We've got an active one

Last week I felt the baby kick for the first time!! I was cooking dinner and I stopped for a minute, looked down and said to myself, "is that what I think it is?". Sure enough it was so I shouted for Andy then ran into the office so he could feel it too. We were both so excited. Now I feel it moving all the time. Last night the baby was particularly active and I could actually see my stomach getting kicked. It just makes me smile. I'm not sick of it moving all the time. Although, I'm sure you're right Aunt Berta, I probably will be at some point! I'm about 25 weeks now, only 15 weeks to go. Work is getting more difficult because it's such a physical job and I'm always on my feet. Thankfully the people I work with are really understanding and whenever there's a chance I'm able to sit down and do some work in the office instead of being on shift. I've still been pretty sore and tired every day after work for the last couple weeks though. I'm not completely sure when I'll start maternity leave but hopefully sometime in June. We'll see. We've got a couple different sets of friends coming to visit in May so that should make the time go by faster too. I can't wait!! This picture is of me earlier this week. I'm just growing and growing!

Watch me as I grow

This will be a quick one. Here's a picture of me just a few days ago. I'm 22 weeks now. I think, as long as I fit, I will wear the same outfit for every picture so you have a more accurate idea of how I'm growing. We just had a midwife appointment today which went well. She measured the baby and said it is "spot on" with how it should be growing. I got weighed and so far I've only gained about 4 pounds. I was worried that's not enough but she reassured me that's just fine. Don't worry everyone...I eat PLENTY! We heard the heartbeat again and although I still haven't physically felt it, the baby was kicking and moving around from what we could hear on the little machine the midwife was using. Hopefully I'll feel it moving soon. Anyway, that's it for now. Enjoy the picture. Let me know if you can notice a difference from 3 weeks ago. I sure can!

34 already?!?!

As most of you know, Friday, March 9th was Andy's birthday. I had the day off so I got up and made him pancakes and coffee. He opened his cards that he got in the mail and then opened up the gifts I got for him. The first was a Hip Hop Classics 3-cd collection and the second was a onesie for the baby that says "I Love Daddy". Later in the day we went for a walk to the beach, had lunch at one of our favorite cafes, did a little shopping (which included getting new pillows, some cake mix and ice cream) and headed home. My sciatic nerve has been pinching very badly so by the time we got home I realized I'd overdone it with all the walking. I sat on the couch with a heating pad for awhile then attempted to bake a cake. I was hurting so bad I had to sit down again but I didn't want Andy to have to make his own birthday cake. So, it was a team effort. He brought all the ingredients to me on the couch and I mixed it there. He then stuck it in the oven and we waited. We make a great pair if I do say so myself! Meanwhile we ate dinner which I had thankfully prepared the night before. Once the cake was ready, had cooled and been iced we ate it while watching our weekly dose of American Idol. The next day we met up with some friends at Pizza Hut at the beach for some birthday lunch. After that we went to a pub that overlooks the water to hang out some more. Andy opened his cards from our friends, one of which had a gift certificate in it to buy some new DVDs. So, after that Andy and Scott walked down to the store to pick out his new DVDs while Molly and I came home and made dinner. After dinner Scott and Molly left and Andy and I watched one of his new movies. It was a great weekend. Happy Birthday to Andy!

20 weeks

We had our 20 week scan a couple of weeks ago. Everything looks good and the baby has grown so much since our first scan which was at 11 weeks. I still haven't felt the baby move but we saw it in there moving around so I'm not worried. We won't find out if it's a boy or girl because they don't tell you over here. Of course the whole time we were at our scan we were trying to see but since we have no idea what we're looking for we had no luck. That's okay. We look forward to being surprised. Here are some of the scan pictures. They look a bit blurry because I took a picture of the picture and this is the best I could get them to look. At least you'll have some idea. The one on the top right you'll see one hand by the head and one by the mouth. You'll also see it's left foot up in the air. The one on the bottom right you'll see the left elbow, arm and hand up by it's face, the other arm bent with the hand by it's mouth and it's legs up in the air. Also, the round thing in the middle by it's elbow is the umbilical cord (if not then we have a well endowed little man in there!). Hope you enjoy.

Prague, Czech Republic

On February 14th Andy flew over to Prague for a conference. I knew that he'd be at his conference all day on the 15th and most of the day on the 16th so I stayed in Aberdeen to work those couple of days. On Friday evening I arrived in Prague so we could spend the weekend there together. Thankfully the weather was beautiful (a bit chilly but the sun was out so we couldn't complain) because we walked a lot. The architecture in the city is so beautiful that we literally could have taken a picture of every single building. We found ourselves in awe at every turn. Even the sidewalks were detailed and beautiful. Probably our favorite part of the city was the Jewish quarter. We paid to see the old Jewish cemetery (where there is about 12000 headstones but far more people and they stopped burying people there in 1784, the oldest headstone was from the 1400s!) and the synagogues. But, the Old Town Square was filled with beautiful old buildings and the Charles Bridge leading over to St. Nicholas Church and then up to the Castle and Cathedral was amazing too. We also looked around the grounds of a monestary and walked by the Archbishop of Prague's house. Everywhere you looked there was beauty. We only have one suggestion before going there...do not take Scottish bank notes to exchange there because most people won't exchange them for you. Oh yes, they'll exchange your money from pounds to crowns (the currency in the Czech Republic) if the money says Bank of England on it but not if it says Bank of Scotland (even though it's the EXACT same money!). Well, of course we found this out the hard way, being from Scotland and all. All the exchange places have the rate for Great Britain which everyone knows includes Scotland (except the Czech people apparently). We had a heck of a time finding a place that would exchange our money for us and when we finally did...the exchange rate was worse than if we were from England! Oh, were we mad. Oh well, life went on and we learned our lesson for if we ever go back there. Once we had some money though we were much happier. At least I was because that meant we could eat. Since I'm constantly hungry thanks to this baby inside me you can imagine the relief I felt once we had some food. Speaking of food, we found a cute little pizza place to have dinner on our last night there which is where Andy finally got to drink beer out of a stein. He wanted the experience and boy did he get it! He ordered the biggest size on the menu not knowing just how big it would be. Has anybody ever had 1 liter of beer in one sitting before? This picture shows you what that looks like. Anyway, we had a great time and would definitely recommend visiting Prague if you ever get the chance.