Surprise!!! We are adding to the Cease family and we couldn't be more excited to welcome a sweet baby GIRL to our family in May. Another girl!! Of course Caroline was dying for a sister and shockingly John Collins said he wanted a "baby gurl." I have the best sister in the world and am not sure what I would've done without her throughout all these years and so I always prayed that Caroline would have a sister to enjoy that special bond with. I pray that they share the same relationship that Mary Catherine and I do.
We went back and forth about whether we felt our family was complete and Alan and I both kept having a gut feeling that we needed one more baby to love. God has blessed us beyond what we deserve and we don't take our children or their health for granted. We had the sweetest day revealing to the kids that there was a baby on the way and then announcing the gender with family.
I found out I was expecting on a Thursday afternoon in September. I dropped Caroline off at ballet and could NOT wait until the next morning to test so I ran by CVS, grabbed a test, and stopped at the shell gas station in Crestline to see if my suspicions were correct. Looking back, that whole situation sounds pretty crazy and I honestly cannot believe I took a pregnancy test in a gas station bathroom. Still laughing at that. Alan was working until midnight that night so I waited very impatiently for him to get home. When he got home I videoed him as he walked in our room and I told him. His reaction was the sweetest and we enjoyed the next few minutes talking about how excited we were!!!
Fast forward to finding out the gender. I am HORRIBLE at waiting and doing things the "right" way. See above about the gas station test :) So when the doctor's office called with the 10 weeks genetic screening results I told Alan that I would not find out the gender over the phone (like I did with John Collins because I couldn't resist) and would let them send us an envelope and we could find out together. Welllllll I didn't really obey this time either. After the nurse told me that the genetic screening results were all normal she said "and do you want to know the gender of this baby?" and I said YES before I could even think. So driving in the car, with my kids in the back seat I learned that I was carrying a sweet baby girl. Of course I started crying and the kids were very confused but it was such a sweet moment that I will never forget. So I called Alan to tell him that the genetic screening results were in and everything was normal and his next words were "So is it a boy or a girl?" He clearly knows me too well. He knew I couldn't wait and had more than likely already found out. So I told him over the phone that we were having a girl :) It may not have been a big "to-do" but it was super sweet to me!
We DID surprise our family with the gender! I didn't spoil that one :)
