Getting ready for the baby

Michelle and I have made some pretty good progress getting ready for the baby.  Michelle has been painting the habitat murals, and I have been installing the diaper sprayer.  Tomorrow Michelle will start adding the animals that family has drawn for us to add to the mural and I will start working on the sky.  The sky will have glow-in-the-dark paint that will replicate the alignment of the stars of her due date (since we want to have it done BEFORE she's born and won't actually know the real birthdate).  Here are some pictures of our progress.

3D Ultrasound

Michelle and I decided to get a 3D ultrasound done because it seems very interesting. Our friends just had one done for their twins and it was really neat. The other lady in our class also had one done for their first child and shared it with us during the class. Michelle looked into them and there are a few in our area (within 3 hours driving time). She decided on Glendale since they have the best deal. This is not a medically significant ultrasound and it seems more obvious when they offer xmas deals! I don't remember real medical procedures having holiday specials... In fact, our insurance will not cover the exam since it is optional and not medically significant, but the "deal" is for only $100 so we decided to do it and we'll pay out of pocket. Depending on when we get home tomorrow night, I'll either post the video and pictures tomorrow or xmas day.

On the way down there, we also plan on doing to shopping since we don't get many opportunities. We are planning on stopping by Linens N Things to use our gift card before they go out of business. We also will stop by some furniture stores to look for rocker/recliners for Michelle. The trip also gives us an opportunity to eat at a good (normal for those who aren't deprived) restaurant. We've never eaten at a Claim Jumpers and we now have one in Palmdale so we might try that, but they also have Famous Daves and since we won't be in Brookfield this xmas I will be missing my opportunity there. Unfortunately, the weather and recliner will mean we will have to drive instead of fly, and we'll have to leave the dogs outside in the cold all day, but we're excited to see our little girl's face!

WI baby shower

While we were back for Brian and Angie's wedding, Michelle's family decided to throw her a baby shower. It's pretty early for a shower since she isn't due until February 23rd, but this will be our last visit to WI before then, so it was good timing.

Chris and Vân were able to drive down from Minneapolis Saturday night so we were able to catch up with them that night. Sunday morning started off early with a breakfast. Guests were over early since they were still in town from Brian and Angie's wedding. Mark made biscuits and gravy and Michelle and Carley's moms cooked frittatas. My mom brought over fruit, cookies, and cupcakes.

Someone set up some games such as melted candy bars in diapers. I didn't even want to look so I didn't play; Laura took first place! It was so nice to be able to see everybody again since we don't get back too often and when we do it's usually limited to immediate family. My Uncle David and Aunt Gerry were able to make it as well as our friends Chris and Vân.

There were all sorts of gifts from everybody, too many for me to list here. We are so thankful to everybody just for being able to come and visit, that alone is really such a great gift since we don't get back to WI very often. Here's a picture that shows everything that we got all together.

It's a Girl!

So Michelle and I went to the doctor today for her sonogram. The baby looks perfectly healthy, all of the measure were proportional and no defects were found. The doctor was also able to get a good picture this time and said it is a girl! Here is a link to the ultrasounds if you'd like to see them.

http://picasaweb.google.com/jayson.brouchoud/Baby?authkey=RVDuy5S0VIQ#slideshow

Now that we know the sex we can start thinking about names. We didn't start thinking about names yet since it would be twice as hard if you have to think of both boys and girls names.

It's an UNSURE!

We had the ultrasound yesterday morning that we were supposed to find out the sex of the baby. It turns out that it was positioned so they had to look through Michelle's belly button and it wouldn't open it's legs so he couldn't tell. He said if he had to guess, he'd call it a girl for now, but he said he really didn't know. The last ultrasound before this one he said he thought it was a boy, but it was too early to know for sure so we are still at 50/50. We are going in for a sonogram in 2 weeks so we'll have another chance then to find out.

Here is a link to the ultrasound pic if you want to see. The head is on the right and it has it's hand over it's mouth.

http://picasaweb.google.com/jayson.brouchoud/Baby?authkey=RVDuy5S0VIQ#5253327579089623250

Dr. appt delayed

The doctor appt that where Michelle and I were supposed to find out the sex of our baby this last Tuesday 9/23 had to be delayed. I got sent on travel and I was really the guy to go. The other person in our group didn't work on this material and had been on travel for 2 consecutive weeks so I was on my way to DC. Michelle rescheduled it for it for 9/29, but I was already scheduled for travel to Tucson so she had to reschedule it to Friday 10/3. So until next Friday, it's still a mystery!

Baby announcement party

Sorry if this post sucks, but I had it all written and then explorer crashed.  I though Google saved drafts regularly???

I thought I posted earlier about the party we had to announce that Michelle is pregnant, but I don't see it so I'll post something now.  For a little background, we're supposed to host a party when we get a promotion at work.  I never hosted my last party and was joking that I wasn't getting paid enough, but a senior engineer forwarded it to the bosses questioning why I hadn't been promoted.

After I explaining to him that I already was promoted and was only joking and whining for another, he claimed he didn't know I was already promoted since I never hosted my party.  Long story short, we finally hosted my promotion party on August 23, 2008.

We figured this would be a good time to announce to the world that Michelle was pregnant.  We had just told family so we might as well tell everybody else now.  Since I didn't want to make a formal announcement and big deal out of it, I decided to wear my t-shirt at the promotion party.

Since the shirt didn't get the best response out the announcement to the Brouchoud family in WI, I decided to modify it for clarification.  The shirt originally said "I love hot moms", but I added a carrot with an a between love and hot and crossed out the s on moms so it now reads "I love a hot mom".  After awhile people figured it out and word spread quickly.  I know the shirt is pretty bad, but if you know me, then you're not surprised.

Here is a front and back picture of the shirt.

Michelle feels like a defective typewriter...

We got the confirmation on Monday July 14th when we went in for the first exam/ultrasound. Michelle is officially spaghetti sauce, I mean prego. We had been expecting this and had to play down while Michelle wasn't drinking during our vacation back for Laura's wedding last month. Some of you weren't too fooled, but now you know officially. Well not really since as I type this we haven't yet told anybody. This will go into draft until we tell family and friends, then I'll post it.

Not being able to think of a better way to tell everybody, I'm going to combine two ideas from Mark (Michelle's brother). First he had Tierney wear a t-shirt to announce Norah, and second he had a shirt that said I love hot moms. We'll see how long it takes my family to figure out from my I love hot moms t-shirt. Michelle's family will have it a little more difficult, but still shouldn't have a problem since they are so movie savvy. Her's says I feel like a defective typewriter. This is a quote from Grease, the rest of the line is I skipped a period.

The due date is February 23, 2009. Now our families might also have a better idea of why we've been saying we won't be home for x-mas this year. We'll be busy getting our crap together and won't have the funds since it'll be going into getting ready for a kid. Here is a link to the 1st ultrasound if you'd like to see it. The next appointment isn't until we get back from the Brouchoud family reunion in Michigan.

http://picasaweb.google.com/jayson.brouchoud/Baby?authkey=RVDuy5S0VIQ