Week 24

We went to the doctor today, just for a regular checkup. She just did the standard stuff... blood pressure, weight, baby heartbeat, measurement, and question-asking time. She said everything was right on track. Hooray! This was my last monthly visit. We made the appointment to have my diabetes bloodwork done at 27 weeks, then it'll be every two weeks after that! I'm not really looking forward to having to go to the doctor every other week, but that means that we're progressing along nicely and will be a family of three before we know it!!!

We're still trying to decide on names for our little one... to no avail. We have some options that we're considering, but it's a really tough decision! How does everyone make it look so easy? Everything is too popular, too strange, too old-fashioned, or just plain weird! Hopefully we'll come to a conclusion soon, I'm ready to start buying monogrammed things!!!

In other news, I scheduled a 3D/4D ultrasound this weekend, and it just happens to fall on Jed's birthday. I think it will be fun to see our little girl on video for his birthday! :)

I finally remembered to take tummy pictures for this week, and just in the nick of time! We start 25 weeks tomorrow! Here are a couple:

As a side note:

As I look at these photos, I really am beginning to wonder about something...Why do maternity clothes always have horizontal stripes? Everyone knows they make you look wider, so why on earth would they expect a pregnant woman to feel any differently? A friend brought that up the other day, and seeing these pictures makes me believe it! As much as I like this outfit, I just really don't get the stripe concept. Don't get me wrong, I'm not feeling bad about my weight gain (at least at this point), but a LOT of women are VERY self-conscious about the weight they gain during pregnancy, so why would you tempt them with horizontal stripes? I just can't follow the reasoning here, even from a marketing perspective!

Okay, enough of my ranting... :)

Have a great week, everyone!

Weeks 21-22

I know, I know... I said I would keep this thing updated more often... Sorry!

Other than Pantherette competition, not too much has been going on, so this post is mostly to put up new belly pictures for those who have asked. Here they are:

21 Weeks

22 Weeks

Somebody needed attention! :)

I missed taking a 23 week picture because I was gone to competition for half of the week, then forgot when I got home because I was so busy unpacking, etc. I'm at the end of 24 weeks today, so I'll be sure to get one this evening and get it posted ASAP!

Weeks 19 and 20

Well, so much for posting once a week... Sorry, guys!

I mainly wanted to create this post to show off my new belly. For those of you who know me, I've been pretty much the same size/weight since high school, so this whole "having a tummy" thing is taking a little getting used to!

This week, according to Baby Center, the baby is about the size of an heirloom tomato:

Here's what I look like at 19 weeks:

19 Weeks!

We had a really good time at the 20 week ultrasound this week! We found out that we're having a little girl!!! We got to see all of the technical details (I had NO idea what the sonographer was talking about), and she said that all was well with our little princess! We watched her moving around in there and even got a shot of her sucking her thumb! I would post the ultrasound pictures, but I honestly get a little creeped out looking at other people's, so I won't subject you to that... I'll just post some more belly pictures to make up for it!

20 Weeks!

Close-up!

Our little girl is growing so fast! We're excited, but it seems so much more "real" to us now that we've actually SEEN her moving around. It's especially real to me because I'm feeling her squirm around in there now!

Officially, she's the length of a banana this week:

My tummy is getting bigger by the day, so I'm trying really hard to document the changes as well as I can. I promise to keep it up!

18 Weeks... and War Eagle!

My 18th week of pregnancy has been a really easy (and fun) one!

Baby Smart says, "War Eagle!"

On Monday, school was cancelled due to snow and ice. I was very excited. I began watching the BCS National Championship game, then find out that school for Tuesday is cancelled, making my celebration (by myself, mind you...) of the Auburn victory even longer, since I don't have to get up to go to school the next day. :) I even had a mini Toomer's rolling!

My "masterpiece"

Tuesday was a cold, yucky day, but the roads were fine, so I went to help a friend look at wedding dresses that afternoon. I had to clean up my mini Toomer's before I left... :(

We started back to school on Wednesday for the second week. What are we going to do when we actually have to have 5 full days of school in a row??? School has been fairly easy for me this semester. I have smaller classes and seem to have really good kids... only time will tell, though! We have been postponing and rescheduling dance practice because of the crazy weather, but we did manage to get a few practices in before this weekend.

On Saturday, I went to Samford in Birmingham to watch 4 SSHS Pantherettes compete in the Solo Division at competition. The Junior High team performed there as well, so I, of course, stayed to watch them. All of the girls performed well, and our captain took home the "State Soloist" title. I was proud of everyone! I had the privilege of NOT having to drive to and from Birmingham on Saturday. I drove up on Friday and stayed with Mimi and Tom, got up and went to competition, then came back and stayed again! It was SO much better than having to drive back and forth on Saturday. I got to see Cindy, Joe, and Forrest (Aunt, Uncle, Cousin) while I was there, so that was a bonus!

Today is MLK day, and we're out of school AGAIN! I had my girls meet at the school this morning for practice (don't hate me, it was THEIR idea...), which proved to be VERY beneficial. They work SO much harder when they aren't already tired from being at school all day. I wish I could have kept them all day, but decided that 2 hours would suffice. The band performed in the Inaugural parade in Montgomery today, so Jed had to leave before daybreak to head that up.

