Canterbury "Berry" Shakespeare Daigneault

So far all is well with our little Berry Baby.  Thanks to our extended trip to London, my doctor gave us a second early peek at Berry, who looks just perfect!

 Perfect little heartbeat, around 169 bpm, adding to Ralph's belief that this is a little pink Berry.

 A cute little profile.

 Measuring within range, but a bit larger than expected.

 Doing an alien impression, which struck Ralph as looking like Connor. (Mind you, and with all due respect to Ralph, he should wear his glasses regularly, but usually doesn't.)

And just another cute Berry profile.

I still cannot totally believe we are expecting another baby, though I am completely excited.  Very shortly after we found out we were pregnant, Ralph and I began working on a nick name for this baby.  We began working on a name for this baby as well, and we've got a boys name pretty well set, and a strong option for a girl's name, but since we've decided not to find out the gender until Berry is born, we've also decided not to publicize the name until Berry is born either.  However, we have referring to a baby as "it," and we just generally like nick names anyway.  At some point in our discussion of names I believe "Canterbury Shakespeare" came up.  This is a reference from the british version of the Office.   It doesn't have anything to do with a baby, but we like the show, and we were throwing out names that have some meaning or relevance to us, and that one came up.  We like Ricky Gervais, we love London, we like Shakespeare, and one of our first movies we watched together when we were first dating (on VHS) was Shakepeare in Love.  It had the right elements for a name, but wasn't actually quite right for a name, for our child born in 2012.  I liked it for a nickname though; however, Canterbury Shakespeare is obviously too long for a nick name. I tried Canterbury alone, or Shakespeare alone, but they are both still long, and both sound masculine.  I tried a few shortened versions of both names before I came up with "berry," short for Canterbury, and we finally got that to stick.

Little Berry we are looking forward to meeting you.  As I write this I am 11-weeks pregnant.  So far you've been a harder pregnancy on me that either your brother or your sister, but by many women's standards I simply cannot complain.  I had a few weeks where I would feel kind of queasy if I hadn't eaten in a while, and if I got to that point the mere idea of food sounded disgusting.  Fortunately for me, once I actually got some food in front of me and started eating, it went down fine and I would feel better.  For a couple of weeks there the only two things that ever sounded good were whataburger cheese burgers and fries, or twice baked potatoes from Kroger.  Yes, I've already gained a couple of pounds.  The strep throat really knocked me out, and I think the antibiotic contributed to sick feelings, because after I finished my antibiotics I've been feeling much better, minus that little incident just before landing at Heathrow, but I think you were just a "contributing" factor there, not the primary cause.  But you are well worth it, and I am not actually complaining at all!!  You may have been a bit more a challenge that your siblings, but by many accounts you've been pretty easy on me.  Plus, I think there is some rule about babies who make their mommy's sick having to be really good babies, like rain on your wedding day being good luck, and if there isn't such a rule, I'm making it up now!  Thus, I suggest you start preparing to sleep though the night by 8 weeks, and potty train yourself by your second birthday. :)  XOXO, Mommy!