Since we decided to keep little Baby Lima’s creation a secret from everyone until our mutual family Thanksgiving Dinner on October 31st, 2009, I decided to keep a little journal documenting Baby Lima’s history so far.

September 17th, 2009 – The Big News
Just before heading over to Parent’s R house for dinner and cards, Megan took a pregnancy test and we found out that there was a little Lima Bean growing!!! It was very difficult for both of us to contain ourselves that night – we wanted to tell the world!

September 19th, 2009 – Thanksgiving Dinner Idea
While spending our relaxing weekend camping, we decided that we wanted to try our best to tell both of our parents at the same time. After much thought and many ideas, we decided on inviting the both sets of parents, Josh’s Grand Mom and Megan’s brother Matt to Maggiano’s in King of Prussia for our first family Thanksgiving Dinner. Little did they know!!! ((Of course, both of our Mothers are going to say that they thought something but just didn’t want to say anything…))

September 22nd, 2009 – Doctor’s Appointments Scheduled
Little Baby Lima’s first two doctors appointments have been scheduled – October 6th and October 20th.

Tiredness
Has come on full force.. I take a nap and within a half hour I could just go right back to sleep. Naps have become my newest best friend. I have two very good nap buddies though, Flop and Eb take turns cuddling up with me!

September 28th, 2009 – Morning Sickness Begins
The dreaded morning sickness arrives, luckily I have read many tips on how to take the bull by the horns. Set my alarm clock early and sleep with a pack of Saltines next to the bed. Josh and I set the second alarm to go off each morning at 5:00am so I can down 4-5 crackers and then go back to sleep for another 2 hours. I have also found that drinking a BIG glass of milk before going to bed in the evenings helps! Unfortunately, Morning Sickness does not just relate to the AM hours, I tend to feel sick throughout the day as well, some days are worse than others.

Frequent Potty Trips
Long drives = not good. TV commercial breaks can not come soon enough. And my co-workers must think I had  bladder removal surgery. I am lucky if I can go 20 minutes without needing the bathroom. Josh thought I was bad with going before, HA! That was nothing!

Saturday October 3rd, 2009 – Fried Eggs & Bacon
Thinking a nice healthy filling breakfast would be good for Lima and me, Josh made fried eggs & bacon. Unfortunately Lima was thinking otherwise and I was in the bathroom feeding the toilet bowl. Again, I had two very good four legged aides making sure I was okay. Josh was great too, he brought me water and offered to clean the toilet. I did accomplish cleaning the toilet while I sat on the ground composing myself after the relapse of eggs & bacon. Funny when I manage to get things done!

Energy – Non-existent
I have never in all my life since living on my own out from under my parents roof  had such a dirty house. Ask me if I care? I have no energy what-so-ever. I will look at the laundry sitting needing to be folded and let it sit, I will let vacuuming go for a good week or more until I have a bit of energy to even think about if I want to vacuum. Everything in our house has a home and these last 8 plus weeks I have just learned to allow things to have new homes! Josh has been very helpful as well, he has really picked up for my lack of energy and has stepped in and helped out a great deal!

Tuesday October 6th, 2009 – Medical History Appointment
Josh, Lima & myself had a 2pm appointment at our Obstetrician. Very exciting for both Josh and I for this really seemed like the beginning of our little Lima coming. We received a lot of information and both gave the Nurse a lot of our families Medical History. My mothers neighbor works at this Obstetrician and we really wanted to run into her to tell her not to say anything when around my parents. ((not that she could – good old HIPPA)) The nurse we met with told us that Dotty saw I was coming in for a first appointment and said how surprised Richard and Janet will be. The nurse said that Dotty wouldn’t say anything, but that she’d be asking her, the nurse – Nancy, how the appointment went. Josh and I were both happy with the pleasant staff and are anxious for our next appointment, October 20th!

Our One Year Wedding Anniversary
We planned to go camping and celebrate our anniversary under the stars and away from all. With feeling sick the majority of the time, we felt that cancelling our trip was the best move. Instead we made dinner reservations for Saturday at a restaurant right down the street from our house, Gracies, and spent the weekend home, together.
Gracies was a delight and very delicious. We toasted our One Year Anniversary with Diet Coke and water with lemon 🙂 After an enjoyable dinner we still had Sunday, the actual 10.11.09. We did some running around and cuddled up with the three other cuddle bugs, Floppie, Ebony & Benz ((yes he likes us now)) and watched some football. We made a wonderful dinner and had the ever so anticipated cake! Lima was content and happy for the cake and dinner stayed down. 🙂

Passing on “Beverages”
A few times now since finding out I am pregnant I had to be cleaver in my ways to turn down a “beverage”. Remember my place of employment has a party if a piece of lint falls on the carpet! ((not literally, but any reason they can come up with a party/drinks are served)) Plus my parents have come to enjoy wine and with that comes sharing wine at our weekly dinners! I just want to express that I have not turned into a “non-drinker” but for the next umteen months I will not be drinking. The headaches and feeling under the weather were all just reasons I quickly came up with to get out of having a drink. Please keep track of all the missed occasions for once our “Little Lima” arrives and I am able to indulge in a cocktail I will be doing so again! Til then CHEERS from “Little Lima” and me!