Since I've been home at practice, and Jed isn't here, I've been trying to clean out and rearrange closets in our house so that the baby can actually have clothes! I really need less stuff and more storage! This is proving to be very difficult. Would anyone like to volunteer to reorganize my house for me? Anyone???

Well, back to work I go... wish me luck!

Apologies... and Big News!

I am officially THE WORST blogger in the world! I really do apologize to those of you who actually try to follow the blog. I promise I'll try to be better, but I have just been so busy, and whenever I finally get done with everything, I crash!!!

Speaking of crashing, there is actually a reason besides lack of sleep (for once)...

For those of you who don't already know, Jed and I are going to be parents in June! I'm currently 17 weeks along. I actually made my very first maternity clothing purchase today, so I guess it's time to start taking belly pictures! I'll try to get those up once a week, but no promises (my track record isn't so great...)

Okay, now it's time to try to back-track to tell you about our wonderful Christmas. I would go back to Thanksgiving, but I'm not sure I can remember that far back... ha!

This was the first year that we have taken our trip to Pickens County before Christmas.We decided to spend our time a little differently this year because of our New Year's plans. We spent several days just RELAXING at my Mom and Lee's house, which was very much needed! On Christmas Eve morning, we got up and realized that Santa had come early to Mom's house! After we finished with gifts, we got dressed and went to Nanna's for lunch. We had such a good time getting to visit with her! When we got back to Carrollton after lunch, we almost immediately went to have the annual Christmas Eve celebration with Cindy, Joe, Forrest, Mimi, Tom, Mom, and Lee. We found out that Mimi wasn't feeling well, so she and Tom stayed in Birmingham. We took lots of pictures and talked on the phone, but it just wasn't the same without them! When we finished at Cindy and Joe's house, we went to Daddy and Melissa's to spend the night. We got up and found that Santa had come again! We left there just as the snow started to head back home.Before we came home, we went to Jed's parents' house to do Christmas one more time. We had a lot of fun hanging out with his family and opening even more gifts!

We were blessed to get to spend so much time with family over the Christmas holiday, but we were happy to actually have a few days at home to rest. Well, when I say rest, I mean stay busy... taking down Christmas decorations, reorganizing closets, taking things to Goodwill, etc.

When we were finished "resting," we headed to Destin to celebrate with Danny Joe and Ashley at their New Year's Eve wedding. We had a lot of fun hanging out with, yes, MORE family! The wedding was beautiful and we had a really good time!

We had one more day of "rest," then we headed back to school. The break was wonderful, but they never seem to be quite long enough! Back to the real world, I guess...

I'll try not to be so long between posts in the future! Goodnight everyone!

Gulf Shores/Oil Spill

We went to Gulf Shores with my Mom and Lee at the end of June, just as the oil hit. We had a good time, but seeing one of my favorite beaches covered in oil and tar was really sad. There were workers out all day and all night, cleaning it up, but more and more washed in as each day progressed. We still sat on the beach during the day (away from the oily stuff), but we definitely did NOT go in the water, even though there were more people swimming than you would think! We went out for yummy seafood dinners and Mom and I went "birthday" shopping at the outlet mall one day, so it was still a really good trip, despite all the oil! Here are some pictures we took:

Look at the pinkish streaks of oil in the water... :(

Tar balls that washed in overnight

More tar balls...

Yuck!

Jed washing his shoes in the "Tar Wash" bucket.

Some less depressing pictures:

We had  a really great time just spending time together, even if the beach smelled like tar... :)

Katie and Drew's Wedding

We had the opportunity to go to Savannah on our last "free" weekend before football season started. We went for Katie Coan and Drew Farmer's wedding. Katie is a friend of Jed's from high school. They were in the band together at Smiths Station and have been good friends ever since.

I had never been to Savannah before, and Jed had only been to visit Katie once while she was doing her pharmacy residency here, so we were really excited about getting a little mini-vacation in before every weekend was taken up with football games! If you've never been to Savannah, you should definitely go, it's beautiful! It was really hot, so we've decided we want to go back, but definitely NOT in August...

The wedding was held at Whitefield Chapel at Bethesda, which was absolutely beautiful! It was so quaint and pretty, I just loved it! (Paula Deen got married here, too, by the way...)

Jed was really excited to see a lot of his high school friends who came in for the wedding too. Here are some pictures we took:

Clark, Cason, Jed, and Ryan at the chapel, waiting on the wedding to begin.

Katie and her uncle, walking down the aisle

The "crew" again, after the wedding.

This was just too funny not to post... I have no idea what we were looking at! Jed says it looks like an advertisement for something! I told him, if I weren't in it, it could be a Brooks Brothers ad! :)

The lighting was bad here, but this was the only picture I had of the whole group of friends, including Katie.

This one is blurry too, but I still like it. This was taken when we walked into town to get a bite to eat after the reception was over.

We had a wonderful (hot) time in Savannah and the wedding was gorgeous! Congratulations, Katie and Drew!