Olivia Finds out. December 24, 2010

Much time and planning was put into how we were going to break the news to Olivia, and we decided it would be one of her presents to open for Christmas day. I took those little socks with the duckies on them, and found a cute little Christmas-themed bag I had gotten from a friend which was the perfect size to hold these cute little things. I wrapped, re-wrapped, and wrapped them again until they were buried in wrapping paper. I felt like the suspense would make it more exciting to get to the bottom of what was in that tiny little box! I stuck it in the bag and set it under the tree two days early. She would be here on Christmas eve.

The days flew by with the busyness of cleaning, cooking, shopping, wrapping and the like, and before I knew it, she was texting me that they were just fifteen minutes away, and I was at CVS. Holy COW! I rushed home and luckily made it there before they did, and my husband woke up in time for their arrival. I'd cooked dinner and we sat down to eat, and then hung out a little bit. My husband whispered in my ear that he wanted to "do it tonight," so we sat down on the couch.
Bri: Olivia, if you'd like to select a card off of the tree to open tonight, you can do that.
O: Yay! I'll take... this one!
It was the card that was just a generic Merry Christmas, you're a great kid, from us. Then, we told her we'd pick out a present for her to open, and we gave her that little bag with that thrice-wrapped pair of socks, and had her sit down on the couch. She quickly tore the present out of the bag, and started unraveling the many layers, layer after layer, commenting about how much wrapping paper there was! And she got to those little socks and stopped. Her head tilted, and she jumped up with delight and wrapped her little arms around my waist and hugged me for an eternity! She was squealing with delight about how excited she was and hugging me until she finally let go to run to her daddy and give him some hugs!

And ever since then, it's all she talks about. "I'm so excited for the baby." "I can't wait for the baby."
She stayed with us that week, and on Monday I left for work. I came home to a screaming pair, "CLOSE YOUR EYES!!!" She led me from the door, to the table, and uncovered my eyes. There sat a beautiful display of Lilys, and a handmade card, designed and written from the creative mind of Olivia herself. She even came up with the poem on her own.

A New Baby is a Blessing

and you are one too.
Beautiful flowers, for Beautiful Brianna.

B for Brianna.

We love U.

Up until this point, it was all fairy dust and flowers. Everything was fun, new, exciting and great. I was having a blast being so special with this new baby in my belly and feeling like I was in a dream world. Only, it was too wonderful to last forever. I would soon find out being pregnant can also be one of your most painful experiences...