How to announce your pregnancy

Tip #1:  Prepare your parents for the shock


With our first baby, Richard and I were too giddy with excitement to understand/believe that anyone could possibly feel differently.  So we just fired the news at our parents, point blank:

me: Hey everyone!  we're havin' a baby!!
my mom: that's so wonderful!
richard's mom: how exciting!
my dad: congratulations *wipes a tear*
richard's dad: *silence*

Now that I have kids of my own, I realize that I may have misheard their adulations.  The conversation probably went more like this:

me: Hey everyone!  we're havin' a baby!!
my mom: but you haven't finished your degree yet!! isn't this a bit irresponsible?!
richard's mom: do you even have insurance? savings? anything?!
my dad: please tell me you aren't going to need to move back home.  *wipes tear*
richard's dad: *silence*

Tip #2: Grandparents love their grandchildren.  Take advantage of this.

When we were expecting Thing Two, we thought it would be a great idea to have Hannah make the announcement, since she's just so dang cute!  Unfortunately, she couldn't talk yet.

No problem, we thought.  We'll just get a bib that says "World's Best Big Sister!", then take her over to the grandparents for dinner!  so adorable!

Yikes.  Wal-Mart doesn't make bibs for older siblings.  Apparently they assume if you have a child that still needs a bib, you would be crazy to have another.  I completely agree with them.

Solution!  We'll get a Sharpie and write "World's Best Big Sister!" on the back of a cheap, plastic bib.  That'll do just fine.

Half way through dinner:
Sarah: Has anyone noticed Hannah's new bib?!?
Richard's mom: Well, I saw it but I thought it was kinda weird, so....

Tip #3: More Creative does not necessarily mean More Better

For our third little bundle of joy, we decided to think outside of the box.  Do something special, something memorable, something so hilariously funny that it would be the best baby announcement EVER!!!!


The plan: Bake a cake with one of those little Mardi Gras babies in it.  Then when someone gets the baby slice, we yell "We're havin' a BABAH!!!" and have streamers shoot down from the ceiling and balloons float up from under the table and....

It all went wrong:  One mistake led to another and we ended up dropping a minature Dopey (one of the seven dwarfs) into the pot of baked beans.

My Dad: Hey! Um, there's a little person in my beans.
Sarah: That's 'cause we're having a BABAH!!!
My Dad:  Oh.
My Dad: But why is there a little person in my beans, then?

Tip #4: Give it up already

By the time baby four came around, we were tired.  sick and tired.

Sarah: *rushes into parent's house* Hi mom, excuse me...I gotta throw up...
Mom: *backs away*
Sarah: ...'cause I'm pregnant

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Even though mostly everyone knows that we're expecting by now, I thought I should make it "blogger official".   Yes, my last post was about our trip to Hawaii.  No, it is not a coincidence.

Mahalo!