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Monday, May 9, 2011

breaking the news

Mother's Day is always a weekend that I look forward to. First, because it's a great time to show appreciation to our moms and grandmas. Second, because it's always fun to help my students make something special to give their mommies. Last year, Mother's Day weekend was especially memorable because we chose to tell our families about our little bun in the oven! We wanted to be able to tell each of them in person and we didn't want anyone to find out way before or way after anyone else. So....that made for some interesting travel plans! Here's a general idea of our itinerary:

Friday....
Right after school was out, we headed to Cedar Falls. We had decided to tell my parents by giving them a cookie bouquet, which we ordered from a very talented friend who lived in Cedar Falls. After picking up the bouquet, we headed for Boone. We were giddy with excitement and spent the drive talking about all things "baby". We also had to plan out exactly how we would deliver the bouquet. We decided that after we had gone inside and greeted everyone, I would tell Mom that her Mother's Day gift was in the car. Then Dameon would go outside, bring in the bouquet, and set it on the table. Then we would reveal it to her. The cookies were so cutely decorated with things like "Baby Place" "Boy or Girl?" "Baby Makes Three..." etc. Both of my brothers and my dad were also there, so they would all get in on the fun. Well, actually, Brad and his girlfriend already knew because they had come to our place for dinner earlier in the week and we couldn't hold it in :) We gave them an invitation to a birthday party and inside it said Where: Iowa Methodist Hospital; When: Early January; What: The Birth Day of your niece or nephew.
Anyway, back to the story. So, Dameon went out to the car and got the bouquet. When Mom came into the dining room to look at it she "ooohed" and "ahhhed" but didn't really react much more than that. Then I said, "Do you see what it says?" Then she bent down to look closer and after a long pause she yelled, "WHAT?!?!" Then she looked at me and said, "Is it TRUE??" Yes! I said. Then she just let out a wail and we all started crying and hugging! After having supper together, we had to head right back to Waterloo because Dameon had large group contest the next day and our second reveal was going to happen in the morning.

Saturday...
Claudia, Dameon's mom, was set to arrive mid-morning. She has a talent for restoring old furniture, so we decided to tell her by giving her an old rocking chair to fix up. Dameon had given me a video camera at the start of the weekend for my first Mother's Day gift and by this point we had had a chance to charge it up. We secretly video-taped the whole reveal to Claudia! When she got to our house, we had the rocking chair in the living room with a gift bag setting in it. The gift bag had a couple children's books inside. I think she thought it was just a cool Mother's Day gift. We had her open the bag and she said something like, "Oh, this will be so fun to have when you have a baby someday." We both just kinda sat there not knowing what to say. Then Dameon said something about that day coming soon. After what seemed like a loooong wait, she finally caught on! :) It was fun to then get to spend the day with her and talk about baby stuff. I remember thinking that I already had a baby belly and showed it off to her!! (Little did I know what a baby belly really meant!)

Sunday...
We had already scheduled our home inspection for the house we thought we were going to move into in Winterset (that's a whole other post...for another time...or maybe never...ugh!) so we had to head south for the day. We stopped in Clive on our way there to break the news to Zach and Jess. We decided to use the birthday invitation idea again. Much to our surprise...they weren't surprised! Jess just had a sixth sense that we were expecting!! She had even written a letter to us that she ran upstairs to get. I must say, that was pretty cool :) After the inspection, we called up Rick and Joyce (Dameon's dad and step-mom) and asked if we could come to Pella to have dinner with them. I figured that would be a dead giveaway, since that was not on our way home by any means. I guess I never have asked them if they were suspicious. We met them at Dairy Queen and Dameon started giving a detailed description of the inspection report. Then he said something about how the inspector told us the second bedroom would be a great nursery. He paused.....but they didn't take the bait. Then he said, "Because we're going to be needing that. SOON." I'm not sure who caught on first, but I remember Joyce smacking the table really hard and saying, "Are you pregnant????" Then there was a swarm of hugs. And, by the way, I had my first real bout of pregnancy nausea on the way home and will never be able to eat a Dairy Queen chicken strip basket for as long as I live. But that's neither here nor there.

And on this Mother's Day....my first Mother's Day with Henry...my husband went above and beyond to plan a special time for us. When we woke up, he presented me with an oh-so-special gift. He purchased a beautiful painting of a heart and printed Henry's hands and feet on it. All by himself!! (I wish I coulda been a fly on the wall for that part!) Then we headed to church. Afterward, we went and grabbed some coffee at Starbucks and then went to Johnny's Italian Steakhouse where he had made us a reservation for the Mother's Day buffet. It was definitely some of the most delicious food I've ever eaten and I think it should definitely become a Mother's Day tradition. Yum! Then last night my mom came over and we all walked to Frosty's for burgers and ice cream. No cooking for me yesterday!

Thank you, Dameon, for wonderful Mother's Day memories. And thank you for Henry, too!

2 comments:

Mrs. Moffitt said...

This is such a sweet story. Happy first Mother's Day to you!

Paulette said...

Loved reading the details of all of the wonderful surprises. Very creative and fun!!! What a blessing you and Dameon are to us and now an added blessing....our precious Henry!