Ainsley's going to have a little SISTER (and a BOY cousin)!!!

IT'S A GIRL!!! 

We had our 21 week sonogram last Friday.  I was scheduled (or suppose to be) for my monthly checkup before my sonogram, but they didn't have me on their schedule and the doctor wasn't even in the office, so I only got my sonogram that day.  We were lucky and got our favorite sonographer, Holly. 

I had actually talked Joel into possibly not finding out the sex of the baby during the sonogram, and instead waiting until later that evening when everyone else found out at our gender reveal party.  A minute or so into the scan, I asked Holly if she could tell what it was, and she said she had a pretty good idea.  Of course, Joel said he thought he already knew also from looking at the scan.  I thought I knew, because I thought I saw something sticking out between the baby's legs.  I told her to go ahead and tell me and she moved the wand over to reveal a girl!  When I say I was shocked, that's putting it lightly!  I thought for sure it was a boy!!!  The entire pregnancy I had a feeling it was a boy and we even called the baby "him".  I think I asked Holly five or six times over the course of the sonogram if she was sure it was a girl.  We didn't care either way what the sex was, but I just "knew" it was a boy, so I was completely taken off guard.

It's a girl!

Two girls!  What are we going to do in 15 years when they're both teenagers?!?!  Joel's happy with two girls.  He said it's going to save some money, since we don't have to go out and buy all new clothes, etc.  I think he's only thinking about the immediate future and not in the years to come when we'll have two proms, weddings, etc.  Poor Joel!!!

Everything looked good on the sonogram and the baby looked perfect.  She's measuring right on track, which was a relief.  Ainsley was already measuring small at her 20 week sonogram, which is when they started watching her closer and I had to have sonograms every few weeks.  This baby is measuring in the 60th percentile.  She was 14 ounces and is already acting like her big sister.  She only showed her face at the very beginning and then hid it in my pelvic bone and wouldn't show her cute little face again, no matter how hard we tried to get her to move! 

Baby feet

It's hard to see....but this is the best profile shot we got

We were able to get a few pictures with the 3D sonogram, but the umbilical cord was right in front of her face.  It seems like we never get any good sonogram pictures!

Precious baby face with arms

The only bad news we got during the scan was my placenta is sitting in front of my cervix, which is called placenta previa.  It's only mild, and the doctor thinks that in a few weeks it will move on it's own so it's not blocking the cervix.  I'll have another sonogram around 32 weeks to check.  If, by chance, it's still blocking my cervix, then I'll have to have a c-section.  The doctor said I shouldn't have any symptoms, though, so hopefully in the next few weeks it moves and we can go on like normal.

We had a small "gender reveal" party that night to reveal the sex to our parents, etc.  I think I had a smile on my face the whole way back to Jacksonville and would just start laughing and looking at Joel asking him if it was really another girl.  I was still in shock!  I was planning on putting either pink or blue balloons in a box and letting them out to reveal the sex that night.  We had to stop in Jacksonville on the way home to get the balloons.  I ran into the Dollar Tree to get a few pink balloons and was told they couldn't fill up balloons because they didn't have any helium and that all of Jacksonville was still without helium because of the helium shortage.  Last year when I was getting ready for Ainsley birthday party, I had to buy a helium tank from Walmart because everyone was out of helium then.  I guess we really do have a helium shortage if we've been without it for a year now!!!  So, we headed to Walmart to buy a helium tank and some pink balloons.  It was pretty busy in Walmart that afternoon, so I hid the package of pink balloons under my purse.  I just knew we'd end up running into someone while we were in there and they'd see the balloons.  Sure enough, we saw Rita and then later Jim!  Rita thought she knew what it was by the look on Joel's face, and she said "boy"!  We just laughed and told her she'd have to wait to find out!  We were able to get out of Walmart without anyone seeing the pink balloons.

Everyone arrived that evening and I had them sign either a pink or blue piece of paper on what they thought it was.  The only ones that guessed it was a girl was Mom, Kathleen, and Lani.  Everyone else thought it was a boy!  Of course, Joel had thought up another wonderful name for a boy.  He said we would name him James Thomas and call him "Jim Tom".  I think it's a name of one of the guys off of the t.v. show "Moonshiners".  If this baby would have been a boy, I think it was going to take us until the baby came out and we were in the hospital to actually decide on a name for him. 

