My Surprise Babies

Anna, from In Honor of Design blog is instagraming about her surprise baby and the gift that she is.  I was thinking about if I had a surprise baby, and the first to come to mind was Eowyn.  We had the stomach flu that winter and I was nauseated for about two months.  But with 7 children, the flu had cycled through the family once and then the first to get it were re-infected by the last to get it...you get it: rough winter!  But sometime early Spring I had a day set apart from the kids' sickness when I had yet another wave of nausea and that time it dawned on me that I might be pregnant.  I took a test, and yes.  I hadn't had a cycle after Legolas (#7) so, it was a surprise.

I instantly got onto some website and calculated my due date and landed Christmas Eve!! I was so pumped! But then came my next surprise.

I went to the ob/gyn and she wanted a quick check ultrasound to confirm dates given my lack of cycle.  There was a darling, swimming and playing little ballerina (I didn't know it was a girl yet), 10 weeks old!! As I've said before, my Christmas Elf became myThanksgiving Turkey!  I was already almost two months along!  That was a real surprise!

So, that's the story that came first to mind...

but of course, I never did get a cycle after I got married.  Honeymoon baby.  I WAS surprised. I guess she wasn't "unplanned", although I certainly wasn't planning on anything, we were just open.  And as I counted my calendar dates from the office I was working in at the time, I began to hope.  Then I began to doodle girl names at my desk.  My husband did NOT believe me when I told him I thought I was pregnant.  We had to buy three boxes of tests.  I'm not sure WHAT I did wrong, but sure enough--I finally got that positive!  My husband, for one, was shocked.  I was ecstatic!

I guess Arwen counts as surprise baby #1.

We were trying and hoping by the time Aragorn was conceived.  But at 9 months out, with no cycle yet, Gimli was our second true surprise.

I didn't think of him as a "surprise" baby, because I (in my very youthful enthusiasm) had already been hoping for another.  But when I told my husband I thought I might be pregnant (as I whipped up spaghetti at 2 in the afternoon to satisfy an insatiable craving), he said, "you can't be: you haven't had a cycle yet".  Well, shock #2 for my husband, and our beloved Gimli came as the best gift his big brother could have ever received.  At 18 months apart, those two have been each other's greatest gifts.

So, I think that's it.  Three TRUE surprise babies.  Two conceived with no cycle in between babies.

For YEARS I could count how many cycles I had in our marriage on one hand.  But that's probably TMI for the inter webs! lol

Time to dash!  Have a great weekend!