We Have a Life Form...

March 4 was the day. It started much like any other, but we had our first doctor's appointment. I was 14 weeks, to the day, but they wouldn't even let me make my appointment until I was 8 weeks and then I had to wait for the first avail...moderately frustrating. But all of that was forgotten when we walked into the exam room...and heard our baby's heartbeat!!

We Officially Have a Life Form!

It may be slightly politically incorrect, but I often refer to BabyParr as my Little Alien Baby, because, let's face it - it's absolutely insane to think there's a baby growing in my belly...INSANE!

The heartbeat was very fast, 163 to be exact, which the Nurse Practitioner said was perfectly normal. She also said it was perfectly normal that I wasn't showing at all yet. Which, at 17 weeks, I'm still not (I want the bump dammit! No one believes I'm prego!) Apparently you're supposed to be able to tell the baby's gender by how fast or slow the fetal heartbeat is, but thus far we have received nothing but conflicting reports as to how the fast/slowness relates to the male/femaleness. We'll take that Old Wives Tale with a grain of salt.

Which does beg the question, are we going to find out what the baby is? As I will reach the 18 week mark in a couple days, by the time we have our next appointment we should have an ultrasound and it just might be possible to see whether there are boy parts or girl parts...

But, alas, Mr. Thomas and I remain at an impasse as we broach this particular topic. He has made the declaration that he does not want to find out, while I, on the other hand, really, really, reallyreallyreally dooo. He wants us to be surprised together, which is incredibly sweet...but I need to prepare! I have compulsions! Dare I say obsessive compulsions as they pertain to details and preparation for life-altering events, that must be accommodated. How am I supposed to know if I'm shopping for sweet sweet baby Air Jordans, or a plethora of over-the-top headbands and hairbows?? (yes, some of the headbands will have feathers)

Buuut, then again, I don't have to find out. We can have a week's worth of gender-specific outfits on hand and fill in the rest as we go along, right? Actually, the stroller I must have is a gender-neutral gray. And as for the crib and nursery furniture I'll go with my long-time fave espresso-colored. We'll be renting, so it's not like I could paint the baby's room, anyway. So really, I could deal with not knowing. Oof. I think I lose the debate. Cause I know Tomasito won't change his mind. But I guess you never know - he could waver during the ultrasound and decide he wants to know!

Or I could just slip the doctor a note saying I'll call him later to find out the gender, and then just keep it a secret...Haha, I know, I didn't believe the part about me keeping a secret either. Oh, babies!

The All-Sacred First Toy...Has Been Chosen

So Tommy and I were on our way to go out to dinner one night in celebration of getting through our first trimester (Ruby Tuesday, I believe) and he decided he wanted to stop in at Toys R Us first to buy the baby its first toy.

Amid declarations of "I refuse to buy my child any toy that won't make it smarter" and "Why didn't they have this when I was a kid?!" we wandered the aisles of Toys R Us and Tomas tried out nearly every single Leapfrog learning system, robot, light-up device and bicycle. After countless gentle reminders that the baby will be a newborn when it makes its first appearance and the age recommendation of 3-5 years won't apply for quite some time, Tommy finally settled on a delightfully cute pair of maracas that count to three, teach colors, play music and talk not only in english - but spanish as well!

Needless to say the trip was a huge success, and the all-sacred first toy has been chosen aaaand purchased. We'll definitely need to get some new batteries for the maracas by the time the baby can play with them, if you guessed that's because Tom plays with them constantly at home - you're right. This child will have no shortage of fun in its life, guaranteed :)

A few pictures of the momentous occasion...





Cute :)

The Word Is Out...

Well, the word has officially gotten out (a trend started by my mother who spilled the beans to several people mere hours after finding out herself, in spite of explicit instructions to remain mum...some things never change...but, I digress.) I think Tommy and I have personally told, or attempted to personally tell as many family members and friends as possible...

We're having a baby!

Sooo...I suppose if you're reading this, but did not receive the news personally you have gained a new understanding of our closeness. Joking, of course...and changing the subject now! Because, after all, this is not what you want to read about...you wanna know how ON EARTH this happened, right?! Haha, me and Tom PARENTS? 100% responsible for another life?! How DID this happen? Let me try to explain. You see, when a man and a woman really love each other, they...just kidding.

So if you haven't yet realized, the conception of Baby Parr (TinyParr, as my dad calls him/her...or FartParr as Tom has so lovingly branded his in-utero firstborn) was not a planned phenomenon (as few "phenomenon's" are, I suppose). In fact, Baby (Tiny...Fart...insert your own favorite zygote moniker here) might possibly be the worst-timed baby in the history of babies.

Aside: Now, there will come a day when Baby becomes First-Grader and learns how to read, and somehow finds this baby blog on the interwebs that I would have written about him/her 7-8 years ago and reads that last sentence...for that time 7-8 years from now I will clarify myself...Baby Parr is not a Mistake Baby, Baby Parr is a loved, welcome, yet highly unexpected edition to the Parr Family Tree. That being said...

Baby Parr comes about at a time when both of his/her parents are hot on the job hunt, living in my parent's vacant home, and with virtually zero legitimate claim to anything except the clothes on our backs. And the weight bench in the basement, we did buy that ourselves. Wait...actually, we used a gift card for the purchase of the weight bench...does that count? Eh, details. Because you know what? C'est la vie, my friends! Que sera, sera! Carpe Diem! It simply wouldn't be my crazy, chaotic, beautiful life if things like this didn't happen, and bringing a precious little bebe into the world in partnership with my favorite person on this earth is a fabulous thing. In spite of the alleged "obstacles" we have to overcome I want the world to know we are officially excited to be the greatest parents we can be! We're gonna have a mini-me to join in on all of our fantastic adventures - what could be better?!

So you wanna hear about how I told Tommy the good news? Sure you do! But I'm not spilling the beans...some stories need to be ours. I will tell you this, though, he was adorable and is extremely excited to be a daddy :). Whelp, since I'm not exactly sure what the optimum length for a blog entry is (I'm assuming the shortest it can possibly be, while still disseminating as much information as humanly possible is ideal) I'll go ahead and wrap it up.

Tommy and Christa Parr...Parents-To-Be...Woweee-Wow-Wow-Wow.