Although I'm sure most of you know already....since we announced it officially a few weeks ago. :) Also, I know that gender is a social construct and what we are actually revealing is the baby's biological sex, but "sex reveal" doesn't have the same ring to it, so I am making the choice to call it what everybody else does.
Milan and I had an ultra sound on February 19, 2014. Since we were leaving town later that day and wanted some time to process our news we didn't tell anyone about our appointment. We did know that at some point we wanted to have a small gathering with immediately family to let them all in on the surprise at the same time, and an important part of that would be having everyone cast a vote. To be fair, Milan and I wrote and signed a dated piece of paper with our votes (Milan voted boy and I voted girl) so we couldn't change them by the time we got to the reveal.
At the appointment everyone from the receptionist to the sonographer made us feel super comfortable! Each new person we encountered asked if we were going to find out the sex- which made us guess that they've made some mistakes by oversharing inadvertently before. The sonographer was SO amazing. She made us right at ease letting us know what to expect for the appointment (e.g. the doctor might not come in right away, the doctor might want to look at a few things with her own eyes, so don't be worried if she picks up the wand and wants to see more, etc.). She decided to "get right to the good part" so we wouldn't be in suspense any longer. She fired up the machine, waved the wand around, and right away we could see little Baby Compton's legs...with nothing in between them! She told us to think of the view as if she was sitting on top of a copy machine and snapped the following picture:
As you can see...LEG, LEG, GIRL! All I could think about the rest of the day was this picture of her cute little butt on top of the copy machine. :)
Of course, I immediately burst into tears because I was so surprised! I felt in my heart that it could go either way, but since I really wanted a girl I didn't quite expect to get one. Milan squeezed my hand as we went through the rest of the appointment. Measuring everything from head to toe, taking tons of pictures, examining every organ, etc. It was so amazing to see the blood flow through the umbilical cord, her tiny heart beating, and her stomach expand into a little black bubble as she swallowed amniotic fluid! The sonographer kept trying to get a clear profile shot, but baby girl was stubbornly sucking her thumb. The sonographer poked pretty hard, had me flip over, and finally inverted the table in an effort to get the thumb out of baby's mouth. Milan just kept laughing and saying, "If she's anything like her mom, she won't move if we want her to." As if he's not equally as stubborn as me!
When the doctor came in she said that everything looked absolutely healthy and wonderful. Baby girl weighed 13 ounces and everything appeared great. Getting a clean bill of health was such a relief- that was what we were both waiting and praying for! As I sit here a few weeks later I just remember thinking that I wanted to bottle up that joyful feeling and open it back up again later. It was truly the most amazing thing I have ever experienced. I'll never forget sitting with Milan later that night in our hotel in DC and him asking me what qualities and traits of mine I hope she'll end up with. We are still having so many fun conversations and I have loved sharing all of our dreams for her.
The Friday after we got back in town we invited over our parents and siblings for our little gathering. We knew we wanted everyone to cast a vote, so we asked each person to pick out a pink or blue pin to wear while we made dinner and ate appetizers. We also provided everyone with a little help guessing if need be based on a number of Old Wives Tales.
Here is a photo of all those that guessed boy:
And here is team girl:
When the time came for the big reveal, we gave a balloon to each of the grandmas...
On the count of three the balloons were popped and out poured the pink confetti!
We got a pretty cute video of this in action....mostly consisted of some loud screams, jumps, and surprise on the part of the grandmas!
Here is Grammy with her blue pin (her vote) and four pink pins (representing votes from our close family friends- the Nienows and McEachrans).
And finally a picture of proud Mom and Dad. We can't wait to meet you, Baby Girl!
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