One More Month

What a difference a month makes!

Today, I am now one month away from my due date! As you can see, the baby has grown quite a bit in the past month since my "two more months picture."

I am now in the "Home Stretch" as they call it. I believe this means that I'm being stretched into the size of a house . I am staying active by walking a lot with our visitors from Holland. But eating, breathing, and sleeping are becoming a bit more difficult.

The fun part has been really feeling the baby move and wiggle around and trying to imagine what he's doing in there. And wondering what he'll be like when he emerges. We can't wait to meet him!

Baby Shower

On Saturday, Oma Angie and Auntie Dana threw Mark and me a wonderful baby shower! It was a "Jack and Jill" shower so instead of it just being women, we got the guys involved too. It was a blast with great food, fun games, and a wonderful group of people!

As you can see, Mark really got into it . To see more pictures, click here.

Thank you to everyone that could join us for this special occasion! And a special thanks to Oma Angie, Auntie Dana, Sheri and Monica who were fantastic hosts and helpers! Thank you so much. It was a truly memorable evening!

Graduation Day

Tonight we graduated from our prepared childbirth class! Our instructor was great and we learned all sorts of interesting things in the class, such as:

• When to go to the hospital,
• What floor we should go to when we get to the hospital,
• Breathing Techniques,
• Basic childcare (ie. diapering, swaddling, breast feeding techniques),
• and most importantly, when to ask for the epidural

While I wouldn't say were feel completely ready for what is to come, we feel a bit more prepared as some of our basic questions were answered.

Two More Months

Today is September 15th and that means just 2 more months until my due date! These last few weeks have really flown by. I'm feeling pretty good but it is definitely getting more difficult to do things like walking and sleeping :) All in all though, I'm having fun and Mark and I are enjoying this time. Here is my 7 months picture, enjoy!

Painting the Nursery

Yesterday, Mark and I chose a color for the nursery. We went with Benjamin Moore's JetStream color because it matched the nursery decor we picked (Lambs and Ivy Goodnight Star). I helped washing and taping the walls but then Aunt Dana came to do the painting.

Mark and Dana did a fantastic job! The color looks great! Here they are, hard at work:



Mark will do a second coat today and will work on the trim this week. Then we will install the wallpaper boarder. Pictures to follow...

The Crib Saga

On Sunday, Mark and I spent a few hours at BuyBuyBaby (BBB) selecting a crib and a dresser/changer. The crib proved somewhat easier. We thought that the Sorelle Isabella in espresso looked great. The dresser/changer proved to be difficult because we needed to find something that would fit into the 48" nook that we have in the nursery. The Sorelle was too long at 51" as were a number of other options. Then there were the changers that were too small. We finally decided upon the Stanley Young America 4 Seasons in espresso that was just right at 45". We hoped that it would be close enough to the Sorelle's espresso color. We decided to sleep on it and on Monday morning, I placed the order - 6 weeks for the crib and 8 weeks for the dresser/changer - not bad. We were happy to be done or so we thought. On Tuesday night I received a voicemail asking me to call BBB and on Wednesday morning I called back. Apparently the Sorelle would be an extra 6 weeks. UH OH! Not good. That would mean we wouldn't get the crib until Mid December. I ended up cancelling the entire order as we decided we should start from square one.

On Wednesday and Thursday, I did some more research and went to a few other stores. Apparently 8 weeks seems to be the earliest you can get your furniture since most items are made in China or out of the US and those that are made in the US have long lead-times anyway. I also found out that the crib should be made of a hardwood rather than pine which can be consumed by the baby when they are teething.

So to make a long story short, I spent another 2 hours at BBB today re-placing our order. Mark and I decided to go with the 4 Seasons Contentment crib and dresser/changer from Stanley Young America in espresso. The quality seems good and while the lead time might be after the baby comes, a travel crib can provide help until it arrives. We also went with a glider and ottoman from Dutailier. DONE! Finally :) Here are pictures of the items we chose:

Crib and dresser:


Glider:

Susan and Mark to share gold medal for "Nesting"

Mark here. Wow, less than 100 days to go. Nine months seemed like an eternity at first, but now we're starting to realize how much we have left to do to prepare ourselves (and our apartment) for this new, little human being.

As little as they are, babies seem to come with many accessories and so we've been making room by cleaning (I believe the technical term is "nesting"). We had numerous boxes of "stuff" in the basement. Here is a sampling:

• Every single page of school notes from elementary school to college
• Every greeting card we ever received
• 6 boxes of books that are either no longer relevant or that we'll never have time to read
• VHS tapes - movies and home videos
• 3.5" disks
• 5.25" disks
• Iomega ZIP disks
• Old decorations we'll never use
• Ancient electronics like film cameras and cassette players

We've spent the last couple of months either scanning, digitizing, converting, donating, giving away, recycling, or trashing all of this stuff. After that, we completely reorganized our basement to make room for the inevitable overflow of toys, clothes and other baby accessories.

With the basement all cleaned up, our next step is to start cleaning out the office, which will become the nursery. We'll get rid of even more things and move a few things to the living room. Then, we'll paint the nursery and start buying some new baby furniture.

Phew! Who knew this baby thing could be such hard work?