Shake your booty and smile!

Lola has been practicing her dancing skills recently and she is also smiling a lot now!  Here is a video that has the best of both:

Getting Ready…

As we get more and more things for the baby, it’s starting to feel more real!  Mom (Lara’s mom Barb) bought us a swinging crib for the baby to use. If you’re from my side of the family, you already know about the family crib, so you can skip to the next paragraph   But my great-grandfather (Bion Barger, Sr) made a crib that nearly everyone in my extended family has slept in as a baby – it even rocks/swings.  I think my cousin Denise has it right now, but I’m not sure.  Anyway, shipping something like that from the west coast of the US to England is a bit impractical, so Mom got a swinging crib for us to use for our baby.  I suppose we can start a new tradition, UK-side.

Sam practicing his baby-rocking skills

As you can see, the crib fits in our room (just about!) so she can sleep in the same room for the first few months; apparently that’s what’s recommended.  Sam decided he wanted her on his side of the bed, so we’ll see how that goes – but we’re open to moving it around if we need to!  Thank you again Mom for getting this great gift for us!

Westiemania!

Last weekend we were house-sitting (and pet-sitting) for Sam’s parents.  We took care of Dusty and Hugo and it was nice to be able to light a fire!  Granny (Celia) and her fiance, Arthur, came over for dinner one night and it was great to catch up with the newly-engaged couple.  No wedding date yet, but we can’t wait!

As part of our pet-sitting, we took Hugo for a walk last Sunday on Kenley Common.  We ran into Kate, who has four westies: Tommy, Minty, Lola and Breeze, who is a puppy.  Here is a video of the FIVE wesities (Kate’s dogs, plus Hugo):

The rest of the day we just chilled out – I think Sam, Hugo and Dusty were tired!

Sam, Dusty and Hugo napping

Baby Training

Last week Sam and I got to meet the sweetest puppy – Breeze!  She’s a 12-week-old west highland terrier and was the cutest thing.  She belongs to Kate, a friend of Christine and Richard’s, and she has three other westies.  Hugo (Christine and Richard’s dog) was very jealous of all the attention!

Sam really bonded with Breeze, I think, and it looks like he got in some good baby training holding the puppy!

You can see the video on YouTube here:

I can’t believe that in just 11 weeks (or less) our little girl will be here.  We’ve both had dreams about her already and can’t wait to meet her.  Everyone also thinks that  she will arrive early – I just have a feeling that she will, and Christine and my mom (Barb) both have a psychic inkling that she’ll be a November baby.  Even in Sam’s dream she had been born in November!  My last day at work is 19 November, so maybe she’ll be really sweet and show up on the following Monday.

We should really start getting the baby’s room in order, because at the moment it’s kind of a mix between “nursery” and “place where we keep random crap.”  These last few weeks are going to fly by, so we’d better get started!

Camping and Salisbury

This weekend we went camping at Green Hill Farm in Wiltshire, with our friends Tom and Becca, to celebrate Sam’s birthday weekend (his actual birthday is Monday).  The weather wasn’t the greatest – cold, wet, windy – but we still had a great time.  In the field next to our site, there were lots of cows and donkeys; the donkeys are really friendly and come right up to the fence to let you pet them!

The showers were a BIG improvement on last year; they’ve been completely re-done so don’t have the resident spiders anymore, and the water temperature is a constant warm instead of alternating between scalding and freezing.

Sam acted as head-chef, cooking breakfast on his new camping stove:

Chef Sam

On Saturday we went into Salisbury, which was nearby, and spent the day there.  We had a quick visit of Salisbury cathedral, which was really beautiful, and had a coffee in their cafe – it was gorgeous because it had a glass ceiling and you could look up and see a lot of the great architecture of the cathedral.

Salisbury

Salisbury Cathedral

Lara's "Deluxe Hot Chocolate" from the cathedral cafe

Swan-tastic

In other news, Baby has been kicking away!  Lara is getting really big and is starting to feel a bit uncomfortable… camping while 6-months pregnant was interesting   We can’t believe we are only three months away from meeting our daughter!

