Diaper Keg Party

Following in the footsteps of many of our friends, we threw a Diaper Keg Party last night. The party was a good chance to spend time with friends and to show off the nursery - basically one final hoorah before baby comes and takes over our lives!
So in the tradition of the Diaper Keg, Ryan and I made a bunch of food and bought a keg of beer. Our friends came to the party and got beer in exchange for diapers.
I didn't take any pictures during the party, so you are just seeing the before and after. The most amazing thing was that I managed to stay up until 12:30 a.m. - normally I'm on my second wake-up/bathroom break of the night by then.
We had a fun time at the party and we hope everyone else did too! We received 1,271 diapers from size 1 to size 5 (luckily everyone skipped the newborn size!) and also over 1,000 wipes too! Thanks to everyone for all the diapers and for celebrating with us!

Getting Ready for Baby

Wow, how baby and I have grown in 9 weeks! Tomorrow we get the 36-week ultrasound and we'll find out just how big he really is.
Now that the showers are over, I took time to photograph the completed nursery. Come see it in person as I'm sure the pictures are missing a lot!
A lot of people have helped us prepare the nursery. Thank you to all of them for their time and attention to detail!

Brueckmann Baby Shower

Soon-to-be Aunt Kristin and Grandma Terrie threw a baby shower today at Bill & Terrie's house. The above picture is not great...but I was fighting hotmail for 10 minutes to download any pictures and only got 2 before I gave up all together. So, here I am with both of Baby Brueckmann's grandmas.
The shower was really nice and thanks to everyone's generosity, we now have (nearly) everything we'll need for Baby Brueckmann. Terrie made him a very cute blanket and we also received some great clothes, toys, towels, sheets, etc.
The new bedding and clothes are in the laundry room and after a trip to Babies 'R Us for some returns of duplicate items, we should be ready for his arrival.
I went to the doctor this past Tuesday and everything's still looking good. We won't know anything new about his size until the Week 36 ultrasound, which is about a week away. So for now we are just enjoying the warmer weather and waiting for the big day.

Lesinger Baby Shower

I'm up very early today thanks to a kicking baby, whining dog, and growling stomach. So I'm starting the "to do" list!I had a wonderful baby shower in Columbia, Illinois yesterday! So many good friends and family members were able to come and it was nice to (try to) catch up with everyone. Thank you to everyone for all the wonderful gifts!
Chris came back home with me yesterday and helped me go through everything and I had fun showing Ryan all the great stuff we received for the baby. We threw a bunch of things in the (hypo-allergenic) laundry, so the bed is finally fixed and things in the baby's room are looking great.
I am excited to spend some more time in there today, organizing the gifts and finding room for everything. Babies do really appear to take up a lot of space (and not just in my ever-expanding belly!)

Surprise Baby Shower!

On February 10, my coworkers surprised me with a huge baby shower! They were so generous with lots of nice gifts (including some big ones like the stroller system, jumper, bouncer and 204 diapers) which were fun to take home and put in the baby's room. After the presents, we enjoyed a catered lunch and cake from McArthur's. Yum!

There are no pictures of me with the presents because they only took action shots so I'm always either not looking or in the middle of saying something. So you get pictures of cute desserts instead!

I am about 32.5 weeks along and visited the doctor today for another check-up. I am measuring at 36 cm, instead of the normal 32/33 cm for this time. So I stayed for an ultrasound...everything's good, giant baby is healthy, fluid levels are normal. Wait, did you say giant? Yes, I did. Our baby book said "your baby now weighs almost 4 pounds" -- but our ultrasound technician has estimated him at 5 pounds, 13 ounces! This doesn't mean he's coming early because he still has the lungs of a 32 week old...so it means he will continue to grow and grow and grow...stay tuned for updates in the weeks to come!

Beggin' Strips Barkus Pet Parade

Last Sunday marked Annie's 5th year of attending the Mardi Gras dog parade. We missed the last couple years, so it was fun to get back down to Soulard for the event. We met my boot camp friend Mary (our first non exercise outing, now that I can't make it to class anymore), her husband Jeff and their dogs, Diesel and Lola.
Diesel weighs 200 pounds and was possibly the largest dog there. (Notice how small Annie looks, that's rare for her!) He got a lot of attention and had his photo taken by lots of random people.
Here are just some of the innocent dogs who were made to look like idiots. I think they had fun anyway!

Florida Trip

In the fall, a coworker of mine mentioned that she was going to spend a week at her time share in Orlando in January. She thought it would be a good pre-baby getaway and invited me to join her. She said I could bring a friend and since my sister Chris' birthday fell during that time, it seemed like a great plan. We spent 3 nights in Florida.

On the afternoon of Friday, January 29 we met in the Orlando airport to start our mini-vacation. After checking in to the condo, we spent some time at one of the area's many outlet malls. That night we had dinner at Margaritaville in Universal's City Walk.On Saturday we visited Blue Springs State Park, the winter home to 350 manatees. After a two-hour boat ride and viewing the manatees, we made our way to another outlet mall. We also went to Downtown Disney for some Ghiradelli ice cream sundaes.

We saved Epcot for Sunday, since there was no rain in the forecast that day. Unfortunately it was a cold and windy 50 degree day. We didn't stay at the park as long as we would have liked because it was just too cold! We spent the rest of the day relaxing at the condo and had a birthday dinner that evening. Happy Birthday to my wonderful sister!!