ANNOUNCEMENT!!!

My plan was to announce my pregnancy at the 1/2 way point (20 weeks). I don't know exactly why it seemed like such a good idea to me, but it did. I liked the idea of waiting until I knew gender, exact due date, that the baby was going to be born with 2 arms and 2 legs, etc before I announced.

Then I found out I was pregnant a few days after Christmas and I thought I might just tell the WHOLE world in the next 5 minutes. However, my more rational self said I had to wait until at least 12 weeks. Well, I found out that being pregnant-sick and then getting 2 different super-nasty-sickness-bugs on top of that made you NEVER ever want to talk to anyone EVER again. So, 12 weeks came and went, and no baby announcement. By the time I felt better, I was so close to my original 20 week goal that it seemed waiting was going to happen mostly on its own.

Then a couple weeks ago, something changed again. I no longer was able to look like my normal poorly-dressed self (which can hide a baby bump easily). Even the biggest sweatshirts started to look "lumpy" in the middle section. (Below is a representation of how pretty I looked in my GIANT sweatshirts).

I figured it was still fine since most of humanity knows DON'T ASK A WOMAN IF SHE IS PREGNANT, EVER. In my daily life, I don't see many people. Tait and I are pretty much hermits. 

But this past week, I have transitioned out of the stage, "Geez, Brittney looks like she gained weight or is super-bloated."

 I noticed an increased number of people asking questions like, "Anything exciting happening with you guys?" or "Is anything new going on?" Yeah, yeah, I know what you really want to ask!

I was also able to snag a baby-inspection appointment at the 18-week mark, at least I made it far enough to announce gender with my baby announcement. 

So.... in case you are VERY dense, and hadn't figured it out by this point in the post....

Tait and I are having a BABY GIRL! Due September 1!

Here are our hopes and dreams for this kid, but mostly for us. 

She is hereby required to inherit the awesome Hamilton Family BLUE eyes. 

We hope she gets Tait's awesome long legs and curly hair. What we really hope doesn't happen, is that she doesn't get Tait's long arms and my super-short legs. Although having a monkey-baby might be super awesome too. Okay, after looking at amazing pictures of monkeys to illustrate this point, I might have to amend that. Now, I hope the baby gets my short legs, and Tait's long arms. 

We hope she gets my childhood ability to SLEEP! According to legend (which I am sure is exaggerated) I was sleeping through the night at night 2. It was probably more like week 2 or month 2, but either of those is fine too. Tait on the other hand is still the worst at sleeping, in the history, of EVER (even according to his own mother). 

I hope she is stubborn and opinionated, with her parents that is all but guaranteed. Most people know I am stubborn and opinonated. People who only kinda know Tait think we are an opposites-attract couple. However, as anyone who REALLY knows Tait can attest, that dude is stubborn too! Which I love. I would hate to have a door-mat as a partner. How can you run a business with a door-mat? How can you trust a door-mat to give opinions, etc. 

Now back to wanting a stubborn and opinionated kid.... I know most parents would think there is nothing worse. Let me explain why I think there is nothing better, especially for a girl. I was a stubborn opinionated kid. And even as a totally awkward teenager, I didn't get talked into anything, and was pretty much immune to social pressure. It made me odd and I felt I didn't fit in, but I was okay with that. So much of what the popular kids did seemed stupid and foreign to me. 

I would rather have my kid throw embarrasing tantrums in Target and be one of "those parents" who others look down on as my kid pitches a fit SCREAMING "NO!!!" at me in the park, etc than have a kid who gets pressured to do stupid things. If a stubborn kid does something stupid, at least you know it was HER IDEA. I think that is better. 

Plus, after having more than my fair share of 1,200 pound 3-year-olds throw tantrums (that have actually put my life in danger), I seriously think tantrums are FUNNY! 

On the topic of horses, I hope she has a love a horses. Preferably, horses better behaved than the ones featured above. In my opinion there is nothing better than being out in the mud. There is also nothing CUTER than a little girl riding a tiny pony. And it also gives my pony Cricket a goal in her life, Cricket now has 3 years to get clean enough to look okay for a lead-line class at a horse show. I better start bathing her NOW.

We hope she gets some sort of artistic ability from Tait (who has a truck-load of artistic ability), rather than the TOTAL lack of artistic-anything from Brittney. 

For the kid's sake she better get some sort of ADHD, or watching both of her ADHD parents bounce from task to task and talk about 10 topics at once will be rather confusing!

Judging by the fact that she would NOT hold still for her ultrasound, I am guessing we are all set on the ADHD front!