The Great Gender Reveal

Today was the big day! Alex and I went to Lexington with our parents and his grandmother this afternoon to find out if there are hair bows or Tonka trucks in our future. The Baby Belly Spa was so cute! It was kind of hilarious to browse through the "hooter hiders" and belly cast kits with my mom. I told her that belly casts make good chip and dip servers ;) Personally, I wouldn't want a model of my belly or my "girls" hanging on the wall in my house, but, to each her own.

They took us all into the "viewing room", complete with a sofa, chairs and flat-screen tv and I almost forgot why we were there because it's just so cool to see your baby on the screen! It's all, "Awwww! Look at the face! There's an arm! What is that we're looking at?" We heard the heartbeat, 134 bpm, which had slowed down a lot from our first ultrasound. Then the ultrasound tech told us that the baby's legs were crossed. Oh no! But I'd been praying against that! Thankfully, the diet Dr. Pepper I drank and the apple I ate on the way up did the trick and Little Bit moved around like crazy and got into a better position for us to take a peek. And.....drum roll, please.....we're having a little girl!!! We're going to have a little Natalie around Christmas!!! I'm so excited!!!

Alex is going to be great with a daughter. Now I want to buy him the Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters book that we heard about on Dave Ramsey's radio show. I can't wait to see Alex in action as a daddy! He's a natural with kids and I love that about him. This week couldn't have started out any better!

Oh Baby Boy? Or Girl?

So many changes are ahead as I try to prepare myself for motherhood. I'm so excited to start this new adventure! I'm 16 weeks and 4 days into this journey now and it's already really exciting. Our parents are going with us to Lexington this weekend to find out our baby's gender!!! So many people have asked if I have any "mother's intuition" about what I'm having, but I honestly don't know one way or the other. I've been trying to guard my heart against favoring one gender over the other so that I'm not disappointed if I'm wrong. How awful would it be to tell your child when they ask what your reaction was to finding out what they were that you were sad or disappointed? I want to be able to tell them that I was thrilled and excited! My brother-in-law was so upset to find out that he wasn't having a son that he wouldn't speak to anyone for two days.

It's going to be great to get out of the house, away from our smelly wet floors and have some quality time with the grandparents-to-be (we're waiting to hear from the insurance company about what the assessment is before repairs can begin. In the meantime, the kitchen and dining room smell moldy and gross). Some friends of ours are expecting their baby girl at any moment, so hopefully we'll get to celebrate with them this weekend, too!

Here's how the belly looked after work today (I'm the most un-photogenic person on earth! Ugh!):

New Beginnings

Today was the icing on the cake to a terrific holiday weekend; I got to meet Alex's three oldest nephews for the first time. Alex reconnected with the boys on Saturday after a ten-year separation that was due to extenuating family circumstances. In the past, Alex has tried to downplay his disappointment about not having a relationship with the boys, but once the arrangements were made for them to visit their grandparents for two weeks, he got really excited. He spent the weekend going to the water park and then to the movies with them while I had other previous engagements.

I was nervous on the ride over to my in-laws' house today because what if the boys didn't like me? What if it was really awkward trying to relate to three teenagers? We ate lunch and then had a corn-hole tournament wherein my father-in-law and youngest nephew proceeded to beat everyone else in the family.

The boys were all very sweet and things went really well. God is so good to work things out, at least for now, where the family can hopefully continue to build a relationship with the boys even after they go back home. Their being able to visit was a long-awaited answer to prayer for many family members and we pray that this is just one of many to come.

Water Woes, But God is Bigger!

On Saturday, I stumbled while walking through our dining room. I turned around and saw that two long sections of hardwood planks had buckled and were sticking up above the floor. Alex checked for water under the house. All dry. The air conditioner in the attic wasn't leaking through the ceiling. So, I called the local company that installed the floor for my parents three and a half years ago. The owner of the business came over after work today and literally uncovered the problem in 2 minutes. Our dishwasher has been leaking. A lot. For a loooong time. A hose was installed improperly or something like that. The sub-floor in the kitchen, dining room and possibly the laundry room needs to be replaced. Mold is everywhere. Even the drywall in the dining room is damp on one wall. Everything down to the support beams under our house will need to be replaced. Tile floor that was installed just a year ago in the kitchen needs to be removed. Beautiful hardwood floors are ruined. I can't imagine what this is going to cost, but the flooring guy is running an estimate for us. Since our insurance agency was closed for the day by the time we discovered the chaos, I got online and filed a claim with the insurance company. Now we're praying that they will cover the damage because otherwise we'd need a loan to cover what I'm estimating to be $10,000 or more in repairs. Our homeowner's insurance is with the same company as our auto insurance. They were excellent to deal with when I had my car accident in October, so I'm hoping that this experience will be positive as well.

