Ellie's First Easter

Ellie has been....a handful today. She's starting to like to pick up her food herself. The green bean bowl was dumped out in short order. Soon after, she found Daddy's Dr. Pepper and promptly spilled that all over herself and the floor. She then had another nap and is now playing like an angel. What a sweet girl.

We went to Houston last week. Ellie and James drove down to hang in the hotel while I went to some training. Ellie did pretty good in the hotel room, but she's definitely gotten used to her crib in her own room, I think. We have a couple more trips this year, so hopefully she'll get unused to it easily too. A mom can hope, right?

She clapped for my mom yesterday - don't they know they're not supposed to do new stuff when we're not around? And of course, she has done no clapping for me today.

She did sign "more" twice to me today when I was feeding her. She's not consistent, but I think she's starting to get it. It's fun after all these months of signing.

Here are some fun pictures (Note: Some of the links below seem to be broken. I tried to correct them on my end, but it seems to be a website issue - sorry!):







Sure am having fun with my dinosaur toy!












Mama - you didn't want this trash to STAY in the trash can, did you?












Ravioli is yummy!














Playing with my friend Korben!













Sleepy baby cuddling with Mama.

The bottle got me!

I can hold my bottle now!

I love Sesame Street!

My first train ride at the Easter Extravaganza at church.

Me with a beautiful hot air balloon!

My first Easter egg hunt.

I don't know what's in these, but they're fun to shake!

Like my Easter dress? My Aunt Co gave it to me - her daughter wore it years ago!

I got to meet my friend Emerson in Houston!

Welcome to the Blog - and 10 Month Update

Hey, everyone! Welcome to our new cyberspace home.

You'll see I've moved over all of the older posts from the old site. This is mostly for me to have them all in one place, but it was sort of fun to go back through them to me so feel free if you're interested. I didn't pull in all the old photos, but I did move her 3 month montage over. It has all the best pictures anyway, so check it out if you'd like. It's in the 8/7/06 post.

Boy how they change... She's crawling, pulling up, cruising, holding her own bottle, doing some little baby dancing. She so fun these days! We're saying "No, no" and "Don't touch" a lot, though. There went our dreams of a perfect obedient child...

I plan to post more often and make this a real blog, so please check in and leave comments. Because I've heard some horror stories, and even seen some of them first hand, I've made it invitation only. Please feel free to tell anyone I may have missed to request access.

I've done a new montage covering the 3-9 month range. Check it out!

Make video montages at onetruemedia.com

Archive - From 2/26/07 - 9 Month Update

In just a few days Ellie will be 9 months old. She has given new meaning to the phrase “Wow, how fast time flies!” She is not really crawling per se. Instead she just rolls over and over. She crosses the living room and gets where she wants pretty fast now. I have set her down in the middle of the floor, run into the kitchen for a minute and come back to find her all the way across the room reaching for something that is currently out of her grasp. We are quickly discovering just how much child-proofing we’re going to have to do. She sits up great and plays both with us and on her own very well. She keeps herself content playing alone, sometimes for surprising lengths of time. Until she gets a brother or sister (NO, we’re not expecting again…yet) she’ll just have to be happy playing with us and with her toys. She started pulling herself up to her feet with the help of our fingers and stands and tries to walk with us a little bit now. She is not yet pulling herself up in her crib but it's only a matter of time.

She started eating solids a couple of months ago and Amy makes the vast majority of her food. Ellie is eating increasingly large amounts of solid foods, and is also getting coordinated enough to eat cheerios and “puffs” with two fingers/her whole hand cramming them in her mouth. They often get stuck either to her face, her bib, or her hands. Amy is still nursing, but we are realizing that there will come a time in the next few months when that will likely come to an end. Amy says she'll be sad when this happens. It’s a little bewildering to me. I think I’d be ready for my body to be MY BODY again after all this time. However, Amy has relished these months of doing that with and for our daughter, and I’m sure Ellie will miss it too. I’m so proud of Amy for working so hard at doing it so consistently, and with her work schedule, it has been a chore.

We put up her 6 month professional photos, so check them out. Please don't download them. We also just had a visit from PaPa, so enjoy the new photos there.

