Week 17

Our babies are anywhere from 4.4 to 4.8 inches by pregnancy week 17 and weigh almost 3 ½ ounces! (This is reported online, in reality, they each weighed in at 5.5ounces on 1/23) If you were to hold our babies at 17 weeks pregnant, they would fit snuggly in the palm of your hand. Our babies are about the size of a turnip by pregnancy 17 weeks. The baby's skeleton is changing from soft cartilage to bone, and the umbilical cord — the lifeline to the placenta — is growing stronger and thicker. Body fat is beginning to form this week and will continue to accumulate through the end of pregnancy. By the time the babies are born, body fat will make up about two-thirds of their weight (and will make all those chubby parts especially yummy).
The babies are almost certainly listening up by now. In fact, loud noises — the dog barking, the doorbell ringing — will actually startle the baby (and also get him or her used to such noises; for instance, fetuses who regularly hear a dog barking will become babies who sleep right through Timber's outbursts). The baby's eyes (which have fortunately finished their migration to the front of his or her head) are making small side-to-side movements and can even perceive some light, though the eyelids are still sealed. And since practice makes perfect, the babies are sharpening their sucking and swallowing skills in preparation for that first (and second…and third) suckle. In fact, most of the survival reflexes that the babies will have at birth are being perfected in utero right now. And here's some proof that our babies are truly one of a kind (as if you needed any!). Within the next week or so, the pads on baby's fingertips and toes will become adorned with completely individual swirls and creases (aka fingerprints).