I'm still in shock and can't believe it's really a GIRL!!

For the first few weeks that we knew we were pregnant (and weren't telling anyone yet) we didn't think we wanted to find out baby's gender (we didn't with J and J). Once we started telling people and the questions started about whether we would or wouldn't do it Jim and I started to talk more seriously about it and decided that maybe it would be best if we did. I wanted to be prepared as best as I could and wanted the boys to be prepared too. I also really didn't want to be dealing with getting rid of bins upon bins of boy crap if it was a girl, or scrambling to get girl stuff either. On that note: if you need baby boy stuff let me know! :)

Those moments in the delivery room when Jim announced the genders to me were very special for us when we had the boys and it was those moments that I had to think long and hard about in deciding whether I was okay with giving that up this time. We could have found out during the 20 week ultrasound but it just didn't seem as special to me to find out in an ultrasound room at the hospital, even if we were all together. I wanted something big, and memorable for both us and the boys. 

I knew this was definitely my last chance to do something fun like this and I decided to go for it...and thankfully my wonderful hubby was on board with my crazy plan. I decided that if I wasn't going to find out with just him and me on baby's birth day that I was going to find out with all of the most important people in our world. I wanted to see the reactions of my friends and family when they found out our baby's gender too. I wanted it to be a really special moment for our whole family and one that the boys would remember for years to come and one that we could tell the baby about too. We are very fortunate to have so many amazing people in our lives that love us and our kids and I wanted all of them to be there with us for this huge moment.

Plus I had seen gender reveals all over the place and wondered what it would be like...and I knew it would make for a great blog too! So my first step was asking my talented photog friend Jenn to take photos of the reveal and then I asked Jen from Cake Baby if she would make the cake that we would cut into. This was a huge step in trust because she was the ONLY one, apart from the doctor and the tech, that knew what baby was before we did. We had originally planned the party for January 21st but once we had the envelope in our hands on December 23rd I knew I wanted to do it before I returned to work. We moved the party to the 2nd and started making some basic plans. Our goals was to make it easy and it really was. Thankfully my parents agreed to my scheme and agreed to host the party at their house. Even though it was very loud with just about 40 people there (including 13 kids), I know my mom wouldn't have had it any other way! My dad on the other hand...he would have been perfectly fine if we'd done it somewhere else. Anyways, enough about how we got to the party...here are the pictures and videos from one of the best nmoments of my whole entire life. It was EVERYTHING I had hoped it would be and there wasn't a single person there that I could have imagined doing the party without. All of my closest girlfriends were there, most of their husbands, and almost all of their kids too. It was just an overall really special night and from the bottom of my heart I truly THANK YOU all for coming. And for the hundreds of comments...and thousands of views of our video....I appreciate all of the love and support more than you will ever know. Thanks for being part of our exciting reveal.

First up is my favorite photo of the whole night...this is the moment that we all realized that our newest little love is going to be a GIRL! I truly LOVE this photo so much and it captures our emotions perfectly. Perfect amount of shock and excitement!

Now going back to the beginning...the knives are in and we were all so excited to finally find out!

A picture from a slightly different angle...this was JUST before I pulled the piece up high enough to see the color of the icing! I love the look of anticipation on everyone's faces...except for Jim who looks a little scared or something :)

And this is just after the top photo where James and I saw the pink and we finally realized! The loud cheers from the crowd gave it away as soon as we saw it too. Jim said at first he didn't see the pink but heard everyone yelling so knew what the color was :)

I think Daddy might be a little happy too! Fist raised and everything!

 James's smile in this one is awesome...and even Jordie still looks happy!

His excitement took me away from the tears I felt burning in my eyes!

You can see Jordie starting to get a little miffed at his Dad for taking the knife away.

It looks like I am looking right at Jordie but I will admit I didn't realize at all what was about to happen.

And he's starting to lose it because he didn't understand why he didn't get to eat a piece of the cake right away. That's what started the tears and unhappiness.

There was so much going on that I didn't realize that Jordie was upset so quickly

Oh oh...he's really upset and I'm clearly having a moment with James here! Now keep in mind this whole interaction was less than a minute in length but seeing all of these photos back to back makes it look like I missed out on something. Watch the video posted below and you'll see that as soon as I realized how upset Jordie was that I scooped him right up (even though I knew I wasn't supposed to pick him up!)

My second favorite photo of the whole night...James is pumped and Jordie is sobbing!

I think he was screaming Woohoo at this point! Thanks to Ash who captured this moment perfectly from her spot at the side of the counter.

 Another fantastic photo of a very happy James while I console my upset little Jordie boy!

hehehehehehehe....I'm so glad that Shirley kept filming this interaction...it really makes the whole video if you ask me.

Big thanks to Shirley for video taping the reveal for what was supposed to be a FB Live Video (however I had put my privacy settings to Only Me so I could show her how to work it...so when the video was taken it wasn't actually live)...BUT luckily we realized quite quickly (thanks to Shirley's daughter Diana not being able to see it!) and I fixed it within a few minutes so all of the people waiting anxiously to see it could watch it!

Papa checking in on his guy (and giving me a bit of crap for picking Jordie up!)

Reminding me of our deal that if he was right and he "won" that he got to pick a family activity and we weren't allowed to say no.