Ellie is a ham and is developing a flair for the dramatic. She talks and mumbles (as well as complains) with a variety of sounds. She is developing a cute personality. She is patient and happy about 95% of the time, which makes her a joy to be around. She still goes down for naps almost at the drop of a hat. We set her down in her crib, and generally speaking, she just rolls over and falls asleep, which makes our life very easy compared to some other parents of babies we know. She wakes up happy most of the time and talks to herself for amusement until we come and get her. She loves to smile and laugh, now showing off her two little bottom teeth. Ellie is so much fun and we are so blessed to have her. We hope you are all doing well. Talk to you soon.

Archive - From 1/3/07 - 7 Month Update

Wow - I can't believe how long it's been since I updated this. Sorry! Guess I'll blame the holidays.

Eliana has had a pretty good 2 months. The only hitch has been her first illness. I got sick before Thanksgiving, and it seems she got the same thing. She's been feeling bad off and on and is still hanging on to a cough. Most of the time, though, she's her normal happy self.

She continues to roll over like a champ. She's sitting up, but only for a few seconds to a minute at a time. She still topples, but she'll get there. She's so fun and interactive now. She plays with her toys and babbles so much more. She loves going on walks and swinging at the park. She's also started eating solid foods and is literally eating them up. So far, the only thing she doesn't like is green beans. :)

She's still sleeping through the night even with her sickness, which is so great. We've also dropped her late night feeding which is nice for Mama. Still no teeth, but something sharp has recently appeared on her bottom gum, so maybe soon.

We've had a wonderful two months with family. Ellie got to meet her Papaw over Thanksgiving which was great. Grandpa Fritz has successfully moved to Texas, so there will be more time with him now, too. It was a bittersweet Christmas without our Mama Jean and Mamaw....

James and I are doing well. I'm enjoying my work, and James is loving his counselling. Please continue to pray that his practice will continue to grow.

Enjoy the new pictures!

We pray for health and blessing in 2007 for all of you!

Archive - From 11/13/06 - 5 Month Update

Hi, everyone,

All is going well. Our big news is that Ellie has consistently been sleeping through the night for the past couple of weeks. We're so happy!

She's still as happy and content as always. She's rolling all over the place and is just starting to sit up. So far she just makes it a few seconds before falling over, but she's getting close.

There's tons of drool but still no teeth. I imagine they'll just show up out of the blue one of these days.

We're headed on a driving trip to Denver for Thanksgiving. Ellie will meet her Papaw (great grandpa) for the first time. Cousin Georgie will be there, too, along with lots of others, so we're really excited. Keep us in your prayers that the trip goes well!

We hope you all have a very blessed Thanksgiving. We definitely have MUCH to be thankful for!

Archive - From 10/17/06 - Farewell to Our Sweet Mama Jean

All,

Many of you have heard that James mom, Jean, went on to be with the Lord on October 6th. We are immensely saddened at her quick decline due to cancer. All of the kids flew up to New York week before last and we were all able to be at her side as she went. We prayed and sang over her as we told her it was ok to let go. We're grateful for that time, but she will of course be sorely missed. Thank you all for you thoughts and prayers for our family.

One positive that came out of the whole situation was that Ellie got to meet Jean's parents, Mamaw and Granddad along with some other relatives. Check out her 4 month album below. She was a great baby through all the stress and mostly just went with the flow. Her Mama was so grateful!

Ellie has been doing great. She's rolling over all over the place these days. She's also drooling a lot, but no sign of teeth just yet. Last night was the first night she went all the way through the night without eating (and just woke up once). I'm not holding my breath, but I'm hoping this starts to be a trend soon. She does great with Daddy while I work 3 days a week, and I love my time with her as well. She's a happy flexible baby, and we're loving (almost) every minute!

Archive - From 9/4/06

Hi, everyone!

I can't believe it's been 3 months already.

I've returned to work! It wasn't as traumatic as I'd thought it would be. I've returned on a part time schedule. I work Wednesday through Friday and James cousels on Mondays and Tuesdays. As he builds his practice, we may explore other options, but for now we can both parent Ellie without daycare. We feel extremely blessed. I miss Ellie while I'm at work, but knowing she's with James makes it infinitely better.

Ellie is doing great. No major milestones to report just yet. She's considering rolling over, but hasn't done it yet. We're not in a hurry - she'll do it in her own time. Also still not sleeping through the night. Alas..... She's getting closer each week, though.

Her Aunt Becka was here this weekend and taught her how to blow raspberries with her lips. It's the cutest thing to watch her doing it. James and I look crazy doing it to her all the time trying to get her to practice more. Ahhh....the things parenting makes you do.

