Ultrasound journey!

Adam did the most wonderful thing for me yesterday: He scanned all of the sonogram pictures we have gotten since October!! So now I will take you on a little journey through the life of our baby so far!

It all started around the beginning of October when I thought I may be pregnant. I went in to the USC Health Center on campus to take an official test. I had taken a couple home pregnancy tests and they were both positive so I decided to go in and find out for sure. Here's what the doctor found!!
Yep, that little bean looking thing between the two plus signs was our baby at six weeks old! We couldn't believe it! So teeny and no visible form of a human.

So from there we had to be referred out of USC since they don't provide prenatal care. I was referred to a wonderful doctor at Cedars Sinai Hospital in Beverly Hills. At the first appointment, I was 9 weeks along and the baby already looked like this!
You can see the baby on the right upper side there, she has little arm and leg sprouts and a little head! So cute! At this point we could see her move around a little, it was crazy! Two weeks later, and even more growth! Check this out:
That's just about a full profile with a little teeny tiny hand right above the head! The ultrasound showed a lot of movement but I still couldn't really feel anything for a while yet. The very next week, Adam and I went to the prenatal diagnosis center to get the first round of "real" ultrasounds done to check for all sorts of things like the thickness of the neck, some other spine stuff, and listen to the heartbeat. Most of the time I don't know what they're looking for or testing for, I just stare at the picture on the screen and let the doctors do their thing. :) This next picture might be hard to comprehend but it's a 4-D picture they printed out for us. Not too good but you can see the little arm covering the face and the basic shape of a little human body!
These 4-D pictures are really cool, so high tech! So since late November, when that last picture was printed, I didn't get any other ultrasounds until January. I was getting spoiled! My doctor said I had now "graduated" out of her ultrasound room. So when we returned to LA in January, I got to go again to the prenatal diagnosis center for a full anatomy scan of the baby. During this they looked at all parts of the body and especially a lot at the heart and all its chambers. They took TONS of pictures but I'll post my two favorites that are currently on our fridge.

The first is a full profile picture, not 4-D but so great!
This next one if 4-D of the face. Her little fists are covering her face, so adorable! She's all cuddled up!
So there is the journey so far! I will continue to see my doctor every four weeks or so and hopefully I'll get one more visit to the diagnosis center to see the growth of the baby again soon! Like I said, I definitely got spoiled getting an ultrasound every two weeks in the early stages so now that's all I look forward to! As far as my health goes, I'm doing really well. I have little aches and pains here and there but nothing crazy; I've been really lucky! The baby has started to kick pretty much all day long now, whereas before it was mainly in the evening. It's so great to look down at my stomach and see it move, I smile every time.

Lauren~