Joel

I have accomplished a good many things in my 27 going on 28 years, but yesterday was one of my best. I actually kept my mouth shut. For those of you that really know me, I have a really hard time keeping secrets. If I know it then Joe, Sheila, Crystal, and my moms probably know it too. But not this time.

After my last doctor's appointment I sent out an e-mail/blog saying that my next appointment was today, May 27th, and that that is when we would find out the sex of the baby. Well saying that this is definitely our last baby, I really wanted to surprise everyone, so when I sent out that email/blog, it was a lie. We actually had our ultrasound yesterday, May 26th. Joe and I decided that it would be us and the girls that would go to the appointment and that we would surprise everyone with homemade cookies after my appointments. So Monday night we got our cookie pans, cookie dough, baby carriage cookie cutter, pink sprinkles and blue sprinkles out and started working on cookies. Well for those of you are advanced in cookie making, premade cookie dough does not do well with cookie cutters. Every time I would cut out a baby carriage it would mush back together as I picked it up, so finally I gave up and we just made big circles. Jolie did the "girl" cookies, ie the ones with pink sprinkles, and Josie made the "boy" cookies, ie the ones with blue sprinkles. I even had a woman who works with my mom in Flordia to make cookies to give to her yesterday. I had bought cute little colorful bags to put the cookies in and had printed up a special note for everyone to read before opening their bag. Their sheet read, "SURPRISE!!!! We wanted to surprise everyone with the sex of the baby. We actually had our ultrasound today, and it is a … (look at your cookie). Don’t tell anyone yet or say anything yet. We have more deliveries to make and would like to make the announcement ourselves. We love you, Joe, Jess, Josie, Jolie & Baby J." So after my appointments we headed out to our family and closest friends' works and homes. Everyone was surprised. I loved seeing their reactions as they read the note and realized what was going on and then their anticipation as they opened up their bags. I think we even made a few people cry. Our last stop was at our friends Mary-Kelley and Tims around 8:30 p.m. last night. Today is Mary-Kelley's birthday, and I had forgotten to print her off a sheet, so I handed her the bag and she thought it was a birthday present. She opened it and said, "oh y'all made me a cookie." I said, "its a cookie with blue sprinkles." She said, "aww that is so sweet of y'all." And I said again, "Mary-Kelley, it is a cookie with blueeeeeeeeee sprinkles." Then she realized what was going on. Seeing everyone soo happy and excited really made it worth all exhuasted we all were after making all the deliveries.

My appointment went really well. Joel is measuring just as a 20 week fetus should. He was all curled up as if he were napping. I told the woman that I had just eaten so he was sleeping after getting his "full belly" as Josie would say. I am doing good as well. My blood pressure was good and I had neither gained nor lost weight, so my doctor was happy with that as well. It was really neat this time because with both of the girls when they would show us their parts, they would sit there and try to show us that it was a girl, and I never could see it, this time as soon as his boy parts showed up on the screen, I knew it right away. I knew exactly what I was looking at. My Dad has always joked with Joe about putting the "stem on the apple" so instead of writing "boy" on the ultrasound picture, she put "apple stem."

Here is a picture of his sweet little face:


His foot:


And his "boy parts"
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So glad we have so many wonderful people to share this with.