As we realize some of you are hearing about all of this for the first time, we thought we would backtrack a little and give you all of the information and details from the beginning!

We found out that we were pregnant in early November and were given a due date of July 13^th. My first thought was “oh no, how will I be able to start teaching at the front of the school year” and Eric’s first thought was “oh no, aren’t babies expensive??”! Haha… We enjoyed letting our families in on the secret as we were able to see them in person and everyone was SO excited for us!! Big brother Tucker and big sister PJ were a big part in helping us let the world know we were expecting…. We made special little t-shirts for them to help with the announcements and although they didn’t quite understand what was going on, they did know they were getting a lot of attention while in those shirts!

All went well with the first several months of pregnancy…. And by “all went well”, I of course mean that I was blessed with daily morning sickness J And not a small dose of it might I add! I would honestly like to meet the person who invented the term “morning sickness” as I have no idea what it even means…. More like a 24/7 flu bug that just doesn’t let up! All the while, I continued teaching and saying “well, at least it can’t get any worse than this!” HA. Boy was I about to be proven wrong.

On February 16, we went in for our 19 week check-up and to have our ultrasound. I had my fingers crossed for a girl and Eric was hoping for a boy. I had already told the doctor that one of us would be very happy, and the other would be happy by the next day J He took us through our ultrasound pictures and everything seemed happy and healthy with our little BOY. Following the appointment, we went back into his office where he told us that there was one thing that did show up in the ultrasound: Junior has something called Single Artery Umbilical (SAU). It basically means that instead of having the normal 3 blood vessels in the umbilical cord, Junior only has 2. Most babies have 2 veins and 1 artery; Junior has 1 each. The doctor assured us this was nothing to worry about and if nothing else, guaranteed us more pictures of our little one as we would have to have extra ultrasounds to monitor development throughout the pregnancy.

It was just a week later that I began to feel cramps and pressure….. And one week after the feelings started that I went in to get things checked out. Week 21 was where all of the craziness officially began, and that brings us back to everything you’ve already read! The doctors and nurses have all unanimously agreed that the SAU issue is in no way connected to pre-term labor. To which I said, oh great, there just HAPPENS to be two completely non-related, yet bizarre, glitches in the pregnancy. AWESOME. And so it goes……

Where did this name “Junior” come from you ask?? My grandpa, Normy, was the VERY FIRST person that found out about our pregnancy. I called him within 24 hours of us finding out…. He was very very excited and I woke up the next morning with a text message that said “How’s Junior doing this morning?” I continued to get similar daily texts from him regarding this little thing he dubbed Junior, and it has just stuck! Junior has already voted in the most historical election in the history of the USA and danced and grooved to his first concert (NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK!). While Eric argues that this could have been where all of his problems started, I conclude that he’s just already well-rounded 🙂

Like we’ve said before though, we are happy to have made it to week 24 and hope and pray that Junior will hang tight and lay low, just like Mommy!