2.6 lbs strong (and growing)

As Emily said in her last post, we had another ultrasound last Thursday to check up on the baby's growth progress.  Everything was very positive, he's pretty much exactly in the range we want him to be.  The ultrasound tech said "this is one time it's good for him to be average."  He's actually a little bigger than we expected - 2.6 pounds already!

Ultrasound pics after the jump...

Sugar!

Last Thursday I took the day off work to go to the doctor's office. They needed me to drink a special glucose drink (essentially kool-aid without enough water) and sit around and have my blood drawn for a few hours. It was not something I was looking forward to just for the blood draws, but the purpose of the test was to check if I was gestationally diabetic. Not that anyone wants that, but I REALLY didn't want that.

I had to go on a special "eat more carbs and fruit, no sweets" diet, then fast before the test. I ate dinner at 7:30ish on Wednesday and the test started at nine on Thursday. I did okay getting myself to the doctor's office that morning, but by 12:30 - after four blood draws and still no food - I was a mess. Alan thankfully met me at the office and walked me someplace new with the most delicious grilled cheese and tomato soup I've ever eaten. It was a fun cafe inside a grocery store so we swung by and got some candies (since if I failed that would be the end of candies). Because four hours isn't enough, after lunch we went back to the doctor and did another ultrasound. The pictures aren't as good as the last round because he's getting big! But Alan will post details on that later.

Thankfully, the doctor called yesterday evening and told me that the results came back great. I'm healthy and the baby is looking good. We'll get one more ultrasound in four to six weeks just to check in, but my third trimester has started off quite well!

Old Man Cosby

As Alan mentioned in his last post, we had "The Sisters" over for a weekend of Cosby and pudding pops. Even though there was some concern about the health of the party, but being forced to follow a pregnant lady's sleeping patterns quickly got everyone in tip-top health.

On Friday night we were off to see Mr. Bill Cosby, who is now 73 years old. When he walked on stage in a hoodie sweatshirt, sat down and started telling the sound guys to change the volume on his microphone, I got a little nervous. He looked much older than he did on TV, would he be funny? It was, of course, a silly concern. He was consistently funny. (Though he did fade at the end, but after an hour and a half who wouldn't be tired? I certainly was!)

The best part for me was when he started talking about when he was a boy and he'd hear his dad and grand-dad get up. With a big "hugh!", they'd brace their hands on their knees and leverage their bodies out of their seat. As a boy he never understood and suddenly, one day, he heard his dad's "hugh!" coming from himself as he got out of a seated position. I laughed so hard I cried (and then started coughing). Alan looked at me concerned and not a little confused. The thing was - I had heard myself making that same noise getting up out of my seat the day before.

There Were Never Such Unhealthy Sisters

Today is the start of the 2011 Sisters Convention... the Sisters Basque are arriving early afternoon and Sister Sweeney will be showing up sometime between late afternoon and midnight depending on whether or not she can change her flight.   Tomorrow night we'll all be going to see Bill Cosby at the Chicago Theater and are planning to make pudding pops and wear multicolored sweaters to celebrate.

The bad news is that just about everyone is currently or recently sick:

• Alan - was sick all last weekend and most of this week, feeling better
• Emily - was sick at the beginning of this week, just starting to feel better (although she's still very pregnant)
• Colleen - still very sick
• Amy - still very sick
• Lisa - 100% healthy!?

All signs point to Lisa being the Patient Zero of this outbreak.  Lisa, I'm sorry but once you arrive in Chicago you will have to be quarantined and studied to find a cure.

House on Stilts

Overall the original house foundation is in great shape, especially considering it's over 100 years old and is constructed out of bricks stacked on top of giant base stones.  But the north side of the house was starting to sag slightly so in order to straighten out the house and hook it up with the new and perfectly level addition in the back we had to do a little extra work on that part of the old foundation.

Framed

Finally I'm almost caught up on posting older house pictures - some of these pics are as recent as last week!  The basement part of the back of the house is starting to feel like a real room now... the foundation is done, the framing for the walls on top of the foundation is done, and as of last Friday the support trusses are installed and part of the subfloor is done for the kitchen.

Blogger 101

In case some people reading this aren't familiar with Blogger, I wanted to point out a few things about how the blog works:

• Anytime you see a link labeled "Read more »" at the bottom of a post you should click it to open the full post.  I've been putting most of the pictures and text after that "jump" lately to help keep the main screen from getting dominated by one single picture-heavy post.  So keep an eye out for that link and don't assume that the little bit you see on the main page is all there is to the post.
• You can click on any of the pictures to view a larger version
  
• If you have a Google/Gmail account you can "follow" the blog, which means you'll get notified whenever a new post is put up.  To follow it, sign into your Google account (using the Sign In link in the top right corner) and then click the "Follow" link in the top left of the main blog page.
  
• Logging in using a Google account will also let you add comments to any post.  When viewing the full post (by clicking either the post title, the "Read More" link, or the link that says the number of comments for that post) you will see the "Post a Comment" section at the bottom of the page.