22 Weeks!

I'm a bit tired, but so excited to be showing. Here's my baby girl at 22 weeks and counting...

Baby Treasures

Our cousin, Mandy (Mom of 4!) was so kind to share bags of baby treasures while we were visiting for the 4th of July. I am so thankful to her for all that she gave us: clothes, blankets, headbands, crib pads, you name it!

Most things are folded and put away. But look at her TWO hanging pieces!(looks kinda silly on adult hangers!) I am pretty sure that little (tiny) blue and white bathing suit used to be Samantha or Emma's! (they are 10 and 6 now and oh so tall!)



And one of the BIG items:



A bassinet! You have no idea how exciting it was to wash all of these cute little ruffles and assemble it with Daddy! It now sits right by my bedside, just waiting for you, Baby Girl!

Thank you Mandy!

Gender Reveal!

Off to the East Coast we went to celebrate the 4th of July with family and friends. Oh...and to share the big news! Upon arrival our cousins greeted us, and my belly for lots of rubs and hugs. Francessca, Becky and Tina were particularly excited for cake once they figured out why we brought a cake to the 4th of July party. Becky even begged, "Come on, please? Cut it now as my birthday gift!" (We were celebrating June and July birthdays...Happy Birthday to Aunt Patty, Becky, Audrey, Gianna and so many other summer birthdays that we will miss! We love you!)

The cake to help reveal our baby's gender...



Gramma K. "cut" the cake for us and shared the good news with everyone.



P I N K !!!! It's a GIRL! GIRL GIRL GIRL GIRL!!!



She was so happy for us! (She's been praying for this blessed event for a long time.)



So many people thought "boy" but we were happy to share, another little girl will be gracing this family. Look at all the girls (poor Vinnie!) We can't wait for the day when our little girl will sit on this couch with all of her cousins. She loves you already Vinnie, Lyric, Tabitha, Audrey, Emma, Samantha, Olivia and Gianna! [and many more not pictured =)]

It's a ....

Today was our 20 week ultrasound.

We learned of many things about our baby's anatomy. Baby is so healthy and has everything growing at just the right pace. The Dr. took so much time to show us things and explain so many details, but of course there was one detail we were anxiously waiting to hear about....girl or boy?????

Once he showed us those three little lines he shared: GIRL!!!!

We cried, we laughed, knowing how happy we would be with either a girl or a boy but having a very special place in our hearts for girls lately (with our beautiful nieces).

We rushed out of the office ready to meet my parents at Panera for the big reveal. We were so excited we forgot to take pictures! But I took some pictures of HOW we revealed. They were so nervous, but very excited.

Here's the bag I made:

(on one side it read:)


and on the other side:


Poor Mom thought "twins" when she saw both sides!

And I bought these long before we found out so that I could wrap the correct one...



And the answer:
the pink one of course!
awwww....

20 WEEKS!

Well we made it!

Today is exactly the halfway point in our pregnancy. I can. NOT. believe. it! On the one hand it seems an eternity that we have waited to get this far, and on the other hand I can't believe how fast this pregnancy is going. I'm sure being cautious has made everything seem a little less real.

We are so thankful to be celebrating yet another week of being this little baby's parents! Each Monday is the start of a new week in my pregnancy and each Monday I have a little message waiting for me on our refrigerator (since Daddy is always up before Mommy these days!) [oh yeah...and each week the baby is compared to some fruit or vegetable in the produce department. This week baby is as long as a banana! This is also the first week the measurement changes from crown to rump to head to feet! Baby is growing!!!]

Here is this week's:



And this week's a big one. On Friday, July 1st, we will have an ultrasound (and I'll be almost 21 weeks!) (It's also the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, so we are hoping to find a precious heart beating healthy and strong). We are also hoping to find out if this baby is a little Gary or a little Christine. Oh my goodness. I promise to post when I know :) And I'm sure I will change the background on this blog from yellow and neutral to pink or blue!!!!

Father's Day

Finally: the day I have been waiting for - to celebrate this wonderful man. I was literally up most of the night so giddy with excitement that I could hardly sleep. Upon Gary waking, I pretended to be sleeping, only to jump out of bed a few minutes later to say, "Happy Father's Day!!!!"

We were going to meet my parents for Mass and then have breakfast here. Later in the day we were hosting a second meal here at our home: BBQ with the Hubers. Even though we had a long day ahead of us full of cooking and entertaining...I wanted to take a little while that morning to celebrate Gary as a Father of course. I couldn't wait to give him this:





And inside: a letter from his child. What an amazing moment it was to hear him read those words.



And I had found some great sales on some of his favorite clothing...just a few new outfits I knew he was going to need once baby comes. Also I found him the perfect, classic Father's Day shirt. It is so wonderful to see him in this role.







Time to get the grill fired up for Gary's famous ribs. What a delicious meal! He even made the BBQ sauce this year. YUM.











It was a really nice day. Lots of yummy food and celebrating with each of our Dads...we couldn't be more blessed! We love you, Dad. Thank you for giving us life and for giving us one another.

Readying your room...Phase 2

It has been quite a process to get this nursery ready. And we aren't there yet. If you remember, phase 1 was just trying to figure out how to store/eliminate all of my teaching supplies. What a daunting task as I have so much stuff and such a love for teaching. But I do feel God calling me to be a full time Mom which means I won't be heading back to the classroom for awhile.

Once we found those bargains at Babies 'R Us and then Gary revealed the changing table treasure he had found, it was time to start arranging things-if only in my mind at least.



This blue recliner has been in the Huber family since Gary was a kid! It is still comfy and just needs to be recovered.

As we all find when we start cleaning one room, it affects the other rooms. So I began moving stuff and organizing things. This is our den closet now after several days of reorganizing (and recently picking up my cleaned wedding dress-what a delight it was to see it again...)



Here is the view from the nursery closet (still a bit scary)...where you can see the changing table and the recliner and in the middle there will be the crib and the dresser (also bargains from our day at Babies 'R Us)...



And some of my girly books, picture frames, photo albums and other stuff has a very nice cozy home in the den:



What a change from before!

I guess my iPhone didn't understand the overcastness of today so the yellow comes out a bit orangy in the pictures, but it is very refreshing in reality!

We're just waiting for that little piece of news before we continue with the next part of decorating....pink or blue?

What do you think? Everyone keeps saying boy, but Dad and Brandon say girl.

Anyway, it felt so good to finally do some of the nesting that I've been wanting to do! Plus it's all ready now for some company. We will have both sides of our families over for Father's Day and then Alex comes next week for a wedding here in Ave. He can see his "old room" a little more like the way it was when he used to live here before I moved tons of stuff in.

OH....wondering where all that stuff went?



The garage! And it looks FANTASTIC! That huge white armoire fits very nicely in the garage and also is covered storage. Thank you, honey, for moving it all and helping me to get organized. The garage looks so nice!!! (Okay so maybe you don't want to look in the armoire just yet.) We are slowly still organizing our lives into one life but it takes time. Once we got married we had lots of things separately and no time to really do these sorts of projects. We have really enjoyed organizing our home and preparing for baby.

And what about those birdies of ours? Louie and Kramer are very content in the den now, which used to be their original room. They grew to love the yellow room, but here they are back in the den:



They seem pretty happy!


As you can see there is still more to do, but we're on our way. More to come soon!!