15 months old!

I haven't posted on this blog since Mairi has been born, and I have decided to start up again to update those of you who are interested in how she is doing.

Mairi Hope is officially 15 months old, and I wanted to update all of you friends and family about how she is doing.

• She is into EVERYTHING! As I type this, she has discovered my makeup kit and is pretending to put on bronzer.

• She loves to pretend! She often takes my keys out of my purse or coat pocket and then proudly proclaims, "Bye bye!" and we wish her well on her way to "work". Then she walks to the door and pretends to put her keys in the doorknob. After a few minutes, she runs back into the room and says, "Hi!!".
  

• Mairi is also a little techie like her Dada. She loves phones, laptops, iPods, iPads, kindles, remotes... any and all technology! She knows how to unlock iPods and iPads, along with her Dad's phone. She hasn't figured out the blackberry yet! :)
  

• She loves to take things out of containers and put them back in. We spend lots of time doing this. We are working on sorting by shapes, sizes, and colors. She is a very smart cookie and I'm sure she'll pick it up soon.

• Mairi's favorite words are "dog dog" and "baby". The other day we showed her a picture of herself and Luigi, and she said "DOG DOG! BABY! DOG DOG! BABY!" for like three minutes. She loves it. :)

Mairi is in the 97th percentile for height for her age, and the 55th percentile for weight. She is so tall, talkative, and steady on her feet that people in public often think she is much older than she is.

Mairi has LOTS of words! John and I didn't realize how many until we wrote them all down... here is the list of words that Mairi says:

baby

hello
dog dog
owl
cookie
cheese
mama
dada
granpa
arf
meow
baa
brown bear
lella (bella)
imi (jimi)
duck
bye bye
diaper
no
yeah
ouch
oops
wow
oh my
up
down
all done
alright!
hi
apple
num num
boom
ball
hot dog
bubbles

That's a good update for now, I think! :)

30 weeks! Wow!

Hello all! It has been a while since I've thought to blog. Sorry if you were waiting in suspense. :)

Everything has looked great with Mairi at the doctor since we were hospitalized. My hemoglobin was really low last week, but they gave me an iron supplement and I have been fine. The doctor also sent me to physical therapy for my back injury, and they gave me a "mommy to be" brace. That has helped minimize my back pain a lot, which is wonderful. Generally I am feeling well, although I am sleepy a lot and I feel huge a lot. I can't get enough smoothies and icees, probably because I'm so hot all the time! We have 9.5 weeks to go, and we are getting excited! We had our hospital tour this week (we said hi to our old room), filled out our birth plan, and got a goody bag from the hospital. :)

Now I'll share with you a nice pregnancy survey:

I Am This Far Along: 30 weeks.

The BEST Part of Being Pregnant Is: I love feeling her move around in my belly! Sometimes it hurts a little, sometimes it's touching, and sometimes it's downright comical. My friend Chris asked me a few weeks ago if we were going to raise Mairi as a Catholic, and she kicked so hard that it hurt! So we figure she is really for it, or adamantly against it. :)

The WORST Part of Being Pregnant Is: "Take it easy!", "Don't do that!". I am not very good at asking other people for help with things, and I'm not used to being treated like I'm going to break. I am as careful as possible, but sometimes I forget that I just can't do everything that other people can do. Like SHAVE my freaking LEGS by myself. (Thanks for your help, John!)

This Has Been My Most Ridiculous Craving So Far: I haven't had any really strange cravings. Nothing crazy, really. What surprises me about cravings is not that I'm getting them, but when I do I need whatever I'm craving IMMEDIATELY. Like, right now. I'm not very patient.

This Is The Nick-Name We Have Come Up With For the Fetus: Well, as you now know, her name is Mairi, so we call her that. But we called her "Ferglet" for a long time.

This Was The Time I Felt The Most "Pregnant": I feel very pregnant when I get out of bed and when I try to gracefully exit my car. Or when I bend over to pick something up. Ugh.

This Is The WORST Baby Name My Partner/Family/Coworker Have Suggested So Far: LOL not too many people have dared suggest a name to us. Which is probably a good thing. :)

The Silliest Piece Of Unsolicited Advice I Have Recieved Thus Far Is: OMG I'm not sure. I don't really listen to that anyway. I can't think of anything. One woman told me three weeks ago that I was probably going to go into labor within the week because my back was hurting. I told her no, that I had a back injury that was causing my back pain. And she said no, when you're pregnant back pain is always indicative of early onset labor. Whatever.

People Have/Haven't Started To Touch My Belly Without Asking: UGH I hate this. A LOT. Strangers are bad enough, but it's the worst when it's someone I know who I haven't seen in a while. I would never grope someone like that! Ugh!!

