Baby pics

So we got another ultrasound today and during this one we definitely got to see more of the little guy/gal. Today we're at the start of week 12.
This first one is a face shot which basically makes it look like something out of "Aliens." What's sort of cool/creepy is that you can see the brain hemispheres in this one.

This one is more of a measurement shot. Right now, the baby is about 2.5 inches long - not too big. We didn't get a full length measurement because it's feet were pretty well tucked in. You might also be able to see a white line running down its back - that's the spinal cord.

Another body shot. The baby was very active during the ultrasound. It was swinging its arms around and floating all over the place and its heart rate was 162 beats per minute - nice and strong. It could be because his mom was rushing a bit to get to her appointment and it was still a bit agitated. :)

OK, so this is a bit of an odd shot. The baby's head is obstructed but you can see the arm (right above where it says arm) and then you can see its leg right along the bottom of the sac.

It's pretty amazing the detail that you can see with an ultrasound, especially given the fact that it's not even the length of a full finger. And sorry folks - no news yet on whether it's a boy or a girl. The ultrasound technician said it's still pretty early to make any kind of determination though she joked that once with an ultrasound at about this time, it was very clear that the baby was a boy - so clear that even the parents asked if what they thought they saw was actually the case. The tech said that usually she's pretty good about keeping the news from people if they don't want to know, but even she was sort of caught off-guard that time. We'll likely know at the 20 week ultrasound which should be right around New Year's. That's when they'll take tons of measurements.

We still continue to tell more people about our news. It was really fun today because we had another delivery of sorts - the delivery of cookbooks for our church that we've been working on for the last couple of months. What a relief for that to be done. But what was even more interesting was that our good friend, Elaine, who helped spearhead this project told us before we even told her the news that she had had a dream about us about four weeks ago and in the dream we had a baby. She said she had meant to tell us before one of our proofreading sessions, but had forgotten. Of course, we told her that her dream appeared to be coming true. Had she told us earlier I think we probably would've had to spill the beans because it would've taken us by such surprise that someone we had only met just a few months earlier was getting a baby premonition about us.