Since we still don't know...

Okay, since we still don't know what this baby is that is growing inside of me, there's a possibility Steve and I just might wait until it pops out to see what we are having. I think it would be kind of fun - and I'm definitely not a suprise kind of person. But I kind of feel like God is telling me just to wait and enjoy the journey and the suprise and definitely not to WORRY about what the sex is.

So, I'm having the struggle of figuring out what to do about bedding. If you remember from my previous post, the baby's room is painted this color:

I had some bedding picked out, but Steve felt it was too boyish. So, I went to Babies R Us during lunch yesterday just to kill some time and to browse a little. It's really hard to browse on the weekends, because I have a certain inquisitive 4 year old in tow. Low and behold, I found some bedding that I fell in love with. Steve still thinks it's a little boyish, but I think it would be precious for a little girl too. We could definitely add accents that would "girl" it up. I think I'm going to have to have help convincing Steve this can be girly too. Here's a couple of pictures of the bedding, what do you think?

Of course, take into account the difference in the wall color and our crib/furniture is going to be a dark mahogany color. Here's some more pictures of the accents:

First Baby Shower...

This weekend a couple of my dear friends asked me if I could get a baby sitter because they wanted to throw me an "unconventional" baby shower. So, sweet Holly kept Emily for a few hours so that I could meet up with Karen and Angel.

Now, many of you don't know my sweet friends, but there is definitely nothing conventional about them, so I was really curious what this "unconventional" shower was going to be like. Especially with them not know what is growing inside of me.

They definitely suprised me! We had such a great relaxing time. We started off by getting pedicures. Which was great! I'm at that point now where I'm not able to sit and bend to reach my toes good enough to paint them, so it was really nice to have someone rub my feet and then to look down and see the toes all pretty!

We then went to Angel's apartment and had an all organic lunch. You see Angel is dating a guy that lives on an organic farm and grows everything he eats. So, not only were the vegetables all fresh, the garlic was even fresh. It was amazing. We started with humus and pita bread, then we had spinach quiche, bruschetta, and a fresh salad. The feta cheese on the salad was even from the farm. It was fantastic!!!

For desert we had cupcakes which were from Whole Foods and were made with all organic ingredients. You would never have guessed it. And they were so cute too!

It was such a great time and exactly what I needed! I was able to sit and relax and catch up with Karen and Angel without interruption. No phone calls, no television, and definitely no questions from a 4 year old! It was heavenly!

They said they didn't get any "baby" gifts, since the baby decided not to reveal itself. So, instead they got the momma something. They know how much I love the beach and all things relating to the beach. And they also know Steve and I were not able to make it to the beach this summer and with the baby coming, they know we won't be getting there anytime soon. So, they brought the beach to me - they gave me a body scrub with the name "Beachside Resort" and I swear if you smell it, it takes you to a resort somewhere in Mexico and you start hearing a faint voice saying "Hola Senorita"! I've already used it and it was perfect!

Thank you so much girls! You both are such awesome friends and I couldn't imagine not having you around! I love you!

Happy Belated Birthday...

I'm just now getting around to posting about Holly's Birthday. We had the intentions of celebrating her birthday and us knowing what this baby inside of me is. But, we all know how that turned out. So, we decided to celebrate Holly's birthday and us having a HEALTHY baby. We all went to Shogun's for some hibachi grill. It was so good!!! Emily had a blast and flirted with the cook (of course, everywhere we go she flirts with someone)! Here's some pictures from dinner.

And here Emily is dancing while they sang Happy Birthday to Holly:

After all the excitement of dinner, I think we were all a little slap happy. We went back to Sam & Holly's apartment for cake and presents. Holly has done so good at explaining everything that happened next, that I'm just going to let her share her story on my blog. Here are the links:

http://theshrewsburys.blogspot.com/2008/09/drunk-off-chocolate.html

and

http://theshrewsburys.blogspot.com/2008/09/where-does-emily-get-it-from.html

We had so much fun! I don't think I have laughed that much in a long time! Love you Holly & I hope you had a great night saying good bye to your teen years and hello to the wonderful world of twenties!

