SO YAY!
That was fun! It's so nice to be able to SHARE out loud. Though I am miserable at secrets so if we spoke in real life or on the phone in the past few weeks, you were already well aware. Thank you, thank you, for sharing in our excitement. We are really excited. It's big news!
I appreciated your kind comments so much and had to laugh at what my tells were since mid-October when we found out. For sure the blurry Project Life stuff – most of that was journaling and I will not be going back to share the "un-blurred" images – it makes me bored just thinking about it. That blue square from two weeks ago was an ultrasound photo that no amount of blurring would disguise. The day before Thanksgiving we had our 11 week appointment and finally got to see the tiny one. It was bobbing around and we saw it's flickering heart beat (so thankful!!). That was pretty damn cool (but again, not an image I think needs to live in blogland).
Love the folks that said they knew from the new car (that was totally a baby driven decision plus we didn't want to pay $3k to fix the brakes on the old car) or from my "for little ones" pins. I tried to not be obvious, but you never know! This little baby already has a growing collection of striped onesies and quite possibly the cutest pair of striped pants ever. I am addicted. I am trying to be careful with spending but there were some great Black Friday online sales I took advantage of. (How could I not?)
Otherwise – FEELING GOOD. Like a new person since about Thanksgiving. Weeks 8 and 9 were crazy rough. I survived on red Gatorade, string cheese, pretzels, pistachios and Dawson's Creek. It was far from my finest hour. But now I am a normal human! I eat normal food! Except no potatoes. For some reason, I cannot handle the thought of potatoes except in fried French form.
Running a mile a day has been a blessing and a half. I fell off the "exercise" wagon around the time that I was existing on four foods and so this short but daily challenge has come at the right time. I am totally inspired to keep at it and feeling so good about getting outside and moving around once a day. Hooray for that.
I love that so many of you are excited about baby projects (and that so many of you are expecting!). I am excited about baby projects. A baby IS a project but hopefully I'll be able to put together lots of fun things for the little one. As some of you guessed when I shared tiny peeks, baby has his or her first blanket. I knitted a striped one that I am in love with. Hoping to share more photos and a quick tutorial for that next week (obviously it could work as a full-sized human blanket too!). Next, I'll be cleaning up and making new cushions for a rocking chair that's been in Paul's family for decades.
We are going to find out the gender. Hopefully towards the end of January. I think it's a girl. I strongly think it's a girl. I got a feeling that a girl baby was on the way towards the end of September when I started working on this quilt. Then two negative pregnancy tests later, I thought, "there goes that!" Then a week later and two positive ones, I thought "we're back in action! It's a girl!" Paul thinks boy but I cannot figure out if he really thinks that or just wants the other side of the bet. We will know in not too long!
Speaking of positive tests… someone asked how I shared the news with Paul. I took a test on a weekend morning. As mentioned, it was my third test of the cycle so I didn't want to get my hopes up, but I was still late so I figured it was worth a shot. I was very used to negatives at this point so when that vertical line started showing up, I frantically started reading the directions I had already poured over many times. With a cracking voice, I called to Paul in bed that I thought it was positive. He stumbled over, looked at it with blurry-eyes and said yes, but that we should probably take another test tomorrow to confirm. 24 hours and a second positive sign later, he said we should probably get a blood test to really confirm. I wanted to (lovingly) wring his neck. Happily, he has left his state of denial and is now firmly planted on the sunny side of this adventure. 🙂
Thank you for the concern about Paul being home for the birth. He is deploying early this coming February. This time around, he will be in a non-war-zone so he will have more flexibility with leave time. It's quite possible that he will be able to get back to the states to be there when the baby is born and spend a few weeks getting to know him or her before he has to return to deployment. Then, should all go as planned, he'll be home safe (for the next FOUR years!) in August. Because there are about 1000 wheels in motion and it does no good to speculate, I am focusing instead on these next two months and we'll continue to deal with what comes as it comes. The goal is always to thrive, not just survive, so we will do our best regardless of how things work out.
For those asking about my documentation plans… oh, man. I am overwhelmed!! I am SO GLAD I'll be working from a kit for Project Life next year. My original plan (before I was pregnant) was to make baby his or her album in addition to the family album. At the moment, that sounds more than a little exhausting. But we'll see! I most likely will just be mixing in a baby kit and inserts into the main album. In addition, I may just be taking a million photos and printing up Blurb books every other week until we can open a Baby Cripe Book Store. I am currently emailing myself letters to the baby (aptly called, "dear baby") to document the little things happening so far. Would love to eventually have them printed up in a book with photos from the pregnancy. I am also hoping to take and occasionally share bump photos…but first, I need a baby bump.
This is sort of a novel. Consider the above all the things I wanted to type here since we found out about this little one. And really, thank you so much, from both of us, for sharing in our excitement. I am so grateful for this space to share.
ps… I took yesterday off from answering questions in the comments, but I am there today. Thank you!
enJOY it 
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