Waiting to reveal what the baby is

Ainsley had to stand on the tote before we revealed

It's PINK!

We all went down to the basement so we could open the "present" and reveal pink or blue balloons.  Here's a video of the reveal.

Of course, Ainsley had to stand on the tote, making everyone wait a few more seconds to find out the sex.  I swear, she has to stand or walk on anything that's on the floor.  I think most were surprised to see the pink balloons come out of the tote.

We all sat around, eating and visiting, the rest of the evening.  Of course, Drake and Jennifer entertained us.  Drake showed us how he does "The Dougie" and Jennifer showed off her awesome cartwheel! 

Guys...

Some of the girls

Ainsley and Lani playing

Hadlee and Ainsley

That night, I was anxiously awaiting the time that I could find out what Thomas and Jamie's baby was, though!  Jamie's sonogram was the same day, and they were waiting until they got back to her parent's house to reveal the news.  They filled up a black balloon with either green confetti for a boy or red confetti for a girl and had Jamie's family pop one balloon at a time, with only one having the confetti.  I finally got the call around 9 that night and was able to FaceTime with them and watch the balloons being popped.  Avery picked the balloon for Jackie to pop and out came GREEN confetti!  (Avery wasn't too happy at that point because she didn't like the balloon being popped!)  Thomas and Jamie are having a BOY!!!  I figured they'd have a boy, though.  Like someone said, they just couldn't see Thomas with a girl!

I think it took me forever to fall asleep that night.  It was a lot of news to take in in one day!!!  We had Christmas at Aunt Roycelyn's the next day, and we were going to Dad's before to let him watch the video from the night before of the reveal since he had to work and couldn't come.  Dad guessed it was a girl, because he said Joel didn't sound very excited on the phone when he called the day before to try to find out beforehand! 

Thomas and Jamie had bought a pinata to fill with either green candy for a boy or red candy for a girl to take to Aunt Roycelyn's to reveal the sex.  I had them put some red candy in it for us, so we both could use the same thing.  I told everyone that there was either green or red candy in the pinata, and everyone thought that meant we were both having the same thing, either a boy or a girl.   The kids all took turns hitting the pinata, even though I thought for sure Aunt Bessie was going to jump in at any point to give it a good whack since it was taking the kids forever!  They finally got it open and I don't know if the women from the "older" generation are getting color blind, or what the problem was, but for some reason they only saw green candy!  Kara had yelled out she saw green and red candy a few minutes before, but no one listened to her!  Everyone finally realized there was both green and red candy on the floor and the news was out!

Waiting to start hitting the pinata

Maddax got it down!!

Delaney couldn't wait to hit it!

Aunt Royce and Aunt Bessie when they finally realized there was green and RED candy!!!

We had Christmas at Aunt Doris's the next day, and Thomas and Jamie filled two black balloons with pink or blue confetti and we let Clint pop them to reveal the sex.  Here's a video of our balloon being popped.  And, here's the video of Thomas and Jamie's balloon being popped.

It was nice to be able to tell everyone over the holiday weekend the sex of the babies and see their reactions.  It beats sending out a mass text or calling everyone!!!

I was 21 weeks last Sunday and Jamie would have been 22 weeks on Monday.  Jamie's sonogram went good and the baby is healthy.  The sonographer actually said her due date could be moved up three days, but the doctor doesn't move the due date, so they're sticking with April 29th.  Here's a belly picture of the two of us on Sunday. 

Baby Freeman would be the one that resides in the bigger belly.

My hips have started to hurt at night when laying in bed.  I can no longer sleep on my stomach, so that leads to not much sleep.  I've had terrible heartburn again, and had to get up in the middle of the night the other night to take some Tums.  I had pretty bad heartburn with Ainsley and forgot how bad it can actually be!  I'm feeling the baby move more and more with definite kicks.  It seems like every time Ainsley's on my lap, the baby starts moving around.  I think they're already vying for my attention.

21 weeks