By all accounts we are officially in the third trimester today. To celebrate, large quantities of blood will be taken. Hooray! But before we head to the doctor's office, here is the weekly update on Monkey:
His eyes are blinking now as he responds to light and dark and he's got eyelashes! His brain is doing some heavy duty work creating neural folds and pathways. His bone marrow is cranking out the red blood cells and his adrenal glands are starting to put out some hormones of his own. His big task from here on out is putting on fat - without the fat deposits under his skin he wouldn't be able to regulate his body temperature, which is a big challenge for newborns. At around 2.25 pounds and just under 15 inches, he's got a ways to go before he's ready to meet the world. In the past week he's become more active, and we haven't been able to discern a pattern in his waking and sleeping as it seems he is awake all the time. He's very chillaxed about it though - he's a swimmer, not a fighter.
All the business of Monkey
