Thump Thump!

Well, it's finally happening - little thumps and pokes in my belly!!! The past 2 weeks or so have been mainly flutters or a rolling sensation here or there, but the past 5-6 days has been little thumps and bumps here and there!!! Jerred even was able to feel one of the bigger ones last night while we were watching a movie! It's so awesome. I feel them when sitting still, on the couch or especially at work where I have my feet up and am drinking lots of water! So awesome!!!!!!!!

On another note - I went shopping last week for maternity clothes for our upcoming trip to FL (leaving in 3 days, thank god!) ~ and was actually successful! I got a bunch of shirts, some capris and linen pants and a skirt, and even a bathing suit! The top is obviously too flowy at this point but at least it fits! Yeah! Now I just need everyone to wish me luck on finding sandals tonight/tomorrow night - while I love shoe shopping, when you need something specific it never goes well! And I only have 2 days!

Our next appointment is Wednesday but I'm going solo - Jerred was going to be in Wisconsin for a work retreat but now they are shipping him off to Dallas, so I'm on my own. I don't really care since it's just the normal routine appointment - I just hope I haven't gained too much weight! I hate stepping on that scale!

That's about all that's new here - looking forward to our FL trip right now - warmth, golf, and we get to see family! The real bonus is some of our friends from NYC are going down at the same time so we get to see them too! YAY! It's been too long S&C! See you on Saturday!!

Belly pictures!!

Ok - I have no cute pictures of me yet where I actually look pregnant, but we've been taking belly pictures once a month since 13 weeks - the 13 week one isn't much but here is the 17 week one we took this morning for all of you who have requested to see the progress of the belly!! I'll take them one a month until like 28 weeks or so, then we'll start taking them more often!

Got my first stranger comment today - we were talking to the lady handing out free samples and she asked when our little bundle was due! I didn't think I really looked pregnant to most people yet - just fat, but it was awesome to be asked!!! :-)

Hope everyone is doing well!!!!

Happy Spring!!

I hope everyone had a great Easter weekend if you celebrate it - or just a great weekend if you don't! We had 12 people at our place for a big Easter dinner and it was a lot of fun! It was Jerred and myself, Cam, Jeff, Bailey, Zachar, Kate, Kellie, John, Ingrid, Jen, Shawn & Maureen! Quite the full house! Jerred and I went out on Saturday and bought a card table and 4 folding chairs so we can stop borrowing Cam & Jeff's! :-) I made little Easter baskets for each place setting, filled with a few little Easter goodies for everyone! I didn't get a pic of the tables set for dinner, but here's how it looked in general:

We had antipasto (bed of lettuce with Salami, Sopressata, Prosciutto and Provolone layered on top, with black olives and some Italian dressing); then the awesomely yummy ham, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole and broccoli casserole. Then for dessert we had a homemade carrot cake (yes, apparently one of my new "nesting" phases is baking!!) and Easter candies galore. So very delicious - and tasted great for days as leftovers!!!!!!

Our friends Kellie & John were there with their adorable 2 month old daughter, Ingrid. She really is gorgeous - so much fun to play with her!!! She's alert and making little noises now - so cute! She was the start of Easter!!! And Bailey made us a snow-bunny outside our back door - complete with outline ears, teeth, and a tail! It's awesome!! Check it out:

Then our friends left and we had a round of Wii Olympics with the Aasens - until all of our arms were sore and the kids had to head home since they have school today.

Saw two great movies last weekend - Dan in Real Life and No Country for Old Men. No Country for Old Men was great - I definitely see why it won all those Oscars, it really was a great movie. Some people have said that they didn't like the ending, but I thought it was both fitting for the characters in the movie and for a Coen brothers' film. Very well done. Dan in Real Life was just a great, traditional little love story. One the whole family can watch, so great my sister-in-law (Kate) and I actually burst into applause simultaneously when it ended. Just a great, feel-good, love story. Plus I love Steve Carrell and Juliette Binoche, and getting to stare at Dane Cook for a few hours is never a bad thing!!! :-)

So that was the story of our Easter weekend - lots of cleaning, some fun video games, great friends & family for a holiday dinner, and some great movies! I'm feeling well - I finished 17 weeks on today so I'm in my 18th now - almost 1/2 way, I can't believe it!!! Been feeling the little one move more and more - got a little kick the other day when I was sitting with my stomach too squished I guess!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Happy St. Patrick's Day to everyone!