We got her three month photos done today. Considering how hard it is to make a baby smile on demand, she did pretty well. Here's the information if you want to view the pictures. Some of them need to be rotated to the right to be oriented correctly:

www.searsphotos.com
Create an account
Click to view new session
Session ID: 41337b105113247
Password: 2NMGPZN2C

As you'll see in the latest pictures, my dad bought a boat. We need to get a picture of the whole thing for you, but it's a 47' Chriscraft cruiser. We've loved spending time on it in the last few weeks. Between that and the pool (that she's enjoying a lot more) she's going to be quite the waterbaby!

Archive - From 8/7/06 - Meeting Daddy's Family

Well, the last three weeks have been spent meeting James' side of the family. Mama Jean and Fritz (James' parents) have been staying with us for the last 3 weeks (minus a trip to Abilene in the middle) and are presently making their way back up to New York on a slow road trip with more family visits along the way.

Aunt Becka (James' little sister) arrived in Dallas on Saturday night. This was her first time to meet Ellie, so Ellie has finally met all of her aunts and uncles now. Becka got two short days with us before heading back to Searcy, AR for school. She's not far away, though, so we hope to see her again soon.

We just returned from her second road trip. She went with us to Bryan, TX to visit Uncle Charles, Aunt Glenda and Aunt Betty. Glenda and Betty are Jean's aunts. We had a great time visiting and passing Ellie around.

She got her shots on 7/28. We were mean and videoed it. She did really great. There were tears (hers - not too many of mine) and some really cute sad faces, but she recovered quickly and slept most of the day. She continues to grow like a weed. She's in the 90-95th percentile for weight, height and of course head size!

She's just started little laughs in the last day or two. We're excited for her to start doing it more and get it on video.

She tried her Exersaucer today for the first time. Here's a little video of her in it for you. (Yes, she's a child prodigy at two months!)

Click here to watch "Ellie in her Exersaucer"

I've also been working on a video montage of Ellie. A friend of mine told me about the perfect song for it, so I hope you enjoy!

Photo and video editing at onetruemedia.com

Archive - From 7/23/06 - My First Flight!

I'm still technically on maternity leave (until August 23rd), but there was a convention last week with work that I wanted to be at. As such, Ellie and I went to Ft. Lauderdale, FL! We flew my sister Jennie and my nephew Georgie out to help with Ellie. I was quite stressed about the flight, but she did great. She screamed for the first 20 minutes of the first flight while people were loading, but then she got to eat and didn't make a peep the rest of the flight. She didn't even mind the landing - her ears seemed fine. It was very cool. She did great in Florida, too. She went swimming and on walks with Aunt Jen and Georgie, and slept just like she does at home.
Speaking of sleeping, she is still doing great. Our nightime routine is a bath, lotion massage, changing to sleepers and a swaddle before her 7pm feeding. Hugs and prayers and to bed. (We've moved her into her own room now.) I go in there at 10 or so to give her a last feeding and most times she doesn't even open her eyes and just stays half asleep. She then wakes again around 3-4am for a feeding and then our day starts around 7. Not bad for 7 weeks!

She also finally got to meet her Mama Jean and Fritz. They arrived while we were in Florida, so they picked us up at the airport on Thursday afternoon. She also met her Uncle Mark and Aunt Jocie on Friday afternoon, so she's been quite the show-off. (In case it was in question, they all think she's pretty great!)

She's a great baby, and we're really enjoying her. She smiles a ton now and coos a lot. She seems to be hanging on to all her hair, too, which makes Mama very happy.

Our next big thing is 2-month shots on 7/31. Mama will likely cry more than Ellie, but we'll see. :)

Hope you're all doing great!

Archive - From 7/8/06 - One Month Update

Hey, everyone,

All continues to go well here at the Wiebe house. Eliana is now 5 1/2 weeks old and has passed the one month mark. She enjoyed her first 4th of July (in the rain) and has had some fun visitors!

Our good friends from Seattle, the Cornwell's spent a night with us last week. They have 3 kids that were excited to hit the pool and meet Ellie. The visit was fast, but great. You'll see some pictures in the newest album.

Ellie had her one month pediatrician appointment on Thursday and continues to grow like a little weed. She's 11 lbs. already which puts her in the 90th percentile! She's eating good, I guess! She got her hepatitis B shot as well, which was a little sad, but a feeding time coincided with the shot which seemed to make everything better pretty quickly. :)

She made her first day trip last weekend to a wedding in Abilene. She looked so pretty and did great in the car. There's some photos of her dress that I added as well.