Lots of people have been buying her some great presents, but recently Amy, Matt and Levi sent over a bunch of great clothes from Old Navy!  Here is Lara’s favorite (modeled by Sam’s bear):

the pink tutu

Lara’s mom put her in a blue tutu when she was little, so it’s fun to carry on the tutu tradition!

A new bed

Our cotbed arrived today! Sam and Lara built it together and it was surprisingly easy to put together. It also has three adjustable heights and the sides are removable, so it can be used as a bed up to age five – bargain!

Baby Girl's Cotbed

We have also started receiving gifts for our little girl – she will be so spoiled! Gran-B (Lara’s mom) sent us a huge box of things from our gift list and Nana (Sam’s mum) has bought several things too. Our little girl will be the first grandchild for both our parents, so everyone is excited! She also has some cute purple clothes from great-auntie Caggy and a cute bunny toy from great-grandma Zara.

We still can’t believe that she will be here in just four months!

It’s a….

Think pink ladies and gents!  We’re having a girl!

We had our 20 week scan today and it was such an amazing experience to see all of her different parts: the brain, the skull, spine, ribs, thigh bone, stomach, kidneys… and her heart, beating perfectly.  It was truly amazing to see all of this stuff going on.  The best news of all is that she is completely healthy and everything looks normal/average – we like average!

I think her profile looks just like Sam when he was a baby – only with my nose, if that makes sense.  Christine and Richard came with us, but they would only let Sam and one other person in, so Richard came in to see the scan since Christine saw the first one.  I think he was just as amazed as we were by all that you can see!

Here are the scan pictures:

The black hole in her torso is her stomach!

Amy gave me a really good trick for the scan: drink orange juice and eat a Snickers bar before hand to help get the baby moving!  Seems like it worked, because she was very cooperative for the scan.

Collapsing Humanity

Lara had a bit of an embarrassing morning today…

We get the train into work and it’s always really crowded; sometimes we get seats, sometimes we don’t and have to stand.  I’ve never had a problem with it before – after all, you sit on your backside all day at work, so it’s really not a big deal.  Today, however, was a different story.

About five minutes outside of London Bridge (the station we go t0), I started to feel really sick: clammy, nausea, faint.  I just took deep breaths, but then my vision started getting all weird, like I couldn’t see.  I knew I was going to pass out if I didn’t do something, so I grabbed Sam’s hand and crouched down on the floor of the train.  I was there for a few minutes before a woman next to me asked if I was okay and offered her seat.

What kind of a world do we live in where people are so selfish that they won’t get off their ass for someone who is clearly not well?  I would have been out of my seat in a second offering that person water if it had been someone else.  I am kind of disgusted with London Commuter attitude.

I’m fine now - once I was off the train and got some fresh air, I felt a lot better, just weak and a bit shaky.  Apparently this kind of thing is normal in pregnant women, especially if you’re warm and have been standing for a long time – which I was.  I’m thinking about getting one of those “Baby on Board” badges – not that I think it would make much difference among the self-involved seat-grabby commuters.

Relaxing

Today Sam helped Ben and Kelly move into their new place. After a long day, it was only fair he have a turn with the foot spa. Check out those bubbles!!

Our New Home

Finally some pictures of our new flat!  It is still a work in progress as we’re trying to figure out the right place for all of our stuff.  We’ve also realized that we need to buy more furniture (more??  But we had soooo much stuff to move!).  For example, Lara needs a nightstand and we definitely need some kind of storage/shelving/organizer in the closet.  Lara has improvised with a large cardboard box, creating a cubby hole for some things and a “shelf” for sweatshirts. Nice.

We also need a bookcase, since our last flat had amazing built-in bookshelves in the lounge.  Lara has, once again, improvised with the amazing material of cardboard, making a bookcase out of cardboard boxes.  We’re hoping this will be replaced with some Ikea stuff soon….

A huge, huge thank you to Christine, Richard, Federico and Valentina who helped us move all our stuff and carry it into our new place that is on the second floor

Entryway

Our Bedroom, with new bed built by Sam!

Bathroom

Lounge (excuse the mess!)

Lara's "custom" bookcase