Oh boy! Here he comes!

We went to the doctor today, and I was finally dilated. But just to a one, nine centimeters left to go. Dr.Thompson stripped my membranes to aid in bringing on the contractions. If I don't go into labor on my own this weekend, they are going to admit me to the hospital Monday, October 1st at 6:30pm. Then Patti, one of my best friends and labor and delivery nurse shown above, will put me on an I.V. and start the cervidil. Cervadil will help my cervix efface, and the next morning if necessary I'll start the pitocin. Please pray for us to have a safe and speedy delivery!

Counting Down the Days

Chris took this picture of me today. We thought we should document the uber big belly before Christian decides to come out! We also went to the doctor for a routine check up. Not much changed. Christian is measuring 40 weeks. He hasn't dropped and I haven't dialated. We have another visit next Thursday. The doctor wants to talk about induction then.

We finally did Christian's name wall in his room. We went to Hobby Lobby and bought the letters inexpensively. I painted them here at the house along with alternating colors of background circles. We're really happy with the results. It's even cuter in person because you can see the dimension and cast shadows of the letters.

I apologize if you tried the links on our page earlier and they didn't work. I fixed the links, so you may want to try again now. I also added a link to Lauren's brother Bruce's private Island Hatchet Caye. It's really cool. Check it out!

Pregnancy Session 8.25.07

My awesome and very talented girlfriend, Jessica Hall, did a photography session with us at the studio where she works. If you're interested in using her, her contact information can be found on her website. I've set up a link to it on your right as well as the pictures from our pregnancy session.

Our Baby Shower

We had an awesome baby shower! Patti and Mary Grace Forrester, my step mother Julie, and Jennifer Conner hosted the shower at Jennifer's fabulous new house. The food was awesome, especially the artichoke dip and chocolate fondue! The cake and flowers were adorable, and it was amazing seeing almost all of my friends together in one place. We played a couple of fun games. One were we guessed the baby food in the jar and another were we guessed which chocolate candy bar was melted into which diaper. Yuk!

Chris, such a wonderful involved daddy already, was there filming and helping me open up presents. We received a lot of great gifts. Some of the more unique gifts included a maternity shirt from Laura with Buddah on the front. His big belly went right over my big belly, our navels nearly aligning! We also received an awesome travel system from my mom and nursery bedding from Julile and my dad. Patti, Jason, and Mary Grace gave us a gorgeous Moses basket set with an embroidered blanket and matching burp cloths. My friend Jessica gave us a photography session with her that we used to take pregnancy pictures recently. We received many more wonderful things for Christian that we appreciate all so much!

Christian's Nursery

Chris and I, in true procrastinator fashion, are still almost finished with the nursery. However, we are quite happy with it the way it is. At first I wanted to do a fool proof design. I thought we could paint it a robin's egg blue on the top half, divide the room with a chair rail, and then paint a pattern of stripes on the bottom in blues, tans, and white. Luckily, Chris talked me out of being safe, and we chose a much more whimsical design.

Together, we went to The School Box and Chris found a really neat children's book Five Little Ducks. We loved the illustrations in the book, so we used them as inspiration for the room. We bought the book and a couple of boxes of chalk too. Then we went to Home Depot and bought a blue and a green gallon of paint. Chris painted the entire background for the nursery the blue sky, surface water, and underwater. I was relieved because I was really apprehensive about making the water look natural. Not to mention, I couldn't be in and around the paint fumes. He really did an awesome job! A few days after the paint dried and the fumes dissipated, I came in and started sketching on the walls in chalk. Little by little, I painted over the sketches. Chris painted a book shelf that I had for a while. Julie, my step mom, gave it to me to use when I was in college. It was turqouise green, and I painted it tan with dark brown zebra stripes. I had used it as an entertainment center and later stored all of my shoes on it. By painting it white we were able to repurpose it as a storage unit in Christian's room. I went to Target and got a great deal on the different colored storage boxes for the shelf. It has really turned out to be great!

The crib in the room is absolutely beautiful, dark cherry wood in a sleigh style. It was given to us second hand by a friend. We found the changing table online at craigslist.com along with the cosleeper that will be put into our room. The cosleeper is shown there in this picture to the left under the window. We ordered the red and white gingham drapes from target.com, and Dad and Julie gave us the nursery bedding from Pottery Barn at our baby shower.

The only things left that we want to do are a little more painting and putting up some crown molding. We'ld also like to put Christian's name up in the room above the storage unit and buy a rocker glider to put in the corner. Otherwise, the only thing that is missing is him!