July

I find it sad that I am having to sit and do a catchup post on nearly a whole month. My biggest blogging hurdle has been moving the computer to the desk in the other room so I only make it in their to check facebook or read a couple of blogs I follow. My time away from the computer has been great for spending time with my husband and friends but sad for my blogging.
July was a busier month than I thought it would be. It seemed like everytime I thought things would slow down or ease up I found myself busier than ever. At the beginning of the month we had a group of friends over for the fourth. We had a great time cooking out, fellowshiping, playing corn hole, and watching fireworks. The rest of my weeks were busy keeping my cousin's little one three days a week and then meeting with other friends on my "off days". I was also able to squeeze in some Turner kiddo time since they were in NC for nearly two weeks. I have really enjoyed being able to see so many of my friends this summer. Aaron and I have also spent some time cleaning up around the house and getting projects completed. It feels good to finally see things getting accomplished.
Just this last weekend I went down to the beach with my mom, her best friend and her best friend's daughter. It was a great girls weekend and we managed to do a lot in just a few short days. We enjoyed a day in downtown Charleston complete with carriage ride, shopping, lunch, and lots of walking. We also spent time down on the beach and at the pool. On our down time we attempted to watch a few movies although someone if not everyone ended up falling asleep in just about all of them. Overall we had a great time and enjoyed our mini getaway!
For the last few days in this month I am at the Turners house hanging with the kiddos while Matthew and Amy work. We dont have a lot planned but have just been enjoying our time together. While the kids play I have been getting to a lot of work I need to do on the computer including blogging and baby registries.
Hopefully life will settle into a more settled pattern (haha) and I can get back into blogging more. The next couple of months will be our last ones without a child so we will be trying to make the most of them while at the same time not wear ourselves out.

We have a bit of catching up to do...

Going back a bit to the beginning of June. We had our first party to celebrate our little one. As part of the agreement when we decided to find out whether we were having a boy or a girl I agreed that we would have a party to celebrate our big news with our friends. Because we were going to a wedding right after we found out we went ahead and told family but our friends had to wait a few days longer. We asked them to wear blue if they thought we were having a boy and pink if they thought it would be a girl. While up to that point we had more people saying girl we ended up with nearly an equal amount of each that evening.

Here are the pics for team blue and team pink.

We had a great evening of fellowship with friends and enjoyed being able to tell many of our friends at the same time what we were having!

The cupcakes held the answer inside.

It's a boy! A little boy will be joining our family towards the end of October or early November.

We are excited to meet our little one :)

roadblock (of sorts)

My plans to post and update my blog over our vacation have been halted due to no internet at our condo. Hopefully I can get on next week and update. Life is well! Later!

Keepin on, truckin on

Life has been busy. There are so many things that I need to catch up on. The last month has flown by. We started off the first weekend in June with our big ultrasound appointment at the doctor's office. Right after the appointment we drove over and picked up Aaron's mom and started our drive to Northern VA for his cousin's wedding. We had a great trip seeing his family and being there for their wedding.
Week 20 (The beginning of the bump)

A few days after we got back we held a Gender Reveal party for our friends to let them know whether baby Giese would be wearing lots of pink or blue. Our party was a blast! I will put up a seperate post with pictures from that night.


The following weekend I drove down to Winston-Salem to see Abby in Cinderella. For years now I have been able to go down and see the various plays put on by the West Side Civic Theatre. The plays are outdoors and are always fun to watch. I enjoy the layed back night of entertainment. The next day I was blessed to be able to visit with Sean, Christal and Cooper for a bit before coming back up to the mountains.


The last couple of weeks since then really have been a blur. I have gotten back onto the task of crossing items off of my really long and detailed to do list. Many of these items have been on there for nearly a year and some of them I really want to have accomplished before our little one arrives. Starting last week I also started keeping my cousin's little boy a few days a week. I have enjoyed being able to help them out while also forcing myself to stay home and get a few things done around here as well. Not to mention he is such a happy baby! In addition to those things Aaron and I have also made some decisions, based on many prayers, about our church home. We knew my time in the nursery was coming to an end but we have also decided that our time of going to Access church are also coming to an end. We love many different aspects of the church but are feeling led to come back to a more local church in order to raise our family in the way God would have us to.


