It’s that time again!  My ultrasound confirmed this morning what we knew in faith -  there is a little baby growing inside of me!  Sure, I took a few tests in the past weeks and the double line showed up (indicating I’m pregnant), but until you hear that heartbeat or see the baby, it just seems like an idea.  Well, then there is hunger pains that almost instantly turns to nausea as my body says, “You better eat, NOW! We’ve got a baby growing in here.”  Also, the afternoon that calls to me, “Beka, you need a nap -you’re not going to make it through the day today without one!”  And finally, my least favorite part of being pregnant – the heartburn.  It’s already popping up, yuck! But sitll, at the beginning it seems like it takes faith to really believe there is a life growing in me – until I hear that heartbeat or see that baby…

Baby Bean is laying down, head on the left (dark in the head is the brain), and legs extend out to the right. (click to enlarge photo)

But today was my favorite part of the pregnancy – an ultrasound that let us peak into the womb where God is knitting together a precious little one to join our family!  I’ve never had an ultrasound this early before, but they wanted to figure out the due date, which turned out to be February 13, 2010.

I loved this early ultrasound, because even as our baby is the size of a blueberry – we saw the heart beating fast (151 bpm), the yoke sac that is feeding the baby until a placenta forms, the technician showed us the forming brain, and this little one was wiggling all over the place!  Already, while still so tiny, this baby is amazing!

Jason affectionately called he/she, “Baby Bean” as we look lovingly at our fuzzy blob picture the ultrasound technician sent us home with.  It’s funny how exciting a little black and white blob is!  Because this picture is so much more than a blob, it’s our baby!  And the picture doesn’t do it justice, see the baby squirm and wiggle is so much fun!

Here is a little more about what is going on with our baby this week:

pregnancy: 7 weeks

How your baby’s growing:

The big news this week: Hands and feet are emerging from developing arms and legs — although they look more like paddles at this point than the tiny, pudgy extremities you’re daydreaming about holding and tickling. Technically, your baby is still considered an embryo and has something of a small tail, which is an extension of her tailbone. The tail will disappear within a few weeks, but that’s the only thing getting smaller. Your baby has doubled in size since last week and now measures half an inch long, about the size of a blueberry.

If you could see inside your womb, you’d spot eyelid folds partially covering her peepers, which already have some color, as well as the tip of her nose and tiny veins beneath parchment-thin skin. Both hemispheres of your baby’s brain are growing, and her liver is churning out red blood cells until her bone marrow forms and takes over this role. She also has an appendix and a pancreas, which will eventually produce the hormone insulin to aid in digestion. A loop in your baby’s growing intestines is bulging into her umbilical cord, which now has distinct blood vessels to carry oxygen and nutrients to and from her tiny body.

7 more months until we meet this new little one – stay tuned!