What will it bee???

Since I obviously wouldn't be home over the holidays for the gender reveal of Kyle and Kalynn's expected baby, they thoughtfully made a way that Karmen and I could be let in on the secret together a bit earlier than the rest of the family.  

The thing was, that when they ordered the "revealing" candle, they still weren't 100% sure themselves of the gender.  Little Baby L hadn't been totally cooperative the first time around, so they were going to go back for a take two.  However, after the second appointment, it would be too late to get the candle ordered in time to send down with Karmen.  So, they went with the doctor's first guess and bought a candle.  

Kyle and Kalynn called us on the evening of Tuesday, Dec. 19.  "Do you want to burn the candle now?" was their rather rhetorical question.  Of course we wanted to burn the candle!!!  

  

Breathless with anticipation!

So now the question is, do we need to be excited about the color that the candle reveals or the color it does not reveal?  The answer: the color it does NOT reveal.  Doctor guess #1 was inaccurate, so the candle color will also be inaccurate.  No problem!  I think we can make that little switch in our minds.

How long is this going to take???

So, we sat and just stared at the candle for a while.  Finally, we decided that maybe it would be better to set it somewhere out of sight for a few minutes and see how things went.  We decided that three minutes seemed quite long enough to wait!  

I think we actually chatted for five minutes before bringing the candle back to where we could see it.  We had set it on a table behind us, so I kept my eyes open long enough to reach back and grab it without getting burnt.  Then both Karmen and I kept eyes closed until the count of three.  It was a huge moment!  

And when we opened our eyes and looked down at the candle, this is what we saw....

NOTHING!  

So, five minutes is not long enough.  This was getting a little nerve-wracking since the Oklahoma LiaBraatens had gospel meeting that evening.  "Be warned," we told them.  "We do not plan to extinguish this flame until it reveals unto us the secret of the candle.  We hope you can stick around to see it, but..."  (We probably wouldn't have followed through on that threat, but...)  We decided that another ten minutes of "hiding" the candle was in order and left to give Kyle and Kalynn a video tour of our cabin during that time.  

When we returned, we followed the same process as before.  This time the candle spoke to us.

PINK

IT'S A BOY!!!!!!

WE'RE GOING TO BE UNCLES!!!!!!!!