After much Googling for Disney gender reveals, I couldn't get too much information on how to go about doing it while in the park. I had read only a few stories about other couples having the character reveal the ultrasound photo, or having the cashier at a souvenir store surprise them by putting in a Mickey or Minnie plush or Pink or Blue Mickey ears in a box, and revealing it that way. I decided, why not try to put the two together, and have the Mickey ears be a surprise while a character reveals them to us!? After one more intense Google search, I found one other family that did this in Disney World, but just a quick description on a Disney message board was all the help I received. After calling Disneyland and speaking with City Hall and multiple Cast Members, it was basically up to me to pull the whole thing off, so I had a pretty set plan and just rolled with it as we started our trip. Since we wouldn't be in the park until mid-afternoon on Wednesday, our first day there, I decided we could hold out one more day to find out bright and early in the morning, hopefully avoiding some crowds, too, and getting some one on one time with the character of our choosing.
Since we had some leftover time to spend on Wednesday night, with Disney California closing early, we decided to grab our ultrasound sealed envelope and head over to World of Disney, to see if they could help us out with packaging our surprise Mickey ears. When I brought both pink and blue to the embroidery counter (because Nolan got his own ears, to be embroidered, of course!) the Cast Member screamed with excitement that she was going to help us with our reveal. She called over two other Cast Members and they all were giddy to be a part of this experience, which cracked Jason and I up. I figured this was a pretty common thing, but they all insisted that they had never done this before and wanted to make it extra special for us! They were so sweet, and took their time to make sure nothing was left to ruin the surprise (they even crossed out things on receipts, made us turn our backs and close our eyes, and couldn't stop smiling the entire time)! At the end of it all, we left with a Disneyland bag with our ears wrapped tightly, no peeking allowed. We had waited this long to find out, so we weren't about to ruin the surprise by waiting a few extra hours overnight!
When we got to Disneyland on Thursday morning, I hurried over to City Hall while Nolan and Jason checked out Main Street and waved to some characters. We preferred to have Mickey open our surprise, so I had a Cast Member track down where and when to go visit Mickey, which ended up being in Toon Town. As we made our way over, we realized we had about 20 minutes to spare before Toon Town opened for the day, so we took some pictures at the Castle and then hopped onto It's a Small World and enjoyed the decked out Christmas theme throughout the ride, which was so magical!
It was finally time to visit Mickey and find out what baby-on-the-way was going to be! Mickey's house had about a 15 minute wait, so Jason waited in line while Nolan and I explored Toon Town. When we came back, Jason was right towards the front, and we snapped a picture to send to our friends and family for one final guess! Boy or girl!?
Mickey was ah.may.zing with helping us perform the gender reveal, and the Cast Member took photos with my camera (because there was no Photopass member taking pictures- um, hello? This is Mickey's house!?), but the guy only took pictures of Nolan and Mickey during the entire thing, instead of all of our reactions. I also had the lady behind us in line take a video of the whole reveal, and she did an amazing job and I'm SO thankful for her excitement and willingness to help out (plus I got screen shots of our faces, which are not the best quality but so amazingly priceless)!
Nolan was in a state of shock by meeting Mickey, and only wanted to cuddle into him initially, but then when we suggested to open the bag with Mickey to find out what the baby was, he intently watched on as Mickey was about to pull out those special ears! Mickey unwrapped, and unwrapped, and unwrapped some more... They really didn't want us to know what was under all of that paper! Finally... Mickey got to the end, and hid the result from Nolan....
The Cast Member asked Nolan if he wanted a baby brother or baby sister, and Nolan said, "SISH-HER!" (which has been his answer since the first day we told him about the new baby). After he responded, Mickey pointed and agreed as he pulled out the ears.....
IT'S A GIRL!!!!!!!!
Jason and I were in complete disbelief and shock! I was 99% sure this baby was a boy, based on how similar the pregnancy was to Nolan's and how little symptoms I've experienced this time around, again. We were hoping for a girl, to experience one of each, and we are so blessed and thankful for it to have worked out the way it did! This experience was by far one of the most exciting and memorable things we've had in our lives, and to be able to capture it all in Disneyland is something so, so special!
We took some photos and thanked Mickey for the amazing experience, and continued to walk through Mickey's house (which was huge, by the way). Nolan was exploring the halls and rooms, super excited to be in Mickey's house, and it finally hit me that we were having a little girl! and I started bawling. It was such an amazing feeling and I was so overwhelmed at the time, but to others walking by us, I must have looked like a lunatic! Mickey's house in Toon Town will never quite feel the same as that moment... and I'm so glad to have that memory forever.
Flash back to a few weeks ago (15 weeks, 1 day), and we had our ultrasound at Miracle In Progress, where my mom, Aunt Denise and Uncle Georges all came with us to sneak a peek at Baby 2.0. I was kept from seeing the images and video on the disc they gave us, because as well as the envelope that housed our baby's gender, the disc revealed the gender, also! So now that we know baby is a little lady, I can post away!
Baby was pretty lazy during our ultrasound, and didn't want to move around to much, but made sure to give a little wave a couple times to say, Hi! (head on left, belly on right)
We listened to baby's heartbeat, and it was a solid 158 BPM. This was one of the very few differences between my current pregnancy and Nolan's- as I listen with the Doppler frequently, baby's heartbeat is always in the 150s. With Nolan, his heart rate was always in the high 170s! The old wives tale is that if the heart rate is high, it's usually a girl, and if it's slower, it's a boy. Apparently in my case, I'm the opposite! This was always one flag that stood out to me with the difference in pregnancies, but not enough to convince me that there was a little chick inside!
Baby looked a little bit like an alien, looking straight at us in this picture, with her hands by her ears (head is on the left, belly on the right):
We got lots of profile shots at the ultrasound, and just like Nolan's gender reveal, I'm amazed at how easy it is to fall in love with these little shots on the screen (head on left, belly on right)!
Towards the end of the ultrasound, and on the video, you can see baby girl scrunching up into a ball, and then stretching out suuuuuuper long right afterwards. It's always the weirdest thing at this stage in pregnancy, because the ultrasound shows so much movement from baby, but I still can't feel anything!
We obviously had to take lots and lots of "Baby Sister" pictures in Disneyland... Enjoy!
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