How we spilled the Beans

Waiting to tell family in person that we are expecting was sooooo hard but well worth it.

In the end we let the Peanut do the spilling with a back up "Congratulations" card that I had made up in case things needed a little more explaining. Of course the Peanut was so excited to see Grandma and Grandpa that she was talking a mile a minute and we had to get her to repeat "I'm Going to be a big sister!" a few times before Grandma got it. My Pa got it right away and sat back laughing at my Mom until I handed over the card that also didn't seem to click right away. Perhaps my adamant proclamations that we were finished and that the Peanut was it, had a little something to do with her delayed reaction?

We told the Husband's Dad the same way. He has a little bit of a hearing problem so there was a little more of the same but the look on his face when he got it was priceless.

The rest of the trip was spent with each family faction in turn. The reason for the trip was for the Ma-in-Law (or my second Mom's) family reunion. In the 17 years I've been with the Husband I've only ever met a handful (and by handful, I mean less than 5 members) of her family. Seeing her inside a family environment, surrounded by people who opened their arms to her when she walked up was an amazing experience. I spent a lot of time in the kitchen with the women (and more specifically the Grandma's and the Great Grandma's in the family which is probably one of the best places to be in a large family gathering like that. There's something about the bonding that goes on at the hearth that seems to be universal no matter where you go.

Staying with the Husband's Dad was a quieter experience other than our first day there, when we celebrated the Peanut's birthday. I had some friends from my first years of art school come over with their children and while the kids played we had an afternoon of catching up and remembering.

We finished up at my parents place with a trip to the zoo and a lot more time than I usually get with my baby sister. We got the Peanut to tell her the big news too. Since I'm showing quite a lot, and it's still pretty early and she's a single Mom of an almost 13 year old and almost 11 year old twins she was kind enough to laugh hysterically and tell me that she was glad it was me and not her since she was pretty sure that the odds of the Bean being the Beans were pretty high considering the size of my belly....

Which leads me to the results of our first ultrasound for the Bean. The Bean is just that; a single little being. The Bean is also 12 and a half weeks instead of 11 and a half; which bumps the due date up a little bit. We saw face, spine, hands and feet and of course a steady little heartbeat. Exactly what we wanted to see.