Coming to the Ralphs family around 10-11-12!

So it's that time again! Since we've been married, we have welcomed a new addition (or two) every leap year. Abigail was born in 2004, the twins in 2008, so it only makes sense to welcome another one in 2012. Well, in some crazy way, it makes sense to us. Most people would think though that having four children doesn't make any sense at all. I figure that I have made it through twins and survived, what's one more baby to add to the chaos? That is one thing I am sure of, there is only ONE baby joining our family sometime in October. I am thinking though that next leap year (2016) one of my younger siblings will have to keep up with the tradition cause I am not sure I want to do this pregnancy thing again. So here are some details about the pregnancy thus far (not too graphic - I promise). I write this for the two people that may be interested, but mostly for my journaling purposes because I can't seem to remember anything these days.

*Finding Out
Darin and I had been talking about whether or not we wanted more children and we had decided that if we were going to have more children, better now than later. The twins will almost be 5 when this baby is born, a pretty good age gap if you ask me. I guess that answers the question, for those of you that were wondering, yes, this was planned and it not a "surprise" pregnancy. I actually found out that I was pregnant on my birthday (February 1st). Fortunately, Darin's birthday is on February 2nd, so I only had to keep the secret to myself for one day. I found a blue & pink gift bag and put some blue & pink tissue paper in it. In the gift bag I put a little sign I had made that said "Baby #4 - coming 10-11-12" (I had figured out my due date from a chart online). Also in the bag was the positive pregnancy test (I cleaned it off) for proof, just so Darin would know that he wasn't being punked. I presented the birthday gift to Darin after the kids had gone to bed and he told me that he was on to me cause he saw the box to the pregnancy test in the garbage can. I was disappointed that I hadn't totally surprised him, but we were both pretty happy about it.

*Telling Family
I wanted to make sure I had a viable pregnancy before breaking the news to family members, so I waited to tell people until I had had a couple of doctor's appointments under my belt. We told our parents by sending them a Spring-themed card with the above picture in it. We left it to them to figure out what was happening. We got a little more creative in telling the girls and Heather & Shane. We invited Heather and Shane over for Sunday dinner and on the menu was: Baby Back Ribs, Roasted Baby Carrots & Baby Cabbage (brussel sprouts), Baby Spinach Salad with Baby Oranges. To drink we had milk and for dessert we had Heather & Shane surprise. I got some cloth diapers to use as napkins and wrote the baby's due date on the inside of the napkin. I wish I could upload a recording of Heather's reaction, she sat down at dinner and said, "Misty, why are we using diapers as napkins?" Then she read the menu, jumped up and started screaming hysterically. She scared the girls with all of her screaming, so they ran out of the room and then came back when the commotion had settled and Abigail asked, "what just happened?" Pretty funny! Then Heather started mopping my kitchen floor because she said that I shouldn't be doing that. Silly Heather, life goes on when you are pregnant with your fourth child. I do way more than mopping every day and hopefully this baby is stronger for it.

*How I've been feeling

Compared to my other pregnancies, I have been feeling great! Don't get me wrong, I still have morning sickness every day, but at least it is just morning sickness and not all-day sickness. I think the worst thing is that I have been exhausted. I sleep for 9 hours every night (some times interrupted) and I am still dragging by the afternoon. I am pretty much useless after 8:00 every day. When I am pregnant, my immune system seems to go into shock, so I have had a few issues with strange infections and things, but I think we have those things under control so far. I don't really have any food cravings, but I definately have foods that sound and look totally disgusting to me. For example - I can eat chicken, but preparing it has sent me over the edge a few times. I also usually love onions and they totally gross me out now. I have really liked eating soup lately and Hot Dogs are not my friend. My memory has been terrible and I am constantly loosing things and forgetting stuff. I couldn't even remember my doctor's name the other day. I actually had to get on the clinic's website and look through all of the OB's pictures to jog my memory. I have lost my phone and camera, but my children may have helped me with that as well. Sometimes I will fix myself lunch and then forget to eat it. Other than those things, all is well and I can't believe that I am 1/3 of the way through my pregnancy already. Well, I will be next week. I can't wait to meet this little person and I am excited to see what their personality will be like. I can definitely tell this little one has a personality cause when I had my sonogram at the beginning of the week, it was fluttering around like a humming bird and would not be still for any measurements or to have it's picture taken. The baby may have been responding to my increased heart rate though cause I was really nervous they would find more than one baby in there. I am at ease though cause we are pretty sure that there is just ONE very active baby.