Honestly, I was more concerned about cooking dinner and feeding my hungry belly (I'm ALWAYS hungry now!!! Sheesh!) than being upset about mold in our house and having to stay somewhere else while repairs were being done. God will provide. He was faithful to see that this happened before the baby arrived so that it will be a distant memory by the time we bring home our precious bundle. Please pray for us that we will have favor with the insurance company and that whoever ends up making the repairs will do an excellent job so that there are no complications down the road.

The Man Cave Makeover Continues

We got a great start to the nursery this week during our stay-cation and now I'm in full-on decorator mode. I can't wait to see everything come together! Here's a sneak-peek at what we started:


This morning, I got up bright and early to hit a couple yard sales close to my house. I snagged a changing pad and three covers, a waterproof crib liner thingy, sleep sacks/gowns, and two onesies for $31. Buying all gender-neutral yellows, white and greens is kinda boring, but at the same time it's still really fun to finally shop for my own baby! Eeeek! I found a pink gown that I loved, so I had to get it, and to even things out I got a cute boy one with a puppy on it, because we LOVE puppies around here!


Speaking of puppies, I saw the cutest boxer pup yesterday that I wanted to take home with me so that Layla could have a buddy. He was tied up on his front porch and looked lonely. Poor thing! If dogs weren't so expensive to feed, vaccinate, etc, etc, I would find Layla a playmate pronto.

I hope you're having a great weekend! I'm going to try and make the most of what precious little time we have left before returning to work on Monday. *Sigh* No more mid-day naps for me....

The Man Cave Makeover Begins

Alex and I are on a one-week stay-cation this week, so we decided it was a great time to start turning his old office (now a storage room) into the nursery. We picked out paint yesterday and then lost the motivation to actually put it on the wall once we got home. The primer and main color are now finished and we'll start painting some stripes tomorrow. Hopefully the painting will be done tomorrow or the next day! I can't wait to see my vision come together, although I'm a little nervous that it might not turn out the way it looks in my head. We've started shopping for a crib, found one we liked and then discovered that the color we want has been discontinued. The crib search continues! We did find a neutral shag area rug for the room though, so it's coming together little by little. I'll post pictures of the nursery once the painting is finished!

How Do I Say This?

God is just so GOOD! That's all there is to it. I've thought of a million different ways to write this post, but I think straight-forward is just gonna have to do instead of something fancy and creative. I'm pregnant! We found out April 16th at just 3 weeks and 5 days along. Now I'm 11 weeks and had my first official pre-natal visit today. My doctor normally doesn't do ultrasounds until 20 weeks, but I think he wanted to let Alex see the baby for himself so that it seemed real, so he scheduled an earlier u/s for us. Here's the first peek at baby Godin!!!!!:


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The heartbeat was 167 beats/minute, which is on the high end (wives' tales say that girls have faster heartbeats, but we'll see!). It was such a dream come true to look at our precious baby up on that screen. We saw the heartbeat for a split second and then got to hear it. What an amazing sound!!! It was music to my ears!

I'm due on Christmas Day, which might seem like a bummer to some, but it is such confirmation that things happened in God's timing. About 5 years ago, while we were still dating, Alex and I picked out a boy and girl name. Our girl name, Natalie, means, "born on Christmas Day". I don't want to jump to conclusions that we're having a girl, but how cool would that be?! I'll be super excited with either a boy or a girl. If baby G is a boy, we want to name him Nathan. Middle names are still up in the air because Alex has always hated the idea of middle names (loooong story), but I'm determined to convince him to give our baby a middle name or else I'll sneak one onto the birth certificate! ;)

So far, I've been nauseous all day long, but have still been able to eat everything except onions and sharp cheddar cheese, and breakfast. Apparently the baby doesn't agree that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Even though I've been really tired during the day, I usually get a second wind once I get home in the evening. I told my boss my news a few weeks ago and am going to tell my co-workers tomorrow with the ultrasound pictures. I wonder if they've already figured it out? Thank goodness babydoll-style shirts are in style since they hide a lot!

Alex and I have both enjoyed keeping track of the baby's development with babycenter.com's email updates, but I've really enjoyed reading Praying Through Your Pregnancy by Jennifer Polimino and Carolyn Warren. Each chapter covers one week of the baby's development and shows you different ways to pray over your baby. For example, when hands and feet are forming, you pray for them to grow properly, but also that your child would grow to use their hands and feet to serve others and live out the Gospel. It even includes chapters on how to pray while you're waiting to conceive.

For so long it seemed like we would never get pregnant, but now I'm so thankful that things worked out the way they have. It seems cliche, but it's so true that God's timing is perfect and His plans are perfect. Waiting is so hard, but without the waiting, I might not have learned things about the Lord that He wanted me to see. My eyes were opened to have compassion towards couples struggling with infertility. I don't want to take the next 7 months for granted because I've waited a lifetime for them.