Paint The Barn Red: bumpdate: how we told my parents about baby

-If the Easter bunny and Easter eggs are confusing you...keep reading-

Some of you have asked how Jason and I broke the news to our families about expecting our first baby. Coming up with creative ways to break the news to our loved ones was something that I spent a lot of time brainstorming over, planning out, and sometimes getting people in the right place at the right time from over 2,000 miles away! So I thought it would be fun to share on my blog how we broke our big news to the people we love most!

This will be a three-part series over the coming weeks as I share how we told my parents, how we told Jason's parents, and how we told the rest of our families. (: My baby bumpdate blogs will continue to be posted weekly as well! Stay tuned for my 17 week baby bumpdate later on this week! (:

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Now let me explain the reason for the Easter bunny and Easter-everything:

If it's throwing you off, good. That means you're probably going through the same confusion my parents and brother and sister went through upon opening this mysterious package that came in their mailbox.

If it isn't throwing you off, it's probably because you're already aware that my due date is 8 days before Easter 2015.

But before anyone knew about the baby news, I can assure you:
getting an Easter themed package in mid-September would have thrown just about anyone off.

But it didn't start off this way.

My original plan was to buy some plain white mugs and try out the Sharpie thing where you can draw a design on a mug with a Sharpie, bake it, and have what you drew become a permanent fixture on the cup. I was going to write "grandpa", "grandma", "auntie" or "uncle" on each mug--I figured I'd let the mugs do the talking.

But from what I read, it seemed pretty hit or miss if the Sharpie would actually be as permanent as it led on to be. Plus, I wasn't sure if four mugs shipping across the country would in fact, still be four mugs by the time they reached my parent's doorstep.

Back to the drawing board.

The next idea that crossed my mind was fortune cookies. I could make my own cookies, and each person would have a message inside stating their new "title" as grandpa or grandma, etc.

But let's face it, I only recently perfected The Grilled Cheese. Beyond that, I've learned to make a decent Tex-Mex salad and some pretty stellar spaghetti. But in no way am I ready for making something like fortune cookies. I'm no Martha Stewart in the kitchen, here. I'm more like Susan Meyer (à la Desperate Housewives).
The only woman in all of Fairview who could burn Mac n Cheese.

Not that I've ever burned Mac n Cheese.
But I have started a fire in the microwave before.

That has to earn me points for something.

So then it finally hit me: the baby is due right around Easter. Easter eggs would be the perfect thing to slip a little message inside of!

No microwaves were harmed in the making of this pregnancy announcement.

So with some cut up crepe paper, an Easter basket, and a lot of cheesy ambition (no Mac n Cheese pun intended), Jason and I hit pen to paper to come up with the most ridiculous, sometimes rhyming sometimes-not poem to go inside the Easter basket.

Happy Easter!

...I'm celebrating a little soon.

I know you must be thinking,

"that bunny is off his rocker".

But news this big could be quite a shocker!

I may be coming a little early this year,

but I have a surprise you might want to hear.

So find yourself a seat - I have a little treat.

On each egg, you'll find your name...

But this Easter there's going to be change!

We're giving new names and changing titles!

But yours is yet to be discovered:

Open your egg and it'll be uncovered!

Then I printed off a coloring page of an Easter bunny and colored it in and made some bunting out of card stock that read, "Happy Easter!". I attached bendy straws to the back of the Easter bunny and poem so that the bunny would lay flat during shipping, but could then be flipped up when my family opened the box.

Next were the Easter eggs. I simply used some plastic Easter eggs and wrote each person's name on the eggs. Then for each person, I printed and cut out a unique job title and description with its effective start date (my due date), and rolled it up and placed it inside its corresponding egg.

grandpa

job description:

love me, hug me, tickle me, take me fishing, tell me stories about walking fifteen miles uphill both ways to school in the snow, play with me, fall asleep in chairs throughout the day with me after reading me a story

effective start date:

anytime around March 28th, 2015

grandma

job description:

love me, hug me, shower me with kisses and cookies, read me no less than 100 stories when I come to visit, tuck me in and say goodnight, play with me, and watch my imagination and personality grow

effective start date:

anytime around March 28th, 2015

auntie

job description:

love me, hug me, kiss me, pinch my cheeks and tell me how much I've grown, be my friend, spoil me, take me to the beach and play with me in the sand, make special memories with me, and make a bond so strong because my mommy says you're her best friend

effective start date:

anytime around March 28th, 2015

(mommy tells me we might get to have the same birthday!)*

uncle

job description:

love me, support me, teach me things that I never knew before, help me discover, have fun with me and make me laugh, tell me stories about when you were little like me

effective start date:

anytime around March 28th, 2015

*My sister's birthday is March 27th, so baby could have the same birthday as her! (:

Once the Easter basket was ready, we mailed the box to my parent's house. I made sure to contact my dad and tell him to make sure no one opened the package when it got there. I told him it was a gift for the entire family from Jason and I. It wasn't the first time we've sent them a gift by mail, so it didn't come off as suspicious to them in that way at all. I also said that since it had been a while, that we should do a Skype call with everyone there to catch up.

So that Saturday after my family had gotten the package, Jason and I Skyped them.

We told them they could now open their present.

Danielle read the poem out loud for the whole family,

then each person got their egg and opened it.

And we got to see their reactions unfold before our eyes... (:

Their reactions also unfolded before our camera since we filmed the entire thing! (:
I'm so glad we filmed that Skype call because now we have that memory saved forever. (:

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It was so fun being able to surprise my family this way since Jason and I live over 2,000 miles away from them and we couldn't be there in person to tell them our exciting news.
This will be the first grandchild for my parents and the first niece or nephew for my siblings! They are all excited and I think the four of them are going to live up to their new "jobs" as grandparents and aunt and uncle wonderfully! I'm already in the process of recruiting my sister for the Summer as additional help and for babysitting duties haha

Would you like to see more?
Check out my other "bumpdates" below!