Boy or Girl?

The BELLY from my point of view. 18 weeks, 5 days

We find out on Friday whether this baby is a boy or a girl! I'm excited. Kind of. I actually feel bad- I find myself purposely thinking about it in an attempt to get myself more excited. I guess being as this will be the 5th time we've had this particular experience added to the fact that we already have 2 boys and 2 girls, well, it's more like an episode of Ground Hog Day than anything else! I know, I'm terrible, but it's the truth. Between all 5 pregnancies I've had countless ultrasounds and I've gotten to the point where I'm insanely good at reading them. So that will be fun~ seeing the little one moving around and pointing out fingers, toes, etc.

I think the fact that I'm nearing the half-way mark makes my heart beat faster than finding out the gender. Honestly- being half way done means we're getting closer to having 5 kids and I'm so not ready for that yet!

In an attempt to not make this kid need anymore therapy than any of the other kids, I wanted to write down just a few notes about this pregnancy. I did so well journaling with Thomas. Then Hailey's pregnancy journal was about half the size. So on and so forth. Poor 5th baby. At any rate... a few notes:

It's been a somewhat typical pregnancy for me. They've all been a little different and this one follows suit. My nausea has decreased significantly but it hasn't gone away, which isn't fun. I need to eat often and finding food that sounds good to eat is hard. I can sum up my pregnancy cravings in one word: CITRUS. Orange juice, oranges, Clementines, lemons, lemonade, grapefruit- I've eaten them all in decent quantities and it hasn't let up. I think I'm going on 5 or 6 weeks here where I've eaten a grapefruit at least once a day. I don't care to eat meat or sweets, unless they're citrus related, then I'll eat a small amount. I am really tired this time around. I go to bed as early as life deems possible and have a hard time waking up. I take naps and they're heavenly. I have a lot of the aches and pains I had with the others only it's happened so much faster this time around. Honestly, everything seems like it's happening faster this time around. Makes me wonder if baby is measuring a bit bigger. I have no memory this time around. I honestly forget things all the time and it drives me crazy.

On a more positive note, I started feeling this baby move at 13 weeks and it's steadily increased to the point where I feel him or her move often each day. Despite the fact that I look like I swallowed a volley ball, the baby feels really low in my abdomen. Baby likes to move when I'm hungry. After I eat, about an hour goes by where I feel nothing. I envision baby lazily reclining in there, enjoying yet another grapefruit. Ha! Everyone has felt baby's kicks at this point~ I wouldn't say they are super strong or crazy or anything, they are just pretty consistent and often feel really far apart on my belly. Tall baby perhaps? I've felt some more rhythmic movements but can't quite tell if they're hiccups just yet. My allergies have been intense the last few days and I woke up this morning at about 4am sneezing... which made me had to get up and run to the bathroom. Both of which woke the baby up and I spent the next hour attempting to silently make the baby stop moving so I could go back to sleep. {It didn't work.}  

So that's this pregnancy in a nutshell. :)

What's your guess: BOY or GIRL?? Both Adrian and I have the same hunch but the kids have all decided they want a brother... we'll know on Friday!