from then to now.

We need to play a quick game of catch up: from point A (where I left you after the last post) to point B (where our pregnancy is now.)

You've heard how God, with His infinite grace and knowledge of my desires and purpose, allowed me to have an extra week before I found I was pregnant, during which He changed my mind completely to fit His will. I am so thankful for His hand being a part of this story. It speaks volumes of the way He will continue to intervene and control this baby's little life.

That week we went to the doctor for the first time (Friday) and the next Monday our "take-home test" was confirmed by the official blood test saying, yes indeedy - there is a baby in me. We found out we were already 7 weeks along, and our OB office likes ultrasounds at 8 weeks, so we went in and found out we're having a .... human! And yes, the technician checked, there is just one. We are finding out the sex... unfortunately we'll be waiting until November 4th.

Very quickly, or maybe even this had already happened by this point, Mr. Allen and I fell in love with our baby. We talked about and prayed for and thought about our baby all the time. (We still do.) Let me tell you how crazy in love I am with Mr. Allen for being so in love with our little one. He even nicknamed our baby Allen: Cubbie. This is so fitting for about 100 reasons... or two main ones. We live in Chicago, on the north side, ergo we are automatically Cubs' fans. And as I had mentioned before, all the Allens have a bear-friendly name (well except Mr. Allen, but we'll let that pass), so our littlest Allen was in definite need of being Allen-adapted so immediately. Cubbie Bear Allen. Absolutely perfect.

At our next OB visit, we met with our main OB and talked about all of the what of the pregnancy. She told us that we are an ideal situation based on age, health, progress, etc. She gave Cubbie his/her first "A" on his/her check-up. Count these two Allens so proud of our baby.

We had a lot of fun telling our family about new addition. (I guess I'm taking a few steps back right now.) The day we found out we skyped with Mr. Allen's parents, my parents, and my best friend Danielle, and then we called our siblings. I loved (most of) the responses and seeing others get excited with us. Soon we were ready to post on facebook (the day of the first ultrasound) and then we got even more feedback and encouragement from friends and family all over. Thank you, thank you, thank you. We are blessed to be so supported.

I've been one of those obsessive new-mom/first-pregnancy crazies, reading anything I can get my hands on. It has been so fun to "watch" Cubbie grow week-by-week and read about how his/her body is developing. A lot of different books and websites compare baby to the size of food to give the new parents an idea of how big that little body is. We've been through grain of rice, half a Cherrio (so cute, right??), raspberry (a favorite of everyone's), plum, lime, peach... and for now Cubbie is (until tomorrow that is) a lemon.

Tomorrow is a new mark of Cubbie's growth and age, and we are going to the OB, so hopefully there will be a little something to share.

with pure joy.