The Big Baby Shower Day

Today is the big day! My wife and I are attending a "modern" baby shower in our honor.

In my mind, the shower is a big milestone following the major dad-to-be milestones I have experienced:

• Getting the official "we have a live one" pregnancy confirmation from the doctor,
• Hearing and seeing the heartbeat for the first time (this may be the same event or two separate events),
• Any ultrasound,
• Feeling the first kick (Dec 30, 2006 for me).

Any current dad can tell you, the pregnancy can be hard to relate to in the first few months. During this time, the pregnancy is fairly abstract or intangible. You can't see any difference, feel any difference, or hear the baby swimming around. Until you are able to get some sort of physical evidence, making the connection takes a little work. Make a daily effort, the mom will appreciate it.

At 32 weeks, however, that's all changed. My wife has the perfect pregnant silhouette and I get to feel the baby kick, roll, and hiccup. It's fun to hear my wife explain all the baby's habits and various maneuvers. We've identified the following so far:

• standard kicking and punching,
• baby barrel roll (usual elicits a suprised exclamation from my wife),
• Karate Kid "wax on, wax off" performed with the feet,
• stretching (I think the baby has been listening closely to the yoga instructor),
• hiccups.
  

Many of our friends and family we will be seeing today have not seen either of us in the past 6 weeks. I am excited for everyone to see Kiersten and I am looking forward to watching the attention Kiersten gets. The excitement and interest that everyone has shown has surprised me, or it never occurred to me that other people would be as excited as I am. Sounds wierd, it's true, and I am welcome to share the experience!