Giving My Parents a Heart Attack

My parents have been in town visiting for the last week or so. Up to now we’ve been careful not to tell anyone because we wanted to make sure things were going well. Plus the truth is, neither of us were wanting to deal with any fussing or uproar over the whole thing.

So a few days ago we took some photos of us sitting on the couch making funny surprised expressions. We loaded them into the computer and then I spent a couple of hours fighting with the software to make big spooky eyes. She suggested putting a funny background of colourful dots and circles – it really made it look fun, sort of like a kid’s birthday announcement. Across the front we wrote in big letters, “SURPRISE!”

We then made a second blank pic with only the background dots image. On it we wrote “Our lives are going to change a lot… We’re expecting a little Critter around March 6, 2009. Are you surprised?” We did an identical one in French for her family, “Nos vies vont changer considerablement… Nous attendons un bambin aux environs du 6 Mars 2009. Surpris?”

She went out and got some nice blank cards and we made up a few of them for both parents, siblings and close relatives and mailed them out. She also got a kid-on-the-way announcement card from the store to go with the home-made one so we filled it out for my parents.

My parents were leaving the next morning, so we invited ourselves over for coffee and then I casually pulled out the two cards and handed them without any announcement to my mom and dad. Pregger one poked me and looked at me as if to say “aren’t you going to say anything?” Which I did not.

My dad was the first to open the store-bought card, and he had a mildly surprised look on his face. He read the contents and then quietly said, “congratulations.” My mom opened the home-made card and looked at the front, then opened it and read the interior. She too didn’t really say much other than “congratulations” and “we’re happy for you.” My dad further remarked, “I thought we were only going to have grand-dogs” in reference to my older brother and his wife’s spoiled Bichon Frises.

They were so quiet and low-key that I was caught off guard. I expected my mom to be all bubbly and excited, but I think we really did surprise them. Thinking back, both Mom-to-be and I realize they were probably expecting a marriage announcement, not a grandkid announcement!

Both of us were a bit worried that they weren’t going to sleep that night – they had a long 10 hour drive home the next day. And that they wouldn’t have heart attacks!