To No One's Surprise But Mine...

...we are having a baby boy!  I had my supersonic ultrasound today, and the results were conclusive.

I've probably not told this story before on the blog, but I am notoriously bad at predicting the gender of my babies.  I just KNEW that Charlotte was a little boy because I did not believe I was destined to be a mother to little girls.  When the sonographer told me that she was a girl, I went home and cried.

Of course, I cannot imagine our family without a little girl as our firstborn, so I'll chalk the crying jag up to pregnancy hormones.

When I was pregnant with Elijah, I again just KNEW that he was a little girl.  Since Charlotte was a girl and God had obviously decided I could mother girls, I figured that He would bless me with nothing but.  So when that sonographer told me within seconds that it was a boy, I was shocked.

With this baby, it wasn't that I KNEW anything, but I just couldn't imagine this one being anything but a girl.  I could only picture a dolled-up little girl, a second "mom" in Charlotte, and a protective big brother.

Ha!  As Jeff told me, "You're batting a thousand, honey!"

Jeff had a feeling from early in my pregnancy that this was a boy because of the similarities between this pregnancy and my last one.  Charlotte decided a bit ago that being the only princess in the family was nice, and, thus, this baby HAD to be a boy.  Elijah didn't really care, at least after his first expression of how nice it was to be the only boy.  As far as he's concerned now, the boys will finally outnumber the girls, which mean the boys have won.

Anyway, I got to have some of those cool 3D ultrasound pictures made today.  This technology totally blew me away!

This one is a side shot; the baby has his right arm tucked behind his head, and he is evidently snuggling with the placenta.  You can see his leg bent up into his body.

This one shows more of his face.  His legs are kind of cut off in this picture, but his right arm is still tucked behind his head; that's his elbow stuck out beside his face.

And here's the more traditional, profile shot.

I won't submit you to the gender verification shot, but we have one of those, too, and there's really not much room for doubt!  So now for the hard part...finding a name!

By the way, the doctor said that the baby looks wonderful.  While an ultrasound can't find all possible abnormalities or birth defects, it can see indications of a good many, and Dr. Leonardi didn't see anything today.  That is indeed an answered prayer.

While the news of the baby is wonderful, we also got some sad news today.  A woman at church lost her battle with cancer with yesterday.  She was 40 years old with three young children.  Her husband is our kids' pediatrician, and she taught our kids in church when we lived here before.  She was a fellow homeschooling mom and just a really wonderful person.  While more of an acquaintance than friend, Kim was an inspiration and outlived her initial diagnosis by over a year.  If you think about it, offer a prayer for her family...this is a terribly difficult time for them.

Well, next time, I'll fill you in our trip last weekend to the Dells.  Have a good one!