Announcing Our Baby News

We were so excited to start telling people that we were having a baby.
I'd already told airport security people, doctors,
nurses and a few other misc unrelated people out of necessity.

Kevin wanted to wait to tell people until we found out the gender

and I didn't know if that would be possible.

It depended on how sick I was and how much and how early I started showing.

Luckily, I felt great for those first 18 weeks.

Being tired and hungry 24/7 were my only symptoms.

I had some nausea here and there but nothing too bad.

Oh and I didn't want to make our big announcement over the phone!

So with some sneaky dressing and concealing of my ever growing baby bump

we were able to tell the majority of our family and friends in person.

Here's how we told everyone:

My HUBBY:

 I actually told my cats before I told my husband on Oct. 1, 2012!
They were the only ones home with me so what was I supposed to do...

I found out about 3 hours before Kevin was scheduled to be home from work and I was dying with excitement.  I had read about ways to announce a baby to your husband with the hopes that one day I'd be able to make the same announcement.  I decided I would put together a word puzzle and have him unscramble it.  I wrote out "We are pregnant!!!", printed it out and cut the letters apart.  

I paced around for hours waiting for him to hurry home.  He finally arrived, we ate a quick dinner because it was late and then I told him I needed his help.  I said that I was working on a project for my students and needed his help.  I told him that I needed to see if it was too hard for my kids to figure out.

I handed him the stack of letter cards and told him that it was three words that he was trying to figure out.  He loves word puzzles like this so he was eager to get started. 

 He got the we are section really quickly 

and he needed a few clues for the pregnant part.

I told him it started with a p and gave him a few other basic clues.

 Then he looked at me with a super surprised and excited expression

and said "Really???  Oh My Gosh!!"

There were some tears of joy and excitement.
We had some pint sized Butterfinger blizzards to celebrate.

Then we chatted over what we need to do next:

doctor appointments, vitamins, etc.

My SISTER:

I went out to lunch with my sister and her family.  We ate at Culvers and then headed out to run some errands with just the girls. We stopped by the mall and I told Haley that I had to get one last Christmas present for Kevin.  We found the personalized ornament kiosk and I started looking for the perfect ornament to reveal my surprise.  Luckily, Haley ran into a friend who distracted her for several minutes.  I selected the ornament below and wrote out what I wanted written on it.  We had to come back in 20 minutes so we shopped around and tried to kill a little time.  

My ornament was taking longer than expected so we parked it on a bench.  I told her to wait there and then I'd go and get the ornament.  It was ready and looked great.  I hurried nervously back to my sis and her girls.  I asked her to tell me what she thought about the ornament I'd gotten Kevin.  So she unwrapped it, read it and just about fell over. 
I wish I had a picture of the happy surprised look on her face but I'll always remember it despite the lack of photo evidence.  She was full of questions and I was excited to finally be talking about my baby with someone.  I filled her in on the details, we chatted for a bit and then we decided to head home for the afternoon.  We got back to her house, put her kids down for naps and then she pulled out maternity clothes and books for me to go through!!

Our PARENTS:

We knew we were going home for Christmas so we tried to coordinate a secret dinner with both sets of our parents.  It was trickier than we thought to plan a dinner with just our parents, no siblings, no friends and without either set knowing that the other was coming.  We tried not to make our plans sound suspicious but we had to do some convincing that we really wanted to eat dinner with just them.

We rode with my parents to our favorite pizza place and when we arrived Kevin's parents were already there.  Everyone seemed a bit surprised to see the others but just went with it.  We sat down to order our food.  We got drinks and then Kevin said he'd order for everyone.  He asked how hungry everyone was so he'd know how much to order.  They all said that they were hungry and Kevin said, "Well we should probably order a lot of food because Whitney is eating for TWO!"  

Everyone was shocked and surprised.  We gave them our latest ultrasound pictures and updated them a bit on the last 18 weeks.  They were so happy and amazed that we could keep our secret for so long.  We talked about plans, names and all things baby.  We ate pizza and just enjoyed the evening together. We were really glad to get to share the news with our parents.

 Kevin + his parents

 Me + my parents

The whole crew after dinner.

FRIENDS:

We pretty much just came out and told them.

They were excited :)

SIBLINGS:

Our announcement was made through various phone calls, 

visits to work and at Christmas gatherings

My CO-WORKERS:

 I came back from Christmas break and was ready to tell all of my friends and co-workers!  I'd been keeping the secret for so long and anxious to finally tell the people I spend all of my days with.  I put together an assortment of candies and treats, bought pink and blue paper products and typed up the following signs.

 I set it all up before school and waited to tell people as they came into our faculty room.  They were thrilled and so excited to hear my baby news.  I left the treats out all day so I had a fun time talking baby things with all of my co-workers.

My THIRD GRADERS:

I knew my class would be super excited with my news so I came up with a perfect way to tell them.  I put together a little mystery game with lots of clues and asked them to try to figure out my mystery. 
Here were my clues:
1. Mini Tootsie Rolls in pastel colors
2, A bell pepper because that's how big the baby is right now

 3. A baby board book called I Love My Mommy Because...
We read the whole book, then we each went around
and said what our favorite thing about our moms.

 4. I made my usual chocolate chip cookies
but made them mini sized with mini chips and mini m&ms

 5. We ate Mother's Cupboard's animal cookies

6. I talked to them about titles that people have and what titles that would say that I have right now.
Wife, teacher, sister, daughter, baker, blogger, friend, etc.
Then I asked them about the titles that each of them have... they did some thinking and had fun coming up with all of their various titles.  I told them that I was going to be getting a new title in June. 

 7. Finally, we wrapped up the mystery game with Hangcat.
It took them a while but they finally got it!

They cheered for joy and were so excited.
I went back through each of my clues and explained the significance to them.
They loved the whole game!!

Then came the questions:
Are you going to retire now?
When can we meet the baby?
Will you name the baby after me?
Do you think you might be having twins?
 Are you kind of scared or nervous about having your first baby?
How did you know you were pregnant?
What does Kevin think about you having a baby?
Can I call my mom, she'll be dying to know?
Luckily, 8 and 9 year olds are content with v.e.r.y basic answers.

FACEBOOK / INSTAGRAM / BLOG

My mom and sister helped me with a little announcement photo shoot while we were in Indiana over Christmas.  I had an idea of what I wanted ahead of time and we worked together to recreate it.  Luckily, my mom saved some baby shoes of mine that we were able to use.  We had a girl pair of patent leather ones and white ones.  We shot both in many different poses and then went with the white since we have yet to have a definitive boy or girl ruling.  I know I've said it several times but I'm head over heels for the way the finished product turned out.  It was exactly how I'd pictured it, it was FREE because my sister took the picture and I did the editing.

It was really nice to hear from all kinds of friends with such nice wishes of congratulations!

These have been the most exciting weeks of our lives!!