Full term!!!

Months ago, early in my pregnancy, one of the nurses at my OB office mentioned something about my chart listing me as "poor obstetric history". I kind of had to laugh, and said "yep, that's pretty much me."

Well, here I am, full-term, with a healthy baby girl growing inside of me...grinding her head against my ribs, sticking her feet into my bladder, and reminding me constantly just how blessed I am to be here now, waiting to meet her and fall in love with her a million times. Just look at these lips! 

Ultrasound today showed her looking healthy--approximately 5lbs 14oz (31st% for 37 weeks), plenty of fluid, and as breech as they come. Everything checked out perfectly, and now the specialist is going to review the ultrasound and then talk to my regular doctors on Monday to decide if I am a good candidate for an External Cephalic Version--where the doctor manually pushes and prods baby gradually into the head down position. As long as they decide to go for it, probably it will be scheduled for early next week, and I'll go in to L&D where they will look at her position one last time, monitor her heart rate, give me medicine to relax my uterus, and then try to coax her into place. There is a risk that the procedure could break my water or put me into labor (or cause distress for baby or placental separation), so they would have me come with bags packed and doula on hand in case we end up sticking around for delivery as well.

I'll be spending my weekend hanging off the couch, crawling around on hands and knees, putting ice packs on my belly where her head is, and various other silly things to try to get her to turn before Monday comes. They say playing music at the bottom of your belly can coax baby to come closer to listen, so maybe I just need to try more things to see what she likes. Adelyn prefered Yo-Yo Ma while in utero, but maybe this girl is a rocker.

Overall, I'm feeling about as close to ready as I can get. The bags are mostly packed, the house has been getting cleaner and cleaner with all my nesting, and I am feeling pretty excited and at peace with the thought of her being here very soon. This afternoon and evening I've been contracting every 15-20 minutes, so I am feeling like maybe if she just gets in the right position, real labor might not be far away. Or it could be weeks. Who knows?

Adelyn is finally off of antibiotics and presumably totally over her ear infections. She just got two of her two-year molars, so she's probably still feeling some discomfort, but the good news is after two more, that's all the teeth she'll get for a LONG time!

She's been sleeping mostly great and taking wonderful long naps (with the only trade-off being SUPER early wake-up times). She's learning tons of new words...animal sounds and numbers and letters. If I say "one", she says "two"...if I say "O", she says "P". I figure that's pretty smart and she just likes to be a step ahead :)

Nathan is working hard, doing lots of briefings and trainings and drills and other fun things to prepare for action. We get to talk most days, sometimes briefly and sometimes for a decent conversation. It's still hard not getting to really have privacy and unlimited time, and I often wish I could just call him at any point in the day when I have a question or something to tell him...but I'm thankful for technology allowing us to communicate. I can't imagine if we were just sending letters and waiting anxiously for replies!

Thanksgiving is going to be weird without him, but we have so very much to be thankful for and I am looking forward to food and family and celebration. God has been answering so many of our prayers lately...today is just the celebration of one of them. Hooray for full-term!