She's starting to smile and is looking more and more alert. She's holding her head up pretty well, although sometimes it's a Ray Charles type effect! She's sleeping anywhere from 4-6 hour stretches at night, for which Mama is very very grateful! She's a really easy baby, so I know I'm going to be in trouble when we get around to #2!

I hope this finds you well! Shoot us an email or sign the guestbook to let us know how you are.

Archive - From 6/27/06 - Swimming and meeting Cousin Georgie

My sister Jennie, her husband Dave and my nephew Georgie were here this last week. We all had such a great time with the babies and hanging out in the pool.

Ellie did great in the pool the first time. She seemed happy and content in her floatie. The second time she wasn't so happy. She just wanted to sleep. :)

She's been to church several times now as well. She's always a big hit.

She's sleeping between 3 and 4 hours through the night. She goes back to sleep well after each feeding, so Mama and Daddy are doing okay on getting sleep. We're looking forward to the days when those stretches get longer, but we can't complain for now.

I'm feeling great. I'd say I'm feeling 95% back to normal. I still have a lot of weight to lose, but no pain or discomfort at all from the surgery. James has been a great help to let me get naps in during the afternoon, so most days I feel pretty rested as well.

I added a few new pictures, so check them out.

We hope you're all doing well!

Archive - From 6/15/06 - Two Week Checkup

Well, when they let us leave the hospital, they said they'd trust the care of our sweet girl to us for a whole two weeks. I consider it a success that we made it to the appointment with her healthy. :)

So, you may recall that she was 8lbs. 2oz. at birth. Babies lose up to 10% of their birth weight in the first few days after birth. She was 7lbs. 10oz. when we checked out of the hospital on June 3rd. The pediatrician was expecting her to be back at her birth weight or slightly above today. Well, our little piggy weighed in at 9lbs. 2oz.! She gained a whole pound over her birth weight. The pediatrician couldn't believe it but said that it was great. Everything else looked good, so it was a pretty uneventful appointment aside from the big weigh-in.

I had my two week checkup as well. Everything looked good with my incision, and I've lost over half of the baby weight already. That was encouraging. My OB also confirmed that I can still try for a natural birth next time. (Sometimes with emergency c-sections you can't.) I was glad to hear that.

All else is going well. She wakes up about every 3 hours through the night, but she goes back down quickly so it's not bad. Aunt Jennie, Uncle Dave and cousin Georgie get here on Wednesday, so we're excited for the cousins to meet!

Archive - From 6/5/06 - First Home Sponge Bath and Funny Daddy Story

Hi, everyone,

We added some more pictures tonight. Ellie had her first home sponge bath last night. Mama Jean and Fritz (James' parents) were on speaker phone so that they could join in the fun. She wasn't a huge fan of most of it, but she was happy and clean at the end.

We had our first diaper blow-out today. Fortunately it happened with Daddy. :) He got her up for her next feeding and went to change her diaper. As soon as he was done and bringing her back to me, she went in the fresh diaper. So, back to the changing table James goes. This one blew out the back and managed to get all over the changing table as well as on James' arm. As he's cleaning her up, she then starts to go pee as well! (Add to the mental picture Mom laughing from the living room.) He stood strong, though, and she's all clean, in a new outfit and feeding like a champ.

Archive - From 6/4/06 - We're Home!

We came home yesterday, June 3rd. I'm recovering very well from the surgery, and everything with Ellie looks great. She's even at a very low risk for jaundice, so we don't have to go see any doctors for two weeks.

It's been a transition to be home, but we survived our first night without much trouble. She's a good eater and tends to want to eat often!

We're looking forward to all getting to know each other in our more permanent environment.

Thanks for all your prayers and support! It's been great to hear from so many of you.

Archive - From 6/1/06 - The Day After

Hello everyone. Today was a great day. Ellie is doing great. Amy is also doing well. She was able to get off of her IV medicines and got to take a shower and walk around her room a bit. We had a few visitors today which was really nice. I'm adding a few more pictures and will continue to do that as we are able. I won't email you all every time I do that however, so as to not be a Spammer. SO, please check back for new pictures regularly. Thanks again for all your calls, thoughts, and prayers. They have meant a great deal to us.

Archive - From 5/31/06 - Our Daughter was Born!!!

