Girls, Girls, Girls

The gender of our baby has been a topic of much speculation on all sides of the family pretty much since the beginning of the pregnancy. We knew from the beginning that we would find out the sex - there's too much planning and too many emotions involved, in our opinion, to not find out in advance. Of course, there's the down side that as soon as you find out the gender, no one wants to buy you anything but clothes for the wee one. And can you really blame them? Who wants to buy a case of diapers when they could get the cute little onesie with the fire engine on it? MUCH more fun!

Also, I think everyone was holding out hope that this could be "the one," the boy that would carry on the Kautz line, the boy that my father tried to have 4 times, the boy that would start to even things up on my mom's side of the family (where there are 11 girls to 5 boys between the children, grands and great grand.) My sister wanted me to have a boy so she wouldn't inherit the pressure of producing a boy. It's been a long time since we've seen a boy.

So at the beginning, I was hoping for a boy. He would be such a novelty, such a treat! My dad would FINALLY have male progeny, the Kautz men would live on, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera..... However, Aaron was convinced we were having a girl. So much so that he ended a discussion we were having about boy name possibilities because he felt like it was pointless to discuss such nonsense when we were having a girl. And I started to believe him because he and his mom and his grandma all have a weird sixth sense about things. So, I'm not sure if it was self-preservation and wanting to avoid disappointment, or if it was the fact that "I don't know nothin' 'bout" raisin' no boys, I started to hope for a girl. Just a little....

Well, yesterday was the big day, THE ultrasound where they look at the baby's skull size and shape, measure all the bones, look at the vertebrae, the heart function, the face and about a million other things PLUS they check out the goods! (If you see a "clamshell" it's a girl, a "turtle" is a boy. Nice...... ) And about two minutes into the ultrasound, the technician started referring to the baby as "she." Then the doctor came in and agreed - looks like a girl! A fabulously healthy, perfectly sized girl! Now, they are only 90% positive (thus the single question mark on the ultrasound picture below) but I will go back in 6 weeks for another ultrasound and they will know more definitively then. But 90% is a pretty good indication!

So, with 90% certainty, we are please to announce that around February 5, 2010, the world will get to greet the youngest in a loooong line of girls, future posessor of her mom's chunky thighs or her dad's soccer calves (but dear God, don't make her have both), our daughter......

Addison Frances Kautz

(I think every last one of her 5 future grandmas and her proud Auntie M are at the store right now buying her a cute pink outfit.... but what can you do? :)

this is her alien look.

check out the hands

the 90% of a clamshell. poor kid, goods getting splashed all over the internet