Vi var så i begyndelsen af december til scanning igen, og resultatet var, at hun stadigvæk var stor, men at hun var vokset netop så meget, som de helst ville se, så de virkede ikke bekymrede. De estimerede der hendes fødselsvægt til 4500g.

Siden da har Phyllis så spist store mængder karry, drukket hindbærbladste, og i det hele taget prøvet alskens husråd for at sætte fødslen i gang.

Men Baked er ligeglad, hun danser blot rundt inde i maven:
Hvis hun ikke kommer ud i dag, håber jeg, hun venter til efter jul, for det må altså ikke være sjovt at have fødselsdag juleaften.

Hospitalet vil scanne hende igen kort før nytår, og de giver hende nok en livmoderhalsstimulering ved samme lejlighed, så det kunne jo godt sætte fødslen i gang.

Ellers kommer hun vel ud den 10. januar, hvis hun trækker tiden ud som sin søster.

Som jeg sikkert har nævnt tidligere, skal Phyllis efter planen føde den 9. januar.

Det betyder, at afstanden fra skambenet til toppen af livmoderen gerne skulle være 28-29 cm.

Men da de målte hende i dag til et rutinetjek, var afstanden 34 cm.

De sagde først, det sikkert bare var for meget væske, men de sendte hente til scanning for at tjekke.

Men nej, det er rent faktisk pigen derinde, der er kæmpestor: De vurderer hende til at veje mellem 2500 og 3000 gram på nuværende tidspunkt.

Anna vejede 3500 gram ved fødslen, så det lyder jo umiddelbart ret stort.

De regner med at tjekke Phyllis for sukkersyge i næste uge, men der er ingen tegn på noget i urinen, så hvis ikke det er årsagen, er det sikkert bare en meget stor baby.

Det kan selvfølgelig godt være, at hun vokser meget langsomt fra nu af og altså kommer til at veje ca. det samme som Anna ved fødslen, men det kan man ikke sige noget fornuftigt om på nuværende tidspunkt.

Jeg er i øvrigt meget imponeret over billederne fra scanningen. Phyllis er aldrig blevet scannet så sent i graviditeten, og det gør altså en stor forskel.

Se blot, hvor tydeligt man kan se hendes profil på billedet øverst til venstre.

I’ve had some problems uploading videos to YouTube from the new Sony HDD camcorder my parents gave us because of the file sizes and the 16:9 format, but I found some useful advice here – use mencoder and the following options:

mencoder infile.mpg -o outfile.avi \
-ovc lavc -oac mp3lame \
-vf-add kerndeint \
-vf-add hqdn3d \
-vf-add unsharp=cl:3x3:1 \
-vf-add scale=320:180,expand=320:240 -ofps 30 \
-lavcopts vhq:vcodec=mpeg4:vrc_buf_size=1835:vrc_maxrate=8000:vbitrate=8000:v4mv:aspect=4/3:trell:cbp \
-ffourcc XVID

When Phyllis and I went to the hospital after the waters broke, we naturally had to go to triage in the first instance – it’s their job to check the stage of labour and send people home or to the delivery suites as appropriate.

The midwife there gave Phyllis an internal examination shortly after 2am and said she was only between one and two cm dilated, so she was wondering whether to send her home till the morning. Phyllis persuaded her to let her stay, but she would only put her up in the normal ward, and she told me to either go home or wait in the reception.

Fortunately, I chose the latter, since I had to wait there for less than an hour before another midwife got me, saying that Phyllis was now six to seven cm dilated (birth starts at ten).

I thus went to the delivery suite with her for the birth that happened less than an hour later, so everything was well, but I’m getting angry at the thought that I could so easily have missed birth if I had listened to the silly triage midwife!

Of course most births happen more slowly, but she should know that it varies wildly and not make decisions that could have horrible effects. In fact, although I didn’t suffer this time, Phyllis had to suffer horrible contractions alone in a ward not designed for labour, and if she hadn’t had the sense to call a midwife soon after she got there, she would probably have given birth alone in a normal bed.

