A New Experience

There is always an inner struggle of do you find out the baby's gender when you are pregnant or not. For our first two children, the struggle was limited and we decided to be surprised. This is about the only thing I can think of that you cannot control in life and you can be completely surprised. So we were surprised twice....first with a girl and then a boy. What more could you ask for!!! So for the 3rd time, I thought we'd change it up a bit and find out around 20 weeks (actually 21 because I got off schedule in the beginning with appointments and weeks). Today was our opportunity! We had decided to take Alexis with us because we thought she would be excited to see the baby on the screen, but we were unsure about Maxwell. We figured he really didn't understand the whole concept and wouldn't really get what we were doing there anyway. But in the end, Max ended up there with us. And he totally surprised us! He sat completely still on Ben's lap and Alexis was perched on a stool next to me. As the tech was announcing body parts they were both staring with big, wide eyes at the screen. Finally, she shows us a bottom view clearly of a tush and two legs. She asked us if we knew what it was. Since I thought I saw legs with nothing in between....I thought, "is it a girl?". And she said, yes, indeed, it was a girl. Alexis immediately says, "I knew it was a girl". She starts showing us other views, and Max starts labeling body parts with the tech and was getting so excited. Finally, after seeing all her beautifully perfect parts, the nurse was done and turned off the monitor. All on his own, Max says, "bye baby". So sweet!!! Then all he wanted was to look at the pictures and hold them. Then he would not give them up. I didn't want him to ruin the pictures so I made him his own photocopies of them. He carried them around ALL day. We stopped by my mom's school to tell her and Max rushes in screaming, "Bubum, baby girl, baby girl, Bubum, baby girl". I honestly think he might have been more into it than Alexis. Although Alexis was quite excited too. I have to admit, it is quite the different feeling knowing what it is but not being able to hold it for 19 more weeks. We are used to not being attached to any one gender or the other during the pregnancy, but learning in the moment and then having a baby in our arms. This is definitely different, but just as fun! Now I can dig out the right set of clothes!!! Welcome to the family baby girl!