Friendship is a beautiful thing..

I was thinking tonight that I blog all the time about the baby, how great Matt is, etc, but I've left out a post on a major part of who I am - my best friends.

My best friend Staci got engaged tonight to her soulmate Jordan, and I couldn't be happier for them. They are our favorite couple to hang out with, and when it is the four of us in any situation, it is just easy, fun and always a good time. I've also had some other good conversations with my other best friend Jamie over the last week or so, and it amazes me how a friend bond can remain so strong even though we've lived at a minimum of an hour to three hours apart for the last 8 years.

My best friends are like sisters to me - we fight, we love, we cry, but most importantly, we are there. We can get angry with each other and blow off steam, but I challenge anyone to try and cross one of us in front of the other because they won't get very far.

Friendship is a beautiful thing - it brings out the best in us, and I would be completely lost without Staci & Jamie. My children will grow up to know them as aunts, and I know that no matter where life takes us, or how many directions we go, we always end up back together. Besides Matt, they are two of the only people in the world who I can literally tell anything to - no topic is off limits, no secret too sacred.

I could go on and on, but I just felt like tonight I needed to give some credit to my two beautiful friends and thank them for being who they are. Our friendship is timeless, and is one of my most cherished gifts. There's nothing I wouldn't do for either of you, thanks for all you do for me.

xo,
Lindsay

Hi my name is Lindsay and I've become a baby clothes shopaholic.

So, after 30 weeks I have finally given in started buying baby clothes. I had ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA how addictive it would be. I think I said "awww" about 8,000 times today while shopping at the Hershey outlets. The best part was that I've always loved Gymboree baby clothes, but have always been relatively appalled at the prices they charge for how quickly babies grow out of the clothes. So one of my first stops was to the Gymboree outlets. They were having a fabulous sale on spring/summer clothing which is what LBC will need first.

I went crazy. The pricetags started at $0.99 and the most expensive thing I bought 22 items later was $7.99. Got stuff for this year, for next year, it was so much fun.

I've always laughed when people talk about the amount of clothes their babies have and how they grow so fast they only get to wear things a couple of times at most, and I can now say that our baby will most likely join those ranks. I think I need to stop buying clothes though at this point, because the way my luck goes - our 0-3 month stash of clothing that should fit up through 12 lbs will never fit this ever growing little baby.

I guess if the clothes don't end up fitting, I could always start a lucrative career as an EBay store owner selling baby clothes...

Love at first 3-D third trimester sight...

So today was "Womb with a View" day! Matt, myself, the aunts & grandmothers all went over to see the ultrasound in 3-D and hope that LBC gave us some face time!

We got in and started the ultrasound, and just like earlier in the week, he had both of his hands up at his face completely covering us from seeing anything. The tech was so wonderful and patient and after about 15 minutes of non-cooperation, she gave me a Sunny-D juice container, told me to drink it to get some sugar going through me and to walk around a bit trying to move in different ways to encourage LBC to do some movement of his own.

Once that was done...we tried again. He moved one hand, but the other one was staying put and we were starting to think that we'd have to come back another day for the session. Then she decided we would try one more thing and have me lay on my left side to see if we could get him to move his hand that way. At first, no luck at all, then at the last moment he pulled that cute little hand away and gave us some images which brought tears to my eyes!

The pictures didn't turn out as great as I had hoped, and everything was so much clearer on the screen today, but I will post some of them below.

When she finally got a face shot, we first saw the forehead/eye area and she thought that he looked like Mommy, which we all agreed. Then she went from the cheekbones down, and suddenly it was EXTREMELY obvious that he is also quite the Daddy's boy. It was like looking at Matt's mouth!! LBC was thrilled by our vocal excitement and began to put on quite the show by flexing his muscles, showing his face and giving us smiles. I've been excited for a long time now to meet him, but after getting a glimpse today, I can't wait to hold this child in my arms and tell him how much I love him. What a fabulous day.

