The Reveal

So, as I mentioned before, my lovely photographer and good friend, Steph, talked me into doing a gender reveal session with her. I was extremely hesitant, but I was finally talked into it when she said "....and you, Bob and all the kids can find out the gender together! It'll be fun!"

Sold. Damn it.

Of course, once our families found out about the photo session, everyone wanted to be there. Although I was a little upset at first {I totally had a "let's not make it a big deal" attitude} I can understand them wanting to be there. If it were my sister doing this, I would want to be there too. So I agreed under one condition... we were keeping it SMALL. {We have a tendency to let things get out of hand!} It was just immediate family... parents and siblings {with their spouses/kids}. That's it.

I have to admit, I almost cancelled the photo session/dinner at least 100 times in the last 6 weeks, but everyone was excited and things were planned, so we just went with it.

I had an idea of what we wanted to do, but I have to be honest... I had no idea how to pull it off. The week before the reveal is when we actually started talking about logistics. Ha! I knew my in-laws house would be the perfect setting because they lived in the woods, so my wonderful father-in-law took it upon himself to get things started. He hung a rope between two big trees in his backyard. He then threw a long string over the hung rope so that we literally just had to tie the box to it and pull it up.

Now on to the box... on Thursday night, yep- the night before the reveal, Bob and I ran to the UPS store and bought a PLAIN 20x20x20 box. I didn't want anything on it at all {not even decorations, colors, "boy or girl", etc}, and I'm so glad the store had a plain one in that size! We then bought twine, rope and several kinds of tape and headed home to come up with a plan.

The bottom was easy. I took some twine and criss-crossed it along the bottom of the box before closing it up {the box came unassembled} so that the twine came out of the 4 corners. We then used packing tape to seal the bottom of the box and secure the twine so it didn't slide around and then tied it to a point so that we could hang my FIL's rope from there. Easy peasy.

The top was a bit trickier. We needed to figure out a way to have the box stay closed when filled with balloons and confetti, but open easily when it was time for the reveal. We did a few practice runs before the session {not filled with anything, don't worry we didn't cheat!} and we came to the conclusion that masking tape worked best. More times than not, the box opened without a problem, so we just went with it and hoped for the best.

I then spent the rest of the evening before the ultrasound blowing up BOTH sets of balloons {pink & blue} and cutting both sets of confetti {I just used rolls of streamers and cut them into squares.} I made two bags of balloons and confetti... one pink and one blue... and headed off to bed.

On Friday morning, August 30th, we left for our anatomy scan {nervous as heck for a healthy baby!} It was me, Bob and Carter, who was SO EXCITED that he got to come with us. We did NOT find out the sex while we were at the ultrasound. Instead, I gave the tech two cards and an envelope. I asked her to put the correct card in the envelope and throw the other card away. I then asked her if she could put the ultrasound picture of the baby's sex {I needed proof, damn it!} face down on top of the reveal card so that we couldn't see either through the envelope.

I was oddly okay with toting that envelope around with me for the rest of the day all while knowing that I had the fate of my little family in the palm of my hands. I had no temptation to open it, what-so-ever.

We spent the day running errands and then ran home to get everyone ready for the reveal dinner and photo shoot and headed to my in-laws house around 4:30. When my photographer/friend, Steph, arrived, we gave her the box, both sets of balloons/confetti and the sealed envelope.

She was the only one to know the sex of the baby before the reveal. And as a close friend, I knew she'd have some type of reaction to whatever the baby ended up being, so I'm glad she had time to process the information before taking pictures :)

She headed to a closed room to fill the box and seal it up. She then hid all the evidence so no one could see any unused materials. My FIL headed outside with the box and tied it up there. We awaited the rest of my families arrival and then went out back to do the reveal.

I know many didn't read a single word of this and just headed straight to the pictures below {cheaters!} but I'm glad I have it written down so that I can remember the day and so that anyone else that may want to use this set-up for their reveal has more of an understanding of how to do it!

Now I do have to add something... I totally, 100%, without a doubt thought that this baby was a boy. So much so that I wasn't even going to blow up the pink balloons. So as you look at the pictures below, you can clearly see the shock on our faces. When I envisioned this reveal, I thought I'd run around and hug Bob and my kids and celebrate our new baby. But I didn't. Nope. I just stood there, shockingly. And I cried. I didn't know what else to do... I just stood there and cried happy tears. You can see more of my reaction in the video of the reveal below, so don't forget to check it out!

Whew... this got long. Anyway, here are the priceless pictures taken by my wonderful friend, Steph of Stephanie Glover Photography. And I have to quickly admit something right here, in front of everyone...

Steph, you were right. Thanks for talking me into this. ;)

So, without further ado, here is our reveal for sweet little IV.

Reid had to inspect the "money shot" ultrasound picture, just to be sure. I don't think he agrees with the tech's prediction at all... ;)

And I have to give a shout out to my Carter Man. He was the only one who thought Reid was a boy and he KNEW, without a doubt, that this baby was a girl. So much so that he refused to even talk boy names with me. He just... knew. So here is photographic evidence of Carter's gender guesses of both babies. {And he was correct with Brynn too... 3 for 3!} My little smarty pants ;) He starts kindergarten tomorrow, ya know {AHHHHH!}

Here are everyone else's predictions...

And, as I mentioned above, we have the reveal on video! My sister-in-law's wonderful boyfriend, Shane, happened to capture the reveal with his phone. I didn't even realize it, but I am SO GLAD that we have it captured on video because the entire thing is still a blur to me. I've watched it over and over and it still makes me tear up every time. As you can see, I was in complete shock and just stood there and cried like a baby. Ha! Thank you Shane!

{For some reason, I can't really get the sound to work that great, but I'll fix it as soon as I can!}
Oh, and you can also see that the one side of the box didn't open until later... so the confetti came out first and the balloons came out second, once the other tab opened. Oh well. It may not have been prefect, but it was perfect to us. <3 I also do want to talk to you about the actual ultrasound, but I'll include that in my next post.

EEEEKKKK, WE'RE HAVING A GIRL!!!!!!!!!!!!
Now on to names... ;)