He even made me shake on it

The last of the photos from after the cake had been cut

 OMG...I LOVE this photo too...I just wish Jaxon was in it! It feels a little incomplete without him (oh and maybe Jim and Sean too?!)

Now here is the awesome video of the whole thing. I love this video so much and I am so glad that we decided to do this so we have this memory saved forever.

My sign that I did...that I now realize is crooked...but it was still fun to do!

Looks like surprisingly the final tally was Girl 13 - Boy 15....but if you count all the FB votes it was much heavier to the girl side :)

The absolutely amazingly yummy cake that Jen Mostat made for us. We were so honoured that she said yes to being part of this moment and I was so happy she stayed to watch us cut it too!

Whenever I want to be reminded of the wonderfulness of our news I come back to this photo and smile when I see the pink :)

This picture is how we announced the party and live gender reveal on FB. This video was posted around 1pm and the party was at 6:30 with the cake cutting at 7:00.

And here is the FB Live Video we did announcing the party.

Now the reveal is done...so we'll go back to the beginning and show the lead up photos cause they 

are fun too!

Nana and James were on Team Pink

Nana and Papa helping Jordie write his vote up too!

Papa and Jordie were together on Team Blue

Tyanna waffled back and forth and up to this day I think she thought it was a boy, but went with girl at the last minute!

And our family vote just before the majority of people started showing up!

This is awesome...he thought it was a boy and she totally said girl! I love these two...look at them with their little signs and opposite color balloons :)

More kid votes at the party!

This is a photo of the note that was in the envelope from Dr. Strydom. It was very sweet of Jen to save it for me. I think I may frame it and put it on my bedside table. 

He did it...he finished his first year of school!

And not only did he finish, but he was given an awesome award at the end of year Awards Ceremony for overall excellence in his class which was an award given to a top student in the class who showed great work ethic and overall effort.

This award is nominated by the instructors of the course and was presented to Jim by one of the Associate Deans of Trades from the Nanaimo campus. James and my mom and dad came to VIU for the ceremony and I was busy taking pictures for the ceremony so I didn't feel like I really got to experience the moment like everyone else did, but I was happy to be able to at least get a good picture of it!

Luckily this picture wasn't as fuzzy as some of the shots from that day. The lighting in our gym is terrible and lots of photos didn't turn out great but man was I grateful that this one did!

Shaking his instructor Gary's hand before being presented with his award.

My boys and I really couldn't be more proud of Jimmy for all that he's done over the past year. He got laid off from his job in Alberta and while laid off made a huge life decision to go back to school at the age of 35 to try to start a new career. He has always loved working outside and building things was always something that has interested him so carpentry was a natural choice. We are lucky that here at our relatively small VIU campus that carpentry is one of the 5 first year trades that we do offer. We knew it would be a huge risk and big change for our family with him being in school full-time but we also knew it was time for Jim to really figure out what he wanted to do for the rest of his life.

From the first day he started school until the day the guys went out to their building site in November, Jim studied almost every single night....after learning all day, picking James up after school and either doing swimming or skating lessons, then picking up Jordie and making supper while I worked until 6pm. Then we ate as a family and got the boys off to bed, and then at 8pm he'd usually sit down for 2-3 hours to read his textbook or study for one of the many tests he had to take. He truly did incredible and I really couldn't be more proud of him. I know it wasn't easy for him to be the old guy in a class of much younger guys who a lot of the time just didn't care to be there. It was frustrating for Jim, but he did it, and I think not a single guy in that class would say they have anything but respect for him for what he did. On site he worked harder than all of the other 8 people put together and often got more done in an hour than 5 guys did put together. But no matter what, he knew he was there to learn so he put his head down and learn he did.

He may not have finished at the very top of the class (don't ask him about that though...he's maybe slightly bitter) but he did finish in 2nd and ended up with the most important award of all. I think it's way better to be recognized for overall achievement than just for having the top academic marks. It means something to work hard and to be recognized for that.

We love you Jimmy and we are so so very proud of you for all that you accomplished this past year! Now, onto a year of working with a great local contractor, and then hopefully some time in 2017 he will head back to school for his 2nd year of schooling!

New beginnings for Daddy too!

Some people that read this blog may already know the good news because we've known for months but wanted to wait until ALL of our ducks were in a row before saying anything. Well as of today the ducks are in a row, tuition and books are paid and it's really official...Jimmy is going back to school! 

When he got laid off in December he struggled to find good paying work here in town or out of town. He was lucky to have a good EI payment coming in so we decided that he would stay home with the boys and keep looking for work while I was lucky enough to get almost full-time hours at VIU. 

Around April we seriously started discussing the possibility of Jim going back to school to start his education in the carpentry trade. This had always been a plan for a year or two down the road once we'd saved some money and he'd worked away for awhile. Fast forward just about 2 years from when he left the first time and he is set to start down a new career path again. 

We have been very fortunate that because he is on EI that he qualifies for some great funding resources through the Employment Program of BC that will help us immensely in being able to afford for Jim to work towards his new career.

He has loved being home with the boys for the past 9 months but is very excited to get started on his new life of being a full-time student. It's been many many years since he was in school but I have total faith in him that he is going to do really well. 

My handsome hubby when he was working in Fort McMurray last spring.

Here's to new beginnings for both of my Alfreds! Join me in wishing them both the best of luck!