Our Growing Family

If you noticed the new addition to my sidebar and are sitting at your computer thinking to yourself, "What the crap? How did I not know? Am I always the LAST to know?" don't worry. You're not alone. In the past I could not keep it a secret whenever we found out we were having a baby. It was just so exciting, and I wanted the whole world to know. But this time was different. Yes, I was very excited, but the news came shortly before Father's Day, and since we weren't expecting this news, I thought it would be a fabulous idea to wait until then to tell The Man. So I didn't mention a word to anyone. Well, almost. Had to tell someone, so I told Idaho. (Yes, by the way, I'm calling you Idaho now. That's what you get for moving away from me.)

And I should add that three weeks of hiding this information from your spouse is NOT recommended. Almost the entire time I was dealing with morning sickness (all-day sickness for some of us), I was totally on my own. No sympathy from The Man, who I convinced that it was just the flu ... and then food poisoning. I thought three weeks would go by fast. That's what I get for thinking.

As we prepared for Father's Day, I wanted to find a special way to tell him that he was going to be a father yet again. The kids and I all went down to Creative Pottery to paint a gift for him. We picked out the perfect item ... an ice cream bowl. We painted and colored, stuck handprints and wrote names all over the bowl. I wrote Happy Father's Day, we listed all of our names, and on the bottom of the inside of the bowl I put "and baby."

The big day finally arrived, and I was so glad he was finally going to know. This year Father's Day just happened to be his birthday too, so he was on the phone a lot answering calls from friends and family. We had already celebrated with gifts and cards earlier on in the day, so he thought we were all done. But when dinner was over I dished out ice cream for everyone, and put his in his new special bowl. I told him we had one last gift for him, and we all started eating. Then his brother called. Arrggg. I swear, it took that man 30 MINUTES to eat that freakin' bowl of ice cream!

I couldn't wait any longer. I interrupted the call and asked, "Aren't you done yet?" And he whispered back to me, "Yeah, I just have a little milk left at the bottom."

Side note: We like to put milk in our ice cream. My dad has always done it for as long as I can remember, and when The Man and I were "friends," the first time we had ice cream together he asked for some milk to put in his. I was in love.

Anywho, I hurried him along and told him to just drink it already. He did, and casually looked at the bowl when he finished. He was in mid sentence with his brother when his eyes widened, he looked at me and shouted, "SERIOUSLY?!?!?" and then quickly told his brother he had to hang up.

I suppose after keeping it to myself for so long, it didn't seem so, I don't know, urgent anymore. It wasn't until a few weeks later that I started calling my family to tell them, or mentioning it to some close friends. And I almost got in trouble with a few who had already heard about it from someone else. So my point is, please don't be offended if you didn't receive a personal phone call with the news. Trust me, you're not the last to know. There's a big group of you who are all finding out together.

This pregnancy has been different from all the other three, and I'm trying to enjoy it since it will most likely be my last. I don't feel totally sure that we're done, but The Man is sure enough for the both of us. The doctor even told us this week that my labs for my kidneys are better than they were with my last pregnancy. I told him having children is healing me. And after being told that we shouldn't have any children at all, he'll never know how true those words are for me.

The doctor also told us what we're having. Any guesses?