We headed home to meet Mark and then planned to stay at the hotel that night before flying out on Saturday morning. At the house, we stopped over to say goodbye to our neighbors, the Bluchers, and again the tears started flowing. They have been the best neighbors and friends we have ever, ever had and I fear we will never have such amazing people across our street again! More tearful goodbyes and we finally headed to the hotel.
The flight to Austin was great and landing in Texas was a bit surreal. Was this really happening? Are we really going to LIVE here? The corporate apartment had plenty of room for us and was in a great part of town. I was excited and terrified at the same time. We celebrated by having dinner at the County Line, not far from our new house would be. Outside was Bull Creek, full of huge fish and turtles you can feed. The kids LOVED it.
I don't know why this picture cracks me up, but it totally does. Look at his face! His is so not enthused that he has to carry my cat through security.
Adam gave Jacob this game called "Pass the Pigs" which we had to play while waiting for the plane!
Here we come, Austin!
On our way to get some good BBQ grub on our first night in Austin
Celebrating
Feeding the turtles and fishies
So this is where the story, and our lives, change in an instant. On Monday night, I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn't sleep. I started to think about the craziness of the last few weeks, saying all of our goodbyes, moving, etc. and realized that I was supposed to get my period somewhere in that timeframe but it had not even occurred to me when. I pulled out my phone and started tracking the days and realized I was a few days late. Surely not, I kept thinking. It's just the stress of the move and what not that has made it delayed. Still, I decided to hit the Dollar store (the best place to find cheap pregnancy tests!) on Tuesday morning before heading to meet my friend Kristy for lunch. Back at the apartment, the kids were watching a show and I locked myself in the bathroom and took the test. I watched it, mesmerized, as the window filled with liquid and 2 little lines appeared. Not faint lines. TWO REAL lines.
PREGNANT.
I can't tell you what came out of my mouth in the next 15 minutes. I was pacing back and forth and I think a thousand "Oh my gods" came out along with "how is this possible" along with a mess full of tears. Please don't get me wrong. We had discussed having a 3rd baby for years but could never make the conscious decision to try and well, time got away from us, and the kids just kept getting older and we finally had decided that our family of 4 was complete. We were moving on to that next phase of life when vacations were relaxing again, lazy weekends were possible and enjoying nights out with friends was regular and fun. This was not exactly in the plan!
But God had a different plan. I picked myself up off the bathroom floor, washed my face, straightened myself to prepare for a lunch with one of my best friends. I drove to Whole Foods in a daze. I couldn't figure out how I was going to catch up on life with her without blurting out the words "I'M PREGNANT" in the middle of noshing on our salads. Luckily, it had been so long that we fell into conversation naturally and I got to catch up on HER life for a change and didn't feel the need to insert my crazy news into our lunch. After lunch, we headed to meet Julie at her community pool where we had plans to take the 4 kids swimming. I had much less restraint at that point and during a quiet moment watching the kids on the slide, I handed her the test. "ARE YOU PREGNANT?!" she said with shock in her eyes?! I said "yes" and started crying again. The timing was awful. We couldn't really talk in detail because we had 4 kids to look after but having her there and seeing her excitement comforted me. She said all the right things (Jacob and Maddie are going to be so helpful, it's going to be wonderful, etc.) and I left that day feeling much less terrified than I had that morning. As if the day hadn't been eventful enough, we headed to Waterloo Ice House for St. Theresa's "new family social". I had really been looking forward to this event because it meant that the kids would get to meet some of their classmates and I would get to meet some of the parents before school started. Given the day, though, I was exhausted and dreading yet another outing where my new secret boiled up inside of me. We drove there in a torrential downpour and finally made it safely where, surprisingly, our new mentor family waited and we got to meet some wonderful, wonderful new friends. I left that night feeling renewed...excited about their new school and dare I say, excited about this new adventure our family would be going on together. Still terrified...but the fear in my heart decided to make a little room for excitement at the same time.
I decided that I could NOT tell Mark over the phone. I wanted to share this with him in person and I really, really, wanted to record his reaction. We had plans to drive to Houston on Thursday for the 4th of July weekend. He was supposed to fly from Barcelona to Houston where we would pick him up at the airport and then we were going to spend the 4th of July weekend in Galveston with Frank, John and all the cousins. Those 2 days passed at a snail's pace. I had gone over and over in my head a thousand times how I would tell Mark. I decided to leave the kids with my parents and pick him up at the airport myself so we could have a quiet conversation. I hand painted 3 baby onesies that said "Good things come in three's", "Party of five coming soon" and "#3". The arrival line to the airport was insane! I waited for 20 minutes just to get to the arrival pick up area where he was waiting. My heart was pounding and I still didn't have a plan of where I would pull over to tell him. He FINALLY gets in the car and we just start chatting. At one point, I see an old fire station to my right with an empty parking lot. I pull in quickly as my heart was about to pound out of my chest. Confused, he asks me what I'm doing. I pull out the present and tell him that Maddie and Jacob made him something and they wanted him to open it right away and that they wanted me to film him opening it. Luckily, he bought the story and this happened:
It was fun watching him wrap his head around the news the entire way home. I had 2 days to process it all -- and seeing him go through that process in the car was hilarious. Again, a lot of "oh my gods" and "are you okays". Shock. Just pure shock.
This is what he opened up:
The next day we headed to Galveston with the whole clan. It had been a long, long time since all of the cousins were together and we had a super fun time. We stayed at Moody Gardens and spent a day at the Schlitterbahn (a water park). The kids were in seventh heaven.
We ended up telling Frank, Paige and John the news while we were in Galveston. John was shocked. Frank was beyond excited. Paige's mouth dropped open and stayed that way for a good while. It's been fun watching everyone's reaction, especially those closest to us who were just as surprised as we were.
Back in Houston, we told my parents. Unfortunately, we don't have that on video but I laid there on the bed with my Mom holding her hand while Mark handed the bag with the onesies inside to my Dad. My Dad pulled them out one by one and I think his exact words were "WHAT?" "NO WAY" and " WHAT?!" My Mom was quiet. I could tell in her eyes that she was worried -- about me, about all of us. I had wondered for days how she would take the news knowing that she might not be here to witness it. I wanted her to know, but I didn't want to upset her so I just squeezed her hand tightly and kept whispering in her ear "I'm going to be okay, I'm going to be okay, I'm going to be okay, don't worry about me, and, I love you".
Mark flew out to San Francisco from Houston and the kids and I drove back to Austin. I left with a heavy heart as I always did leaving my parents, especially my Mom. Mark and I had been trying to find a way to tell his parents the news but just could never find the right time while we were in Houston. So, we decided to do a 3 way facetime (me from Austin and him from SF) since Eric, Kelly, Amy, Sean and Nanny and Papa (and all the kids) were all together in Kansas. I am so thankful Kelly got us sharing the news with everyone on video. The video is priceless. Especially Papa needing a little help catching on! Amy and Nanny got it immediately. I love watching everyone's reaction. I think we've watched it a hundred times! Since we were not able to tell them in person, this was the next best thing.
Thanks to everyone in sharing in our shock, surprise and excitement. Going through this with you has meant the world to us and this baby is going to be blessed beyond belief!
