Last night we
attended what for me was a new phenomenon. Our nephew and his wife recently
announced their pregnancy and they held an event for the family known as a
Gender Reveal.
This is a world
far different from the one we knew in 1972. My husband was in the army,
stationed at Ft. Ord
in Monterey, California.
He was a somewhat newly minted lieutenant, having received his bars two years
before at Officer Candidate
School at Ft.
Benning, where our daughter was
born.
All the other
young officers were also starting their families and so inevitably when the
wives gathered the conversations were fairly predictable: toilet training, when
to start solid food, or the child care services on base. Another topic making
the rounds was what I suppose we’d now call an urban myth – determining the sex
of your child. In those days we were still basically writing on our cave walls.
Ultrasounds were far off in the future.
Much has faded to distant memory, but I do
recall one theory involving peeing on Drano to discover whether you were
carrying a boy or a girl. I can’t
remember what was supposed to happen, what color it should turn for which sex,
but looking back, it all sounds a bit hazardous.
You could also try
to take control from the start if you wanted either a boy or a girl. This was all about timing, baking soda, and
temperature. I’ll spare you the details. I will admit that there was a
phone call requesting a certain young lieutenant return home from the base at noon one day and that nine months later he was
happily buying a baseball bat to bring to the hospital.
Last night we were
all issued tiny pink or blue clothes pins, depending on what we thought the
gender of our niece’s baby might be. We filled in a calendar with our prediction of
date and time, and someone even started a pool of five dollars each to make it
even more interesting.
The cake was both
blue and pink, so there was no indication there. We had to wait until a bowl of
water was produced and an innocent looking rubber duck with some gender-revealing baggage on board was lowered into it.
Guess what we’ll
see on November 12, at 5:30 a.m.?
(That’s the date and time my $5 dollars is riding on.)
Congratulations to your nephew and niece. I must confess, I had to resort to google to understand the (obviously) preplanted blue dye. I rely on google to 'splain things to me.
ReplyDeleteIt is always a fund mystery, these times. A new life, is just such a gift, whether it is a boy or girl.
ReplyDeleteOh I remember those days, if you carried high it was a girl, if low, a boy. My husband did his basic at Ft. Ord.
ReplyDeleteYes, all the theories.
DeleteAnd what a nice place to do basic. Not much left of the place now, as I recall. We were out there about 10 years ago with our grown-up son.
Yes, it's quite a different world these days. Now you are considered a little weird if you DON'T know the sex of the child to be. I remember being quite certain that I would have a boy the first time (I did) and a girl the second time (I didn't). Congratulations to the upcoming November baby boy! Loved this post. :-)
ReplyDeleteBabies are popping up all over. We were at a neighborhood gathering last week and the young couple two houses up (I swear they both look 13 even if they are both employed and have a house bigger than mine) is expecting soon. I thought it was sweet that they have no interest in learning the gender until it's born.
DeleteNo matter what shenanigans occur to make predictions , it's still a very exciting time.
ReplyDeletecongratulations to the new parents-to-be.
ReplyDeletethis brings back memories of when my daughter was pregnant in the 90s. The entire family and friends were convinced the baby would be a boy. I said "they're all going to be really surprised when that little girl pops out."
And I was right. I have no idea how I knew, but I also knew what my own babies were before they were born, with no testing of any sort being done.
Hmmm. You probably could have started up a little business back in the pre-ultrasound days.
DeleteYeah, the world of medicine has certainly advanced, hasn't it. Good luck, I hope you win the jack pot.
ReplyDeleteWow, that's all pretty elaborate for gender-revealing! I've never heard of having an actual EVENT for that purpose. Interesting.
ReplyDeleteAnd yeah, I remember the days when no one knew what a baby would be until it showed up!
My kids requested not to know the sex so it was still a surprise. By the way it looked like the duck was floating in draino!
ReplyDeleteI liked the old days when you found out at the birth. But I'm just a dinosaur!!
ReplyDeleteOur methods of determining sex were even more hit-and-miss. Knowing the sex of your child in advance? Whatever next.
ReplyDeleteI like the old days too of not knowing until the baby arrives. I've been trying to remember that old method, something about hanging the wedding ring on a string and dangle it over the expectant mother's belly. How the ring moved was supposed to tell the sex of the baby...something like that anyway. :) Enjoyed the post.
ReplyDeleteWOw, Gender-reveal parties! I feel so old. My Mum smoked while I was in utero and gave me whisky to stop me crying... times have changed LOL (and for the better!!!)
ReplyDeleteMy father always said it's a miracle I wasn't pickled. Oh, and yes, my mother smoked, too.
DeleteI've read that if the mother smokes and/or drinks, it could affect the child's intelligence.
Just think, Natalie. We could have both been geniuses!
I have heard of these parties, the neighbors granddaughter had one such party. I think it takes out all the surprise...but what do I know. I was convinced both times I was expecting a boy and they were both girls! :)
ReplyDeleteI suppose any excuse for a party is good... I've never had to attend one of them. But then we don't even do baby showers in Belgium. We are spared many organisational difficulties.
ReplyDelete