Welcome New Readers!

I picked up a few new feed subscribers and "followers" yesterday after that whole ugly episode with you-know-who about the you-know-what.

Hi new readers!

A part of me feels a lot of pressure to impress you all with my wit and my deep understanding of... something.  Another part of me had a long day and is really sleepy, and doesn't want to post at all.  But I can't disappoint all the new readers!  So here it is, today's post.

Claire (3-1/2 years old) says "melodade" instead of "lemonade" and it cracks me up. 

No no, I'm kidding.  I mean, she says that, but that isn't today's post...  Calm down.  I wouldn't want everyone to click "unsubscribe!" at once.  We might break the internet.

My midwife's husband wrote a beautiful article about her in a national magazine, but I can't link to it because it gives away my hometown which is Against Editorial Policy.  You'll just have to trust me when I tell you that the article was amazing and made me cry, and it made me so grateful that I've found my midwife, Sharon.  I loved my OB and mourned when he left town, but I couldn't be happier with the care I'm getting right now.

I'm halfway through my third pregnancy, new readers.  20 weeks yesterday, in fact.  But as we all know, the second half is longer than the first half.  For one thing, you're not even pregnant for a couple weeks of the first half, which is totally cheating.  For another, everything takes longer when you can't see your own feet.  The baby will come around Christmas.  We don't know if it's a boy or a girl.

A bunch of people are peeved with me for not finding out the baby's gender.  I tried explaining my reasoning to Jen tonight on the phone, and I'm going to see if I can summarize it here.  When you find out what you're having at 20 weeks, you have 20 more weeks to mourn the baby you're not having.  If you want a boy but you're having a girl, you have to say goodbye to all the snips and snails and puppy dog tails.  You pass cute little blue outfits in the store, and get a little wistful that you won't be able to see your little imaginary man in those cute outfits.  Of course, it's exactly the same if you want a girl and you're having a boy, except with sugar and spice and pink outfits.

However, when you find out at the birth, you don't mourn the baby you're not having.  You're so enthralled with the real baby that's in your arms, that you just pushed into the world, that you don't care if it's not the gender you were hoping to have. 

So since BJ and I honestly do not have any preference, we decided not to find out. 

Of course, that's only part of the reason - it's also part of the experience, for us, to hear, "It's a _____!" at that first moment.  There's also superstition - it's bad luck to name a baby before he or she is born!

Sometimes it's just fun to not know, and to let life unfold the way it's going to.  We don't have many mysteries in this life, anymore, and it's nice to let this baby remain a mystery until we can hold him or her.

If you're new, leave a comment and say hi!