It's a... (-nother gender reveal post!)

It's that time again!  Time for me to put my creative thinking cap on and figure out YET ANOTHER way to answer the age old "boy or girl" question with a fun little twist.  I'll admit, I knew how I was going to announce this pregnancy long before it ever happened (ya know, just in case).  But gender reveals are a bit tougher.  They're still fairly new and there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of ideas out there.  We did balloons in a box for Julia, the cake-thing for Jude, and the good ole fashioned "just say it" way with Jack.  And I was determined NOT to leave #4 out of the fun.  So I spent a few good hours on Pinterest and finally decided confetti was the way to go.



We recruited Uncle Jared for this one.  Jon wasn't thrilled that Jared was going to know the sex of his offspring before he did (a whole 2 minutes before) but he wasn't able to provide me with any other options.  So I headed off to my ultrasound appointment this afternoon, came back with a secret slip of paper that no one had seen but the tech, handed it off to Jared and sent him to a room with black balloons and blue and pink confetti.

Baby was fantastic for it's peep show and kept waving at Mama! The tech even said it was a gorgeous baby ... Don't ask me how she could tell from those pictures, I'll just take her word for it.

And then the rest of us waited patiently.

 Uncle Jared counted to three and ...

BAM!!

Aw, c'mon. I did this same thing last time, you had to have been expecting it.

Here's the video for the full experience.

Yes, that's right.  PINK!!

 I realize this is a terribly unflattering picture of me, but for the sake of good sportsmanship I'll still post it.

You see, we had done a few practice rounds throughout the day and I was starting to get a bit gun shy.

With good reason too, I now sport three tiny welts on my left arm where the balloon fragments struck me.

So just be prepared, if you ever decide to try this at home.

Jack gets a turn.

And be prepared to sweep up a lot of confetti.  Or you could just let your daughter eat it.

Julia's thrilled about becoming a big sister.  Okay, so not really.  But I will say, my biggest concern today was my reaction on video if this baby was a boy.  Not that I don't already love it and would shirk at the challenge of raising three little fellas.  But for Julia's sake - I'm so excited to give this girl a sister!

This holiday season has gotten a little sweeter ...

... because we found out some big news right before Thanksgiving!



Yup, that's right. Four under 5 next summer. How's that for a new adventure?

Introducing...

We celebrated the miracle of life again this morning with the arrival of our third baby, and first daughter, Julia Katherine.  Julia had quite the dramatic entrance, the story keeps getting better and better each time we tell it!  I'll be sure to post the details as soon as I get the chance.  But for now we're just soaking up the sweetness of newbornhood ... and trying to sneak in a quick nap any chance we get!

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!

SURPRISE!

We were home for a quick visit over the weekend and got to spend a little time with both families on Friday night.  Our friends at Bellavie Photography offered to take a "families" photo:

1 ... 2 ... 3 ...

Photo Credit:  Bellavie Photography

WE'RE PREGNANT!

Photo Credit:  Bellavie Photography

WE'RE PREGNANT!

Photo Credit: Bellavie Photography

No, really.  WE'RE PREGNANT!



It only took three tries before we got through.

Photo Credit:  Bellavie Photography

Shocked?

Photo Credit:  Bellavie Photography

Yeah, so were we.



But it certainly was fun pulling off our most favorite caper ever!

The day we found out about #2

We had just gotten back from our vacation and had a small hunch that change was in the air. Jon had just been invited to apply for a temporary position overseas which involved 3 months of training (starting in Sept.) and 6 months of work (time which we would be apart). Although not ideal, we both knew it was a great opportunity for his career. Since we're planning on being married another 70-80 years, 6 months didn't seem like too much of a sacrifice. So although not crazy about being a single mom for 6 months, I was supportive of his decision. ...And then I saw the second little line on the pregnancy test.
Now you may be wondering what cute little way I had cooked up to tell Jon. Especially after my awesome Dad pancakes last year. Unfortunately, it didn't play out as well as I had envisioned. It was August 12 and Jon had just gotten home from work (hours later than usual I might add). He immediately started talking about his application for the new job. We started to sit down to dinner and I asked him to get a "special treat" out of the oven. He opened it up and there was one lonely bun. He didn't get. "It's just a bun ... and the oven's not even warm." Then I said, "Yes, I know ... there's a BUN in the OVEN." Then it hit him. That made our decision about the overseas job much easier and I'm happy to report that my husband will be by my side throughout this whole prenancy and delivery.

