You need to...

You can find links for these on the right side of the blog:

1. Join our online baby pool!  We have quite a few guesses as to the size and time of birth already...
http://www.expectnet.com/games/Tiguester

2. Subscribe to our blog with your email address.  This will just send you an email when Joe or I update our blog so that you are reminded to come catch up on the latest.  This could be very important when we head to the hospital to have the baby!

Also, you've probably noticed the renovation in the blog's look.  What can I say, progress is beautiful :)

Mother's Day and Father's Day

It was so amazing to celebrate Mother's and Father's Day for the first time.  It's crazy that these days actually refer to us, I'm so used to it being for my parents and other people.  At St. Vincent's you get a special blessing on that day.  It was fun to stand up with my big bump :)  I won't go into it now but the blessing struck a chord regarding the intense relationship of the grave responsibility in raising a child and the terrific honor it is to be given such a blessing.
On Mothers day I was 27 weeks:

On Fathers day I was 33 weeks:

Happy Father's Day to all those Father's out there... especially the one of my little one due in just 6 weeks!

3D video up to watch!

Who does he/she look more like?  Mom or Dad?

Back on the Horse

So as some of your know, the mentality behind my lack of updates lately has been because of work.  Being a teacher means that so much of my time at home is spent working on lesson plans or grading (lots of grading).  I didn't feel right being on the computer to update a blog and slacking on entering my students' scores, problem is, you never really are finished with grades.  So now that schools is OUT I can get back to not feeling guilty while updating this blog :)  Wahoo!

I feel that I should come back with a bang... We had a 3D sonogram today and I have some great pictures and video of the Tiguester!!  We also found out that he/she is now 4 lbs 8oz and about a week ahead of average in size. :)  I'll post the huge lot of them on Picasa, but for now... (click on the pictures and they will beome much larger!)

In other news we have made quite the tour of the midwest in the last 4 weeks!  We were in the South Bend area for Kevin's graduation in May from ND.  I was able to stay the last week down in Loogootee with the other side of extended family and finished up in Noblesville at the old homestead and got to see some wonderful friends from high school.  I am seriously so blessed with the people I have in my life.  It's not always easy to make the long trips but I love getting to see everyone.  We have a little rest in weekend trips here for a little while until July 4th in Niles hosted by Uncle Joe and Aunt Terri.  I'll be the one "floating" in the pool like a beached whale by that point!

I could write lots more but i think for now I'll just work on posting a couple pics and hope to get the video working soon... I may put it up on youtube, we'll see!

Look at those baby lips :)

Recapping... Easter blessings

It's official - I'm as bad at updating this as I am updating my journal... where did that journal go anyway?  Actually, my goal was to get in a habit of blogging on Sundays after we take my pic but the last 3 Sundays have been a bit unusual and wonderful.  So back we go to Easter first and then we'll recap the other 2 last weeks in the next two posts.

Easter was, is, and always will be great.  I love being able to say "Alleluia" again.  It's silly, but going all of Lent without it makes me miss it and get excited to sing, "Jesus Christ is Risen Today."  Joe and I hit up the Holy Thursday Mass and Good Friday Service as usual too.  I have to say, those two experiences each year truly help make Easter Sunday a joyous celebration and not just another Sunday trip to Church.  Realizing what all goes into the Passion is what makes being Catholic so amazing.  There's value in suffering and a real connection to the cross of Christ which enables us to say our alleluia's with such great vigor when God's merciful love is showered on us.  I was especially struck this year as to how much I have to be thankful for this Easter, how amazingly blessed I have been.  I feel as if I've been given a life I don't deserve between great new friends, a fabulous family (both blood relatives and in-laws), a meaningful job, nice house, parents, brothers and sisters I wouldn't trade for anything, a husband who I adore and especially now the little wrapped present of a person in my womb who I just can't wait to meet face to face.

Take a second and think of how God has blessed you in your life... see what I mean!

St. Pat's, our Craigslist adventure and the picture for week 20 :)

St. Patrick's day was lovely, especially because the Peoria Catholic schools have the day off :)  This is mainly because so many of them are in the Parade downtown.  So I enjoyed morning Mass and a spontaneous morning nap on the couch because I never get to do that and because I sorta didn't have a choice when the eyelids closed.  I'm sure some of you understand!  That evening we spent a relaxed dinner with Joe's parents, aunt and uncle eating Reuben sandwiches and lots of other wonderful things. 

So earlier this week Joe found a great travel system on craisglist.  We've been trying to figure out what we wanted for a while now and was pretty psyched to find this brand at this price with only a year of light wear.  So we drove to Springfield to go buy it and are so excited about our first large baby purchase :)

Last, but not least is our picture for week 20 so you can see how big I am.  I told a mom at school this past week... sometimes I look down and just think, wow, I'm going to get bigger!  Baby's starting to kick me, I think.  It's so light right now and sometimes it's just like someone is rearranging my insides.  That might sound weird, but it's the best way I can describe what I'm imagining is baby somersaults.

God Bless!

First Day of Spring???

The weather was amazing last week and should be this coming week, but for the "first day of Spring" not so much.  Thus... the rain/snow mix we encountered Saturday and the windy cold from Sunday.  Here's some pics from P-town this weekend.

Half way there!

Ok, I'm sure I'm not the only one who thinks that time is flying in regards to our little baby's arrival. All of a sudden we're halfway to Aug. 4th. The reality of what I'm half way toward is starting to set in... the responsibility, the wonder, the, um, pain?!

I do finally have a belly that says, "I'm pregnant" not just, "I went all out for every holiday in the past 4 months." I'm feeling better as well, the almost constant carsickness of months 1-3 is gone for the most part. I haven't had a "Preggie Pop Drop" in over a month. They are awesome by the way. Not a cure all, but it definitly helps! (I don't buy from this website, but it gives you an idea of what I'm talking about, I found them in an alternative pharmacy here in town. http://www.threelollies.com/ )

I keep reading about what's going on inside me at this point, so far all Dr appts have gone well. Little One seems to be active, everytime doctors try to find the heartbeat we have to move around to stay with it :)

15 Weeks!

This is my "is she pregnant?" shirt :)

We're planning on not finding out the gender of this little guy or gal until we see him/her in person so feel free to enter your bets by July to see if you win anything based on gender, weight, height... I know I'll have a guess or two.

Joe and I went to a Valentine's brunch at Church with our Covenant of Love group. It was really nice and we got to sit with Ryanne, Nathan, Maureen and Mike. We're blessed to have such great friends! We'll have our customary pizza and beer this evening... this year though it's root beer :)

Belly Pics

This blog is going from home improvements to family additions! Baby Tigue is due Aug. 4th of this year which puts us at 14 weeks and a 5 days today. We've tried to take a few pictures now that I'm actually starting to show. A couple of websites and books have compared fetal growth each week with a different size of fruit, so we thought it would be fun to show the progression. Each piece of produce you see in the pics are an example of the baby's height at the time. Just keep in mind that although the height may be 4-4.5in the weight is only 2oz so he/she's still pretty fragile. I is amazing to think that in 3 months we've gone from 1 cell big to 4 inches tall!


I know there's a few people living far away from us that have been wondering about my growth so here's a few pics with more to come, weekly I hope.