Vacation

A while back, Josh and I were looking at the calendar trying to figure out when we could take a vacation before BB's big entrance into the world.  Things weren't looking so great.  Our summer is already packed with weddings and work obligations that take both time and money.  I was trying to be okay with the fact that we might just get to take a few day trips here and there and that's about it.  Then, we received an awesome message from our friends John and Loletuth who are both pastors in Kentucky.  They wanted to rent a house in the mountains in Gatlinburg and invited several of our Duke friends to join them the week after Easter!  What a HUGE blessing!  Josh and I were both feeling pretty stressed and tired from work and as we looked at our calendars, the week after Easter was a pretty good time for both of us to take off from work.  We had a great week catching up with friends, playing games, walking around Gatlinburg, visiting the Smoky Mountain National Park, and (for everyone else) relaxing in the hot tub.  Instead of the hot tub, I took a bath which I haven't been able to do in a while since we don't have a tub at home.  It was a wonderful and relaxing trip, and I am so thankful to have gotten some time away.

The beautiful house high in the mountains.

The crazy world of baby products

This weekend, the Mrs. and I carved out some time on Saturday for our monthly pre-planned date time (see the BB's Big Night Out entry) and decided to finish up our baby registry process while near Richmond. We had already visited with the good folks at Target to set up an initial baby registry and knew that we wanted to supplement that with a registry at a local shop in downtown Richmond called Franklin Goose (website here). We also thought we might set up a registry at BabiesRUs as well (more on that later).

BB's First Hospital Visit

On Good Friday, April 6th, we had our first visit to the hospital.  I have my regular monthly appointments at the Health Center for Women and Families here in town.  However, for our big ultrasound they sent us over to the hospital, because they have the big fancy machines.  Eventually, the health center will transfer me over to the hospital full time since they don't do deliveries in their office.  BB was breached again (not a big deal this early on) but was wiggling all over the place!  It's crazy that I can't feel all that movement yet.  I'm sure it's coming soon, though.  We got some great pictures of BB's profile (though the direct on pictures of BB's face are a little creepy and skeleton-like) and BB's arms, legs, hands and feet!  BB's feet were all the way up at my belly button.  The nurse spent time measuring all sorts of things like BB's brain, spine, heart, etc.  It was really neat.  We could even see the four individual chambers of the heart pumping away!   It's so fascinating that they can get such a detailed image.  It took her a while to get through all the various measurements she needed to do which offered lots of baby viewing time for us!  And yes, BB cooperated even though breached and we were able to find out whether we are having a baby girl or boy!  But sorry, we are still keeping that a surprise for the rest of you!  Start thinking about placing your bets.  Only a little over 4 months to go!  After our Good Friday service at church, we broke tradition and celebrated a little by going out and buying BB's first outfit.  It is just plain stinkin' cute and so tiny!  We were able to find a couple other gender neutral outfits on clearance at the outlets in Gatlinburg on vacation...but I will tell you about vacation another day in another post.  For now, it's time to get some things done around the house and make dinner in order to come back up to church to lead a dessert and discussion on "The Hunger Games" with my co-worker Mandy!  Maybe I will have some time at my Christian Educators Fellowship retreat this week to write an update about our vacation.  Until then, I hope you get to enjoy this beautiful weather we are having!

Watermelon

So I have been craving watermelon for about 3 or 4 weeks now!  I've been hesitant to get any, however, because usually most of what you can find right now isn't good since watermelon is not in season.  Last night, though, Josh and I did our grocery shopping for the week and Kroger had the little sugar baby seedless watermelons.  It had gotten to the point where I didn't care if I was disappointed in the flavor.  I just had to have one.  As soon as we got home and put away the groceries, I cut into that sucker and proceeded to eat the entire thing!  While not the best watermelon I've ever had, it was pretty darn good!  And even though I ate the whole thing...I still want more.  I have a feeling I'm going to be eating a lot of watermelon this summer.