I was thinking of baking cookies with blue or pink crystal sugar on top as a way to tell everyone at school next week... That's about the only idea that I have though. Can you think of anything?
Someone on here before posted about having bowls of candy in the lunch area. She was asking the Board's advice for any candy with "Baby" in it......I remember see Baby Ruth, Sugar Babies (is that one?), Sour Patch Kids, etc.
I was thinking about bringing in some Munchkins with a note that says something like "Peace offering #1 - I'm going to be out on maternity leave starting in May." Because of the nature of my job, when one person is out, her share of the work falls directly on everyone else.
You could bake 2 batches of vanilla cupcakes and put pink food dye in one batch and blue food dye in the other. Then frost the cupcakes in either pink or blue frosting. I think once I find out the sex of the baby I'm going to do that for my coworkers.
When I found out I was pg w/#2, I did the candy thing (Baby Ruth, Sugar Babies) with a sign by the bowl that said, "February 14, 2006" (my due date). It was fun for them to guess. A lady at work brought some pickles and a big thing of ice cream with a sign by the pickles that said, "Celebrate with me (ice cream in the freezer)." Everyone had to guess that one, too. I've also seen people bring cookies with pink and blue frosting on them (we've had a lot of pregnancies lately....most people just announce it, which I've done three times, LOL).
I like the peace offering one. I think it is important to recognize that when you announce you are announcing to a wide variety of people (well at least at my work): the good friends who may have known you were trying-so happy for you!, the other women who've recently been pregnant-so happy for you!, the new dad's -so happy for you..
then there's the working half of stay-at-home parent (so they judge that you are working and taking maternity-yes ppl told me this before I was pregnant), the older workaholics (kidless or not) who judge you for taking maternity, the older folks who never married or never could have kids-they can't relate and are jealous making for an awkward situation, then the ones some of us can relate to: the girls who are quietly struggling with infertility and your announcement will hurt.
I definitely stereotyped and by no means am trying to say if you are old you are hateful, just some observations of opposing views I've experienced. Personally I went to tell my boss who has 3 kids I was pregnant (the first time) and had my ultrasound photos... and all and all he cared about was how long I was taking off. Just don't forget this is your job... unless you really work with your friends... I came to realize people get sick of your LONG pregnancy and your LONG leave and everyone talking about you when you walk in the room. We wear our big life changes when we're pregnant, but that is not the norm-most people have big personal stuff going on without showing it at work.
What I came to realize is YAY ME, I am pregnant! BUT the whole world doesn't have to celebrate with me. Just my friends, and the nice coworkers along the way. So for me, I wouldn't do a mini celebration by me that I was pregnant unless it was a sweet way of saying "thanks for putting up with my leave, thanks for dealing with a hormonal sweaty, slow moving pregnant lady. This is my PRE peace offering. Thanks for being great coworkers" okay maybe not exactly like that but I think being humble and realizing that not everyone in the office will be totally overjoyed for you is a nice gracious thing to do...IMO.
I'll probably go subtle. I'm thinking of making my computer background the sonogram pic and waiting for people to notice. Or someday when I'm complaining about not feeling well and someone says "Are you pregnant?" (like they always do) I'll say "Well, yeah...." I feel weird about making a big deal of it.
What do you do about "the girls who are quietly struggling with infertility and your announcement will hurt" when this person is your friend? We talk about having kids all the time and all the things she has gone through while trying. I feel that she will be hurt if I wait a long to tell her and she'll still be hurt that it's not her.
Nikki B.
"My life consists in my being content to accept many things."
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Re: Can you think of any fun ways to tell people @ work abt. pregnancy?
When I found out I was pg w/#2, I did the candy thing (Baby Ruth, Sugar Babies) with a sign by the bowl that said, "February 14, 2006" (my due date). It was fun for them to guess. A lady at work brought some pickles and a big thing of ice cream with a sign by the pickles that said, "Celebrate with me (ice cream in the freezer)." Everyone had to guess that one, too. I've also seen people bring cookies with pink and blue frosting on them (we've had a lot of pregnancies lately....most people just announce it, which I've done three times, LOL).
HTH
I like the peace offering one. I think it is important to recognize that when you announce you are announcing to a wide variety of people (well at least at my work): the good friends who may have known you were trying-so happy for you!, the other women who've recently been pregnant-so happy for you!, the new dad's -so happy for you..
then there's the working half of stay-at-home parent (so they judge that you are working and taking maternity-yes ppl told me this before I was pregnant), the older workaholics (kidless or not) who judge you for taking maternity, the older folks who never married or never could have kids-they can't relate and are jealous making for an awkward situation, then the ones some of us can relate to: the girls who are quietly struggling with infertility and your announcement will hurt.
I definitely stereotyped and by no means am trying to say if you are old you are hateful, just some observations of opposing views I've experienced. Personally I went to tell my boss who has 3 kids I was pregnant (the first time) and had my ultrasound photos... and all and all he cared about was how long I was taking off. Just don't forget this is your job... unless you really work with your friends... I came to realize people get sick of your LONG pregnancy and your LONG leave and everyone talking about you when you walk in the room. We wear our big life changes when we're pregnant, but that is not the norm-most people have big personal stuff going on without showing it at work.
What I came to realize is YAY ME, I am pregnant! BUT the whole world doesn't have to celebrate with me. Just my friends, and the nice coworkers along the way. So for me, I wouldn't do a mini celebration by me that I was pregnant unless it was a sweet way of saying "thanks for putting up with my leave, thanks for dealing with a hormonal sweaty, slow moving pregnant lady. This is my PRE peace offering. Thanks for being great coworkers" okay maybe not exactly like that but I think being humble and realizing that not everyone in the office will be totally overjoyed for you is a nice gracious thing to do...IMO.