These days...

We are enjoying Ilana's hands (that she practices folding before every meal),Ilana's feet,
and Ilana's hair.
Moses loves to help.
We're doing great!
ps-we're also enjoying our 2-hour increments of rest every night.

And her name shall be...

(drum roll please...)
Ilana Christine Miller

These are some of my favorites...

SHE'S HERE!!

Well, my water broke 10:30 Wednesday night...

And after 27 hours of labor...

WE HAVE A BABY GIRL!!!!


Here's the stats:
8 lbs. 5 oz.
19 1/2 " long
Born: 4/18/08 at 12:17 a.m. (!!)
Name: TBD (we were so convinced she was going to be a boy, that we've had to go back to square one with the whole name thing)

More photos to come.
-H

Size matters

I'm just here to lament one small fact...I AM BIG, I mean really big. I get asked multiple times a day how many babies I will be having (even a total stranger at the bank today asked me if I was having twins!). It's a little embarrassing to have gone from regular smalls to maternity extra larges and here's the result...
my belly still hangs out!! Can you say ALL OUT FRONT?!
I never would have thought that my body could stretch like this, and if you had shown me this picture even 5 months ago, I would never have thought that this person was me. Well, here's to being 6 days from your due date!
-H

Oh, what a day!

Sunday was a fantastic day! I'll mention the highpoints:

• My incredible husband gave me a full-body massage (after not sleeping for about 3 nights straight).
  

• We went through baby everything (can you say "over consumerism?!"), making piles of those things we wanted to return.

• We gathered our wits about us, as well as our gift cards, and headed out to make returns.

• We went to: JCPenney, Sear's, Lowe's (not to do any returns, just because we were in the area), Kohl's, Macy's, Babies 'R Us, Olive Garden (a SURPRISE dinner break for me!) and Target.

Yes, that's a total of 7 stores and 1 restaurant in about 7 hours. At 39 weeks pregnant, I think we did pretty good! We spent a good amount of the day talking about the "nuts and bolts" of what life after the baby will be like. Crazy things are happening around here!
-H

All my bags are packed!

But I'm not quite "ready" to go. We're taking care of all those annoying last-minute details, like our email "Baby Announcement" distribution list, etc. etc. etc.
We had a wonderful shower in Annapolis this past Saturday. It was a great time! My parents' house looked amazing (they've been deep in construction for 2 years and now their house is beautiful). Here are some pictures of the day...

This is my sister-in-law, niece and I. Believe it or not, my sister-in-law is pregnant with her second and due only 5 weeks after I am (May 28). She looks about like I did at Christmas time (maybe even before that). She knows she's having a girl. It's going to be a fun spring!

I guess we could call this my 38-week "belly" shot. As you can see, I don't have any shirts that fit me all that well anymore.

Thanks Mom and Dad for a fabulously wonderful shower! We are most certainly blessed to have the support that we do.

-H
ps-if you want to make sure you're on our "Baby Announcement" distribution list, send us an email and let us know.

Long time...no post

Well, a lot of LIFE has happened since last time we posted. Here's a summary:

• The pregnancy is going well. We can't believe we're 3 or 4 weeks away from being PARENTS - kinda scary! We switched to a nurse-midwife in Gettysburg and feel GREAT about the care we're receiving - very natural, very personal.
  
• We're still hunting for a master's program for Paul in the fall.
• The nursery and upstairs bathroom renovations are almost done, but we've got a lot more work left to do on the rest of the house (and that's pretty overwhelming right now). We got new carpet in our bedroom and nursery last weekend. Once a few more things are completed upstairs we'll be getting the same carpet in the hallway, stairwell and Paul's office.
  
• Baby stuff is starting to accumulate in our house, thanks to the 2 surprise baby showers we've had. There's another one in Annapolis this weekend, I'm so excited!

Here are some pictures just to clarify...

This is the latest "belly" picture, just taken tonight. I asked Paul if black was a "slimming" color and he said "Don't try too hard these days!"

Paul and I went down to Texas to visit one of the 3 master's program options. We rented a car for the week and got a Toyota Prius (a HYBRID!). We had so much fun driving it around.

A nursery picture from a few weeks ago. The baseboard molding is actually in place now. We just have to do the window panes and casing in this room then it's READY TO GO!

Me in the almost-finished bathroom a few weeks ago. You can see I was big then, but got even bigger in just a few weeks. In the mirror behind me you can see the FINISHED shower. Again, in here the baseboard molding is in place, we just need the window pane and casing. We're SO CLOSE!

This is what our living room looked like after our first shower. Unfortunately it looked like this for over a week. I had just re-organized, washed and put everything in the nursery when I had our other surprise shower at work, so now our living room looks just about the same once again. Hopefully that nesting instinct will come soon. I could really use some random energy to clean!

Well, that's life for now. Onto pregnancy week 37!
-H