price down to $1.00 per wearing. I've discovered that sometimes during pregnancy, it just helps a woman's emotions to have a new outfit and feel special in it. I'm not the type to go blow $100 on new clothes--in fact, that doesn't even appeal to me--but I'll take my Gift & Thrift bargains any day...and the emotional lift it brings. ;)

Even though I sometimes feel HUGE for only being 15 weeks along, when I look back at the pictures from Tobin's pregnancy, I can see that I'm actually about the same size as I was then. When I wore this dress to the wedding, some of Jeff's co-workers who were there looked at me and said, "Yup, you're really pregnant!" :) But to me, I don't look any bigger now than I did in this picture from July 31, 2007. Maybe this is just how my body "does" pregnancy!