Weekend Adventures

Last weekend we went to visit the Fixels and had a great time in Tallahassee.  Sarah and Will were lovely hosts and we enjoyed a relaxing weekend with the two of them.  This weekend we were finally at home in St. Petersburg.  We spent Saturday at St. Pete Beach and tried out Fort Desota Beach on Sunday which was very pretty. We decided that we'd like to try out different areas until the baby/move back to NC if possible.  Last week while in the middle of the walk, we got a little bored and decided that it would be fun to rent bicycles.  After walking out to our single bikes, we realized they had a double seater that looked like a lot more fun.  Our ride was probably the most hilarious 45 minutes I've experienced in awhile.  I was in front with my huge belly laughing as Alec was in the back with a panic stricken face because of my steering.  I'm sure it was an interesting sight for the walkers around us.  I think I"m asking for a tandem bike for Christmas 2011!

In addition to beaching it, we spent a ton of time looking for strollers/car seats.  There are way too many options out there.  My main criteria was a lightweight stroller that folds up easily and would hold several different types of car seats since we hadn't decided on a car seat yet.  Luckily William and Julie sent us our car seat so now at least our baby will be allowed to come home from the hospital with us! As far as pregnancy goes, here is a little update.  Our Bradley classes are going well so far.  They are definitely making me excited and more hopeful to follow through with a natural birth.  There are only two other couples in class with us so the class goes by pretty quickly.  I'm feeling a little more tired on my walks and at the gym than I have been in awhile.  Still sleeping well though and really can't complain about much.  After going back and forth several times, we decided to have the 3d/4d ultrasound.  It was VERY neat to see such a clear picture of the baby.  They also gave us a few moving images of the baby on a cd where you can see the baby kicking his legs and moving his hands.  Also, we decided on a baby name!  We are going to keep it quiet until the arrival, but the initials are T. A. G.

This week is my Spring Break, which I'm very excited about.  I plan to spend a lot of time reading and relaxing before our LONG drive back to NC on Friday.  We are headed back to NC for Ashley and Andrew's wedding at the Angus Barn, Alyson and Teddy's wedding shower, and finally for our baby showers on Sunday!  I can not wait to see everyone from NC.  We then will drive back to Florida on Monday.  My new job should begin that week.  I'm very excited about working in one school with small groups of students until labor instead of trying to manage 27 new wild students everyday! 

I'll leave you with some 3d/4d ultrasound pics!  Love the little guy already:)

 Hello!

  

my little feet

 I'm definitely a boy!

 

Ok enough with the pictures.. turning my head away and hiding behind my hands for the rest of the appointment

Getting BIG!

We took what we think is our last scheduled plane flight this past weekend to New York.  We were able to spend some time with William and Julie (haven't been to visit them in way too long) and enjoy Jenny and Lane Teller's incredible wedding right in the city.  The weather was a bit different than what we are used to and made it a little bit of a challenge to find "winter" clothes that fit!  My stomach seems to expand at least an inch per day, yikes!  In continuing with our travel routine, we are off for a road trip to Tallahassee this weekend to visit one of Alec's College friends. 

I've been able to pick up sub jobs every day in grades K-12.  Some days are a breeze, while others can get quite challenging:).  I plan/hope to be able to sub until our baby boy decides to come.  Everyday definitely brings something new with a different grade and school.  Alec is counting down the days until his residency is over and he can start his new job in NC.   This year has really seemed to fly by!

We went to class on water birth at our hospital last week and we realized that it really will take a good 45 minutes on the fast side to get to the hospital, but I'm counting on having plenty of notice:).  While we are a little nervous about the distance of the hospital, we know that if there is some sort of emergency we can always go just across from our home to another hospital.  The people who we have talked to seem to really recommend our new (further away) hospital to the closer one because of their birthing practices. 

Alec seemed to think the idea of a water birth was a bit "odd/unnecessary" at first, but after learning more about it agrees that it is a  good option.  We start a series of 8 birthing classes on the Bradley Method tonight.  The class is normally taught in 12 weeks, but our instructor learned to teach it in 10 and she is making a special exception to have it completed in 8 weeks because of our quickly approaching due date.  I've attached a website link for the type of class we are taking if you haven't heard of it- http://www.bradleybirth.com/ .  I also put a pic of the water pool that we will have in our labor room.  

We're still having trouble with the babies name!  I think I'm just about as indecisive with this decision as I was with wedding dresses.  We've narrowed it down to around 3 and each week we choose a different one to pretend that we have selected as a final name, but at the end of the week we just can't quite pull the trigger.  Maybe we'll do a blog vote if the decision is still unmade before the next post.:)

Still feeling good over here, can't complain.  Less than 2 Months to go!  Which means, 2 months to figure out a name and actually set up for a baby boy!  So far, there have been no changes in our household to prepare for a baby. Hopefully we'll have made more progress by next post!

And The Last Trimester Begins!

Well, when I started the blog, I honestly thought that I would put more into it than one post per trimester, but I'm trying hard to make sure each post is filled with truly exciting info for all of the dedicated followers....(maybe one exists?:)) haha kidding about the truly exciting info.  So for today, I'll just give you a little update on life here in Florida with a growing bean.

