Baby News and More!

Looking back over the past few weeks....

first, and most wonderfully, we had our second appointment for the baby on the 9th and we heard the heartbeat! What a wonderful little sound and moment that was! Dinah had to look just a little to find it, so that was concerning, but then, there it was, loud and clear! Praise the Lord. It felt more real (that I was pregnant) after that. The next day I even got a new diaper bag! (from my mom) It's adorable. It's classic pooh, and green. I got rid of our old baby bedding (which was classic pooh) because I wanted something new for this baby's room (but it's nice to have a classic pooh diaper bag still!) We plan to find out the gender, hopefully in just about 2 1/2 weeks! Since we've had the two miscarriages, it seemed like a good idea to make sure everything was ok with the baby - and while we are looking, we might as well find out if it's a boy or girl! (that's the way James prefers to look at it - I wanted to find out what it was even if we didn't "need" a sonogram! :) ) If it's a girl I'll probably make a nice girly pink room, and if it'a boy, I can't decide If I should go with something different (for me) like green, or stay with blues.

Patrick seems to understand a tad bit more about the baby now...in a way. I don't think he really understands, but he's not acting like it's a big joke most of the time anymore :) I see him thinking of it in a more real way, associating things in our home and life with the "new bebe" as he calls it. Things like it's bed, chairs it will sit in someday, going to the doctor for it, etc.Sometimes he talks about "Emma" in reference to the "new bebe." (Emma is one of our names we like - in fact, it's what we were going to name Patrick, had he been a girl!)He likes to idea of someone to play with. He seems to love babies.

I'm close to 18 weeks now! So amazing! I think I started to feel little "flutters" before the 16th week, and It seemed like I might of felt a kick last night! It's so strange and precious to feel this new little person, and think about it's personality, and adding it to our family!

I've been to the doctor three times (for my leg) not including a trip to the sonographer. About two months ago, I had this bump on my leg...which turned into 2, which turned into 4. First I was given antibiotics for an infection, then I had a sonogram, then finally, after this last visit to a different doctor, I got some new information. Dr. Burchfiel thinks it could be erythema nodosum, which can occur during pregnancy. She seemed to think it could last for the duration of my pregnancy. She had some blood taken as well, and everything was pretty normal, except for my white blood count being kind of high. (which is very normal for being pregnant, so we assume it's due to that.)

In other than baby news :)We house-sat for some friends about 2 weeks ago. They have a pool and we were viewing it (especially James) as a mini vacation. Well, it turned out to be a fiasco! Our mini "vacation" included goats breaking out twice, a large snake greeting me upon opening the hen house, Patrick not liking to swim (which we already knew-and we were glad at least he would put his feet in the water while we were there!) scorpions creeping out in the house at night, Patrick having an "accident" in his PJ's in the toy aisle of Wal-Mart, and Patrick breaking out in hives. We ended up coming home early, which meant we had to travel over there twice a day to care for the dogs, cats, goats, chickens, donkeys, frogs and fish. Ah well, there were some fun times, especially the pool party I had with friends.

Just last week, James got a new job! There will be more pay and more training opportunities, so we are excited and grateful to God. We are also grateful to God for James' old job, and all the training he was given there. It was his first full time computer job after he stopped doing violin full time, nearly two years ago. The new job is in Frisco (about an hour away from here) so we are looking for somewhere new to live. The last two moves we made were pretty soon after a pregnancy (both the miscarriages) James doesn't want me to work too hard packing up things this time. Not that packing made me miscarry the last two times, since moves were after I'd lost the babies - but the miscarriages did both happen around times when we moved, and stress could have been higher.

Well, it seems like there was something else I wanted to write, but it's gone, whatever it was. Hope you all are having a happy Thursday. It's almost the weekend :)

Four Years, Going on FOURever :)

July 3rd 2008 was our anniversary of getting married....FOUR years ago! It was the BEST anniversary ever, the best, most enjoyable, restful, peaceful, lovely day of my life! Many thanks to God, for giving James and I to each other, to James for planning our sweet get-away, and to my parents and James' sister, Anna, for watching our little boy while we were gone....

Here's what we did!

About 9:30 we departed home, making a quick stop at the bank.......and Walmart. James made it out of the store just about exactly 10:00, which is the hour our wedding began, and just in time to keep our picture tradition :)

Taken about this time. And four years ago, about this time, I was walking down the aisle to my soon to be husband!

Here I am with my lovely flowers and card....

...and here's James with his card :) The next stop was IHOP for breakfast. YUM YUM YUM. Such a treat to go out to breakfast. We avoid breakfast places usually as a family, due to Patrick's severe egg allergies.After our tummies were oh so full :) we headed to Fort Worth for a day of fun!We did such "exotic" stuff (well, to us it was exotic :) ) First we visited the Kimball art museum. It was a very different and fun thing to do, and we enjoyed looking at the art and talking. We liked the violin statue!Then we visited the Botanical Gardens. We explored the Japanese Gardens....which made us feel very...Japanese :)...and very giddy!James of course was very excited to feed the fish :) There were SO many, and they were HUGE, and acted like pigs instead of fish :)We liked the turtles, too!We enjoyed taking lots of pictures!

Some which were very silly....but if you know James, you understand why :)

I love this silly, handsome guy!

It was a lovely afternoon together!

Remember the past, and enjoying our fourth anniversary. It was also so nice to be able to talk and talk and talk....about anything and everything, and just spend time alone and together!

Then it was time to check in to our room at Lockheart Gables. The place we gone to every July 3rd since our Wedding Day! This year we stayed in a new room, the "Beloved Cottage"

It is bigger than our other room "The Love Nest" which was a fun change! It still had a heart shaped tub, but thankfully no snakes in this one, unlike last year!

Looking from the little "jacuzzi room" (complete with a CD player, snacks and drinks!) into the little living are and bedroom (the bathroom is to the left)

We were delighted for the fifth time in a row by the DELICIOUS and personalized cookies, and the yummy drinks with heart shaped ice cubes!

The bed is SO beautiful! I love the canopy!

The door to our little cottage! (we were departing for dinner here)

Our own private porch!

Outside our room...

Inside the main house, where we stopped to use to phone to check on Patrick. James also played a little song while we were there!

Heading off for dinner....We had dinner at the Olive Garden. We splurged like crazy, having an appetizer AND dessert. We were so stuffed!

It was such a wonderful time together!

Outside the olive garden, where James tried to get me to do all kinds of silly things along with him :)

The next morning they brought breakfast to our room. They have such yummy food!

A toast!

After a relaxing and enjoyable morning and afternoon at the Beloved Cottage, we packed up and took one last picture before heading home...

A quick stop at the gas station, a call to see how little Paddy was doing....a few errands, including chick-fil-a lunch....

...and we were home with our little guy!

And there you have it :) It truly was such a special get-away. It brought us closer together. Four years have gone by quickly, yet they have been a long time. We have gone through wonderful times and hard times together. God has been good to us. So very good. James and I have changed A LOT since we got married. I am SUCH a different person than I was four years ago. I love James SO MUCH MORE than I did on the day when I married him. This anniversary trip showed me how very much I love him, and how much I need him in my life. It was like the song we listened to, as my head rested so peacefully on his chest...."Morning has broken, like the first morning..." It feels like morning dawned on this trip - in a way I could say like when we were first in love, only it's so much better and so much stronger than before. Thank You God, for this wonderful gift of love, and for my precious husband. You truly made him just for me! I know we have many more things to discover on this journey together, and I know that You will be with us all along!