So without further adieu, I would like to introduce LBC in all his third trimester 3-D glory. I know I am a bit biased...but he really is the cutest little baby I've ever seen :)

Here was a little smirk...you can also see his umbilical cord throughout the photos - he apparently likes like play with it, as it kept getting in the way and he had been holding it most of the time.



Sucking his thumb:


Matt's lips & my eyes!


Flexing & showing off his guns:

Whoa. 7 months!

So I've been 7 months pregnant for a little over a week now, so we figured it was time to get some shots of my rapidly expanding stomach. I've not done so well with taking pictures of the belly up to this point, but since it's taking on a life of it's own, I gave in. Excuse the haggard face & hair...it's been a long week!!

Tomorrow is Womb With a View to hopefully see LBC's face - cross your fingers for some good shots to post tomorrow night!!

Future Comedian??

So today was the big day for the ultrasound, and it was big in more ways than one.

I'll start with the "big" stuff - LBC is estimated to currently weigh in at about 3lb 4oz already, which puts him in the 80th percentile for size. Translation : He is on the path to be a big baby. Matt & I were joking around with the technician and I made a remark about having a 12 pounder and she said "well, I wouldn't rule it out". I immediately had the urge to cross my legs in anticipation of some serious pain.

The first part of the ultrasound was great - we saw his head, spine, legs, arms, all four chambers of the heart pumping away, organs like his stomach, kidneys, bladder - all things we've seen before, but this time in week 29 view.

Then we got to what was supposed to be the good part. She was going to get some face shots as well as a good image to once again confirm LBC's little boyhood. LBC is doing some things right, and is currently in the vertex position (head down) where he wants to be for delivery. She moved the ultrasound wand thingy (real technical and smart, huh?) down to my lower abdomen and Matt & I both braced in anticipation of seeing this beautiful little face finally looking more like our little baby and less like the big headed alien we've seen the other times. There on the screen we see all the features of his face and as the tech hits the button to switch to 3-D mode to give us the "real view", LBC turns his head completely away from us giving a nice full shot of the back of his head.

The tech attempts several times to capture that cute little face, and each time he responds with a hand over the head, turn away from the camera or a face smash into the side of my uterus. We even tried having me lie on my side for a few minutes and push around to try and coax him into cooperation. The ONLY shot we ended up with is a half face glimpse of a cute eye, nose and lips pursed into the shape of a smile. Apparently we have a comedian on our hands.

So to try and make me feel better about my un-cooperative child, the tech then moves the ultrasound wand thingy to the top of my stomach to get some boyhood confirming shots. While in the 2-D mode, she points out that yes, he is in fact a boy, but realizes that to the untrained eye it can be very difficult to really understand what we are looking for so she will give us a good 3-D image. Guess what happens next? Yep, our funny little monkey tucks his left leg right up underneath that cute little butt and completely covers up anything that would verify his gender to us. Coincidence? I think not.

So after 30 minutes of ultrasound and a good 10-15 minutes of wishful thinking, we had to give up on our dreams of getting a fun blog worthy picture of this cute little boy. Fortunately, we are headed this Saturday to "Womb With a View" which is a non-medical ultrasound place where we can bring family and try to get some great frame-worthy shots of the little guy. I joked with Matt that I will let today's lack of cooperation slide since insurance is picking up the tab for this ultrasound, but Saturday's falls on our dime along with the company of his grandmothers & aunts who are eager to see his little face, so I may not be so understanding next time!

I can't help but wonder though...is this a sign of personality? Could it be that he has a sweet shyness like his daddy (we all know I have maybe 1 shy bone in my body), or is stubborn and bull headed like his mommy? I guess time will tell...for now, it's fun to laugh and give him the credit for being smart enough to play tricks on us. I can't wait to hear the laugh that develops out of this gestational attempt at humor!

Keep your fingers crossed for us that Saturday results in a DVD full of great images for me to someday show his girlfriend....

xo,
Lindsay

Oh little LBC..

