Another Week Over - Another Week Closer

So today I've reached the 22 week mark and things continue to go well. Our little girl will look something like this at the moment -

As per usual she has had a busy week continuing with her growth and development. Pregnancy. Org tells me that -

• She can now hear our conversations more clearly than before. When we talk, read, or sing, she can hear us. Studies have found that newborns will suck more vigorously when read to from a book they heard frequently in utero. Books she has been hearing include "We're going on a bear hunt" and "Old MacDonald Had a Farm", I hope she is enjoying them.
  
• Her eyelids and eyebrows are fully formed although her eyelids remain closed.
  
• Her fingernails have grown to the end of the fingers. I hope she doesn't start scratching me.
• Her brain has entered a stage of rapid growth, especially in what's called the germinal matrix. This structure deep in the middle of the brain serves as a kind of factory for brain cells and disappears shortly before birth. But the brains amazing expansion program continues until around her fifth birthday.
• With some help from me, her liver is starting to break down bilirubin, a substance produced by red blood cells.
• Her length is about 27.8cm from head to toe and her weight is about 430gm.

Also according to Birth.com by 22 weeks, our baby's nervous system completely 'connects'. The vital link between their brain and spinal cord (the brain stem) now matures and many nerve cells make vigorous connections. When this happens our baby becomes capable of recognising warmth, light, sound and pain. While primitive brain waves have been detected in unborn babies as early as 7 weeks, it is not until 22 weeks that sustained patterns can definitely be recorded. Apparently some women will now notice that their baby 'jumps' with a loud sound- although this hasn't happened to me yet

We do seem to have a very active little girl though, I wonder if that will be any indication of what sort of personality she might have after she is born. This morning I have been coping a major kicking, and even a snakey little feeling - think we may have had an arm, leg or head scrape the uterine wall. It was an extremely weird feeling. Her kicks and punches are also getting more forceful - they even gave me a fright yesterday they were so big and unexpected.

Thursday I did some more maternity wear shopping. Things were getting a little bit desperate especially on the bra front. It is official - I've gone from a C cup to an E cup - I'm beginning to feel like I'm all boobs and belly and it's probably only going to get worse. I also bought some more maternity clothes, a pair of jeans, three tops and a jumper that I can mix and match and get lots of different outfits out of. It is mostly all Ripe stuff but I could only find a couple of the pieces on their site, but you get the idea.

I've been so, so cold as well. I have such trouble warming up at times that I need to have a bath to bring my body temperature back up - oh and that is with the central heating set at 23 degrees. Jochen regularly puts his hand on the tip of my nose to work out if I'm cold or not. The tip of my nose is a great indicator of my body temperature. My nose is also running a bit at the moment and I feel like a have a slight cold. Colds are apparently very normal, the constantly being cold is not - people generally warm up not down.

Generally though things are going well. I'm feeling pretty well and everything is just wonderful. I think those happy hormones have well and truly kicked in. I've virtually forgotten all about the morning sickness and how awful I felt. I'm enjoying being pregnant, having energy and actually feeling like getting out and doing things.