Julie and I have had this day on our calendar for 2 months — Friday, October 17th — the doctor’s appointment to determine the sex of the baby.

If you asked us each what we thought we were having or what we wanted to have up until Friday, you would have had an uncertain and very reserved answer. Julie “felt” like it was a girl long ago — many superstitions and some facts gave some grounds to back it up, but nothing was for certain. (She had only known girls growing up with 3 sisters and no brothers, so I attribute some of her feeling to that.)

I, on the other hand, was very torn. I knew what I WANTED. However, I reserved my desires in the event that the nurse told us that we were in fact having the OPPOSITE of my preference. My real desire was to have an impartial yet excited reaction when we found out, so I told everyone that I would be happy either way. It’s in God’s hands and we truly have no control over the situation.

However, God does know each of our hearts — whether we vocalize it or not.

When the sonogram, showed “two legs and something in between”, Julie and I almost cried right there in front of the nurse. It was amazing. She and I had been holding back what our true preference was so that we wouldn’t be disappointed. Now that we knew, it was a huge weight off our shoulders and we could get back to being excited about the pregnancy. In the blink of an eye, our future as parents had a much more defined path and it is the path we each hoped to be on.

I am more excited now that I ever imagined I could be. I’m anxious to meet my own son!

-RB

ps — The only question left: Does he throw with his right or left?

Living in a 3-2 house has afforded us the space to have a spacious office AND an extra bedroom for guests. That extra bedroom has come in handy several times in the 2+ years we’ve been in the house. The list of distinguished guests includes: Amber, Lindy, Simon, Grandma Killam and even a group of traveling christian skaters (they came to give their testimony and demonstration to kick-off “Skate Church”, a new outreach ministry at our church). Before the end of the year we are likely to host another friend that will be in-between appartments for a few weeks, and then Grandma Killam again. As you can see, our extra bedroom has been utilized and we’ve enjoyed the ability to offer it to those who have needed a place to stay.

All that is about to change.

To say that Julie has been excited about transforming our extra bedroom into the new baby room would be an understatement. She sees visions of safari animals and baby cribs and rocking chairs dancing around in her head. No offense to Simon, but she was so anxious for him to move out so she could begin her nesting and transform this rather drab-colored room into a “Baby Safari”.

The closet in this extra bedroom has been the resting ground for crafts, holiday decorations, extra hanging garments and unused wedding gifts. The first steps toward transformation is to clean out (and relocate) a lot of the “stuff” in that closet. The usual three piles of cleaning apply: Trash, Save, Give Away. It’s always good to do…. but it’s just freakin’ tedious!!

We’ll keep the extra bed in that room until it is time to trade out the bed for the crib, but a word of caution to our house guests until then: you may have flashbacks of daycare during the night.

-RB

We’ve had to put our baby blog on the back burner for the last two weeks, but not much has happened on that front either. I was in Costa Rica for a week, and then Julie left for Anacortes, WA about 12 hours after I returned.

While Julie was in Washington, she stayed the weekend with her Aunt Candy and Uncle Ed. We rarely see them and it was the perfect time for Julie to tell them in person… Candy was ecstatic and immediately took Julie shopping for maternity clothes. Back in Texas, Julie’s Uncle Tim and Aunt Jenny were in San Antonio and we were all over at the Reasonovers’ for dinner and a trip to the neighborhood pool. This was Julie’s family, but I stepped-in to break the news during another rare face-to-face meeting. Julie Anne, a cousin, immediately jumped to give me a hug and went to her phone… I told her “Your mom (Candy) already knows!” She responded with disgust, “How dare she not tell me!!??”. There’s a reason we chose this order…

Once Julie returned from her business in Washington, we were finally set to start spreading the word. The events for the weekend gave us some prime opportunities to talk to people one-on-one in person and share the reaction.

First up was the baby shower for Sarah Pike that Julie and her mother and sisters were invited to. Sarah and her husband, Jim, are college friends of Julie’s and are due in October. We have had an ongoing couple relationship with them as we have each been married and made the time to hang out a the river at least once a year. Julie was afraid of stealing Sarah’s thunder so she told her the news in private, but it was Sarah that asked Julie if she could tell everyone. The shower attendees congratulated Julie, and Sarah graciously shared the spotlight.

That evening, we attended a wedding for a couple from the church that Julie met on her trip to Rwanda last year. Several of our closest friends from church were there and it was too good of an opportunity to pass up. The best reaction of the night goes to Perry — he gave us both a hug and then looked me in the eyes and said, “Now you’ve proven your manhood, good job!”

At church the next morning, we went to our usual 9:30am service. I was most excited to see my cousin Patty and her husband, Jeff. We’ve been sitting with them pretty regularly at church lately and their daughter Katharine is always excited to sit with Julie and I. At the end of the service, we told Patty and Jeff and several other friends. Hope, one friend from bible study, broke down and cried when she gave Julie a very emotional and sincere hug. She and all of our bible study have been praying for us for quite some time. We stuck around for the beginning of the later service to catch those friends that we had not seen earlier. When we got home we realized how many of those key people we saw in such a short amount of time!!

We likely have a couple more phone calls to make, but at this point we are certain that the word is going to spread faster than we can control… it’s like herding cats. We want to thank all you for your prayers, your concern and your love. Julie tells me that she has never felt more special or loved than she has in the last few days that we have been sharing our news.

-RB

Julie and I are fortunate enough to have all four grandmothers still alive and kickin’. It never fails that when we take the time to see them, they always tell us goodbye and say, “you should come see us more often.” What grandkid has ever heard that before and NOT been overcome with guilt? When we think to explain our busy lives we try to find reasons within the society that our generation has created, but then even that answer doesn’t even sound good in our head. Grandparents have that special place in our hearts that we respect and love in a completely different way than any other relative, and we all do our best make time for them in our lives.

For each of our grandmothers, we set aside the time to talk-to or visit with them to share the news. Julie called Grandma Killam in Temple. We stopped by Granny Reasonover’s house during the 12 hours that Julie and I were together in town after my Costa Rica trip and before her Washington trip. We visited with my dad’s mom and stepdad, Mama B and Papa Roy after church on Sunday. I talked to Grandma Pribyl on the phone while she was in Houston celebrating Uncle Joe’s birthday with most of my mom’s siblings.

Each event was special to us. However, what we’ve realized is that we certainly played it up more in our heads than what actually happened. We realized that our grandparents have done this before… this isn’t news of their first child, or grandchild, and in most cases even first great-grandchild. Our grandmothers are seasoned veterans and the news of new life… just isn’t new!!

Now, I’m not saying they weren’t happy for us. Each of them had responses of joy and congratulations, but it’s like they either already KNEW it, or it was just another verse to a song they’ve heard before. I guess you could compare it to the economic law of Diminishing Returns.

-RB