I Believe The Baby Is A(Boy or Girl?): It's a GIRL. And after the 5 ultrasounds we've had to have, I feel very confident that this is true! :)

Funniest Place I Have Unwittingly Fallen Asleep: I fell asleep in the bathtub a few nights ago with my blackberry in my hand, precariously dangling above the water. Good thing John found me before my blackberry took a bath, too!

My Pregnancy IDOL Is: I don't know if I necessarily have one. I will say though, that I have immense sympathy and respect for women who desperately want to get pregnant but are struggling to for whatever reason. We were surprised by this pregnancy, but I feel so lucky that we are going to welcome our little girl into the world without experiencing the pain of infertility.

Three days in the Hospital!

Hello family and friends,

I wanted to take a minute to update everyone on what is going on. For those of you who don’t know, I was admitted into the hospital late Monday evening after a fall on my back onstage during a preview performance of Bat Boy: The Musical at the Firehall Theatre.

Here’s the short of things:
They are kept me in the hospital for a little over 3 days because there has been evidence of hemorrhaging in the placenta around my baby. This hemorrhaging could cause our daughter to lose blood volume, which puts her life in danger. This morning I was released because the amount of her blood found in mine went down, but we’re not quite out of the woods yet. I go back in on Tuesday for them to retest, and we’ll see from there.

Here’s the (really) long version:
I fell at the end of Act 2, changed out of my costume, listened to notes, and went home. My lower back hurt from the fall and I felt strong pain in my upper abdomen. I waited about ten minute for it to feel better, but it just got worse, so we decided to go to the emergency room. When we arrived at the ER, they immediately wheeled me up to the maternity ward and ordered an ultrasound. The ultrasound showed what they thought was a small tear in the placenta, and they decided to keep me until the morning. They hooked me up to a “mom” machine which monitors our baby’s heart rate as well as if I am having contractions. They also informed me that I sprained my sacrum and bruised my hip in the fall. L

Early Tuesday morning, they gave me another ultrasound as well as a blood test. The ultrasound was to check that placental tear and to give the baby a biophysical scan, which shows if everything is okay with the baby. They also gave me a blood test called a Kleihauer-Betke test, which detects fetal-maternal hemmorage. Basically, it can see if there are any fetal blood cells mixed in with my blood cells. A positive result for the KB test indicates bleeding coming from the baby, umbilical cord, or placenta. Several hours after administering both tests, the resident doctor came in and let me know that the ultrasound looked great, but the KB test came back positive, with 0.2% of the baby’s blood mixed in with mine. The doctor told me that they were keeping me for another 24 hours at minimum, and that they needed to monitor our daughter very closely at that time.

Since I’m only 24 weeks and 6 days pregnant, the baby is still very small to be picked up by the monitor. She has a lot of room to wiggle around in, so it’s hard to get her to show up! The nurse will hunt for her heartbeat, place the monitor disc where they can find her, and then I have to lay as still as I possibly can for hours on end. If I move, she goes off the monitor. Then sometimes she goes off the monitor on her own accord. So that’s been stressful. The discs are attached with a two inch think Velcro strap, and I have rope burns on my back from the strap being adjusted when she moves. Today they gave me essentially a huge ace wrap, and that is a lot more comfortable!

Wednesday morning, they administered another KB test, and we waited a couple hours for the result. We were really hoping for a negative, but instead the test came back positive. Not only that, but the amount of fetal cells doubled since yesterday. They are continuing to monitor both of us to make sure that everything is okay.

My doctor also warned us that if the fetal cell percent goes up to 2.0%, there is a possibility that they will transfer me to Fargo to deliver her early. If the fetal cell percent goes up that high, she will have lost a significant amount of blood and will need to come out so she can get a transfusion. The NICU in Grand Forks can only handle babies who are born at 28 weeks or more, so if I need to deliver her soon they couldn’t accommodate her here. The NICU at MeritCare can handle babies born at 25 weeks or more, so they could take care of the baby if I need to deliver within the next week. Which we really hope doesn’t happen.

This morning (Thursday) I was given the KB test again, and three hours later (!) the results came back. The results were positive again, but today they only found 0.2% of fetal cells in my blood, which means that the bleeding went down. My doctor released me and told me to rest for the next couple days and to resume normal activity after that. She also let me know that we’re not entirely out of the woods yet. I go back to the clinic on Tuesday and they’re going to retest then, and hopefully that one will be negative! If not, then we’ll see, I guess!