LBC is kicking up a storm tonight, and its amazing how each time I feel a kick, it is just as exciting as the first time I ever felt it. Each kick makes me wonder more about this little tiny baby inside of me - what will he look like? What will it feel like to hear him laugh or see him smile? How amazing will it be to find out that another human being will be consoled or comforted by just having me hold him?

Don't have much else to post about tonight other than this...we have an ultrasound tomorrow morning and I am really hoping LBC cooperates with the tech and gives us some good images. He has been notorious for hiding his face during ultrasounds!

For now..I'm going to relax with my amazing husband and feel our amazing baby kick his way around and try to take a mental picture of how happy I feel in this moment about the family we have created together and how much we have to look forward to. I hope that I can always remember to cherish these simple moments, block out the rest of the worries in the world and stay inside the bubble of our four walls to find my truest happiness.

Sweet dreams <3

Dude...

Blame it on the pregnancy hormones, but in the last 6.5 months, I have fallen even more insanely in love with my husband than I could have ever imagined. He has been the most selfless, thoughtful, compassionate person I have ever known and I am so utterly grateful and humbled by his love. I couldn't design a better man to spend my life in love with as my husband and the father of my children. Ahhh..I could just go on and on, but will stop before I make everyone sick - I'm starting to nauseate myself (though that doesn't take much these days...)!

There are few things in life that Matt ever directly asks for except for deodorant and sneakers, and he is probably one of the most fun people to buy gifts for because he LOVES everything, no matter the size or meaning.

So as we keep getting the nursery ready and start buying things for the baby, there has been one thing that Matt has really wanted for himself & LBC, and I couldn't resist ordering it for him the other day. Check this out:



This is the "Diaper Dude" and is one of about a hundred diaper bags made by the Diaper Dude company for men...now Matt & LBC can go out on an adventure and Matt can keep his man-card by having a cool masculine diaper bag. I can't help but think of the movie the Hangover though... "it's not a man purse, its a satchel"...whatever it is, it's cool - dude.

These are a few of my favorite things...

I'm going to apologize to my mom first with this post, because I know the title will cause her to sing various Sound of Music songs ALL day long....I can just see her practicing her best VonTrapp family impersonation right now.....

I had to share two new favorite things of mine that I got this week..

First - the "Snoogle" pregnancy body pillow (please note that this is NOT a picture of me with it!):



This thing is INCREDIBLE. As a life long "belly" sleeper, I've been forced to sleep on my side for the last 20 weeks or so and as a good sleep lover, I've been in agony. Last night, after talking about it and researching the different kinds, we broke down & bought me a snoogle. I won't even disclose how much I paid for it, because it was way too much. However, I woke up this morning and hadn't felt so refreshed in months. Highly recommend for any prego who wants a good nights sleep!

Second - I am currently blogging from my new Dell Inspiron laptop which is cool just by itself, but is taken to the highest cool level given the color of it...check it out:



Purple Passion is the official color name....I'm in love. I can now easily upload pictures & videos and it is super fast compared to the dinosaur of a laptop I had before. I have the best husband :)

Third Trimester!!

Today officially starts the 3rd trimester of my pregnancy and the start of Week # 28. I can't believe how quickly time has gone to get us here. I remember so many weeks ago while still in the first trimester when Matt & I would talk about how we couldn't wait to get to at least 16 weeks because we thought at that point it would make things seem real. Now 16 weeks seems like a lifetime ago!!

My pregnancy milestones have been marked by many unfavorable, but memorable, reminders. The week we found out that we were pregnant, Matt & I both came down with the swine flu (it was never confirmed swine, but we were told that was the only active strain in August). We both had fevers of 102+ and were completely miserable for days. Then in the 2nd trimester, my good old gallbladder decided that it was time to bid farewell to my body and ruin our vacation plans. Now, as I start the 3rd trimester, I am on my 2nd day home sick from work this week with a nasty upper respiratory infection and annoying sinus cold. I'm starting to ponder which medical ailment I could possibly come down with for labor day...

