And Baby #3 is....

All I'm allowed to hope is that he or she is healthy, right? If I tell you that deep down inside I wanted so badly to hear the ultrasound technician say "girl" it makes me a bad mother, right?

To tell you the truth I've been hoping for a girl with every pregnancy. I thought Adam was a girl because he was so laid back with his in utero movements compared to my friends having boys. I wanted a boy, too, though. So I was over joyed when I found out Adam was a boy at his birth. He was in distress so it was about 3-4 minutes after his birth when someone announced he was a boy (and I hadn't even met him yet, I didn't meet him for over an hour). Not at all the dramatic baby on my tummy and David and I discovering the sex together I had imagined. Early on with Eli's pregnancy I had a friend who had convinced herself that her second and last baby was a girl and was thrown into pretty deep postpartum depression when the baby was a boy at birth. That's when I decided we needed to find out the rest of our children's sex at the 20 week ultrasound.

I was fairly confident Eli was a boy, but I still enjoyed the week that David and I kept the secret that we knew we would have two boys. By Christmas I had processed and re-imagined my two little close in age boys playing together. (I come from a boy, girl, boy family and it's what I guess I had figured David and I would have).

This is our last baby. I've always wanted three kids and David was happy with two. I wanted a boy to make the big brothers happy. I wanted a boy to be able to use all the totes of little baby boy clothes Adam and Eli wore that I've saved. But I dreamed of a little girl with two big brothers to protect her, bows and pink and someone to balance out the family dynamics. And the biggest reason I wanted a girl, is I craved the mother-daughter relationship I share with my mother. I don't have a sister and it's almost like we are sisters.

This pregnancy has been different, I broke out more, I've been sick more, the babies heart rate was 170 the first time we heard it at 13 weeks and the biggest difference- I felt the boys move at 18 weeks (Eli flutters a little earlier) but I'm feeling next to nothing still at 20 weeks!

So at the big 20 week 19 week ultrasound that we had on Monday I was full of hope that we were going to find out baby was a girl. This baby even kept it's legs closed through most of the ultrasound so we were full of suspense, but at the end babies legs opened and we found out:

He's another boy. And the reason I don't feel movement- I have an anterior placenta acting like a big old cushion between the baby and my stomach.  He was moving and moving throughout the whole ultrasound and I didn't feel any of it.

Monday night after the ultrasound we threw baby a half-baked birthday, complete with cupcakes. After supper the boys opened a present with a little new-born Little Brother Onsie and a blue baby hat. They were overjoyed and their happiness lessened the sting of never having a daughter. I then allowed myself time to grieve and cry, not for having a third boy, but for the fact that I won't have a daughter. We waited to tell family until the next day and coworkers the day after. (Really it was Adam who shared the news with the family and I sent the pictures above out to my close coworkers).

My whole life I've imagined having boys with at least one daughter. I can now imagine my complete family of boys in tow and there are plenty of great things about it. Since Monday I've read many articles about gender disappointment. I realize that even if I had a girl there is nothing guaranteeing we would have the close relationship like I have with my mother. My boys will be wonderful and they are a blessing and I wouldn't even turn the little guy inside my tummy into a girl if I could! So take that gender disappointment- I want my boys and you can keep your little girl!

2013 Recap

The boys grew in 2013.

Adam in January 2013

To Adam in December 2013- before his first Christmas Program!

Eli January 2013

To Eli January 2104- hamming it up for the camera. Turning into a little man more and more each day

January meant the start of shift work for David. It's not all bad, but after a whole year I miss having him around in the mornings or the evenings or at night when I sleep. Every shift has it's pluses and minuses and every week means the start of a different shift. I took the boys to their first movie when Dave was on afternoons- Wreck It Ralph.

 February we took a weekend trip to the Dells to visit with Dave's family. Something I need to make sure we do again this winter. Better start looking for a hotel and open weekends!

March is for taking baths and making bread sticks with daddy.

April was our wonderful trip to Arizona and the Grand Canyon.

And Eli turned 2!

In May we finally found spring, which meant playing ball with our cousin and camping with our Tech friends at Gooseberry Falls. Plus a dueling pianos in my basement.

In June we went to the zoo with my grandma and the boys great grandma. It was a really special trip. June is when we started our Hutch Park Tour and instagramed the whole thing- finished the 23 parks just before the first snow fall in November.

And Adam turned 4 with a big Dino-Mite Party.

July we went on a trip to Wisconsin and Chicago to visit our new nephew and hang out with our siblings. 

And we got to cuddle our new nephew and cousin Nathaniel.

Time at the park by my parents house captured by my sister in-law Shar.

And the Riversong music festival. This year we brought Aunt Annie, our two nephews and both sets of grandparents along with our kids.

