In the last two months a variety of things have happened. First of all, we had our 18-week ultrasound and it appears that everything is going dandy. Here’s a picture of the little one:

He’s doing pretty well, he’s just slightly larger than average which is a very good thing and it looks like everything is good to go.

And yes, as you might have guessed, he’s a boy! He showed us pretty clearly in the ultrasound too, there’s little doubt as to his boy-ness. It’s hard to definitely confirm a girl because it might be because you can’t see the penis etc. in the ultrasound, but boys can be definitely confirmed.

After some deliberation, we also have chosen a name for him. His name is:

Kieran is gaelic for “dark-haired one” which I thought would be a good name (unless he comes out blonde!) It was suggested to me by my mom so that’s cool.

Course, when I first heard it, I think of “Kirin” which I think of the Japanese beer. So far so good, as I like beer and I like Japanese beer…

But of course, the Kirin (Japanese) / Qi Lin (Mandarin) / Kei Lun (Cantonese）is an asian mythological creature that is a symbol of well-being and good fortune, and a harbinger of important events — a Kirin appeared at the bedside of Confucius’s mother when he was born, for example.

Hence, we thought that the name being a homophone would be a great name since it means something in both family’s historical traditions — cool stuff. Unfortunately, the Chinese characters for Kirin:

is too powerful and aggressive for a person’s name — it’s like naming your kid, “Dragon” or “Godzilla” or something. Instead, Mannie’s parents suggested the following Cantonese homophone:

Which means “prayer companion” — a much softer connotation to it (oh, and easier to write!. We may refer to him as 小麒麟 or “little kirin” (which incidentally is the name of Bruce Lee’s sidekick in a movie) but well, he’s probably just be our Kieran.

Anyways, Mannie’s at 23 weeks now. Kieran’s about a pound, about 10 inches long and is moving around. Mannie can feel him but I can’t yet outside. We’re looking forward to meeting the little guy!