It's A.......

Well, I caved and learned the sex of our baby. Actually, Ben and I went in for the 20 week ultrasound (at 20 weeks and 6 days) and we told the ultrasound technician to write down the baby's gender and place it in an envelope, as planned. Ben was to open the envelope later. We had such a fun time watching the baby flip and kick and punch on the ultrasound and, most importantly, everything looks great! We saw ten fingers and ten toes and a well developed spine and heart. We are so thankful! So, we return home and after a few hours I was dying for Ben to open the envelope. I told him I wanted to watch him open it but that I did not want to know the sex. We decided to do this while in the nursery. I'm standing by the crib and Ben is standing by the changing table. He opens the envelope and a look of pure shock and slight panic comes across his face. Immediately I knew what was inside the envelope......"It's a Girl!" I screamed this out and Ben replies with "Yes!" So much for him keeping it to himself. And honey, if you're reading this, please don't ever play poker. Your facial expressions are a dead giveaway. We are thrilled to announce that our baby's name is Emery Catherine Slagel and we can't wait to meet her in June. I think Ben has gotten over his initial shock and is pumped to have our sweet HEALTHY baby girl join the family. I've promised him that he will be able to teach this precious little lady how to ski and swim and wakeboard and he won't be forced to have tea parties all the time. Miss Emery is going to be able to hold her own with all the boys in the family just fine! I've also assured Ben that I won't go overboard with pink and girly stuff. Ben wants me to be practical and choose items for Emery that we'll be able to use for all the future Slagel babies. I agree with this, for the most part, and am very glad that we have done the basics in gender neutral colors. But seriously......like I can resist buying pink monogrammed smocked sundresses and bloomers!?!?!?! AUGHH!!! It's too cute!!! Ben, I've only bought two so far. Well, two dresses and two bloomer sets. Oh yeah.....and a onesie trimmed in pink ribbon with ESC embroidered on the front.

Although I was the one who was fighting NOT to learn the sex of the baby, I have to admit that calling her "Emery" or "Emmy Cate" these past few days and using the proper pronouns when referring to her has made me feel even more bonded to our child. Bennie doesn't realize this yet, but he is about to be wrapped around this baby's finger! He is just going to melt when he sees her. Another lady in his life to spoil.....what more could he want??!!
Emery was tapping her head in this picture.....she's a deep thinker already!

Emmy Cate looks like she is blowing a bubble in this image, but it's actually her umbilical cord visible in the background.