Hello. This is James writing this update. Eliana Noelle Wiebe was born this morning at 7:20am. She is gorgeous and has already showed signs of brilliance! Amy went into labor Tuesday morning at 3am and so we labored at home a lot as planned, going into the hospital yesterday afternoon around 5. Amy's contractions were getting harder and harder and she was in hard labor by very early this morning. She started pushing at around 4am and went until 7am. So, she had labored for 27 hours and has pushed for almost the last three of them. Unfortunately, as most of you were already aware, she had a large cranium (inherited from me...) and she wasn't progressing at all. Amy was amazing. She fought like a war hero to get that baby out! But after all that time she just didn't have much energy left and the baby just wasn't showing any signs of moving down anymore. So, Amy decided that it would be in everyone's best interest to just give in to a c-section. As I said Eliana was born at 7:20 this morning. She is 8lbs 2 oz., and 20 1/2 inches long. It looks like Amy will be in the hospital in recovery until at least Saturday morning. Both Amy and the baby are doing well, but please keep praying for Amy to recover and heal quickly. She was in a lot of pain as her c-section could only be done under general anesthesia and so she had no localized pain medication until over an hour after the surgery, and pain meds don't work nearly as well as an epidural would have if Amy could have had one. In any case, we are proud parents of a lovely daughter and are glad that Amy and Eliana are doing well now. Thanks for your thoughts and prayers.

Archive - From 5/28/06 - She's Late!

Well, my due date has come and gone. I thought I'd update everyone to let you know that we're still here and doing fine. Just waiting to meet our little girl. She seems to be pretty cozy in there, so we're not sure when she'll make her grand appearance.

I've had contractions off and on for the past few days, but nothing consistent or even painful yet. James' parents are here for Memorial Day weekend. They leave Monday evening at 5pm, so I've had some strong words with this baby that I'm evicting her TONIGHT! (Somehow, I don't think she's listening. We'll have a talk about obeying her Mama when she gets older.) :)

Fortunately, the Wiebe's will be back in July, so they'll definitely meet her then.

My doctor understands that we're wanting to go completely natural and unmedicated. As such, we're hoping to avoid an induction. He set the 'drop dead' date for June 7th which will be a day short of 42 weeks. CERTAINLY, she'll come on her own before then, though.

Please keep us in your prayers. We're praying she'll come soon and come naturally and that we can avoid any complications that would lead to a c-section. Above all, though, we're just praying that she stays healthy.

James will be updating this website including the update email as soon as he can after she's born, so watch your emails! Hopefully you'll get another one from us very soon.

Archive - From 4/28/06 - The Countdown Has Begun

Although, I guess when you think about a countdown in this case, it's sort of arbitrary. She gets to choose when she arrives! That said, there are only 27 days left to the due date. We're in the home stretch for sure!

The nursery is all ready. We have the car seat (but haven't installed it yet). All of her clothes for the first couple of months are washed and ready for her. I have less than two more weeks before I'm on maternity leave with work. We're about as ready as we can be, I suppose!

I'm still feeling really well in general. Some nights of sleep are better than others, and I have some days where my headaches are rough but overall I'm still in really good shape. She still moves around and kicks a fair amount. She's found that kicking under my ribs seems to be fun - for her anyway.

We had another ultrasound today. She appears to be perfectly healthy and was breathing really well today. Her noggin is still measuring really large, though. The doctor says it's nothing to be concerned about from a health perspective, but it may not be fun trying to get her out. We're confident God is in control there, though, so we'll wait for His timing. (We're hoping His timing is a week or two early, but we shall see!)

Here is a little video from the ultrasound today. She still has her face pushed right up against the placenta, so that's what all the fuzzy stuff is. You can see her nose pretty well on the left and that's her foot on the right. She's a flexible little girl, evidently!

Click here to watch 'Baby-Wiebe-Face-and-Foot'

I've updated the photos with a couple new belly shots as well.

I hope this finds you all well. We'd love to hear from you - drop us an email or sign the guestbook!

Archive - From 4/10/06 - We're Getting Closer!

Hi, everyone,

I know it's been a while since I've done an update. There hasn't seemed like there's much to say. I thought we'd get some new 3-D pictures last week at an ultrasound that we had. We got some new pictures, but her little face was pressed into the placenta so they weren't as good as the ones we already showed you.

We did have a lovely shower yesterday. I've added pictures from the shower and a few updated belly shots to the pictures area. I felt really blessed at the shower. We had a great turnout, and the hostesses did a great job. We received lots of wonderful gifts including clothes, diapers, the baby bath, diaper bags, socks, car seat, exer-saucer, and much more.

