Let's Play the Name Game...

So, it turns our girl names are way more difficult than boy names. We had a few lined up in the beginning of the pregnancy... such as...
Aubrianna
Kiara
Kylie
Audrina
Adrianna
Aurabella
Elle

My top choice once we found out we were having a girl became Aubrianna. My only issue being that people would nickname her "Aubrey", which I was not so fond of. I was still in a way pushing for Aubrianna because I really loved the name. My husband was a fan but also felt people would call her "Aubrey" for short. So, we tried to think of other similiar names... such as Audrina and Adrianna. Getting creative Matt said Aubrina... which was a spin off of Audrina. We searched online to see if the name came up anywhere and it wasn't listed in any baby name directory so it was obviously very rare (which was exactly what we wanted). My whole wish through this whole naming process was that my baby didn't have a generic name that everyone else in the world had. I didn't want any name you heard all the time; nothing considered popular. Aubrina was truely it... an original. After googling the name you only found about 5 girls in the world who came up with the name (which made me happy... it was rare!). So we decided on Aubrina.
Now the problem was a middle name. Matt wanted to use something more traditional (like my middle name... Katelin), but I wanted our girl to have something all her own... truely original. So, we ended up deciding on Paige.
And so here comes Aubrina Paige Cook this October (or late September).

Drumroll please...

Just as we were about to embark on week 21 our third ultrasound came up. May 19th, we went to the doctors office for an hour long sono. It was wonderful to see how much more our baby had developed and that everything was looking good. It was during this sono that we saw just what a difficult child we were going to have... from covering her face with her hands to crossing her legs to hide her gender. It even appeared that she gave us the middle finger. The ultrasound technician had me walk up the down the hallway, drink water, pee, and even bounce in place in order to get the baby to be in a more cooperative position. Unfortunately the baby continued to be uncooperative. The technician said she was about 60/40 that it was a girl, but she couldn't be 100%.
So, now our whole idea of baby Braeden was tossed aside. Could we really be having a girl after all? What in the world were we going to name her? Well, there was no way we were going to wait another 8 weeks or so for our next sonogram. So, we took matters into our own hands. One of my co-workers, whom is also pregnant, sent me a link to a website she'd found with places that did 3D/4D ultrasounds. It didn't take long to convince my husband that we were going to get another sonogram. We found a place in East Meadow not too far from us that had a "gender package" (which was just a regular 2D 5 minute sonogram to show you your baby's gender). So, that Saturday morning (May 22) we went to Impact Medical Technologies. The baby was super cooperative and super active during this time. It was obvious to the technician almost right away that we were having a girl. With her bottom high up in my stomach it was the perfect position to see that she was indeed a she. The technician was even kind enough to show us the baby's lady parts up close in 3D. So, at that point we knew for sure we were having a little girl.

The Gender Test

In the beginning of April I decided to take a home gender test, called IntelliGender. According to the information in the package it is 84% accurate. So, I followed the directions and waited anxiously to see my results. I was shocked to see that my pee (mixed with the powdery mixture inside) turned a dark muddy green. Apparently I was having a baby boy. So, I quickly took a picture of the test with my camera phone and sent it to my husband. He was of course ecstatic. Of course I was overjoyed too, but seriously surprised because we both thought we were having a girl. Honestly I was hoping for a girl... but as long as I had a healthy baby nothing else truly mattered. I was just happy to finally have an answer to the torturous gender question; especially as early as 15 weeks.
We knew there was a pretty big chance that Intelligender was inaccurate, but neither of us could hold in our enthusiasm. So, we told our friends and family. We explained about the test and that it wasn't 100%. We even decided on a boy name... Braeden Matthew.

Other boy name contenders were: Caleb & Collin.

We went on for weeks calling our baby Braeden... even though in our minds we knew fully well that the test could very well be wrong. After weeks of reading different mother's reviews on the test it seemed like it was a total hit or miss. I mean, it is a 50/50 shot either way, right? Some people had taken the test multiple times and gotten different answers... it was correct for some people and wrong for others. So, we were still anxiously awaiting our next ultrasound to reveal the true answer.

The first three months

On February 26th we had our first sonogram. I was exactly 9 weeks on that day. Weeks 6 through 12 were the only really rough ones for me. At about 4 or 5 weeks I started feeling nauseous. Weeks 6 through about 10 I got sick at least once a night, right after dinner. The following two weeks I only got sick once a week. By week 13 I wasn't feeling wonderful but I wasn't throwing up anymore... I was still a bit nauseous but as the weeks went on and I began my second trimester I felt a lot better. I felt blessed that my "morning sickness" (which was really more like night sickness) only lasted a few short weeks.


In March, when I was a little over 12 weeks we had our second ultrasound. We got some beautiful pictures of our healthy baby.


It's no lie when they say you'll feel a lot better in the second trimester. I got a little energy back (not too much, but a little is better than nothing)... so I wasn't ready to pass out the second I got out of work and going to bed at 9 o'clock anymore. My appetite increased and I wasn't feeling like I was going to throw up all the time.

The beginning

On September 22nd, 2007 me and my husband, Matthew, were married. Shortly after I felt the baby itch. That November we got a female Yorkie-Poo puppy, that we named Bella. Bella cured my baby itch for a good year and I'm glad she did. Having a baby isn't something you should rush into. And the first year of your marriage is a really something you want to enjoy just the two of you. And we did exactly that. So, we decided that in a little over a year we'd talk baby talk. In late Summer-early fall 2008 my husband and I decided we wanted to have a baby around Halloween time. We'd be married a little over two years by then. We had made the decision that 2009 was our year of the baby. News Years night marked the official start of making a baby happen. After anxiously taking a million pregnancy tests through January on January 19th I took a digital pregnancy test that immediately popped up saying "pregnant". We couldn't believe it... so, I took about 3 more tests just to confirm. They all came out positive, we were having a baby!