As far as our little one goes, we are continuing to be blessed by the Lord with an easy pregnancy. My only complaint is some occasional mid back pain. I thank the Lord daily for this child and this pregnancy. I can honestly say I am enjoying being pregnant. I love feeling our little one, who's kicks are growing stronger every day. I am thankful that they seem new and exciting to me each time. I never want to forget just how special this time is. While the heat has been above average here lately I have been managing ok. I have only had one day where I felt miserable with the conditions. Next week marks 24 weeks in this pregnancy! I will post a new belly pic then.


Thanks for continuing to check in on us even in our long absences.

furniture, flutters and funny dreams

Things around here have been very busy lately. We continue to try and finish up projects around the house that we have been wanting to do especially the ones that have to do with baby. At the end of last week the crib and dresser came in and Aaron's mom brought them over here with her truck. During the weekend my parents came over and helped us move around the furniture in our guest/baby room and assemble the crib. It is a beautiful crib and dresser set! We are still getting used to seeing them in the room as we walk by. Once we have things more prepared I will post pictures.
I am getting more and more used to feeling our little one flutter in my belly. Most of the time I start to feel little flutters in the first quiet moments of the evening. Over the last few days and nights I have noticed that I am feeling our little one more often and for longer moments each time.
I am evidently very excited about finding out the gender of our little one. Last night I had 3 seperate and very different dreams about finding out. In each dream there were different friends and we found out or told people in different ways. When I got to the end of the last dream I found myself wanting to go back to sleep and to the dream so that I could find out...haha. Many of our Chrysalis friends and family were in my dreams as well as some complete strangers that I couldnt figure out why they were there or would want to know. I'm glad that I only have to wait 2 more days before we find out (or at least have the chance to).

ch ch ch changes...

This past weekend we began what I know will only be the first of many changes in our little household. We pulled everything out of 3 of our 4 closets and proceeded to sort through and reorganize. Nearly two days later the biggest part of the project was finished. The closets look great, especially the baby closet which is nearly empty awaiting arrival of all things baby.
Yesterday mom and I went to the store of all things baby and bought the car seat and stroller. Later that evening his mom ordered a glider rocker for us and then brought us our crib and dresser we ordered a few weeks back. We have been so blessed to receive so many big items already and all at a discount thanks to an awesome sale at the store of all things baby. With 20% off of each item we really saved a lot!
This weekend Aaron is on call but we are going to spend most of our time working around the house and putting together the crib.
We are getting more and more excited about this little one. It took me forever to fall asleep last night as I realized we had only a week until we will be able to go and hopefully see what this little one is :) As a fun way to announce to our friends what we will be having we are going to have a gender reveal party on June 8th. We will let our families know later that day but will have everyone else wait until the party to find out. We cant wait to celebrate with everyone!

I'm still here!

We are still around and doing great! I am sorry for the long absence between posts. Here are a few tidbits of what has been keeping us busy:

Baby Giese (also known as Wiggle Worm)

I spent most of the first trimester sleeping. That included through a good part of the Olympic figure skating. I was blessed enough not to really have any morning sickness. I did have a few food items that made me feel icky, but with avoiding those items I have felt great. Aaron and I walk as often as we can and have started the process of trying to select names.

I've been to the doctor twice now (I go again next week) and have received two great reports. Thus far this pregnancy has been wonderfully uneventful. I will continue to pray for a happy and healthy pregnancy. We will continue to pray that the Lord continues to form this little one and brings about a healthy pregnancy and delivery.

We have not taken many belly pictures largely because there has not been much to photograph in that department. Around week 12 I began to have a slight bit that I could no longer suck in. Here at 15 weeks I am just barely past that point. Still nothing major to report. Here is a little picture of week 12.

In other events, our social schedule has finally slowed down. We ran a very busy schedule from the beginning of February to the end of April. Lots of fun events but it was very tiring not to have any down time. We were blessed to be able to celebrate Cooper's 2nd birthday with him, participate in another Chrysalis weekend, continue to serve with our church, celebrate Adam's birthday, visit Disney (i promise to upload pics soon) and a number of other events.

I am excited to say that we are making some progress on some personal goals we have around the house as well. It is nice to see some things come to place that we have had to put off for quite some time. Both of us are looking forward to this spring and summer season and all that it will bring!