On this lovely day of green beer, corned beef and cabbage, and well, just plain fun - it's snowing in MN! Ugh. Just after we got rid of most of the snow pack we'd had since November, more falls from the sky!!!! And they are forecasting snow for Easter Sunday... figures! Springtime my a**! And the worst part is I can't even drown my sorrows in a pint of green beer tonight. :-( Oh well - the green-frosted cupcakes will have to do for this year!

Otherwise not much new with us - I think I felt some flutters for the first time on Sunday... hard to tell, but it didn't feel like anything I'd ever felt before and it was in the right spot, so I'm going to call it flutters! We had been playing our new Wii for like an hour, and I finally sat down to rest for a bit and there were the flutters! Very exciting!

Enjoy St. Patty's Day and don't forget to eat or drink something green!!!!

Latest Appointment!

So we had our monthly appointment today - all was great! My blood pressure was normal, weight gain was nice and controlled and on track (yeah!), and the NP found the heartbeat right away and estimated it at about 140 bpm. Measuring right on schedule so far! She also put in the order so we can schedule our ultrasound for the week after my birthday in April - yeah!!! No restrictions on travel, so we're all set for FL next month and then RI in June and hopefully NYC in May. They will even print out a copy of my records at each visit for me to take with me just in case, so that's nice!

So - so far so good! We had more blood tests today for various things, so think good thoughts that everything comes out great when we get the results in hopefully a week or so! They are vampires at that lab, I swear!

It's actually really nice weather here in MN - 40 degrees and sunny, the air actually feels warm for a change. Of course, they are also forecasting a blizzard here next week, so I suppose we shouldn't get used to it just yet!

Daylight Savings Time

So I know this is a baby blog, but since it's our blog we can rant as we see fit :-) And I absolutely despise having to change the clocks for daylight savings time in MARCH - in Minnesota, it's still single digits in the morning, not exactly spring-like weather. And to me, and many people I know, changing the clocks in the spring is just that - a sign of spring, the weather is usually getting nicer, etc. But now that we have to do this in March it doesn't seem right! Or I may just be overly-cranky thanks to losing an hour's sleep this weekend!

On a baby note - things are going great! We have our next appointment tomorrow (rescheduled from Friday), just a quick basic appointment. We got another baby item last night - my sister-in-law's in-laws had an extra brand-new umbrella stroller that they passed along to us! (Babies R Us had a "spend $100, get a free umbrella stroller" promotion and in buying things for their new grandchild they spent more than $200 so they had 2 of them and let us have the extra!). So it's starting to become a little more real!!! We are hoping to be able to schedule our ultrasound soon - maybe in early April!! That way we can start the shopping fun and get started on getting what we need for Baby Cook! And no - I haven't changed my mind about finding out the sex of the baby - SORRY! :-)

Happy Monday everyone!

I love technology!

In many ways technology can be very frustrating in our daily lives (dropped cell phone calls, computers crashing, automated phone systems, to name a few). But, the doppler is the coolest thing ever - getting to hear the baby's heartbeat whenever we want is just the best (especially now that he/she is slowly moving a little higher up and making it easier to find!) ! We were with my parents and grandparents in NC this past weekend and we were able to share that heartbeat with them all, and it was just amazing to see their faces! I can't seem to upload it here unfortunately (if anyone reading knows how to upload a .wav file here then please, let me know!), but if I can upload it to another site and post a link I will!!!!

We have another appointment this Friday when I'll be about 14 weeks, so hopefully all goes well and we'll get to schedule our ultrasound soon! I officially hit the second trimester on Wednesday!!

Now it's time to tackle the apartment and get it organized for baby - and maybe clean out the spare room so the poor child actually has a place to sleep! :-)