 August brought Packer Family Night- which was so much fun we may need to start a family tradition:

A great visit with great grandma and grandpa in Hibbing:

Followed by a broken leg for poor little Eli later that same day from Brockway:

September brought a trip for Dave and I to Boston and Acadia National Park alone. 

October we invited over a Lady Bug, Turkey and M&M to trick or treat with our Ironman and Hockey Player.

We also went to Duluth for the Michigan Tech Hockey game in October and on the way home we stopped at one of my favorite spots Jay Cook State Park for hiking.

November we went to Chicago for Thanksgiving and while we were there we went to the Fields Museum and met Sue. And this pregnancy must have really worn me out because I took next to no pictures in November.

My cool dudes in December! They wear their sun glasses at night.

And some post Christmas lego building.

It's hard to believe another year has gone by, but we are looking forward to the addition of another baby and sibling in 2014. Adam might start kindergarten this year and Eli will start preschool in the fall. Adam is really starting to recognize letters and the sounds they make. Crazy eights is a game we play almost daily as a family as well as puzzles and legos. The boys are also figuring out how to ice skate.  The boys are so big and self sufficient that I'm not sure I remember what to do with a newborn. I hope it comes back to Dave and I fast.

My Potty Trained Preschooler

We started getting serious about potty training this fall after Eli's cast came off. We did a weekend in November with no diapers at home with just as many accidents as successes (luckily they were pee and not #2), but put him back in diapers come Monday. At daycare there is another little girl who is the exact same age as Eli and that week daycare mentioned they were putting her in undies and it was going great. I asked if they wanted to give it a try with Eli and they were extremely supportive and enthusiastic. He did pretty great at daycare, but we had to use a timer and send him to the potty every 45 minutes to an hour or he would have an accident at home. He had accidents, but he wanted to be in undies and be a big boy, so we haven't gone back to diapers since November. So I'd like to announce that for the first time in 4 and a half years, I don't have a child in diapers! (Well to be honest Eli still wears a diaper at night, but most nights it's dry).

After New Years Eli transitioned to the preschooler room. It's kind of nice because now Eli and Adam are in the same room together. I've gone to pick them up and found them playing together several days which is so cute! Eli won't start preschool classes until next fall when he's 3, but I think he's enjoying the preschool room a lot!

That went faster than I remember with Adam- no diapers, preschool room? Where did my little Eli baby go?

Adam's Secret

What happens when you tell a four year old a secret? He keeps the secret by announcing to everyone, “Eli’s going to be a big brother, there’s a surprise in my mommy’s tummy, but it’s a secret and I can’t tell you.” Yep way to keep that secret big boy! Below is our mini 9 week ultra sound of the little bean.

We told Adam the secret on November 12^th, because we wanted him to be the one to tell our parents the news the following weekend. He was pretty excited! He accidentally let the cat out of the bag at ECFE class and daycare. I always want to wait longer to share the news, but I felt like I was starting to show at 10 weeks pregnant, so it was time to tell. After we told our family we started telling our coworkers and friends. As a last ditch effort to let people know we signed our Christmas card with “& Baby #3 due in June”.

Dave’s parents came the following weekend after we told Adam the news and we were all casually having a conversation about how good of a baby cousin Nathaniel is. My father in law said he might be the last little grandbaby he gets to hold and Adam just says, “There’s a baby in mommy’s tummy.” My in-laws looked at us to see if he was telling the truth and we both shook our heads yes and there was hugs all around.

My parents came out on Saturday to watch Adam play basketball and eat supper with us. When we got home from basketball and eating lunch I was a little surprised Adam hadn't told our secret yet, so I whispered to him to tell Grandma Rose and Grandpa Dave and they were pretty excited too. My brother and his wife are having their first child in May, so two brand new grand-babies are coming soon!

This pregnancy has been kicking my behind. Every time I think I’m done getting queasy I have another episode. Or I think I might be able to actually stay up after I put the boys down to bed and wake up on the couch a couple hours later. Yep, a sleep at nine is my usually MO. Christmas season came and left without me being able to eat cookies or treats. It was kind of fun to be on a no junk food diet because it all made me sick. Luckily or unluckily, since I came home from Christmas in Wisconsin my sweet tooth has returned.

My 14 week belly on Christmas Eve

Eli and Adam are stoked to have another sibling brother. They think we are having a boy, and haven’t wavered once when I ask them. I keep reminding them it could be a little girl, but who am I kidding, we are probably going to have three little boys in our family. I texted my brother that we are having all boys probably because I worked at Boy Scout Camp as a teen and he agreed that he had read that working at Boy Scout Camp increases the likelihood of birthing boys. We found out before Christmas that my brother is having a boy. So if my baby is a girl she better enjoy spending time with boys, because so far all the cousins are boys.

Our 20 week ultra sound is January 20th and I'm going to bring a card for the technician to write the sex in if they are positive they know what sex the baby is. We might have a gender reveal party, but I haven't decided yet.