Snakes and snails and puppy dog tails: The story (so far) of Baby Schmutz

12 weeks, 16 weeks, 20 weeks  Clark's comments in Blue.

      I am now half-way through my pregnancy, and we have yet to blog about our little baby!  Here is the timeline (well, some of it) of how Baby Schmutz came to be.  If you are reading this blog with your kids, Amy's comments may have caused them to ask "How did Baby Schmutz come to be?"  Take a minute to talk with your kids about this important matter.  You're welcome.

     Back in December, Clark and I traveled to New York City for a few days.  During the trip we knew there was a slight possibility that I could be pregnant (Honestly I thought it was a zero percent chance), and we decided that if we happened to be, finding out on my 30th birthday would be a fun way to do it.  It was late when we got out of our show (It was Mary Poppins, which is important to the story later-I mean later as in when we hire a magical nanny to solve Clark's communication problems with his kids), but we headed over to Walgreens and bought a semi-reliable looking box of pregnancy tests.  We really weren't getting our hopes up when we got back to the little Brooklyn studio where we were staying.  When I glanced at the test and saw a plus sign forming, I really didn't know what to think or feel about it!   I thought "wait, what does that mean?"  Then I felt confused and happy and nervous at the same time.  Mostly excited.

     We both had such thoughts as:  "Huh. That's weird.  Is this accurate or reliable?  Could it be a false positive?  Didn't that lady on Glee get a positive result when it was really a chemical pregnancy?  I definitely didn't think about Glee.  What are we supposed to do now?  It's probably not right.  Let's just go to bed and take another test in the morning."  Which we did.
     We took another when got home from New York--a different brand this time.
     And we took another two weeks later just to make sure we weren't going to tell our parents some big lie when we went home over Christmas. 
     After 4 positive tests, we were pretty sure it was true. But wait, wasn't there that one time on Dawson's Creek where someone had 4 positive tests, but wasn't really pregnant?...
     Even though I wasn't very far along (about 6 weeks), we couldn't be with our families and not share the news!  Telling our families was such fun.  We made my parents look through our NYC photos on the computer with us.  We we got the photo of the positive test, there was a pause, wide-eyes, "Are you serious?!", tears and lots of hugs.  My dad absolutely could not keep the news to himself.  Pretty much any time someone walked in the door he said something along the lines of, "Amy, don't you have something to tell Grandma?"  By the time my brother's wedding rolled around the next week, everyone including one of my great uncles seemed to know!  The ward found out the news too, as my dad was introducing his visitors and announced that they just found out that his daughter "got pregnant last week"  Those were his exact words.  My mom was mortified, but that's my dad for you!

      We waited to tell Clark's family until Celia's wedding was over.  I had drawn Clark's mom for our Christmas gift exchange and the second gift she opened was our (fourth) pregnancy test, sanitarily placed in a ziploc bag.  There was the brief pause that it takes for everyone to process the meaning and then lots of screaming and hugging and maybe a few more tears (I was a little emotional at the time).

     In January I had my first appointment to "confirm" that I was actually pregnant.  Thank goodness, I was!  Little baby Schmutz was already 11 weeks along and cute as can be.

     It was pretty amazing to see the ultrasound and realize all the moving around was happening inside of me!  My biggest regret is that Clark wasn't there with me.  Was I invited?  When I asked if this appointment was one that husbands usually came to, the lady made it sound like it really wasn't that big of a deal; that is was just to make sure I was really pregnant.  Well, it turned out to be a very big deal!  To see and hear our first baby's heartbeat and see that baby moving all over like a fish was something the daddy definitely should have been there to experience!

     On March 4, both Clark and I (and my mom), went back for another ultrasound.  How our little 18-week BOY had grown!  His little profile will melt your heart.

     One of my biggest concerns was not coming away from the ultrasound sure about the gender of our baby.  After shots like these, there really isn't room to question!  That's my Boy!

     To celebrate, I let myself indulge with a shopping spree.  How kind of Amy to allow herself.  I guess I had nothing to do with it.  Smiley-type face.

     Baby Boy Schmutz is going to be one well-dressed baby.  I went shopping with them, but I couldn't last longer than about 30 minutes.  I still don't get how women do it.  Instead, I went and found a bench and chatted about life and raising kids with a really nice 70 year old lady who was out with one of her great grandchildren.

I have been feeling great lately, and in the last day or two I've started feeling little movements which is a totally bizarre sensation.  Despite the weirdness of my body growing in new ways (Clark loves it; I find it strange), we are so excited for our little one!  Now to decide on names...Clark is pulling for Sufjan... It's pronounced "Soof-yawn" and it's the first name of one of my favorite folk singers and it means "comes with a sword."  To me that is three strikes you're in.

A night fit for a princess

 Our Young Women's night of New Beginnings this year was most definitely a night of royalty...and princess gowns.  I loved many things about this night.  A couple of favorite moments included the questionable looks parents gave as they walked into the cultural hall (it's not very often that you see adult women in dress-up clothes) and finding out who in the ward actually had adult-sized princess costumes that we could borrow!  The night was a success, and it was a blessing to work with such wonderful ladies and young women!

 We started off the evening with the grand entrance of the Fairy Godmother.  She then announced that some of our fair ladies in attendance were actually princesses! 

 Each girl was then crowned...

 then granted a gift...

 and sprinkled with confetti.
It was such fun.

Next we had a skit starring the presidency and a few young women.  It was all about what needs to be done to seek one's happily ever after.  Here we are in all our glory.

 

The night also included a message from the "Fairy Godmother" based on President Uchtdorf's talk titled "Your Happily Ever After."  Other moments included a message from the "King" (our 1st counselor in the bishopric), desserts and the bubble machine.  

 After such a crazy, busy, fun night, we were all starving and exhausted and only one thing would make it better:  Chick-fil-A. 

It helped.  A lot.

What's been cookin'...

Valentine's Cookies

January and February made for lots of time in the kitchen.  Much of it was fun...but making 50 crown sugar cookies (cut by hand) made for some long hours!  Here's a peak at some of the fun, the tasty and the unusual.

Original little fellas cheesecakes

 Crown cookies, chocolate mousse brownies (both for YW New Beginnings) and chocolate pasta.  I bought the chocolate pasta quite a while back at the Chocolate Exhibit.  I finally got around to experimenting with it and made Clark, Tony and Robin be guinea-pigs for my chocolate pasta with chicken mole dinner.  I don't know that I'll make it a regular, but it was decently tasty, different and fun.

After listening to the food nanny the other night, March will hopefully be a tasty (but possibly more healthy) month!