He or She...Which Will it Be?

We had our celebration for Baby E yesterday.  I had gotten a lot of the things set up the day before so that morning all I had to do was frost the cupcakes. 

Matt won another one of the gift cards from his work - they get added to a raffle each month if they get good customer responses sent in and he wins a lot!  It's a blessing.  This time it was to Friendly's and I had the cupcakes done by 7:30, so we decided to take a break and enjoy the morning and went out for breakfast.  I'm not sure we've all been out to breakfast together ever before!

When we sat down and the kids opened their menus, there was a "How to draw a bumblebee" page... It made us smile since that was to be the theme for E's party! 

Side note:  There was hair on my French toast, which was gross, but ended up being a blessing cause they didn't charge me for my meal - which made the entire outing only cost us $2 after the gift card! :) 


We had a ton of people at our home for the party - we were so thankful for the nice weather (it's been either so hot I can't stand it or raining lately, but yesterday was perfect and around 80)  The kids were able to play outside which was good cause our house is not big and there were close to 20 kids here - plus all the adults!

The big plan for this party was to reveal the gender of our newest blessing and I had so much fun getting ready for it!  We had everyone "cast a vote" on if they thought it was a  "he" or "she" - which surprisingly came out exactly even in numbers! 

Here are some pictures, followed by the video of how we revealed our big secret!! 



I made this cupcake stand... pretty excited about it!



Yummy food that I made way too much of since my mom and sister bought a ton of pizza too



"He R She" bars and bee headbands for the kids to wear

My little bees... of course holding an extra headband for big sister Rachel



Cast your vote!!

"Welcome to our growing hive"  I put the first initial of all the kids' names.

The box that holds the secret...

And us opening it.... I realized when looking at the photos afterwards, that Rachel's daisies are on the table behind us in all the pictures of us opening the box. 

 

 

And here is the video of us sharing our big secret!!

 

After we opened it and the excitement died down, Matt led us all in prayer and we thanked God for this little blessing and asked for God's hand to be on [it's] life. (still trying not to give away the secret... you have to watch the video!!)  And then he announced our full count of boys and girls - with Rachel included.  Such a blessing to my heart

Thank you honey... you are an amazing husband and father and I am every day amazed by how you lead us in love with such a servant's heart and so much wisdom. Thank you for all these beautiful children and the ability to stay home with them.  You work so hard for us.  I'm living my childhood dream....and being so blessed in God's calling on my life as your helpmeet. I love you.

 And because I know the next question from everyone is going to be "What does 'E' stand for?"  Here is the only answer you're getting before this baby decides to join us out here....

After the party, I fell asleep sitting up on the couch for a half hour or so and then we packed up and went swimming for a little while.  It was a busy and very blessed day and we all slept well last night - although I spent my first night on the couch (usually happens for the last month of each pregnancy since we don't have a bathroom upstairs!) but I couldn't lay down with the amount of acid coming up my throat from eating pizza for lunch and dinner and it's easier to prop myself up on the couch.  I am huge!!  I cannot wait to hold this baby in my arms.  Won't be long!!