Tuesday October 20th, 2009 – First Appointment
Both of us were extremely excited for the first appointment. So excited that I couldn’t pee like I was instructed to do. When we went for the Medical History Appointment I was given a little container to save my urine in each morning of all my upcoming appointments. The urine will be tested at your appointment and the container will be given back to me to use the next appointment. I couldn’t pee! I ended up downing some water and running the sink faucet  in order to get myself to go! We met with Dr. Maria Tucker who we both found to be so nice and informative. Without getting to graphic, a brief internal exam was done and she felt my uterus to see if everything seemed normal. I am being sent for an Ultrasound on October 29th, to get an exact DOB. With having abnormal cycles from February of 2009 through becoming pregnant a DOB could not be determined. An ultrasound will help in determining a more accurate DOB. We are also having the Quad Test done. This is a test that is performed in weeks 11-14 of a pregnancy. It is completely up to the parents if this test is performed. This test helps determine any birth defects or down syndrome. Since I am under 35 there is a 75 % chance they will be able to determine if there are any complications. Josh and I both felt that having this test performed would ease our minds or if there would be some sort of complication we could prepare together and with the help of specialists on what to expect when our baby is born. Proactive in preparation per say. We are both so excited for our new edition that both of us feel knowing of a complication in advance will enable us to become knowledgeable of the condition or situation before the birth of our Lima.

Some tidbits of information from this appointment:

Megan is HIV Free
Benz is a nice cat. Tested negative for the cat disease. 🙂
My urine proteins are great!
I received my first A+ ever… my blood type!

Thursday October 30th, 2009 – Ultrasound & First Trimester Testing
What an emotional day leading up to our appointment, both Josh and myself were nervous yet very excited to see Lima for the 1st time! I was a bit of a mess worrying, but I think that is only natural. Arriving in Oaks for the appointment I needed to pee so badly and approached the nurse asking her if I could ask just one question. Her response was “sure, but you can’t pee” I looked at her smiled and said, guess you get that question a lot. She giggled.
Josh and I were escorted into an exam room with the ultrasound equipment set up and ready for us to see our Lima. The tech got me ready and there on the tv screen was the most fascinating, beautiful image I have ever seen – Our Lima! Tears filled my eyes and I was doing my best to not lose it completely but lost that battle as the tech pressed a button and Lima’s heartbeat was heard loud and clear – 165 beats per minute!!! Tears streamed down my face as I squeezed Josh’s’ hand, who was seated right next to my head.

The tech continued to capture images of Lima and run the required tests as Josh and I sat and enjoyed the time we were able to just sit and look at our little Lima! At one point the tech told us that Lima was sleeping and she would need Lima to wake up to perform the one part of the test. Much to our surprise Lima kept sleeping!!! We waited, Lima slept, I needed to pee. The tech said that she was going to ask “Mom” ((oh wait that is me)) to cough if Lima didn’t wake up shortly. She said that babies sleep a lot in the womb and it was nothing to be concerned about. I still needed to pee and little Lima was enjoying a nap! The tech asked me to cough which I did – Lima slept. I then moved my body a bit, shaking gently back and forth – Lima slept. I coughed again – Lima slept. The tech said that we are going to have a good sleeper ((hope she didn’t jinx us)) because our baby was sleeping through earthquakes! I laughed and just like that little arms and legs started flaring on the screen – Lima woke up! It was an image that Josh and I talked about later and said how it just moved our hearts to see this small image 2 inches in length moving around. The next thing that happened brought tears to Josh’s eyes – hiccups!  Yes, hiccups – our little Lima got hiccups that we witnessed. Lima’s little body was hiccuping on the screen, so adorable!

Once the tech got all the images needed, Dr. Donnenfeld came in to look things over with us. He said that our baby is very healthy and he played the heartbeat for us again. He explained how down syndrome babies have a lot of thick murky fluid at the back of their heads and Lima has very little and clear colored fluid which is a good sign that our Lima isn’t down syndrome.

After I got myself dressed and used the bathroom, I then had blood drawn for the test. We will hear from a genetics specialist within 4 days to go over the results. I then return to have a second blood test at the end of November, beginning of December.

What a special day Thursday October 29th, 2009 was to both Josh and myself. A day we will remember forever and always, the day we saw our Lima for the first time!

Take a look at Lima’s photo album to see the first photo shoot!

Saturday October 31st, 2009 – We tell our Families
As mentioned above, we had planned a family dinner in honor of Thanksgiving, little did any of our guests know that the real reason we were getting together was to announce the upcoming new addition to our family, Lima! The evening went just as we had expected it to, everyone was happy and thoroughly overjoyed of our new addition.

Josh and I came up with a cleaver way to share our news. I found a person on the web who knits lima beans, cutest little things. So we decided to order lima beans and we handmade individual tags for each of them. For example, my brothers tag said “Uncle Matt” on the front and “Coming Into Our Lives May 14th 2010” on the back. Each of the tags were pinned on a lima bean and the 4 beans were placed together in a basket with the tags hanging over the side. Once we were at the restaurant and seated the hostess brought the basket to our table and set it down in the middle of the table. Faces of perplexion surrounded the table as everyone except Josh and I was uncertain as to what was going on. In fact, Josh’s Father thought that the restaurant was trying to sell flowers as is done in restaurants in Italy. My Mother picked up on the tags right away and gave me a big smile, as she realized what was going on, but stayed composed to let the others realize on their own just what was going on! Once everyone figured out our big surprise, I handed them each a copy of Lima’s ultrasound picture and the happiness continued to flow around the table. Many hugs, toasts, and even some tears were shared as our parents realized grandparents they would be, Matt realized an Uncle he was about to become and Grand-mom realized that the word GREAT was going to become part of her name.

A great night Saturday October 31th 2009 was and we have now shared our news with many other friends, family, co-workers and acquaintances and the reaction is all the same – complete happiness for Josh and I! Continue to check back as I am sure myself or Josh will post happenings over the course of the next 2 trimesters and before long little Lima will be with us all!!

To view the pictures of our evening at Maggianos and the Lima Bean Basket, click here!