19 weeks

(My husband has informed me that the format of my blog makes it undesirable to read, and that if I were to follow his advance and put a double space between each paragraph he, and others, would be more likely/willing to read the entirety of my posts. So, Matt, this is for you:)

As of this week our baby is about 6 inches long and designating specific parts of the brain for smell, taste, hearing, vision and touch. This is generally the time when doctors encourage you to talk or sing to your baby because research shows they are just beginning to be able to hear you. So it's time for me to make good on my promise of reading to my baby while pregnant.

Matt and I are part of a website called baby center where we get weekly updates and can see advice and stories from other parents. This week there were a few other moms commenting about how active their little ones are in the womb. This made me smile a bit.

I am literally counting the days (there are 13) until our next doctor's appointment. Last night I started thinking about the changes we are going to have to make to accommodate a baby in the house. We are probably going to use part of our tax return to get the stuff we need to put our house (+ nursery) in order. I really have no desire to paint or otherwise redecorate this room, and neither does Matt, so this mostly consists of buying 1 or 2 pieces of furniture. And since we aren't going all-out on the nursery, maybe I will sew a quilt or paint a painting or something to satisfy my nesting instinct.

Anyway, I am most excited about picking out names! We have talked only very briefly about this topic because we knew we were going to find out the sex and wanted to wait for that. So I have only heard a handful of Matt's baby name ideas (most of which I think-- or hope-- were jokes). But this should be fun.

FYI readers, we are planning on keeping our baby's name a secret until the baby itself is debuted, so don't think you are going to get a sneak preview... even when we do choose a name.