22 Week Update | Baby Miller #4

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It's been an exciting few weeks around here as I hit 22 weeks today and a little over halfway to seeing this babe face to face. Two weeks ago our church celebrated 10 years since it's launch and it was so amazing to spend time reflecting on God's faithfulness to me personally and our church family over this past decade. It's still hard to believe that I moved to DE 9.5 years ago excited to join what God was doing at LifeHouse Church and that 9 years ago this month I met Joel for the first time. As a girl who lived by a "10 year plan" prior to God's calling in 2012, it's amazing to look all He's done in the last 10 that I would have never dreamed of, let alone planned. 

We came off of that celebratory weekend right into another one in which we got to meet up with family and do a joint gender reveal with my sister. As soon as I my mom found out my sister was pregnant a few weeks after I did she immediately said "maybe we could do a joint gender reveal!" That sounded like a super fun idea but given that my family lives 9 hours away,  all our schedules seem to be opposite, and my sister and I ended up being 7 weeks apart, I thought there was no way it could actually work out. But when my sister started mapping out when she would hopefully get her early blood work results and I would go for my 20 week anatomy scan, they both lined up in the same week and before a weekend where everyone's calendars were free. My mom and sis have always wanted us to do Great Wolf together sometime since they know the kids love it but have never been so we started seeing if we could find any deals and sure enough there was a great sale running right when we needed to book. There was still a part of me that couldn't believe it would actually happen and we'd both get our results in time but I was excited at the hope of it. 

On Thursday morning last week, I went for my anatomy scan and was thankful baby cooperated for them to put the gender in . We left immediately afterwards for Williamsburg but were still awaiting my sister's results. Once we got there she called her doctor's office to have them give the results to Liv (our designated secret keeper) but they didn't have the results. We were disappointed but decided we'd wait til Friday to give it one more day. We had started getting dressed for the waterpark when about 30 minutes later Kate's doctors office called to say they got her results! It really is crazy how it all worked out and it was so so fun to get to find out the results all together.

My mom had made the kids all shirts that said Big Brother and Big Sister and they got to open gift bags revealing whether they were getting a Baby Sister or a Baby Brother --

 
 
The boys excitedly pulled out a PINK onesie - BABY SISTER!! 💖
My niece (and sis) pulled out a BLUE onesie - BABY BROTHER!! 💙

Both dads got what they were hoping for and it was so fun to see their excitement! But my mom was the giddiest of all and still can't watch the video without crying. 



Massey Ruth | We've had this name picked out for a girl very long time. Joel and I met at a Bible study at a friend's house on Massey Church Rd. It also happened to be the road I lived on while we were dating and engaged. I lived in a carriage house on a beautiful property there while I nannied a sweet baby girl and we got to have our wedding there. Given that we met and got married on that street, we've always wanted to incorporate Massey. Joel's great-grandmother's name was Ruth and she was a missionary to Morocco. To us it's so special that her heart for missions was a legacy for Joel and we're excited to give that name to our daughter. Joel's sister Jessica's middle name is Ruth also which just adds to the sentiment. Massey will be another double first name just like her sissy. Her anatomy scan showed that she's around 1 pound which is right on track! She's so wiggly and I'm loving feeling all her kicks. (Yes it's still weird to me to say HER.) 


Momma | Everyone keeps asking if I'm shocked we're having another girl and the answer it YES. But unlike the last time, my surprise came in layers and not in one major moment. From before I was ever pregnant again I immediately assumed our 4th would be another boy. I've always imagined myself as a mom of lots of boys and honestly never imagined us having a balanced number of boys and girls. This assumption only deepened when I was craving cheeseburgers like I did with Malachi's pregnancy. 

The first thing that made me start to question this was my 16 week scan at our local pregnancy center where they are training ultrasound techs. Even though they weren't looking for gender (because we told them not to) one of trainers ended up landing on a potty shot while getting one of her needed views. It was brief and I'm not an ultrasound tech but I couldn't help but notice that it looked like a girl and not a boy. So I of course googled and in doing so came across the Nub Theory which I don't remember seeing before. It has to do with angles of the spine and the genital nub that you can see as early as 12 weeks if at the right angle. Looking back at our ultrasounds that too made me think maybe we were indeed having a girl. I honestly was excited to not feel so one-sided on my guessing because then I knew I would be thrilled AND surprised either way. 

In my 20 weeks scan, I told them I only wanted the gender in an envelope and didn't want to know in the room so she had me turn my head while she scanned legs and anything in that direction. She'd told me I could look again and was back to the abdomen to get a few more things. A few minutes later I saw her notating "RT OVARY".... bahhh. I tried to turn my head and pretend I didn't see but then she said "Yeah we don't look for them but since I can see her ovaries I'm going to go ahead and note them." I'm not sure if she was talking to me or the tech she was training but AHHHH haha. I was laying there in the room trying to contain my surprise and excitement. She never acknowledged that she goofed and neither did I but my thoughts began racing of another baby girl. By the time the boys pulled out a pink onesie, it was just the formality for me but I really enjoyed getting to take in everyone else's reactions a little more since my surprise had already happened. 

I really didn't have a preference but I'm definitely getting excited to have another sweet girl, watch the sister bond, and enjoy all the matching sister outfits. Physically, I'm not feeling great but I am feeling functional. We had some sickness in our house this last week and while it' passed fairly quickly for each of us, it was definitely a major setback in fatigue for me. I'm only nauseous if I let myself get hungry so I'm thankful for that. 


Daddy | Joel is so excited to be having another little girl. He's said from the beginning that he would love for Cora Mae to have a sister close in age like the boys have each other. Cora Mae is quite the Daddy's Girl and I imagine Massey Ruth will be the same. Joel actually was very surprised when the boys pulled out the pink onesie. I had told him after the ultrasound that they slipped and showed me reproductive organs and I was pretty sure I knew what we were having. He requested I just not say anything and just have him find out for sure in a few hours. I was really glad because I wanted to see his surprise in the moment. 


 

Big Siblings | The kids are all very excited to be having a little sister! The boys had initially voted boy but by within the last few weeks they'd joined Daddy in saying the hoped Cora Mae got a sister. Levi resolved that it was great either way because if it was boy then they would be "really in the lead" (4-2 because they include Joel and I in their count) but if it was a girl we'd be tied and Cora Mae would have a sister buddy. Malachi says "Massey Roof" soooo cute in his little three year old voice and I'm excited to hear that hundreds more times. While in the beginning Levi was way more affectionate and excited than Malachi, he's definitely caught up now and is constantly coming up and loving on my belly and talking about Massey Ruth in there. Cora Mae seems to be understanding more and more. Now she randomly and without prompting will want to kiss my belly and say baby over and over. I'm working on teaching her to add "sister" to that baby. 


To sum it up, we're all very excited and a little in shock to be welcoming another girl in the Miller home! We are so thankful for these 4 precious gifts God has blessed us with. 

My random polling question -- Did any of you who wanted to be surprised end up finding out in the room accidentally? 




CONVERSATION

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