19 weeks!

I'm already approaching the halfway point in this pregnancy. I can hardly believe we've come that far. Although I can say I'm a bit more distracted this time around. Lily keeps me very busy and this pregnancy is just flying by. The baby is getting bigger and stronger. I can feel it kicking in there every day. It's about the size of a mango now. I, however, am much larger than that. I have gained about 10 pounds so far. I gained 35 pounds total with Lily and I hope to gain at most that much again.

Physically I still feel good. The morning sickness is a distant memory now, although at the time I remember wondering why I signed up for this again. I have noticed a little bit of swelling in my legs, which got really bad last time. But some things are different. I have had more cravings--nothing that Scott has had to go out in the middle of the night for though. Stereotypically I have been eating a lot more pickles and ice cream, I don't think the later has anything to do with the pregnancy. Early on I was starving all the time, now I think my appetite is pretty much normal.

Lily knows there's a baby in my stomach. I doubt she gets the whole picture, but she says baby and point to my stomach. She gives it kisses. She is a really great helper and I know she'll be a big help to me when the baby gets here.

We had our first doctor's visit in New Haven. Or midwife visit would be more accurate. We are seeing midwives again for this birth. New Haven is a mecca of sorts for midwifery. In the U.S. 1 in 10 births are attended by a midwife but in New Haven it's 6 in 10. This is largely due to the prestigious program at Yale. The midwife group that we're seeing is similar to the practice we used at UCLA for Lily's birth. It's located a couple of blocks from Yale-New Haven Hospital, where we will deliver. And we'll see all the midwives in the group and whomever happens to be on call when I go into labor will deliver Lily. There are a couple of regular obstetricians in the group and I will also see them during my pregnancy. We saw one of the midwives on the 28th. We listened to the heart beat and went through all of my records from UCLA. Everything was fine and normal of course. All signs point to a healthy little baby growing nice and strong. The big news is that our next big ultrasound will be on January 11th. We'll hopefully be able to find out the gender of this baby then. Lily didn't cooperate very well last time but hopefully this baby will be less modest.