With my doctor’s approval, I should be resuming my role as Meredith in Bat Boy: The Musical at the Firehall next week (maybe tomorrow if I’m feeling up to it). I sincerely appreciate all of you who were showing your support this week. We are both pretty shaken up, and it helps knowing that there are lots of people praying for us. Our daughter is a little fighter, and so am I, so the two of us girls are working hard to keep her in there until she’s done cooking! :)

Much love to all of you!

Love,

Maura, John, and Mairi Ferguson

(oh,P.S., her name is Mairi! We figured that since all of your prayers helped, you deserve to know her name.) :)

More pictures!

Here are three more pictures we got of our little girl at the ultrasound a couple weeks ago!

That is a closeup of her profile!

That is her teeny 3 centimeter footprint!

The little white hamburger shows us that it's a girl!!

Things have been going well here in the Ferguson household. We are getting reorganized and are starting to put the nursery together. While I feel our little Ferglet dancing around every day, John still hasn't been able to feel her move yet! Even if she's going crazy, once he puts his hand on my belly she gets shy. I'm sure he will feel her any day now!

As you already know, we are keeping her name a secret until her birthday. However, we are calling her by her name at home, and both of us have almost slipped by calling her by name in front of our friends and family. This is a tough secret to keep, but so far we've kept it! :) We won't tell! Even if you get my adorable three year old cousin to call and ask me, Aunt Kathy! :)

Love to all of you this week!

And the Ferglet is....

We are having a daughter!! We were both surprised, as we both had boy vibes, as did our Doctor! John took a day or two to get used to it, but I'm pretty sure she'll be daddy's little princess. :) I am really excited, and went out and bought a couple girly onesies today, one with red ruffles and cherries all over it, and another that was pink polka dotted and says "I ♥ DAD".

The ultrasound took well over an hour, because she was all curled up in the position you see in the photo. She was sitting in the breach position, and her feet were tucked up by her chin. Those little lines under the "a" in the picture are her toes! Because she was stubborn (imagine that, my daughter being stubborn!), we have to go back next month and get another ultrasound next month because they couldn't get a clear picture of her spine. Hopefully next time she will cooperate more with the ultrasound tech! :)

And now, here are some "belly pics" for you to see!

18 weeks
20 weeks

Nursery Stuff!

Hello all! Sorry I haven't blogged in a while, I've been a busy girl! :) I started my new job this week at the UND Bookstore. I am the Senior Accounting Clerk. I hope to be fully trained in a few weeks... right now I don't know what I'm doing and it's a little frustrating. I start rehearsals for Bat Boy: The Musical tomorrow night, so I will be really busy for the next few months!

We have ordered most of the furniture for the Ferglet's room (thanks, Mom and Colin!), and I wanted to share some pics! We haven't received any of it yet, but here are some pics from the websites.

Here is the crib:

Here is the changing table:

And here is the bedding, which I am madly in love with:

I'm not sure how we'll decorate the walls yet. :)

Hello, friends and family! Happy May Day! Maura here with an update.

This week has been a long one! My beloved Grandma, Mary Williams, was hospitalized early Monday morning for heart issues. I went up as soon as I could make it, and spend hours upon hours there talking to the doctors, taking notes, watching Dr. Phil, and beating my Aunt Kathy at Gin Rummy. :) Grandma was released late Wednesday, and we are all happy to see her home again. She has to get a test done in Saint Cloud, MN (about a 3.5 hour drive from Grand Forks) to see if there is a blockage in her heart. If there is, they will take care of that here in Grand Forks. If there is not, then they will consider the possibility of a pacemaker. Keep her in your prayers, please!

The pregnancy is going very well. I can feel the baby move on a daily basis now. The Ferglet is the most active at night when I lie down, and after I have anything sugary, like candy or cookies. It also was very wiggly the other night when I was watching "A Celebration of Sondheim at Carnegie Hall", which tells me that our baby will have impeccable musical taste. :) The wiggles don't feel like flutters anymore, it feels more like there is a tiny person wiggling around inside me! :) I wouldn't say the baby has kicked yet, it just wiggles and adjusts, from what I can feel. My latest food obsession is cherry pie. YUMMMM! I'm afraid they will soon know me by name at the Village Inn because I have been in so frequently lately for a piece of warm cherry pie with ice cream on top. It is so good. I think when I'm done with this post I'll go have a piece. :)

We are counting down to Tuesday, May 12th- the day we get our first ultrasound! When I was in the hospital with my Grandma, a technician came in to give her an ultrasound of her heart, and I asked her if she would just really quick give me one to see the sex of the baby. She said no. I tried really hard, though. :)

Do you think The Ferglet is a boy or a girl?? Comment and let us know! :) Love to you all!