I went to the clinic for a blood test that night. I was disappointed to find that I would be seeing the weird doctor that I did not like, the one that had offered me a perscription for birth control less than 2 monthes before. A perscription that I had obviously never filled. :) He walked into the room and the first thing he said was, "I take it the pills didn't work." Blah to awkward doctors!
So I'm sure some people think we're crazy for having children only 18 months apart. But we're very excited about Baby #2 and can't wait to go through the whole pregnancy, childbirth and (my not-so-favorite part) the newborn months all over again! We hated keeping it a secret but, for several reasons, originally decided to wait until the second trimester to make the big announcement. We also thought it would be more fun to tell everyone in person when we came home in October.
Well, it didn't work out that way. As many of you may know, my husband is not known for his secret-keeping-skills. The fact that he had kept this news under wraps for over 3 weeks was pretty impressive! So I wasn't too upset when he caved this weekend and alerted my in-laws to their 8th grandchild's existence over a lovely outdoor seafood dinner. We didn't want to leave my parents and the rest of our family out so we dashed over to Michael's for some iron-on letters that spelled out B-I-G B-R-O and made Jack a t-shirt to wear. The next night we sent a text message with the picture to my parents, then our siblings, and then to a few of our friends. Within a few hours the news had leaked onto good ole' Facebook and when we decided to make an "official" announcement. And that brings us to the present. Me sitting on the couch, exhausted before the day even starts, chugging water and munching on saltines. Other than some blood tests and paperwork, I haven't been to the doctor yet. I think I'm somewhere between 8-9 weeks. As of right now, my due date is April 14 but I think that will change once we have our first ultrasound in two weeks. I'm pretty sure these next 2 weeks can't go by fast enough. I hate first-trimester anxiety!! In the meantime, I'll be sure to keep you updated on all the details of second-time mommyhood!

The results are in ...

Well we had our big ultrasound this morning and were very excited to find that we're having ... A BOY! Woo hoo! Now that we got the important stuff out of the way I'll talk a little about our visit to the Navy Hospital.

Here he is!

I scheduled my appointment for as soon as possible - 7:00am on the first day that Handsome Coastie had off, so in typical J family fashion we arrived and were waiting by 6:30am. We have to laugh when we look at our ultrasound pictures and see 6:41am stamped on them - who gets ultrasounds that early in the morning? I think it was early for our ultrasound tech too because she was lookin' a little groggy. We were forewarned that the "big ultrasound" is really to check your baby's anatomy and not specifically to find out the gender, so we patiently waited until our task-oriented techie was through looking at my uterus, placenta, bladder and ovaries.

This is J with his hand on his head.

We finally got to the exciting part when she began pointing out the head, hands, arms, legs, little belly, and beating heart. Then she got real technical and showed us the brain, liver, kidneys, stomach and spinal cord. It was fascinating to see his little fingers waving about. I couldn't take my eyes of the screen, and then when they started watering I realized how much I had been staring and that I should probably blink them occasionally.

I think he looks like his dad in this one.

It was also really strange to see this little baby moving all around but I still can't feel a thing on the inside! Finally, finally she zoomed in on the "nether regions" and both Jon and I knew before she said anything - it is obviously a boy. But just in case, I asked her how sure she was before I went out and started buying little Coast Guard ball caps and football jerseys. She responded as pleasantly as one does before their morning cup of coffee, "Well, we're not supposed to be 100% sure on these things, but if I could be I'd say it's definitely a boy." That settles it, I'm going shopping this weekend!!

Teeny tiny foot.

And so, mama is happy, daddy is pleased, Marmie and Poppa are excited to take their first grandchild out fishing, and Nonnie and Poppy are looking forward to grandson #6 and finally a little one to carry on the family name. And of course the rest of our family is ecstatic as well. Kudos to Kate for calling us all the way from Israel at 7:30am (while we were still sitting in the ultrasound room) and being the first to know! And a pat on the back to all of you who voted "boy" on my little poll, and to those of you who originally voted girl and then changed your vote after I posted the heartbeat predictor, well half-a-back-pat to you.

The News is Out

Being Jon and Janine, we don't like to waste any time. Less than 12 hours after getting my positive home-test, I was sitting in the doctor's office getting my blood drawn. Confirmed! I called Jon, who was working that night, to let him know. At the time, I was unaware that Jon's co-workers sometimes listen in to his phone calls in case the dialogue pertains to "official business." It did not take long for this particular person to determine that this phone call was fairly "unofficial." Too late. And so the first to hear of our exciting news was none other than Jon's fellow Coasties.
When Jon works the night shift for the whole weekend we see very little of each other. So without adequate time to discuss our "news release" we had decided to hold off for a few days until we could think of a fun and creative way to share.
The ladies I work with have pretty keen baby-dars (I'm something like the 8th person to get pregnant in our building this year) and so the secret was out within the first half hour of that Monday morning. Of coure, everyone was compelled to silence until we could figure out the best way to tell everyone.
As much as we wanted to drop the bomb in person, we knew we wouldn't be able to wait that long. So we finally developed a scheme. That Tuesday immediately after getting home from work, Jon and I ran out to the beach (the cold, wet beach) and snapped some shots of our footprints in the sand. A few computer clicks later and we had our announcement. Then we just had to wait until we knew our families were home, and off went the email. Our phones were ringing the rest of the night.
By the time we had finished updating our family and close friends it was time for bed. When we awoke the next morning, the news was OUT! (credit goes to Facebook) So much for trying to tell everyone personally. I succombed to sending out a mass email to everyone we know and following up with as many phone calls as possible. If there is anyone out there that is still unaware of the newest Tillman family development, you have my apologies. (But obviously you never email me or I'd have your current address and would have sent you an announcement.)
I think the best thing about babies is that they make people so happy! :)