From Peanut to Pretzel

Every Wednesday Steven and I get an email from BabyCenter.com telling us what to expect in the coming week of pregnancy. The email includes illustrations of what the baby looks like that week as well.

Last week the baby was 18 weeks along, and looked like this:

Peanut

Pretty normal, right? Today we hit 19 weeks and somehow the picture changed to THIS:

Pretzel!

HUH?!?!

What the heck happened??!! As a first time parent, I am concerned. What do I do with a child that can literally plug it's own ears with it's toes when I play too much Lady Gaga? Should I be worried or should I embrace this, and sign up my child for America's Got Talent already? I will be pondering this for the next several weeks. Stay tuned.

We are t-minus 2 days away from the big gender reveal! On Friday we go to our first ultrasound since week 7 and will hopefully get a good look at Peanut's, um, bathing suit area. So far the votes have been split down the middle- or in thirds, I suppose, since so many of you seem to believe I will be giving birth to an actual peanut! We'll see who gets bragging rights very shortly.

Now that we are in week 19 the baby's hearing is coming along to where it can begin to hear voices, music and Steven's guitar playing. This major development comes at a perfect time! After our ultrasound on Friday we're off to the Hullabalou music festival where we'll see our good friend Dierks Bentley (who is also expecting in December), as well as Bon Jovi! This will be Peanut's THIRD Bon Jovi concert, if you can believe it. That's what you refer to as an "occupational hazard." On Monday we're going to see the one and only PAUL MCCARTNEY and a few days later.... it's baby's first Hanson show! Peanut is getting a great musical education- it's diverse and chalk full of some of Mom and Dad's absolute favorites!

I'll be back Friday, hopefully, with news on whether we'll be expecting a son or a daughter! Until then I'll leave you with this cute picture our tour photographer just sent me. It's from Bon Jovi's Atlanta show in April. It was my pleasure to take my mom and sister backstage that night! I found out I was pregnant a few days before and am 5 weeks along here: