Our Pregnancy: 27 Weeks!

Welcome to Week 27 baby girls! :) Here's what's going on this week!

Week Twenty Seven: Eyes can open

You are 27 weeks pregnant. (fetal age 25 weeks)
The fetus weighs almost 2 pounds now and is about 14.5 inches long.
The head is over 2.5 inches (7cm) in diameter.
Your baby's hearing continues to develop.
The eyes can blink, open and close.

Welcome to the third trimester. Congratulations! You have made it 2/3 of the way through. It may be hard to believe, but your baby now appears much like he or she will look like at birth. Baby now has eyebrows and eyelashes and hair is growing everyday. The muscle tone is improving and his or her body is getting plumper.

Your little one's brain continues its rapid growth. Don't forget to share music, conversation, and even books with your baby. Baby may start to recognize your voice as well as your partner, so be sure to say lots of nice things.

The retina at the back of your baby's eyes is beginning to develop. Those beautiful baby eyes can open now, and the baby will notice and may turn his or her head if you shine a flashlight against your belly.

At 27 weeks, your baby's length will have tripled or quadrupled from the 14 week mark. If your baby is born this week, the chances of survival is now at least 80 percent. However, serious complications are still possible.

We are now just ELEVEN weeks away from our final goal of 38 weeks for delivery, or 77 days if you're counting! :) I enjoy all the kicks and punches I feel and definitely notice sitting seems to cause more activity then laying, and laying on my side often initiates movement from whoever is on the "bottom" (or at least I am more aware of it when I'm laying on my side)! We have a midwife check next week and then I am really looking forward to the next ultrasound we have on January 12th! We'll be just over 29 weeks at that point and I cannot wait to hear about how big the girls are and make sure my cervix is still behaving itself.

I had all of last week off and it was wonderful. I didn't sleep great so didn't feel all that rested, but I felt pretty good. Today is my first day back at work and I feel like I'm running on empty again. I'm completely wiped out. I haven't had too many leg cramps this past week, and only a little swelling in my ankles/feet.

My OB called today with the results from our Glucose Tolerance Test last week and I passed the 1-hour! Yippee!! That was great news and I was really happy about that! They told me my iron was only 11 though, the nurse who left the message just said to up my iron rich food intake but I am going to start some OTC supplements as well and make sure to take them with some Orange Juice. I saw Raisin Bran on the list of iron rich foods and am going to make sure to pick up a box of that and some spinach as well. I've been eating a bowl of cereal as a snack a few times a week so Raisin Bran will come in handy.

Here are some of the suggestions:
Beef, buffalo (lean cuts)

Duck
Sardines (with bones, for a calcium component)
Cooked clams, oysters, mussels, and shrimp
Cooked dried beans
Soybeans (edamame) and other soy products
Oat bran
Barley
Pumpkin seeds
Dried fruit (raisins, apricots, prunes, peaches, or currants)
Jerusalem artichokes
Spinach
Seaweed
Blackstrap molasses

I doubt I'll be adding seaweed and duck to my diet anytime soon, but it's helpful for a few good ideas I can try to incorporate more often! :)

One week closer to my next mental goal of 30 weeks - then a month from now we'll be at 32 weeks the next big one! So far so good (knock on something), I just keep hoping and praying for many more weeks of things to continue as they have been, though I'm anticipating the "REALLY big and uncomfortable" stuff to start within the next month or so, we'll see!! :)