Your Pregnancy Week By Week: Meat Lovers Edition

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We think that getting weekly email updates about your pregnancy that compare the size of your fetus to various fruits and vegetables is pretty weird, so we’ve gone a different route–and it’s delectable. Here are some excerpts from our new email newsletter for expecting families, Your Pregnancy Week By Week: Meat Lovers Edition.

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Week 6: Your baby is as big as crumb of taco beef.

What a delicious miracle! Even though your baby is only about a quarter of an inch long, she’s already working on some of her most important features–eyes and ears, a circulatory system, and a tiny beating heart. But she is still tiny enough that she could fall out of the back of your taco.

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Week 10: Your baby is as big as a cocktail wiener.  

Have you ever seen such an adorable amuse bouche? At ten weeks, your baby is the size of a cocktail wiener and rapidly developing its vital organs, along with tiny details like fingernails and a fine fuzz of hair. As badly as you want to wrap him in a warm, flakey pastry blanket and take him home, there are still about 30 weeks left until you will welcome him into the world.

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Week 12: Your baby is as big as a meatball.  

At half an ounce and two inches long, your bundle of joy is now the size of a scrumptious meatball. Not as big as one of your Italian grandmother’s meatballs, but more like a chain restaurant meatball. This week, your baby has finished developing its kidneys and urinary tract and now urinates into the amniotic sack. But we’re not going to think about that, because that’s disgusting and inappropriate.

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Week 16: Your baby is as big as a respectably sized shrimp.

In just a week, your baby has gone from being the size of a crappy shrimp that you get at in a Chinese buffet stir-fry to the size of a really nice, respectable, two-bite shrimp. We are talking about the kind of shrimp you get in a shrimp cocktail at a nice wedding. The kind that looks like a witch’s finger. Sadly, we’ve spent so much time talking about shrimp this week that we will have to skip the details about your baby’s development until next time.

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Week 21: Your baby is as big as a rib eye steak.

Finally, your unborn baby is big enough to fully satisfy you at a meal, if he were a meat product. At 21 weeks, your baby is growing steadily and weighs as much as a tender, filling 12-ounce rib eye steak, give or take some grizzle. Your baby can also now kick and elbow you–is it a coincidence that it feels like indigestion?

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Week 27: Your baby is as big as a damn lobster.

Twenty-seven weeks into your pregnancy, your bundle of joy is the size of a two-pound lobster, exoskeleton and all. You baby can now open and close her eyes, sleep, and even think, just like a damn lobster. Also like a damn lobster, your baby is now viable in the real world, if we do not steam it, dip it in melted butter, and eat it while wearing a bib depicting a baby.

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Week 35: Your baby is as big as a honey-baked ham.

We could also say that your baby is now the size of a small watermelon, but that would be a bit strange and puzzling, wouldn’t it?

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Week 40: Your baby is as big as a turkey.

Get out the carving knife and invite over your friends and family –you’ve made it to 40 weeks and your baby is the size of a juicy, golden-brown turkey! After nine months of growth, your baby is absolutely ready for this world, from his strong, meaty legs to his crispy, crispy wings. Did we say wings? Never mind about the wings.

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