So what did my parents say when I dropped the big bomb?

Most girls who find out they are unexpectedly pregnant are most nervous about telling their dads, that was definitely not the case for me. Lets just say you haven't met my mother. (who was the last to find out)  I can remember driving down dialing my dads number and anticipating what his response would be, which was much better then I could have imagined. Our conversation went a little like this

Me: Hey daddy whats up
Dad: Hey pumpkin, just working how are you.
Me: Well, Im alright, I am just going to get this over with, I'm pregnant.
Dad: GREAT! Congratulations.
Me: what? You are not going to yell at me?
Dad: Well what good is that going to do, you are going to have a baby whether I yell at you or not.

Yea, seems pretty simple right? Well that boosted my confidence a little as I was trying to muster up the courage to tell my mom.

A week goes by and everyone knows..except for mom. I had to wait for the perfect moment, which had to be in person.. I would have been hunted down if I told her over the phone. My sister Ashley and her husband were coming to Visit from Florida and I finally got some time off from work to go to Blairsville and visit. When I arrived, my sister and her husband were off celebrating their wedding anniversary. I initially had planned on not telling my mom while my sister was there because I did not want to ruin their trip with a "family crisis." My brother ruined that idea. I come in the door, settle in and make a sandwich and as I am sitting there he blurts out, Mom, Amber has something to tell you, yes I know, way to throw me under the bus. Well, there is no going back now. So i said it,

"Mom, I'm Pregnant"

Mom: "Haha your real funny."

Brother: "No mom, she is not kidding, I have known for two days"

Mom: "She is kidding, she has to be, she is not that stupid."

And this is the point where all heck breaks loose and mom goes off the deep end. She goes and frantically calls for my stepdad to come inside who rushes inside and asks, "Who Died?" And my mom goes on to tell him I am pregnant, at which point his face calms and he becomes the voice of reason. Three hours of tantrums pass, and my mom goes from "I am not going to be a part of any wedding, and that boy better not show his face in this house." to

"Well, I guess I am going to have to get a swingset."

So as soon as she calmed and realized that I was not 16 and in highschool she was consumed with excitement and ready to be a Grandma! So the rest of the week goes on and I am the butt of every baby joke my family can come up with.

And here we are today, a  year and a half later, and my mom and dad love sweet Izzy with all of their hearts. We laugh now at the responses from my mom, and tease her, but I know now that I am a mother, that all she wanted was the best for me, and she didn't want to see my life spiral out of control.

I have an amazing supportive family.

"Yep, that definitely says Positive"

So people love stories right? As soon as I get into a deep conversation with someone who doesn't already know my entire life story two of the first questions they ask are "How did you find out you were pregnant?" and "What did your parents say" Both of which are now very humourous stories. Let me enlighten you.

It was July 5th, a Monday. I had literally just opened my eyes and was laying in my bed, shaking off the sleepy and trying to get myself motivated. I can remember my stomach growling and thinking that there was no food in the house and I would probably have to venture out to get something. The VERY next thought that came into my mind for whatever reason was... I am going to take a pregnancy test. This was odd for me because I hadn't had a single symptom, wasn't late, and had no other reason to take one, except to just take one. I am not the kind of person who just has pregnancy tests laying around, but on this particular day I just happened to have one because a friend of mine had taken one on campus at her college and couldnt keep the other one because if the R.A found it she would get kicked out. SIDENOTE: At this particular time I was living with my most amazing friend Ashlee Green who just so happened to be using the bathroom. So I asked Big Mike (her dad) If I could use his bathroom in his room, which I had never used before. So I go in there, do what you do, and patiently wait for the results, not thinking much at all about it.. Again, at this point in my mind, it was just something to do. well about three minutes later, my world was flipped upside down. Two pink lines stared straight at me and I am pretty sure a few explicit words came out of my mouth. So off I went to share the news with Ashlee, who was at the time showering. I can remember holding up the test and saying tell me this doesnt say positive... and her response just solidified it... "Yep, that definitely says positive." My next step was to call my boyfriend, A boy I had only been dating a few months, and had only met my mom twice. I had NO idea how he was going to respond or if he was going to run, like many 19 year olds did. So I called him and this is how the conversation went...

Hey Babe what are you doing

Matt: Sleeping whats up

Me: I have to tell you something

Matt: Okay...what is it

Me: I think I'm pregnant, I took a test and it was positive, but I am going to go to the health department later to find out for sure

Matt: Really? Sweet! Well I am going back to bed, call me later.

Yep. Thats how it went. He went back to sleep. HOW COULD HE SLEEP? I was frantically freaking out. I was a cheerleader, I was a captain of my college cheerleading team, I had my WHOLE life figured out. At least I thought I had.I wasn't ready to get big and sacrifice my 111 lb body. But ready or not, it happened, and now its almost a year later and I have a beautiful baby girl who means more to me then anything.

I can remember people saying that Me and Matt were getting married because I was pregnant. Let me clear this up now, Matt and I got married because we love each other, and anyone who knows us will tell you that. Would we have gotten married as soon as we had if Elizabeth had not come along, probably not. But I gave my life to him because he is worthy of it. I am so blessed to have someone like him to come home to every day.

Amber, Mom, Wife, Cheerleader, Student, Captain, Christian, and now Blogger.

What is in a name? A title? For most of us our names are followed by a longer list of subtitles. Oh Ashley... She is such a "Nice girl" Oh sarah, she can be a real "Witch" It occured to me today, the first day I had a day all to myself and actually had time to sit down and think, that I myself, have acquired quite a few titles in the short 21...soon to be 22 years that I have been blessed to live.What also occured to me, is that I have so many different things in my life that require my attention that it is hard to find and prioritize time for all of them. So many times I am asked.."How do you do it?" Well I will be the first to tell you, its not easy, in fact sometimes it is a miracle I even make it out of bed. It can get hectic and overwhelming in this house, But thankfully, I have an amazing husband to pick me up when I feel like the world has used me as its personal punching bag. It IS hard being a mother, I won't rant now on that issue, but I am sure it will come out in due time. So here it is, my very own blog, venting place, and a chance for you to see what its like Keeping up with the Kennisons.

So whats been going on with us lately? Izzy now has TWO teeth coming in and I don't care what they try to say, ain't nothing going to fix the pain of teeth shoving their way through your gums but a nice Loratab, and well we all know better then that, so poor Izzy has been pouty and fussy, and mom is sleep deprived. She has also figured out how to crawl upstairs, but thankfully our house doesn't have any.
  We all had a wonderful thanksgiving and it was the first time we all could be together in years. So with good, naturally comes the bad... 16 people from our dinner got some AWFUL stomach virus, 8 of which were staying with mom at her house, Needless to say, it looked like a hospital ward for the next few days.
    Other then that it has been a wonderful week and Matthew and I are just getting ready for finals. I dont know how to end a blog, so until next time ;)