Announcing Baby Part One

So I finally figured out how to put videos on my blog!  Turns out I couldn't just add them using the director icon...I had to convert them because they were too big for blogger to handle.  And then I had to download some sort of something to convert them, and that took about a million years to get through.  Anyway...

So baby updates:  still doing great!  Getting my alertness back (thank goodness!), little to no nausea, slight food aversion, but it's mostly gone!  Feeling great!  We go to the doctor next week, so hopefully we can get a clean bill of health til next checkup :)

I promised blog entries about how we announced to the family that we were pregnant.  First we told our parents waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back in early February.  Both sets were coming to Muncie for Kyle's birthday, and since we were all going to be together, we figured it would be the perfect time to tell.  The only downside was that at this point, we thought we were further along than we were because we hadn't had the dating ultrasound yet.  So when we told our parents, we expected to only have to keep the pregnancy a secret for another two or so weeks...not six!  From the way it sounded, it was just as hard for them as it was for us (maybe harder!).  We called our siblings soon after and swore everyone to absolute secrecy.

Testing out the new camera before everyone got there...

Then, everyone arrived!  Kyle wanted to do presents before going out to lunch and since I could hardly contain the secret anymore, I agreed.  Our baby's in-utero name is Seamus Magoo, so I put that in the card.  Needless to say it threw everyone for a loop when he read the card, and it took a little bit of time for everyone to realize...

But once they did, they sure were happy!

Most memorable birthday EVER.

Baby FAQ (and a pregnancy test)

So, okay, a few posts ago when I said nothing much new was going on...I lied.  Yep, there's been a lot going on, actually! 

So pregnancy has pretty much been all that's been on our minds (or at least taking up a large portion of it) since about this time a year ago.  Since I feel like this is SUCH a big step and is preoccupying so MUCH of my poor baby-addled brain, I figure I'll do a few posts about baby...like updates, information on how we told the family, etc.  All the juicy details!

But first, since I'm really tired (and hungry, and forgetful), we'll start small(ish).

I'll give everyone some answers to the questions people have been asking me MOST over the last week or so.  Are you ready?

Q:  When are you due?
A:  September 22nd.  

Q:  So you'll have to take some time off school?
A:  Heck yes!  (by the way, this question was not asked by ANYONE I work with...they all knew the answer to that one already!)

Q:  How are you feeling/how have you been feeling?
A:  Pregnancy has not been that hard for me.  Notice what I just said.  For me.  And hasn't (as in hasn't yet).  I've gotten some nausea throughout the first trimester before bed, but not so bad to where I couldn't sleep it off.  I had some major food/smell aversions, so that kept me from eating a ton.  But NOOOOOOOOOOO vomiting, thank goodness!  It would have been a heck of a lot harder to hide if I was!  As of right now...just peeing a lot, losing my brain, some minor cravings, and some bad headaches.

Q:  Have you been craving anything/what have you been craving?
A:  Pizza.  All the time.  The greasy kind.  Also fried chicken occasionally.  And carrots last night.  I know...it's a sick, sick game that my body is playing.

Q:  Will you find out the gender?
A:  Yes.  I wouldn't be able to wait.  And I like to plan A LOT, so I would want the baby's room to be ready for whatever gender it's going to be!

Q:  Do you want a boy or a girl?
A:  I want a HEALTHY BABY.  I know, I know...typical mom answer.  But it's true!  I'd have fun no matter what the gender was! 

Q:  Do you have names picked out?
A:  Yes.  We've had names picked out for a long, long time.  But we're not sharing names ahead of time.  The names are to be a surprise.  You gotta have some sort of surprise!

Q:  Wow!  I can't believe you didn't say anything earlier!  (this is actually a statement, I know, but is intended for us to do some explaining)
A:  We wanted to wait to tell until we were well out of the first trimester because we miscarried our first pregnancy at six weeks right after Thanksgiving.  We're all right now, but it was very, very difficult for us for the entire month of December because we'd been trying to get pregnant for what seemed like forever and then once we got pregnant, it didn't work out.  There was nothing we could do to prevent the miscarriage, and eventually Kyle and I became a lot closer because of it, and we certainly appreciate our  healthy baby that much more.  It made for a really horrible day at school, an awful trip to the ER, and a crummy birthday for me later that week.  We had already told Kyle's immediate family, and having to call back and say, "Hey remember how we told you we were having a baby?  Yeah, just kidding." was an awful phone call to make.  Better to be safe and avoid that when possible.

Q:  Why did you have to go to the ER?
A:  Mostly because Kyle read that it was important to have me checked over (what a sweetheart!), not just for my physical health but also my mental well-being, too.  On a more legitimate note, I have a negative blood type and needed to get a shot of Rhogam.  If you're not sure what that's all about, briefly educate yourself here and here. 

On a side note, let me say something about miscarriages...until I began telling some people about my miscarriage, I never realized that so many women have had one.  My friend who is a doctor gave me some statistics when I first called her when the miscarriage began:  1 in every 4 pregnant women have some sort of bleeding in their pregnancy.  1 out of 2 of those will be miscarriages.  That really stuck with me because it made me realize just how fragile and precious life truly is.  She did say that most of these miscarriages would happen the first trimester, often before a woman really knows she is pregnant.  How crazy is that?  But anyway, people came out of the woodwork comforting me because they knew what it was like to have miscarried before.  For those people...thank you.

Q:  Have you been taking baby bump pictures?
A:  Yes.  But I feel like I'm going to wait a little while more to post them...at least when there's a noticeable bump!

Q:  Where will you put the nursery in your house?
A:  The office!  That was the plan when we first moved into the house...the office would be converted into Baby's room and the office would go upstairs.  So now we have to remodel the upstairs!

Q:  Be honest...how long have you been planning this?!
A:  A baby in general?  Or a time to have one?  Babies have always been in the plan for us.  And when we got married over three years ago, we established that once we graduated and got through my first year of teaching, we'd start trying, regardless of whether we "felt" ready or not.  Because honestly, there's no "feeling" ready.  I don't know if you're ever really ready to have a kid.  So last March or so, we began making preparations for getting pregnant.  We started trying in May.  We got pregnant in October and miscarried at the end of November.  And then in December, we got pregnant again!  Now it's April, and things are looking great.  Hurray!  Feels like it took forever, but we're very happy :)