So here's some fun tidbits on LBC & the pregnancy thus far on his special 3rd trimester day:

-LBC is now 189 days old in gestational terms, which means we are 68% of the way there! He can now hear, cry, blink, & practice breathing and he is a little over 2lbs and is about 14-15 inches long.

-There are only 91 days left until LBC makes his grand entrance to the world..though it could be even less than that as he is growing like a weed and there is talk of him joining us a week early so he doesn't get too large and either destroy my nether-regions or force a C-section situation. (I keep trying to remind him that I have wonderful natural birth plans for him including a doula, birth ball, no meds, etc)

-While LBC has been quite a pain in the rear (sometimes in the literal sense, as he has begun to push on my sciatic nerve), causing never-ending morning sickness, unpredictable gag reflexes, over the top heightening of senses (seriously, its just wrong to have to endure the smell of a dog fart moments before it hits everyone else), I've been quite lucky and have yet to re-gain the weight I lost while sick for all those weeks and I am still at a -3lb weight gain from my pre-LBC weight for the pregnancy. Not too shabby, thanks little monkey.

-LBC is quite the active little guy and I'm convinced that he is either monkey-like as he climbs and swings his way around my uterus, or he is practicing his athletic abilities and will be the next David Beckham immediately upon entering this world. Though perhaps I have it all wrong, and really he is inspired by what he hears when I shamelessly watch the garbage show that is "The Jersey Shore" on MTV and he is in there practicing his fist pumping and creating a "situation" like the self-proclaimed "guidos" on the show.

-Archie, our beloved golden, has now figured out there is a baby in my belly and he & LBC have already bonded. Archie loves to sit next to the couch when I am on it, and push his nose into my rapidly expanding belly. LBC seems to sense him there and always kicks back as if to say hello to his BFF.

So now we start heading towards the home stretch. We are kind of in that lull that I remember being in not long before our wedding. You know there are a million things to do, but it doesn't really seem like the end is in the imminent enough future to really do much. Regardless - LBC is coming, and coming soon - and sometime in the next 90 days, our lives will forever be changed for the better by this little guy. I am giddy with excitement to meet him.

I can't end my post for the day without giving a special shout out to the all time greatest baby daddy ever Matt - he stopped home to check on me today with a milkshake from the PA Farm Show where he had to be at for work this morning. I'm starting to think that life really doesn't get better than this.

xo,
Lindsay

Our new Friday nights..

Well, I am now a "mobile blogger" as I found a handy little iPhone app for my blog.

We are having a rather exciting evening (insert sarcasm) as I have been sitting in a recliner in the babys room for the last nearly two hours watching my strapping husband assemble piece #3 of baby furniture. He did not take my advice and start with the easy piece, and is determined to complete assembly tonight, so alas we spend our Friday evening here. Can't say that I ever thought this would be our "fun" on a Friday night! Guess having a baby really does change everything!!

Here are some "before" pics of the nursery..I will be posting the during and after this weekend. Enjoy!





Thought I'd throw the next three in for fun..

Eco-Friendly wannabe Lindsay

Most people who know me have always known me to be a raging Democratic liberal, even though my career in banking has pulled me a bit closer to the middle over the last few years. I still bleed blue when it comes to my thoughts on most things. I grew up with a Democratic, politically involved father and campaigned with him and had the opportunity to learn a lot.

One thing I've never been quite good at however, out of sheer laziness, is my respect for the environment and the damage we do to it on a daily basis. I must have a little Al Gore growing in my uterus, because I have become suddenly aware of "carbon footprint" for lack of a better term, and have found myself vowing to make an impact in my own small way to try and contribute toward a better Earth for my children.

So where do I begin?! I'm trying to take a more natural approach to some of the aspects of parenting and raising a child. I'm also tapping back in my holistic roots from my time becoming a certified reflexologist. We have made the decision to attempt to solely breast feed the baby along with taking a stab at cloth diapering (before you judge, google BumGenius - the cloth diapers of this century are so cool!). I am trying to be more organic in the products I use to clean my home and myself.

