Our Fun Mother's Day Surprise

So for Mother's Day, we both had gifts to give our moms.

We each chose how we presented the gifts to them.
I mailed mine to NC and told Mom to Skype with us after she'd opened it.
Jeff wanted to see his mom's reaction, so he decided to give it to her personally that day.

The card above was given to Jeff's mom and the card below was mailed to my parents.

We had so much fun making the onesies and cards!

Then to tell grandparents and other family members we...

mailed some more cards and pictures to NC with descriptions typed on the back about each picture.


And for Jeff's grandparents in Utah...

We emailed these pictures and descriptions.
*My favorite is the description for just the 13 week pictures because we actually saw the baby wave with its itty bitty hand:)

The baby is coming in December and we are so, so, so excited about it!

There is a book I found at the family's house where I work that I feel summed up our emotions almost perfectly. The book is called, Love Song for a Baby, and at the very end it says:

We'd dreamed a baby,
We'd wanted a baby,
We'd planned a baby,
We'd waited and waited and waited for a baby,
until finally there was you.

I'd probably add we fasted and prayed for a baby, but besides that it's pretty perfectly stated. I think I like it so much because it portrays how wanted babies are in their parent's lives. I think it's just beautiful. Now I don't feel like we endured any sort of hardship or trial getting pregnant compared to so many others who have seriously dealt with difficulties getting pregnant. So I hope I haven't made it seem that way or that our journey was a terribly difficult one because I will never describe or remember it as one. We do though feel so blessed to be pregnant and feel so aware of the Lord's tender mercies in our lives. I love a quote by Elder Bednar where he states, "Often the Lord's timing of His tender mercies helps us to both discern and acknowledge them." I feel like that quote more properly describes our experience. We are more grateful now for a baby than I think we ever would have been had everything in our lives not happened exactly as they have.

But all seriousness aside, we did go through A LOT of pregnancy tests. We actually ended up buying kits online from a site we knew my sister-in-law had used when trying to get pregnant. The tests were super cheap, but they are just thin test strips and very flimsy looking. (Not to mention the learning curve that some people, other than myself, had in figuring out which end was the pee end and which end was the one you hold ha ha ha). So when we actually took the one that showed we were pregnant, we were both in disbelief. I was in shock because I'd already told Jeff I hated taking those tests because they're always negative. While Jeff was very skeptical about whether or not to actually believe the little piece of paper. He said we'd have to wait two more days and then we should get one of the fancy pregnancy tests that we used to use.

And when we saw this...

We were believers :)

And you're probably impressed with how super classy we are that we even included a picture of the pee stick...
It was just too exciting to not document it!

I'm headed into my second trimester and feeling so much better.
I wouldn't say I feel normal again, but I don't think that will happen until a while after I have a tiny baby in my arms.

This news may explain my recent disappearance from the blogging world, from social events, and from life in general, ha ha ha. And I hope it better explains why I have all this extra fat on my belly! I've definitely been flying under the radar as I've tried to adjust to pregnancy and all the glorious symptoms that accompany it.

And we find out the gender on July 7th!

And I'm not gonna lie...I'm super excited that it's coming in December. What a happy month to come into this world right? I keep watching any movie that takes place during Christmas time because I just want to skip ahead to Christmas! Little Women has been the most recent reoccurring movie in our home, but I usually have to sneak it in when Jeffrey's not here ;)