This morning we went in and got Olive's anatomy scan taken care of. Everything is normal with her; she's developing well, and really looks human in there. There was exactly one disappointment: the doctor switched the ultrasound machine to 3d mode for just a second, took a 3d photo of her face, printed it out… and then kept it. I'd really wanted that thing to show here. Still, I got to see the face of my daughter! She looks very much like an infant.

Another impression which stood out was that Olive is already really filling the womb. Her head was nestled at one end, curled in to make room; her feet were nestled, bent-legged, at the other. She had room enough to move about—and she took advantage of this, during the appointment!—but there wasn't enough space to really swim around, the way there had been earlier in the pregnancy.

This coincides, of course, with Christina's feeling ever more topheavy. It's to the point that we're really starting to wonder how big she'll get by the end; she already seems to be pretty large with child, and we're only a little bit past the halfway mark. At the moment, it's a question of posture and clothing whether or not her belly projects past her breasts; there's no question that it'll be well past, by the end. In the meantime, we're having a hard time really picturing what the end of pregnancy will look like for her. Christina is a pretty small woman, but it looks like her belly would fit neatly on someone about a foot taller. It's one thing to extrapolate her growth, and hold out hands inches in front of where her belly currently ends; it's another for that impression to seem plausible.

In the meantime, we're starting to get into the swing of baby consumerism. One of the first big-ticket items we're looking at is a new car. For the last several years, I've driven a really nice, nimble, top-model little two-seater convertible; it was the only car I've ever bought new. It's been workable, if somewhat impractical, during the transition from being a single guy to a married one. Unfortunately, it is utterly impossible as a family car, so we have to sell it off and replace it. The question is, what with?

The thing about car economics is that the longer you can keep any car, the better the value you get from it. The newer the car is when you buy it, the longer you can keep it. When I'd bought the convertible, I'd intended to keep it more or less forever. At that point, family hadn't been much on my mind. Now, we're still looking to get something newish, with the intent to keep it as long as possible. We're not going to get a brand-new car, because you just lose too much value the first time you drive it off the lot, but Germany has a great selection of Jahreswagens¹, so that's what we're looking at.

But what's practical? It needs to have at least four doors, because I've seen people try to maneuver an infant into a car seat in a two-door car, and it wasn't pretty. It needs to be small and quick and relatively nice, so that it isn't too much of a step down from the current car. It needs to have cargo space practical for a stroller plus groceries at a minimum.

This has led to an in-joke between Christina and I over the last month or so, in which I'd propose various options for our "practical family car": an Ariel Nomad, say, or a Caterham 7. Still, we've also been doing proper research; our actual short list for now is (in approximate order of preference):

1. VW Golf GTI²
2. Mazda3 Sport
3. Opel Astra

We haven't done any test-drives yet, but those are on the schedule.

Beyond the car, we're taking care of other kid chores: we have a line on a good-looking used stroller, and a promise of a side-sleeper which attaches to our bed, so Olive can sleep near us without actually interfering with our blanket. We've got an appointment with a family lawyer to nail down the details of estate planning, just in case; we've started to make lists of what's practical and what's stupid in the case of baby accessories³.

More or less the only thing we haven't made real progress on for a while is her name. While we've upgraded from a checkbox list that either of us could strike through to a weighted spreadsheet which factors in both of our name preferences, we still haven't nailed anything down. She's not going to be Olive forever, except maybe online; we still haven't decided whether or not to give her name here. We just don't know what she'll be called yet⁴.

We still have time, and I'm pretty sure we'll agree on something in time. For now, we're just planning and waiting, setting up.