There is so much information out there to consume and it can be so overwhelming that it causes more heartburn than the pregnancy does, but it feels really good to know that I am trying. Thank goodness for Matt's cousin and my friend Sandy - she & her husband Chadd are raising their child very eco-friendly and I have learned so much already, I'm thrilled to have such a resource in her. I swear she will want to start charging me for her opinion before this is all said and done!

So just to challenge a thought for the day to everyone....how have you thought recently about your impact on the Earth and environment? What do you do each day to try and make a difference? I'd be interested in tips and thoughts if you wouldn't mind posting in the comments.

xo,
Lindsay

New Perspective

For several years now, my work has been my baby. I eat, sleep and breathe banking for the most part and it is not uncommon to leave early in the morning and not get home until well after dinner time or dark. Matt & I have both had jobs that require a lot of time away from home, and it became part of our normal routine. Stuff at home can be easily overlooked until the weekends because M-F is dedicated to other things. We work hard, play hard and somehow it all seems to get done. I have always taken for granted though the freedom of our schedules. If we don't eat until 9 or 10pm, no big deal, if we only get 5 hours of sleep because we stayed out for one more drink, we caught up on the weekend.

As I've gone through this pregnancy so far, it is really interesting to see how my perspective on time has changed quite a bit. I have started thinking ahead to a few months from now when I have a sweet little baby waiting for my undivided attention in the evening, how much easier it will likely be for me to remember that the work will still be here in the morning.

It has really it me recently that soon, it will no longer be just Matt & I and our lackadaisical routine. That Saturday mornings will no longer be reserved for either a) a hangover and not waking until lunch or b) getting up early to clean the house before laying back down and sleeping away the afternoon.

I'm a planner in most aspects of life, but not when it comes to my home routine. It will be interesting to see how everything will change. I already have a new found sense of respect for seeing how my mom and grandmother who worked full time when I was kid find a way to get it all done. How selfless and tiresome it must have been for them and all those years I just figured it was the norm.

Welcome 2010!

I can't even begin to express my excitement over 2010 beginning. I don't know that I've ever embraced the turning of a new year as much as I do this year. As I sit and look back over the last ten years, I feel pretty good about how things have been. I've really grown up over the last decade, going from my teenage high school years to a twenty-something on the closer side of 30. I've had the biggest joys and biggest heartbreaks of my life and am proud to say that on the other side of it, I am a much stronger & better person than I was in the year 2000.

The only resolution I care to make this year is to love stronger, pray more, and continue to enjoy and embrace the little things that make life so special. I'm emotionally overwhelmed by the things to come this year as I become a mother. There are a few things I'd like to document that I want LBC to know about someday when he is older to understand, so I thought I'd share them here:

1) I hope you always know that there has never been a moment when I wasn't full of such abundant joy over being your mom - and that from the moment I found out you were growing inside of me, I have loved you to the depths of my soul.

2) That I love and respect your father more than any other person in my life. He has shown me what true love is, and is my best friend. Our love has grown even stronger since creating you - and when you join us in this world, you will complete the family that our love has created.

3) That it's ok to be scared of what life has in store for you - we walk blindly everyday not knowing what will happen next, but we get our light to see through it all from our faith, our family and our friends.

4) One of the biggest things I want for you to know is that you have an Aunt Jessie in heaven who watches over you every single day since you were conceived. My heart will feel somewhat broken everyday of your life that you will never have the true honor of knowing her because I know that she would have loved you like her own. I had so many conversations with her growing up where we talked about what you would be like, and how much we would love you. I promise to tell you all about her, to keep a piece of her with me that I can hold onto and share with you. I also promise to teach you how to truly love your siblings when our family grows someday - it is one of the most important relationships you will have in your lifetime.

I think 2010 is going to be a fabulous year...I can't wait for every moment. Happy New Year!

xo,
Lindsay