What's in a Name?

This naming stuff is hard.  In Genesis 2 God brings "every animal of the field and every bird of the air...to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called each living thing, that was its name."  I don't know how Adam managed it.  Perhaps getting to name a blue million creatures makes it easier because you can basically choose every name you could ever want and still have things like a blobfish or a star-nosed mole left to just sucker punch.  Regardless, the power of naming something is significant.  You have to think about middle school, initials, possible disturbing rhymes, etc.  And, of course, it is just the start of the big decisions to be made in the upcoming years. 

Richard and I have an extra trick with Peanut because we want to find a name that will work well in both English and Spanish.  I am not a fan of "translated names."  To me, your name is your name, so if it is Santiago then I want to call you that and not James.  It is why Richard is called Richard here (okay...Reeeeechar) rather than Ricardo, and why Mamie is just Mamie.  But Mamie is not simple (anywhere, I know), and I certainly deal with my fair share of "Mommy-ay," so we want to find names we like but that also come out of Texas, North Carolina, Illinois, and Colombian mouths fairly well.  No small task. 

So, we are always up for suggestions.  Just remember, we haven't got quite as many chances as Adam did to work this out...

(For some fun you can go to the Social Security Administration website to check out how popular your name is in any given year or the most popular names in particular years.)

The Better to See You with my Dear...

For Richard's birthday we gave him an ultrasound so that that Peanut could send greetings on Papi's special day.  We went to a different place than we have gone before, and it turned out to be a 3D sonogram - and we didn't even have to wear the glasses!  Dang but those things are amazing.  We could count fingers and toes, see eyes, ears, nose, all sorts of stuff  (though we tried very hard not to see some stuff as we are waiting to find out whether Peanut is a boy or a girl until her/his birthday.  I figure, gotta have some reason to keep pushing...).  

It is not common here to wait to find out the sex of your child.  Not only do folks here ask us all the time, the doctor himself could not believe we didn't want to know.  He would stop the Doppler wand in places he seemed to think very telling, but I think we did a mix of not looking and of not actually knowing what was going on.  It turns out that even with clear pictures it is not always evident what you are looking at if you are not trained to see it.  Still, he had to have asked us minimally 5 times if we were sure we wanted to wait to find out, and of course he was kind enough to add how very strange it was that we didn't want to know.  Thanks...  

Given the nature of the Spanish language, it is also challenging to keep the secret because all adjectives have a male and female form.  If the baby is "pretty" it is either "lind-O" for a boy or "lind-A" for a girl.  If fat, "gord-O" or "gord-A."  To complicate things at least a bit (which is helpful if you don't want the big answer), the word for baby is "el bebé" - masculine - so that even if you have a girl the doctor might say you have "un bebé muy activ-O."  I must say that with all those factors working against us, we will not be surprised if someone spills the beans ahead of time, but we are doing our best to not know.

Below are some shots/videos for your viewing pleasure.  Remember, if you feel like you have figured out, we still don't want to know.  :)  

A 3D Peanut at 21 Weeks from Richard Williams on Vimeo.

At week 21 (we think), it looks like Peanut is doing just fine - good spinal column, good cerebral blood flow, very tumbly.  Also already showing us that Dad's traits are strong because after a little while s/he started hiding from the photos.  "Enough of the paparazzi people!"  

(In case you can't tell, Peanut's head is facing left with a hand over the eyes toward the top/middle of the photo.)

So while at the end of our appointment we saw a lot of Peanut's ears, I must say, they are some good looking ears...

Kickin' It in Rio

Yeah, so Rio de Janeiro is WAY cool.  You should totally plan to go there after you visit us.  :)  

Peanut must have also been impressed because the kicking started there, and it ain't never turning back.  It is nothing quite so strong as the picture on our earlier post (which I quite frankly can't decide is real or not), but I have officially seen my shirt move and Peanut even bumped our little computer up and down a few minutes ago.  Wild.  I am not sure this experience reduces the sense of alien being inhabiting your body, but we are just hoping the nutter is more friendly than any movie counterparts.  

We also know that Peanut's ears are now supposed to be in the right place (thank goodness, they were moving for weeks), and the eyes are able to distinguish light from dark.  Dra. Lily (regular doc, not OB) told us that we are supposed to shine a light on my belly through a colored cloth and tell Peanut what color it is.  Thus, not so regularly, we press my shirt on my belly and say, "Esta es ROJA Peanut"  (This is RED Peanut) and proceed to name all the things we encounter regularly that are red.  This is more challenging with purple once you get past eggplants and the color Mama Kit mistakenly died her hair one Easter, so feel free to add your suggestions.  

At any rate, in Rio, on the top of Corcovado (where the big Christ statue is, see above) we decided that if we could tell Peanut what color something was, we could show Peanut what Rio was too...so we have included a small video for your viewing...giggles.  :)

Peanut and Rio from Richard Williams on Vimeo.

PS.  It should be noted that Dra Lily also gave us an actual prescription (written on her prescription pad) to have Peanut listen to Christian music for an hour every day.  We have potentially broadened the definition of Christian music she had in mind, but I don't think Shakira will mind.

Brazil Bound

Today we are off to Brazil!  We have a mission personnel retreat with all the folks serving in South America and the Caribbean at a site just outside São Paolo, Brazil (look way South, a little below Rio). 

This means a few different things:

1.  Posts will likely be more sporadic, though we may try to put something up while we are away so don´t forget about us altogether!  To note, we shall return May13th at the latest for a Happy Birthday DAD (that would be RICHARD) sonogram update.

2.  Peanut will now have traveled to three countries (in utero, but there is definitely travel going on) in his/her short 4-ish months of existence.  Darn tootin' easier to carry the bean around this way too in the end...

So "tchau" for now, pessoas queridas.