What everyone has been waiting for...

...we are having a....

HEALTHY BABY!!!

You see, the thing I feared has happened. The baby did not cooperate at all this morning during the ultrasound.

We were so excited last night and thanks to Michelle's great idea we made signs last night for a boy and a girl. That way Emily could hold the correct one up and I could let the secret out on the blog without taking away all the dignity the baby had left after the ultrasound by posting it's private parts for all the world to see on the internet.

So we are all piled into the ultrasound room and the technician (who was the same one that did the ultrasound when I was pregnant with Emily and always brags about the fact that she has never been wrong about the sex.). The tech starts with the head and Steve and I are telling Emily what everything is and pointing out the arms, the heartbeat, and then the legs and feet. So, Steve asks the tech if she can tell what the sex is. And she is like, "not with the feet and legs all bunched up like that". So, she goes out and gets Dr. Burch (who by the way, I think is the best OB-GYN in the world). And he comes in and decides to basically jump on my stomach to get the baby to move. Emily thought this was hilarious because I scream out that he better be careful because I just might use the restroom right on his table if he hit the right spot.

And even after all of that - the baby still didn't move a muscle!

So, I was all worried I was going to have to wait another month until my next appointment. But sweet Dr. Burch told me to stop by sometime next week and he would take another look to see if he could see anything.

The main thing is the baby is healthy, the heart beat was great, and the growth was right on target for where it needed to be.

I have to be honest, when we figured out the baby wasn't going to cooperate, I teared up. But then I reminded myself that we know it is healthy and that is the most important thing. I think God is trying to remind Steve and I that we don't make the plans, He does. And we need to learn to just trust in Him and He will get us through this whole thing! Thank you God for giving us a healthy BABY, regardless of what sex it is!!!

P.S. The funny thing about all this is my family has always joked about my Grandaddy and just how stubborn he was. If he got something in his head, he was doing it regardless of what anyone else said, even up until his last day on this earth. So, I think the baby is just doing what comes to him naturally because it takes after Grandaddy!!

Belly Shot...

Okay, this is not the best picture. But remember the photographer that took it is only 4 years old and the camera weighs almost as much as her. And it was way early in the morning. We go to the doctor on Thursday for our 20 week ultra sound. Which means we are half way there! And hopefully we will get to see what the baby is. (We know it's a baby, we just would like to know the sex of the baby so we can start planning).

It's kind of hard to tell from this picture, but the belly is definitely starting to pop out. I'm quite a bit bigger than when I was pregnant with Emily, which I don't think I like at all.

Oh well, say some prayers for us that everything is healthy with the baby when we go in for the ultrasound!

And it has begun...

As you can recall, I'm not really up to date on the girly things little girls like to do. I was raised playing ball, not taking dance. So, I really wasn't for sure what to do for Emily. I looked into dance lessons, but they are only during the week. And I didn't think our family could handle one more activity during the week. So, then I found out there is a gymnastics school that has classes on Saturday mornings. (Thanks Nonna and Mary!) So I decided we would try it out.

Emily was so excited!!! We actually had a leotard from her Halloween costume from 2 years ago that still fit her, so of course that's what she wanted to wear. In fact, I tried it on her Friday night and she wouldn't take it off. So, she slept in it.

We woke up early, the class was at 8:30 and I wanted to make sure she had time to eat a good breakfast since she was going to be running around a bunch. We were the first ones to arrive and she was so excited to meet Ms. Kelli, the teacher.

Of course, we had to take pictures to document the event. Although, I was feeling a little dorky, I was the only parent with a camera.

She did really good and learned lots of new things. We are definitely going to have to work on her upper body strength. She had a hard time with the hand stands. And I think we are going to have to work on her attention span, either she is definitely her daddy's girl or she was just overly excited! She had a hard time sitting still while she had to wait for her turn.

Look out Olympians of 2018!

Tribute to Grandaddy....

So, the reason Memorial Day was so quick this year is because of Grandaddy.

