What Baby #2 Looks Like!

Just like we did a 3D/4D Ultrasound for Nolan, we decided to do the same for baby #2, and we were super excited to find out what baby girl was going to look like in detail!  We visited the same ultrasound studio that we did with Nolan, Vegas Baby 4D Ultrasound, and right around the same time frame (29 weeks, 4 days this time vs. 28 weeks, 6 days with Nolan).  

On the morning of the ultrasound, I made sure to eat some jellybeans and drink a ton of cold water right before we visited, since the last time we went with Nolan, he was stubborn and refused to move much and it made it difficult to get good pictures.  We met up with my mom, and when we went inside, Nolan was totally distracted by the fun toys they had and could care less about seeing baby Sissy on the big screen! Ha.  

As we got started, we noticed her hands were right in front of her face, and I knew from that second that she was going to be just like her big bro- stubbbbbbborn!  Sure enough, we struggled to get some good pictures, since she was pretty set on sticking in one spot and keeping those hands right in front of her face and eyes!  From what we did get to see, little miss has more than just her stubbornness in common with Nolan... she looks JUST like he did in his ultrasound pictures!  She has a very similar nose and lips, which we can't wait to kiss!  She even gave us a quick little smirk, right in the beginning, which had us melting instantly.

In between trying to get good facial shots, the tech did some measurements and checked on baby's heartbeat, position, weight, blood flow from the cord and my placenta.  Everything looked great, with baby being head down already and weighing in at 2 pounds 10 ounces.  Compared to Nolan's ultrasound in the past, she's already bigger than he was (barely over 2 pounds around the same time), and the chunky cheeks we got to see in the pictures speaks for itself that she may be a chunker!  Her heartbeat was steadily in the 130s, which has been consistent with the doppler readings I've been getting at home, between 130-140s.  She showed off her tiny little ears, and the tech confirmed, yet again, that this little one is all girl!  While checking for gender, she gave us a little toe touch show, using her hands to continually grab her feet!  Super cute.

She was definitely a sleepy little thing and didn't want to move for anything!  Keeping her hands up by her face, she looked so peaceful and even gave us a little yawn to swoon over.  

At the end, she decided to place her hand under her chin and show us just how chubby those cheeks really are... and oh my goodness, these are definitely my favorite pictures of the session!  It's so amazing how excited you can be about a new baby, but once you see these detailed ultrasounds, with their movements and features, you fall sooo much more in love with them! 

In comparison to Nolan's ultrasound, I did a side by side to see how alike these two really look.  Judge for yourself, but we're convinced they are going to be twins!  

(Baby girl is on the top in both photos, Nolan is on the bottom)

We really cannot wait to meet this little baby girl and welcome her into our family!  I can't wait to snuggle those cheeks and kiss those pouty little lips!  It's coming up SO soon!

January Happenings

We kicked off the New Year by getting a glimpse of baby girl at our 23 week ultrasound, which actually turned into our 22 week ultrasound since my Due Date was changed by 5 days.  Little Miss was extremely active and all over the place, but everything looked great and developing on track.  We got this sweet little profile to admire, and I feel like she may look more like me than Nolan does/did.  Can't wait to find out!

We started a new session of classes at the rec center, and this round, we decided to try out a Messy Friday art class with our besties.  Nolan was immediately more comfortable in the class than any other he's taken since he had his buddy Hudson there with him, and they both seem to enjoy the weekly arts and crafts each class offers.  This week, they got down and dirty with paint!  

Nolan insisted on rocking in the rocking chair with his baby shish-ter and all of his stuffed animal friends.

He started playing with one of my old Cabbage Patch Dolls, calling her sissy, and picked her up one afternoon, totally random, and started rocking her saying, "I Love Sissy", "Sissy, Love You!" which made me melt into a million pieces.  When I tried to record it, he just decided to talk a lot of gibberish to her, instead. 

Nolan turned TWO and we celebrated with a fun Sesame Street party with all of his closest friends and family!  We also had a low-key birthday at home on his actual birth-day.

The morning after his birthday, we set up his new basketball hoop, which he has been obsessed with ever since.  When he makes baskets, he's now learned to say, "Swish!"

When the weather warmed up, we headed outside to ride our Lightning McQueen car (or KaChow, as Nolan likes to call him).

I snapped a picture of the ever-so-styled dude before our Preschool class at the rec center one morning.  He's too much with those glasses.

Nolan played in his awesome new Sesame Street tent from Auntie Stacey and absolutely loves it!

We went grocery shopping and I finally caved and let Nolan ride in the humongous car cart, and other than it being ridiculous to push and getting all the stares, he absolutely loved it and made grocery shopping a little bit easier that day. 

He sported his adorable Star Wars robe that Auntie Erin and Uncle Jeremy gave him for his birthday, as I squealed with excitement over how adorable he looked in it (don't mind the hat, he insisted on taking his picture with it on).

I tried videotaping him singing Let It Go, from Frozen, now that he likes to sing songs (or his version of singing every 3rd word), but instead I got a typical boy-response... a burp and laughter.  

Daddy and Nolan read books together before bedtime one night, and they looked like complete twins (the older Nolan gets, the more and more he looks just like his Daddy).

We visited the doctor for Nolan's 2 year checkup, and this was his first ride in the carseat forward facing since we hit the 2-year mark.  He absolutely loves facing forward and gets so excited to ride in the car now (before he was getting extremely irritated and uncomfortable rear-facing, which is why we made the switch since it was acceptable for his age, height and weight).  

Nolan made some handmade (literally) Elmo Thank You cards for all of his party guests, and they came out super cute!

We hit the 24-week mark in this pregnancy! 

I started some major shopping for the babe's nursery, and am so excited about how it is coming along!  

Nolan had an absolute blast at his Messy Friday class when they got to play with shaving cream!  At first he was a little hesitant about the huge mess, but soon enough, he got right in and played away.  He thought hiding the toys in it and making "castles" was the coolest thing, and Mommy thought the colors were pretty sweet, too.

We definitely were lacking on the pictures and videos this month... between all of our activities, classes, being sick and just plan 2-year old craziness and all-over-the-placeness.... it's hard to document everything!  We'll try better next month!!

Baby #2 Gender Reveal... Disneyland Style!

When we planned our Disney trip for the holiday season, we weren't expecting yet, although we were trying.  In the early stages of planning our trip, I had imagined how cool it would be to announce our pregnancy or, if the timing was even more perfect, unveil our gender reveal while we were visiting Disneyland.  To my amazing surprise, our timing worked out absolutely perfectly, and even though we would have to wait a few extra weeks to find out the gender (I would be 16 weeks, 6 days at the reveal), Jason and I both agreed it would be totally worth the surprise by doing it in Disney!  

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!  

Although there were moments of temptation here and there those first few days of keeping the envelope sealed, it was completely and totally worth the wait to find out in the Happiest Place on Earth.  This definitely ranks as one of the top moments and surprises in our lives, and we couldn't be more thrilled to be welcoming a little baby girl into our family!  Nolan is going to be the best big brother and I know he will love and protect this little chick so, so much! 

We obviously had to take lots and lots of "Baby Sister" pictures in Disneyland... Enjoy!

Here's to our little baby girl!  Let the shopping begin!  Yay!!