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[cranberryink]

My workplace is throwing me a baby shower in a couple of weeks. The invitation that went out today had the headline, "It's a BABY!" Hahaha. Glad we cleared that up (though it could still be puppies, which would also be awesome). I think the poor girl who made the invite was so used to putting "it's a boy" or "it's a girl" that she just couldn't

Comments

[jewelianna]

I think I totally missed the announcement on this one! Congratulations! Sending best wishes for love and laughter (and a baby that SLEEPS!) your way.

[cranberryink]

Thanks! I am also hoping for a good sleeper!

[thefourthvine]

My mother told me that before it was routine to know the sex of the baby, people would say, "What are you hoping for? Boy or girl?" in place of the "What are you having?" question. It is THE ISSUE on people's minds, apparently! Once they're sure you're pregnant, I mean; I spent more of my pregnancy with people asking me if I was pregnant than what I was having.

[cranberryink]

Yeah, once we say we don't know the sex we get a lot of "well, what do you WANT?" and "do you have a FEELING one way or another?". My husband always says he wants a drummer.

[firelily]

First off, I think that's a hilarious shower invite. At first I thought it was done in a completely humorous intentional way. Too bad the person who sent it out probably didn't do it to be funny. Oh well.

Secondly, the obsession with your kid's gender is all based on people's insane need for immediate gratification. I'm convinced.

That being said, if I'm ever pregnant, I personally want to know so I can start shopping for baby clothes. Not that I'll be putting my daughter all in pink or anything (boring) but I just want to know. For shopping purposes.

[cranberryink]

Yeah, there was no irony intended in that invitation. But that's part of why I think it's so funny. :D

The one message that other parents have consistently given me is, "Don't buy baby clothes. You don't need to. Everyone else will get them for you. Seriously. Don't buy any." And while I'm sure that not telling people a gender will cut down dramatically on the amount of clothes I get, it's still advice I'm following. Until after my shower, that is.

[firelily]

That IS true, definitely. I will have to vigorously restrain myself from not buying baby clothes. And if I do find out what the sex is, I might not tell everyone anyway just to prevent people from giving me a million pink or blue things. But I really want to go out and pick out a couple of things special. I mean, come on, places like H&M have baby clothes now! My potential future kid will probably be better dressed than I am.

Plus I kind of want to be able to focus on girl or boy names. But, on the other hand I totally get not wanting to know, and wanting it to be a surprise. That's such a cool thing to find out during the moment.

On the other other hand, by then I'll know how to do an ultrasound and I might even be able to interpret the results myself. Heh. I'll be all "give me the wand, I'll do it myself".

[cranberryink]

Yeah, I confess that a big part of why I don't want to know is to prevent people from buying me a bunch of pink or blue crap. I'm kind of a control freak that way, hahaha.

[gmth]

LOL, I love the exchange with the cashier.

Baby shower! So much fun. Hope you're feeling well! :)

[cranberryink]

I am looking forward to the baby shower! Much more now than when I was 3 months pregnant. Maybe it's because I feel better now than I did then. It's been a fairly smooth pregnancy so far--I feel lucky!

[strippedhalo]

I love that invitation! And I think it's more fun not to know. But I guess that is a minority opinion now? When my best friend was pregnant with her first baby, she didn't want to know if it was a boy or a girl, but her mother was OBSESSED with finding out, and somehow managed to get my friend's doctor to tell her (wtf). And then she called my friend and TOLD HER. (My friend's mother is not actually very nice.)

I think maybe part of the obsession with knowing is that people also like to pick out names ahead of time. Which I also think is a little weird (PERSONALLY). How do you know what your kid should be named before you see him/her? (The flip side of this: I was almost a month old before my parents could agree on my name.)

[cranberryink]

There are so few surprises left in this world. Why not let this be one of them? Plus, it's not like you're not going to know soon enough.

I think we will be picking out names in advance (one boy and one girl name). My husband and I have a VERY HARD TIME agreeing on things, so if we wait until the baby's born it could be years before we come up with a name!

[cranberryink]

ALSO, your friend's mother sounds like a terrible, terrible person. The way it worked with my OB's office is that I only had one ultrasound that would have revealed the sex of the baby. At that appt, we told the ultrasound tech that we didn't want to know, so she didn't tell us and the sex didn't even go into my medical file. So my actual doctor has no way to know it, and couldn't tell us (or anyone) even if she wanted to. It's perfect!