A pregnant pause

So yeah, I've got a new project. I'm growing a baby.

It's almost 12 weeks old, and the last six weeks have been possibly the longest EVER apart from maybe counting down to go overseas, because I've been sick with morning sickness and zonked out with tiredness - common first trimester complaints. But that all seems to be coming to an end as I head into the second trimester... I'm about to start showing and I'm officially allowed to tell people but to me it still seems a very surreal experience. I've just come from the 12 week scan where they test for chromosonal abnormalities by measuring the skin at the back of the baby's neck, known in our household as The Mong Test. The radiologist said everything was looking good healthwise, but we have yet to get formal results. The postie didn't get all misty-eyed at seeing the wee flickery heart beating like I did, he remained quite stony throughout. The baby looked like pictures of scans I'd seen before, a cute wee head, little hands and feet, and it was springing around in my uterus like it's a bouncy castle. It's so weird to think that's going on in my body right now, when all anyone can see is me sitting here typing and smiling to myself a little bit.

So yeah, a new project. An unplanned one, one that has taken some getting used to, and one that will come to fruition in January.

The postie and I plan to find a new flat after we holiday in Noosa (a pre baby plan, I'll be four months pregnant when we get over there), and strollers seem to be our hot topic of conversation lately. That and rocking chairs. His parents and my parents are pleased as punch, Sweeney seems oblivious to the whole thing, but Sweeney's parents are stoked he'll have a cousin.

We are going to find out what flavour it is, but not for another two months or so. I think finding out what sex the baby is doesn't ruin the surprise, as the surprise when a baby is born is that you get a person, not a sex. When I think about the Kid I think about a wee girl, but in my dreams, which are vivid and literal at the moment, the Kid is a boy. I dreamt one night I was having a political discussion with it when it was aged ten and he had shoulder length dark hair all shaggy like teenagers do. I looked at him and thought "wow, I made you." It was wild.