I really think the triage midwife should have looked at how Phyllis looked and not just at her measurements, and she should have given her an extra internal after an hour to check progress before sending her to the other ward.

If she always performs her job like that, no wonder that some mothers give birth in supermarkets and traffic jams!

On 19 December 2007, at 4.24 a.m., Phyllis and I had a daughter: Anna Bridget Buchanan-Widmann. She is beautiful, weighs 3400 g and is 50 cm long.

Everything went well, but really fast: Phyllis woke me up at 1 a.m., we arrived at the Queen Mum’s at 2 a.m., at 2.45 I was asked to wait in the reception (or go home) because birth wasn’t imminent, at 3.45 they told me to return as birth was about to start, at 4.24 I could see the crown of the head, and less than a minute later she was outside and I could cut the cord.

I’ve uploaded some photos.

It’ll be interesting to find out what she’ll call me – far (Danish for “father”), daddy or Thomas (like her siblings).

Vores lille datter må gerne snart komme ud. Siden i fredags vil hun ikke længere blive klassificeret som for tidligt født, og vi glæder os sådan til at se hende!

Selvom Phyllis naturligvis er smuk med sin store mave, som i ny og næ bevæger sig, når den lille pige sparker hende eller bokser lidt.

Vi har fundet på et navn (og også et drengenavn, da de kun garanterede kønnet med 97% sikkerhed), og vi har pakket tasken og fået et videokamera af mine forældre, så vi er klar!

Det lykkedes mig med det samme at lægge nogle stills på Flickr, men først i dag klarede jeg at konvertere hele DVD’en til en AVI-fil, som jeg kunne oploade til YouTube (sådan her).

Jeg kan anbefale at spole hen til det sidste halve minut, hvor der er billeder af hendes fødder og ben og den slags.

Blot en skam, jeg ikke har redigeringssoftware til at fjerne den store sorte ramme rundt om den rigtige video.

I dag troppede vi syv mand høj (os, børnene, Dougie og Ann) op på en privat scanningsklinik på Ingram Street.

De scannede Phyllis, og ikke blot sagde de, at det med 97% sandsynlighed er en pige, men vi fik også en DVD med hjem med utrolige billeder af pigen!

Er hun ikke smuk? Jeg kan næsten ikke vente til december!

Today I found a website that asks you some simple questions and in return suggests some names. Phyllis and I answered the questions together, and here’s the result:

• Girls: Burgundy, Carmen, Caroline, Fauna, Ginger, Hannah, Jada, Julie, Sandra, Sienna

• Boys: Casper, Connor, Corbin, Dalton, Gordon, Kenneth, Sanford
• Unisex: Birch, Jude

The idea is good, but the result is terrible! Surely even a badly written program can come up with better suggestions than that!?! I mean, Gordon is a nice name, but we can’t really use that, can we now?

My two-bedroom flat in the city centre has felt a little bit crowded ever since Phyllis, Marcel, Charlotte and Léon moved in last year, and it’s not been ideal for Marcel and Charlotte to live so far from their school.

What with Bart arriving in December (no, we’ll find another name before then!), things were not going to get any better, so we were happy when we found a house in Newton Mearns with enough rooms for us all.

Phyllis has taken some nice photos of it.

Floorplan
Originally uploaded by viralbus

The dimensions of the rooms are as follows:

Name	Dimensions		Area
Lounge	399	363	14.48
Dining	328	310	10.15
Kitchen	378	282	10.67
Family room	597	216	12.89
Dining/bedroom	381	305	11.61
Porch	239	104	2.49
Bedroom	307	241	7.42
Bedroom	389	203	7.90
Bedroom	384	279	10.72
Bedroom	292	297	8.68
Bathroom	307	173	5.31
Bathroom	198	183	3.62
Bathroom	254	198	5.03

We’re thinking about making a new kitchen in the family room, and having three bathrooms with bathtubs is somewhat over the top, so we might do something about that, too.

The rooms listed above add up to 110 m², but the survey claims the house altogether is 160 m².