I’ve been giving it some real thought lately…. how will I approach “Mommy-hood” with my business, my blog and just my LIFE?! So as I have thought it through… while I would love to think my life is all pretty and beautiful professional photos, and just Instagram Perfect… it’s realistically SO far from that – and I want to document that. I plan on making this series of “The Not So Mommy – Blog” about my shortcomings, hilarious encounters with parent hood and HOPEFULLY some successes too! So if you can follow along with my ramblings, I have decided to do some “mommy blogs” and by this I mean… The “Not-So-Mommy-Blogs”. These posts will -I’m sure- amuse some, confuse others, scare some into NEVER wanting to attempt being a mom and others will just roll their eyes at me because they ARE mom’s and they have been through it all…. Yes Yes I know you mom’s out there have indeed been though it all… but this is for me… and all the women who are terrified of being a mom!

I recently re-read some of my personal blog posts about my engagement to E, our wedding planning process and even some of my Closet Shopping posts, and what I love most about them is not the ones with perfect photos… but the ones with iPhone shots, home videos my dad has made and just raw moments! My blog is a way to document life as it happens and also hopefully show off some pretty images of things I shoot throughout the year… but realistically I literally laughed out loud at some of the posts and how I WIRTE!! I am not a writer at all… I have terrible grammar and punctuation and I am sure most of the time it’s even hard to follow what I am saying because I type like I talk…. SUPER ALL OVER THE PLACE! (With lots of parentheses and exclamation points!! Not to mention the dot dot dots….)

That being said, I hope some people will like these posts about our life, journey to being parents and learning a long the way… so what better way to kick it off than the night we literally almost fell off our seats when we found out we were pregnant…..

Here’s the story:

It was New Years Eve and E and I had invited his parents, my parents, his brother and sister and law (with 2 kids) and my sister and brother in law (with 2 kids) over for a New Years eve SLEEPOVER! – if you can do the math, that’s 10 adults and 4 kids- and mind you, it was because we had JUST bought our new house and wanted to spend an evening with them celebrating that! Eric’s brother immediately asked us when he arrived “So are we all here so you can announce you are pregnant” …. I almost SPAT out my water all over him and laughed! “NO WAY! I mean that would have been a fun way to tell you all, but no… we are NOT and I repeat NOT pregnant.” So at least the air was cleared early in the day…

Fast forward about 8 hours, it’s 11pm and our families have been hangout, chatting and sitting around playing games literally waiting for the new year to roll in.

Set Scene:

11:27pm we are all in one big circle in the living room playing catch-phrase- which the boys were not really liking I am pretty sure- when out of my mouth pops: “Katie (to my sister in law) how did you know you were pregnant? other than the test of course”  (what was I even thinking asking that? I am not sure myself… that’s still a mystery to me..)

As Katie rambles off a few things she experienced, my heart rate picked up as my family teases me that I COULD be pregnant….. I thought to myself… “whoa whoa whoa… those all sound like normal “Aunt Flo” type feelings… right???

(Also you should know E and I have been married at this point about 18 months and I have probably taken at least 25 pregnancy tests just out of fear alone….! Do the math… I know it’s not possible but really…. take my advice and go to the dollar store for your tests if you are like me 😉 because Costco doesn’t sell them in bulk yet…. and TRUST me I am working on that with them)

Oh My Gosh oh my gosh oh my GOODNESS… there is literally NO possible way I could be pregnant right now right?! RIGHT?!

11:33pm Tonie says ” Im gonna go grab a sweatshirt I’ll be right back”

E sees me go to the medicine cabinet and grab the last remaining dollar store test I have…

11:35: Tonie comes sauntering up from downstairs… “Ha! Forgot you guys! I am NOT pregnant… just took the test and it’s negative!”

11:37 My sister Alex thinks I didn’t wait long enough to look at the test and goes to the bathroom to check it herself… she thinks she see’s two lines (not just ONE like I had seen)

Alex proceeds to ATTEMPT to quietly get my attention to allow me a moment to go back to the bathroom and take another look at the test so that I could “find out” in privacy because she knew I … just might…. well freak a little….

11:39 I get this funny feeling in my stomach that “Gosh I do NOT want to be the girl that threw away a positive pregnancy test… maybe I should go look again so I did….

11:39 TONIE COMES RUNNING OUT OF THE BATHROOM to the full circle of family (my dad, father in law and everyone included) with a stick I just peed on and toilet paper hanging from it, because it’s the cheap kind and those don’t have lids!!!! “GUYS!!!!!! IS this TWO LINES OR ONE?!??!!”

We practically passed it around the circle and took votes on if it was or not… E says, “Well yea that’s two lines but what does two lines mean?!”

My mom and sister start SCREAMING and jumping for joy and meanwhile I am left dumb-founded and tears welling up, attempting to be “excited” but pretty embarrassed that I just found out in front of my ENTIRE FAMILY.

My sweet brother-in-law and Dad see the terror  nervousness in my eyes and immediately offer to go get be a digital test that will be more clear…which they run out the door and do!

11:46pm: E and I stand in the bathroom together staring at a spinning pin-wheel and as I look up at him he says grabs my shoulders and says ” Babe, this is awesome. Your clients are going to be ok and it doesn’t matter that we had made a “plan” this is God’s plan and in His hands..” — Man I love him… it was JUST want I needed to hear.

We looked back down and saw this:”Pregnant and 1-2 weeks”

 

Welp! No mistaking THAT one! So we come upstairs together hand in hand and tell the family…..

“YUP it’s true!”

Truth be told, the next 30-45 min are a bit of a blur (as you can see from my puffy and tired face haha!)…. I remember being REALLY scared, REALLY excited and thinking….oh my gosh WHAT am I gonna do in 9 months when this thing has to come out of me?!?!?!

 

 

If I can get real here, which I will anyway… I want to say a couple things:

1. I was terrified for my clients! I have an insanely amazing group of brides to whom I would NEVER want to let down or abandon! – let me just say, for how I stressed over that situation, God so blessed it and the few brides that I had to talk with about finding a new photographer were AH-MAZING and it was not worth the stress… but just goes to show how much I DO care about each one of my clients

2. I realize that some people (including people VERY VERY close to me) have a very different story about getting pregnant or trying to get pregnant- and it pains me when I see a loved one wanting to be pregnant so bad and something medical (or something else) is standing in their way. BUT what I have come to realize is that EVERY story is different. One of my BEST friends tried for 2 years to get pregnant only to miscarry and then finally get pregnant and now has a BEAUTIFUL baby to show for it. (Thank You Jesus!) BUT that is not my story, and it’s ok for my story to be different than other people’s and for me to have different emotions surrounding a SURPRISE pregnancy. After the initially shock wore off, I will say it took me a while to warm up to the idea of being pregnant and all that it entails – and what I have come to realize is, THATS OK. Again, my story and my emotions are different than ANYONE else’s. Needless to say, the excitement began to set in and then allllll the questions began to flood my mind… boy or girl? do I care? HOW do I take care of a baby? What do you feed a baby when you are done breast feeding? Do ALL babies REALLY not sleep at all? Will I ever have another date night with E again?! And let’s be real…. that’s what this blog series will be all about. It will be about my shortcomings and how God grows and changes E and I into the parents he wants us to be!

We are not only blessed by our Heavenly Father who is writing our story, but also my family, friends and CLIENTS who have ALREADY gone our of their way to bless us with support, gifts and encouragement!

So, if you made it to the bottom of this post, stay tuned for some more hilarious Life moments from The Not So Mommy Blog Series….

And these were the morning after we found out and I hadn’t slept a WINK that night, but as you can see the thoughts were setting in!!