Girl!

I convinced Steve to open the envelope on Thursday evening. I couldn't wait anymore. I'm impressed a waited a full day!  I was trying to cheat and look through the envelope to see if there were any clues (or to see if I could just read what was inside).  It appeared that the paper inside the envelope was pink. This convinced Steve to open it... or maybe it was my desperate pleas to open it :-)  As soon as I opened the envelope, we realized the paper inside was actually orange, not pink.  Well it was too late- we had to read it now!  And this is what we saw...

I took the photo on my iphone and it automatically flipped it. Not quite sure how to flip them back.  Anybody want to give me some tips?

Yah!!! We are so thrilled!  I would have been happy either way.  Now I've really got to start thinking about names. I had a boy name picked out but we're pretty clueless when it comes to girl names. Luckily we have some time to figure it out.

My appointment on Wednesday was for the first trimester screen, which my OB said is recommended for both low and high risk patients. I fall in the category of low risk since I'm less than 35 and have no other medical complications related to this pregnancy.  I was sent to a high risk maternal fetal specialist for this scan. Half the time the OB's office will do the scan, but they sent me to a specialist more as a courtesy since Dr.Fogle's (one of the doctors I work with) sister in law works at this high risk practice. I wasn't going to complain since they're more experienced and have very good ultrasound machines. 

For the first trimester screen, they are checking several things on the baby plus doing bloodwork on me. These things in combination with my age gives the risk for trisomy 13, trisomy 18, and trisomy 21. The baby looked good in all three measurements (nuchal translucency, nasal bridge, and blood flow). Yah Baby H! I'm still waiting on a call with the overall results, but given that the measurements were all good and I'm relatively young, I think we'll be just fine.  Baby H was so incredibly active!! They wouldn't let me take any video clips unfortunately (due to liability, I suppose). She was by far the most active I've seen her. Very fun. She was turning, kicking, stretching, etc.  It's amazing how developed she is- we got to see her fingers and toes, spine, stomach, brain... you name it, we saw it!

Here are the photos!

Feet!

Sorry for the sideways photo.  You can see her hand near her face.

I think this may be my favorite. You can even see the stomach... the dark area in the abdomen.