Dawson's weekly update:

Your baby is now considered full term, even though your due date is still three weeks away. If you go into labor now, his lungs will likely be mature enough to fully adjust to life outside the womb. He weighs 6 1/3 pounds and measures a bit over 19 inches, head to heel (like a stalk of Swiss chard). Many babies have a full head of hair at birth, with locks from 1/2 inch to 1 1/2 inches long.

Your full-term (yay!) baby is gaining about 1/2 ounce a day and getting his first sticky poop (called meconium) ready. He's also brushing up on skills for the outside world: blinking, sucking, inhaling, exhaling, and gripping (it's getting strong!).

This week has brought many exciting changes! I have been experiencing some Braxton - Hicks, and also some real contractions. No worries, though the real ones are few and very far apart! The past two days Dawson has tried to position himself straight up and down, which is not very comfortable for either of us. I'm not sure if he's practicing, or trying to decide if he's ready to grace us with his presence. I am leaving it up to God, Dawson, and Dr. Kinder to decide when is a good time.

It's really hard for me to believe that in about two weeks we will be holding our little boy. I rock him in the evenings, sing to him, and tell him how much I love him already. People have been offering advice about parenting, and trying to warn me about all the negative sides of parenting. I shrug it off politely, but what many people don't seem to understand is that David and I wanted nothing more in life than to start our family. We have been blessed that Dawson has grown, and not had any complications this far. We do not look at his arrival as an end to our freedom or the lack of sleep we will experience. We see this as an awesome transition in our lives, and are truly thankful that God has blessed us with a son. We are ready and willing to make any sacrifices necessary in order to help him grow, thrive, and learn. I can't wait to shower him with our love and affection. He is going to be the missing piece to our lives that we never knew existed.

Aside from that, we have our bags packed and ready to go. The only thing left to do is to experiment with the bottle warmer. Since I plan to breastfeed, it is the safest option to defrosting the milk. I'm not sure how long it will take, so I'm going to try it out using regular milk to get an approximate time. Who knew about all the contraptions for kids these days!

We go to visit Dr. Kinder tomorrow for another check up. Last week he said that although I had not started dialating, that my cervix was thinning. He said this is a characteristic of first time mothers. He predicted that I would be dialated at my visit tomorrow. He also said that Dawson's head was really low, and that he didn't know he was that close! I laughed and told him that Dawson has been there for weeks. Aside from that, my vitals were good and my blood pressure was fine. Tomorrow we will schedule a day for the induction, so I'll keep you guys posted!

Little Dawson Lance will be here before we know it!

Lots of love,

Lori