Gender Reveal

With our first pregnancy we did not find out the gender of the baby. I loved having Philip be the one to announce to me that we had a girl. I felt like it was the first moment we shared as a family.
With our second pregnancy we decided to find out the gender, mainly because we had all the girl clothes we would need and  no boy clothes. Our budget couldn't handle buying a new wardrobe all at once, so we wanted to be prepared. We had another girl.
With our third baby, Philip was deployed. We argued about what gender the baby would be. So during an appointment when Philip was home we asked the doctor for an ultrasound. The doctor agreed, though he warned us what we already knew- it was too early to be likely that we would be able to identify a gender. Johnathon proudly showed us that he was a boy.
And now, we are pregnant again. We have boy stuff. We still have some girl stuff. There isn't really a NEED to know what gender this baby will be. So, I didn't want to. Philip, however, wanted to know. So we agreed that he could find out and I would not. We chose a pronoun for the baby- we would continue to call the baby she (because the girls and I were already doing that). He would not be allowed to tell anyone until after he told me. The ultrasound tech did a great job of keeping the gender from me and let Philip know while I ran to the bathroom after my appointment. Philip has been so good at not letting any hints slip. We even chose baby names without him being more interested in one over the other. I was back and forth- sometimes feeling like I was having a girl, sometimes a boy. There were times when both of us wanted the information to be shared- but we held off.

Until the other day.

You see, Philip will be deploying again. While he should be here for the baby's birth- he wont be around for much longer than that. For me, that changed things! Preparing for a deployment is hard work. You go through so much emotionally and have so many things to do to be as ready as you can be. I didn't want that tainted our joy at having a new baby (though it has already started to). I wanted something to celebrate joyously before deployment emotions took over. We decided we would have a gender date sometime during the month of May. Afterwards, we would do a family announcement for the girls (and I guess for Nater too, though he doesn't understand it). Then we would tell family and select loved ones. I am sure we will eventually announce it publicly too- but not until those we are closest to get a personalized announcement.

Our gender date happened kinda sporadically. Philip had a few possible date plans- but decide that since we were going out for cupcakes already he would use that for my surprise. He called the cupcake place and had them put a specific color frosting on my cupcake. He warned me before we got to the cupcake place that I was not to open the box because it would be part of our date. We decided to take the kids with us instead of driving all the way back home for a babysitter. We went to the mall and while the kids played on some rides I opened my cupcake. Philip and I discussed how we felt about the gender and then we all shared the cupcake. Then we got to shopping. It is tradition that Philip picks out an outfit for the babies to come home from the hospital in. We also wanted to get a blessing outfit. We shopped and shopped and shopped the night away (making other stops for other things we had needed). We let the girls know that we would tell them the next day if they were having another brother or another sister.

The next day we put together a gift bag for the kids. We included several items that were the color associated with the gender of the baby. Attached to each item was a piece of a puzzle that announced, "It's another ________!" They got the items out and put the puzzle together. Then they read the puzzle and we talked about their thoughts and feelings on the gender. We emphasized that we are not telling people the gender and that they should not talk to anybody about it. It was a lot of fun! I have big plans in store for family announcements and cant wait to get the calls from them when they receive their announcements. For now, I have felt a lot of happiness and peace from knowing. I feel like I am not as anxious because I can prepare as needed. (not to mention- this drawn out announcing is a LOT of fun!).