There's Something I Need to Tell You

       People always ask how you found out you were pregnant. Everyone has some hysteria, which soon turns to comedy, to share. Mine was no different. I had taken a test and left before the result. "They're always negative", I thought, "why stick around?" So I made dinner, poured myself a glass of wine, and caught up on the news with my husband. Eventually, I went to the bathroom and remembered the test. To my surprise, I saw two very distinct lines, but I still wasn't sold. I chugged a couple bottle of waters and tested again- it was negative. So I went on with my night.  Around 3am, I woke up remembering back from nursing school, that water can dilute the sample resulting in a false negative. I also remembered that false positives are very, very rare. So I took one more test and there they were again- two lines. I took 14 more tests and everyone of them had the same result. I knew I wanted to tell JG with some element of creativity, so I opted to wait until after he got home from work that evening. I waited fifteen hours to tell Justin, fifteen long hours, but his face was well worth it.

      As soon as the mall opened, I drove to Von Maur and picked out a little sleeper. I had it wrapped it in a very masculine plaid paper, but not before I slipped this into the box 

JG got home from work that day as I was making dinner. He saw the box on the counter and asked what it was. I told him I knew he'd been working hard, it was just a small something to say "thank you". In true "Justin form" he had to shake the box to guess what was in it before opening it. "Am I going to like it?" He asked. "Is this going to be the best gift ever" My face stayed calm, but my heart was racing. " I have a feeling you are going to LOVE this. You fool, just open the box," I thought. And when he finally did, the face I saw was a face I wish I could have frozen in time. Disbelief, followed by tears and sheer love. It was magical.  We sipped on this, caught our breath, and wiped away our tears, and then we began to think of the ways  we would tell the rest of our family. 

Here are some of the ways we came up with:

My mom had been saying Novenas for weeks.  (A prayer of Catholic devotion when asking for something very specific)

And we all know my father was "Google" before there was "Google"

We flew to Minneapolis to surprise my brother-in-law for his 30th birthday and then we surprised him with this:

And this was the final pregnancy announcement that went out:

 Note: when texting your husband about how you'd like to tell your sister, and one of your most favorite people, check the  "To:" section first. Nothing ruins the surprise of telling your sister you're pregnant quite like a mis-text. I may never live it down, but at least she was a good sport.