JUNE 30th!!

So pretty much for the last nine months Heath and I have been repeating the date "June 30th" over and over again! While I think the statistic is something like only 5% of babies are born on their due date, after hearing a particular day over and over again you can help but think that's going to be the big day! Well . . . . here we are.

It's a bit surreal figuring out how you want to spend the last few days as a "couple" leading up to your child's birth day and beginning of a whole new family life. Heath decided to even start nesting himself. Over the last two days he has done a lot of work to our basement and our bathroom (luckily what was going to be a project that inhibited the use of our shower for two days turned into no access to the shower for just one evening!). He also baked one of his amazing homemade carrot cakes because I was craving it, and finally today he decided to get in one more round of golf with a good friend.

In an effort to save as many sick days as possible, I decided to come to work. I suppose there is also a little pride in being able to say I worked truly up until my due date. I'm also going to enjoy lunch with a good friend. Prior to this "big day" I've spent a ton of time cleaning and vacuuming, getting the baby's room ready (perhaps a little early to have the baby monitors set up but it makes me feel better!) and stocking up on toilet paper. Oh, and walking, walking, walking. Unfortunately, I'm beginning to think walking to induce labor is just an old wives tale!

Whether today's the big day or not there's no denying how excited we are ( and our family, I'm getting use to the nightly phone calls!) Half jokingly, half serious a good friend made a comment that if he's anything like his dad he'll be late and probably come on the 4th of July just to make a statement! Oh goodness, I hope he's here before then :)

"My Heart Belongs to My Mommy"

It turns out our doctor wanted to do one more ultrasound on little Baby E before his big arrival. There wasn't really a big scare but just a few things she wanted to check out. And, as predicted, everything seems to be perfectly normal. Surprisingly he seems to be measuring at 7.6 lbs although she said that could be off.

Heath and I both know that while we can feel as prepared as possible neither one of us truly have any idea what it's like to be a parent until the little guy gets here. But I think we both felt a little taste of that with the anxiety of thinking something might not be just quite 100% perfect with our baby prior to his birth. Being completely responsible for this little guy is quite an awesome task.

The other thing I think I learned from this ultrasound is how hard ultrasounds are to read! I chalked our initial ultrasounds at 7, 10, and 22 weeks up to the fact that the baby was so tiny. Now, I'm not quite sure what the excuse is. Our ultrasound tech kept trying to figure out which nose our baby had - I was just trying to figure out where his nose was!!! In case you need some help the picture above is of his tiny little heart!

The picture above is of his little hearbeat (just in case you needed a little help like me!)

EVERYONE knows something is up?!?!

With our due date less than a week away, Heath and I are admittedly getting anxious. We've started getting the phone calls and the e-mails asking when our little guy is going to get here and believe us we're just as ready to know as all of our family and friends! The car seat is in the car and the hospital bag is packed.

For the last nine months we feel like all we've been doing is preparing for Baby E to arrive. I think we've neglected that our pets have also been very aware that something is changing too. Peyton loves going in to the nursery when we're in there and camps out on the rug in the middle of the room. And if all the baby's toys aren't put up, Peyton is quick to bring them to us. He has already received his "welcome home" baby present -a new indestructable toy- and Papaw Jim has been put on Peyton Patrol when he gets here. If I can just figure out how to push a stroller and walk a 93 lb dog at the same time I don't think we'll have any problems!

Peanut, our first baby, we believe is also getting the sense that life is never going to be the same. Heath surprised me with Peanut five years ago shortly after we moved to VA and to help us make our family feel complete. Unfortunately, "Peanut" is probably not the most fitting name for him (lets hope we do a better job matching our baby and his name!) and he's never been too in to being petted and loved on. He has, however, been very interested in trying out the crib and the pack-and-play. I'm not sure he's fully recovered from us bringing home our montrosity of a dog so who knows what he's going to think about Baby E?! During the summer he loves to wait by the door and try to escape -we're hopoing it's just to get outside and enjoy the weather not because he wants to run away from home.

37.5 weeks

It's only when I post these pictures that I realize just how big I've gotten! With gradually getting bigger each day and having not used a zipper or button for probably five months it's easy to not even notice the circumference of my belly! I suppose next week I need to put a side by side picture up from 10 weeks to 39 weeks. Our doctor's appointments are now weekly, because I suppose anything could happen at any moment. On Wednesday, I'll technically be full term and baby Ewing has the green light! Although at out last doctor's appointment there didn't seem to be a lot of progress, so I have a feeling he's just going to stay nice and cozy as long as he can.
Back in October when were first found out we were pregnant I couldn't even imagine how I would be feeling at this moment (physically or mentally!). Now, with the bassenet sitting by our bed and the baby monitors already plugged in, I can start to picture what it'll be like to watch our baby sleeping - and hear him crying in the middle of the night! And while testing out the glider reading Brown Bear and feeling our little guy move I get more and more excited about getting to hold him while he hears the story. We have been so blessed to have a relatively easy pregnancy and so many family and friends supporting us.

More visitors!

This weekend Heath's mom and nephew came to town! We had a great time and Heath and Austin tried out SnowFlex while we went for a round of indoor putt-putt. Funny how Heath was both the scorekeeper and the winner? And hmm . . . either this pregnany is making me shorter or Heath has hit a very late-in-life growth spurt?

Out-of-Town Guests

Recently we've had a lot of "out-of-town" guests checking up on us to make sure we're ready for the arrival of Baby E. During my parents visit we tried to stay cool while checking out some of the local favorites. As you can see, Peyton has become quite the water dog. We even had a great drive along the Blue Ridge Mountains and lunch at Peaks of Otter. Of course we got some very helpful "baby errands" run as well with picking up a baby book and some nursing necessities!