You see, he was diagnosed with cancer of the esophagus Sunday of the long weekend. It was definitely a hard thing to hear. He would have been 87 this month and had been healthy. The doctor even said he had a 70 year old brain in a 87 year old body. I have learned so much from my Grandaddy and didn't really realize just how much I was going to miss him.

He passed away on June 14th. The hospital had released him because they had done all they could do for him. So, he had been admitted to a nursing home. But he refused to stay there, you see, my Grandaddy is definitely where I get my stubborn streak. He decided the moment he was admitted to the nursing home, he was done. He wouldn't take the oxygen they wanted him to be on. So he passed in his sleep during the night.

I think the hardest thing for me, is I never got the chance to tell him something. Oh, I told him I loved him and spent as much time as possible with him in his last days. In fact, we all did. But I never got the chance to tell him we were going to name the baby after him. We found out that first week Grandaddy was in the hospital that we were expecting. We wanted to wait to tell everyone because of what happened last time, but mom went ahead and told Grandaddy just because we weren't for sure if he would be there if we waited to much longer.

As I've mentioned before, Grandaddy was a veteran of WWII. So, he had a military funeral. It was very moving! To watch the respect the officers gave to the casket was amazing to me. Here they were in the middle of June dressed completely in their blues, sweat dripping off of them, but they were still so respectful.

At first, I really had a hard time with Grandaddy's passing, but I'm at peace because I know he is not suffering anymore.

Another Long Weekend...

...Memorial Day is another long weekend that I always look forward to. It seems that this year came and went so quickly. It definitely will have a different meaning to me from this point on. We started the weekend out as normal. Swimming, grilling out, and shopping. Emily loves going to Me-maw and Pe-paw's to go swimming. She doesn't really swim yet, but she loves playing in the water and floating around. These are pictures of her modeling out by the pool. She is such a ham when I get my camera out. She thinks it funny to "pose" for mommy.

She also helped Me-maw and Bonnie Jo plant some flowers around the back yard. I'm glad she's prissy and doesn't mind getting a little dirty (or should I say a lot dirty, she always has some form of dirt on her)

Here's Bonnie Jo doing what she does best! Love you Bonnie Jo!

One More Wedding Event....

So, I told you I would be all mixed up on the wedding posts. The very first event that I documented with pictures was the bachellorete party/girl's night out. We all met at the park 'n' ride in Pleasant View and decorated the Expedition for the fun night! Then we all went to eat at the Spaghetti Factory and had dessert at the Boundry. It was a wonderful night out - it was my first venture out since getting so sick with this whole pregnancy thing. I actually stayed out until midnight - wow, I'm getting old!!

Here's some pictures of the night!

Love you Holly! I'm so glad you had fun and can actually remember it! :)

Long Weekends and Birthday Celebrations...

I always look forward to long weekends (but I guess we all do!). Labor Day is always a fun time because it just so happens that my Daddy's birthday is on Sept. 3rd, so we celebrate it over the long weekend. Which normally means lots of pool time, lots of grilling out, and shopping. And of course, those three things are right up there on my list of things I LOVE to do!

This year we decided to do something a little different for Daddy's birthday. We went to an outdoor concert at the Carnton Plantation in Franklin. The band that played was a Beatle's tribut band, so it was a lot of fun! The kids had a blast dancing, running around, and eating snow cones! Here's lots of pictures of all the fun!

As I have stated a thousand times on here, Emily loves to dance! And definitely loves to be the center of attention! She begged Pe-paw to get up and dance with her. If you know my daddy, you know he does not dance. He never has been very big on dancing - I think I've only danced with him a couple times in my life. Well, Emily has this certain way of getting what she wants when it comes to Pe-paw. Here's the proof!

The kids were not the only ones that enjoyed themselves! My aunt and sister were in town, so they had fun. And of course, mom was there to help celebrate the birthday. Bonnie Jo and Candy didn't want in on the picture action, but I made them pose for one (notice the cooler placement). They also decided to teach Emily to put ice down people's shirts. She thought it was HILARIOUS! She went around to everyone trying to sneak up on them, but how could she with all the giggling!

Here's what I did all night:

And this is what Steve did all night (poor thing):

Hope your Labor Day weekend was as fun as ours!