It's a ... (gender reveal post)

We hit 19 weeks on Wednesday and had our anatomy ultrasound!  I went by myself and Jon stayed home with the boys.  After a long, full-bladdered wait, I finally got to see our newest little one, who made sure to give mama a wave during all the investigatories.

I had a great tech this time around.  I think she thought this was my first because she was explaining every little thing to me.  She definitely had a "teacher's heart" and I didn't want to cause any problems so I just kept nodding my head and saying "uh huh" or "Yeah, now I see the two femurs" "Ohhh, wow look at that placenta."  When really, it was just a load of black and white fuzzies to me.

But I did see the heart, all 4 chambers.  And it was beating.  And I saw all the parts of the brain.  A nose, lips, a yawn, fingers, toes.  A perfect spine.  The tiniest ribcage.  A perfect little hiney that was pointed in the air.  Wow, life is amazing.  Baby is about 8 oz., the size of your morning cup of coffee, and moving like crazy.  I've never felt this much movement this early with either of my other two, let's just hope it doesn't mean anything for the future.

She had me turn away at the end so she could do the between-the-legs check.  This is when I told her I had two boys at home and a lot of people were rooting for a girl.  "No way!" she said, "Mean you've done this before?!"  Sure, but it never gets old!  She put the results in a sealed, cardboard envelope and sent me on my way.

Now I was pretty sure we were having another boy.  But she threw me for a loop when she said (a) the heartrate was 163 (a little on the higher end, especially compared to last week and (b) she was 80% sure of the gender.  80%!!  How am I supposed to plan with those kind of odds!  The techs for both boys told me they were as certain as they could be, and I think that's because boys are a bit more obvious.  It's a lot easier to look for something than to look for the absence of it.  So now she had me all confused.

Later that afternoon Jon took the envelope and a big box to the Dollar Store and told the nice little balloon cashier that we wanted her to open up the envelope and fill the box with pink balloons if the results said "girl" and blue balloons if the results said "boy."  He ran across the street to the store while she loaded up the box and sealed it shut.  Then he brought it home and I wrapped up.  We somehow managed to accomplish all of this without error so that neither of us knew what we were having until the moment we opened the box.

Since this was just a family affair we had to work with limited recording devices, i.e. two cameras on tripods and a remote control shutter ($4 on Amazon, get one!!).

Jack, look at the new baby!

So unfortunately, Jon is a bit cut off at the top in the video.  Also, since we had to keep the box taped shut, there was a good amount of (aggravating) downtime right before the big moment.  And yes, I got a bit of sun this weekend.  I decided to sit outside and read my Kindle while the boys napped on Saturday.  Let's just say, Sherlock Holmes is a fascinating read and the boys took a really long nap that day.

And now, for the big reveal:

Haha, gotcha!  I guess you'll just have to watch the video.



Evidently the Dollar Store didn't have any plain-colored balloons.  But the substitution worked well.

Jack is pretty excited about his baby sister, er I mean, "sister balloons."  He's probably thinking, "Dude, if all sisters come with balloons I'll take 10 more!"

We've had the balloons in the house 3 days now and he keeps asking for "sister balloons."  He's also asked to watch the video of the reveal several dozen times.  "One more time, Mama.  One more time!"  I finally  just set him in a chair and put the video on repeat, and I was able to cook our entire dinner without interruption.

So yes, we're having a GIRL!  Can you believe it?  I honestly thought this was a third boy.  I was totally surprised.  But now that I've gotten over the inital shock, I'm excitedly planning out a sweet little nursery for our new baby girl.  And dreaming of tea parties and frilly dresses.  And having someone to share all my favorite books and movies with.  Of course, 80% isn't much to bank on, good thing I'm well-prepared should we need a back-up!