We are now onto our bimonthly doctor's appointments and have recently switched to the midwife side of our OB practice.  After reading a little about the differences of midwifes and OB's and even talking to our current OB, we are excited to experience the midwife's approach to labor and delivery.  For now we still plan to give birth in the hospital where the OB can be called if there are any last minute problems.  We are taking a water birth class at the hospital in about 2 weeks which I'm really looking forward to.  Our first meeting with the midwife is in a week and we have lots of questions for her, such as will I be allowed to walk around during labor in the hospital.  So far, my favorite book is, "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Natural Birth," which I might add was the first book I purchased on my new Kindle (a gift from William and Julie:)) after sampling out several other birthing books.  Physically and emotionally for the most part, the pregnancy has been very pleasant. Knock on wood.  I feel almost completely normal (pre-pregnancy) everyday.  Random strangers are noticing more and more that I'm pregnant which is fun.  

The baby and I went to Miami for Alyson and Jenny's bach and had a wonderful time!  Felt great all weekend and the weather was wonderful!  Ready for the wedding in May!  Our next flight isn't until March 6th to Wilmington.

Here's a little story for you to end with....A couple of weeks ago, I was talking to William and convinced him to allow me to send him a picture of my baby bump via phone pix text.  However, instead of sending him a picture of me, I sent him one of Octo-mom's bare stomach near her due date.  Needless to say, her stomach is HUGE and a tad scary.  I assumed that William would see the joke right away....how wrong I was.  His reply text, was "oh god, that looks like an uncooked turkey, can you please pull your shirt down the next time IF you must send me another picture?"  I couldn't believe that he actually thought my stomach was up to that size at this point so I decided to play along for a few more texts and act hurt that he was being so insensitive about my massive stomach:).  William did not feel the need to apologize about calling my stomach "disgusting."!  But I sure got a good laugh out of it!

Moving right along...

Within the past couple of weeks, our baby boy has started moving a lot.  We can both feel him punching or kicking away in there especially at night time.  It's great having the kicks to reassure you that everything is alright in there between appointments.  We've been having monthly appointments up til now, but after next week's, we will start to see the doctor once every two weeks.  The pregnancy is going by fast to me at this point!  This week we took a tour of the hospital where we are most likely going to deliver.  We had never even seen the complex before so we figured it would be a good chance to make sure we wanted to use the hospital that was 45 minutes away from home.  There is a new hospital that is actually walking distance from our home, but the doctor that we like delivers at the further away hospital.  The hospital tour was very nice and looked very comfortable.  We will have to go back sometime soon for the water birthing class:). 

Everything is going well here in Florida.  We have a busy Spring lined up but are eagerly awaiting July when we are able to move back to friends and family in NC!  I am taking the baby to South Beach in two weeks for his first bachelorette trip and Alec is going to spend the weekend with Beau.  Then we are traveling to Wilmington in March for Alyson and Teddy's engagement party, NYC for Jenny and Lane's wedding, and Greensboro in April for some other parties and hopefully to see Kamron's baby in April!  Finally after our last scheduled trip in April, we will sit tight for a month to relax as a family of 2 as we eagerly wait on the baby's arrival  (hopefully before May 14th!- Alyson's wedding).  Well, all is well here and I will leave you with a pic of my bump somewhere around 23 weeks!

It's a BOY!!!

After initially planning to wait til birth to find out the baby's sex, I quickly realized I wasn't going to be up to that challenge.  So, Alec and I decided that we'd wait until Christmas to find out whether we were having a baby boy or girl.  I realized this would be one of my favorite gifts and it would be free!  We had heard of some creative ways to reveal the sex and became very excited about one.  At the 20 week anatomy ultra sound where they check to see that all of the organs and limbs are developing correctly and of course can determine the sex, we had the ultrasound tech seal two envelopes with our baby's sex enclosed.  The ultrasound was amazing, they were able to see the details of the babies heart and even lips among other things. Everything looks great so far for baby Gill.  We then dropped one of the envelopes off at a bakery and ordered a green cake.  We asked the baker to use blue or pink food coloring for the inside of the cake batter so that we would know the sex after cutting into the cake.  We were entrusting them to read the envelope and were only slightly scared that they would get confused and use the blue/pink icing on the outside of the cake, spoiling the surprise.  Since Alec and I were staying in Florida this Christmas and hosting both of the families, we wanted to wait to cut the cake in front of everyone.  While the Greensboro snow slowed down my family, we were finally able to cut into the cake after midnight on the 26th.  Eager to find out,we both held onto the knife and made two slices to pull out a piece of cake filled with baby blue icing between the layers!  It was amazing!  While Alec had stayed quiet about his wants, I had made it quite clear that I was rooting for a boy so we were both EXTREMELY happy!  After passing cake slices around to everyone, we opened the second envelope from the ultrasound tech that included a picture indicating the male status:)  What  a Great Night!! 

A New Addition

We wanted to give our newest family member the honors of creating our first post....




Hi Everyone,

I wanted to take just a minute to introduce myself, afterall I am the reason for this blog thing.  While I've been dying to tell you all about me, my parents said I had to keep quiet throughout the first trimester.  Well so far, I've been behaving so well that my mommy and daddy didn't even believe I was really here until they saw me during my first ultrasound. Eventhough I came a little earlier than expected, I think they are pretty excited to meet me!  As for me, I sure can't wait to meet all of my parents' favorite people!  I've got a lot of time on my hands so I'll try to keep you in on any interesting updates.  See you next May!

Love,

Baby Gill

P.S. I attached a picture from my second photo shoot.  Hope you enjoy!