Two of my favorites were a ready-made scrapbook for the first year made by James' parents (Mama Jean and Fritz to the baby). They hadn't even scrapbooked before, but the book is just amazing. There's one photo of it, but it doesn't do it justice. Any of you that come to visit should ask to see it. Another really sweet gift came from Madison Meeks. She's the granddaughter of my dad's best friend. She's 5 years old and really wanted to join her grandma at the shower. Grandma said no, so Madison asked if she could buy the baby a gift. Grandma had already done her shopping and said no again. So, Madison asked if she could send the baby something of hers. She picked out the purple bear in the photos to send to Baby Wiebe. So cute, right?! I thought that was so sweet.

If we assume she's on time (and what baby is, right?), we're looking at around 6 weeks left. We made our "Things to Get Done before Baby Gets Here" list this weekend. It's not too bad and most of it is for James (haha!). We're trying to also enjoy our last few weeks before life changes forever!

We hope this finds you well. Please sign the guestbook or shoot us an email to let us know how you are.

Archive - From 3/13/06 - Third Trimester is in Full Swing

Hi, everyone,

Lots has happened since our last update. Many of you know that we lost my MaMa (Dad's mom) on Monday 2/27. We had taken the ultrasound video over to show her in its entirety which she loved the Friday before she died. While I'm really sad she won't get to meet our little girl here on earth, I know she will in heaven one day. Thanks for all your thoughts and prayers.

We've also put in a lot of work on the nursery. You'll see pictures along with updated belly shots of me in the Baby Albums area. At the request of some of you, I've also added some outdoor pictures of our home in the Family Albums section.

Our other big news is that we went up to Seattle this last weekend, and my dear friends had a shower for me! (Thanks again, Mandy!) It went so well, and we got lots of stuff for our little one. I've taken pictures of some of it which is also in the Baby Albums area. While it was impossible to see everyone, we were able to spend time with several of our good friends while we were there, so it was a rich and full weekend with friends.

We're busy cleaning the house for our Open House we're having this weekend. (If you're in the metro area, stop by! It's Saturday between 6 and 8 PM. Email me for the address!) Now that the nursery is painted, we decided to open it up and let folks take a look at all of James' (and some of my) hard work. After that, things should calm down significantly. I don't plan anymore travel before the baby arrives except a one-night road trip to Abilene. No more planes for a while! Yea!

Do sign the guestbook or email us and let us know how you're doing.

Archive - From 2/24/06 - It's Still a Girl!

Well, we got to see our little chica again today. They said everything looks great, but her head is measuring big. Must be a trait she got from her Daddy. :) We'll have another ultrasound at 32 weeks to check on it. It's nothing abnormal or anything, but they're worried about me being able to get her out naturally if I go to term. It may mean I'll have to be induced early...we shall see. We got some great 3D pictures and even some video for you. We're working full swing on the nursery now. We'll have some photos of that for you soon. As a special treat, here's a video of our favorite part. Hope you enjoy!

Click here to watch 'Baby-Wiebe-Yawning'

Be sure and sign the guestbook or shoot us an email to let us know what you think.

Archive - From 2/12/06 - Baby Goes to the Carribean

Hi, everyone,

We had such a great time on our cruise. The weather was great, and our ship and cabin were really nice. Our first 2 1/2 days were at sea, so we slept in and relaxed by the pool a lot. Then we had three days in a row at port - Montego Bay (in Jamaica), Grand Cayman, and Cozumel. We did a sail and snorkel excursion in Montego Bay which was really fun. We ended it at Margaritaville where they have a slide and water trampolines. I watched while James enjoyed (both the slides and the margaritas!) but it was a lot of fun.

We went to visit the stingrays in Grand Cayman and also did some snorkeling there. The water was beautiful, and it was amazing how friendly the stingrays were. We also saw a really neat school of fish while snorkeling that I included a picture of.

In Cozumel, we just took a cab to a beach. It was so nice just to relax and get into the water when we got warm. We could have stayed there longer, but alas we had to get back to our ship. (Feeling sorry for us?)

Our last day was at sea, and unfortunately this was our one day of bad weather. It was too cold and windy to be out on deck, so we just relaxed in our cabin and did a few of the on ship activities. It was a relaxing way to end the cruise.

We drove back to Plano last Sunday and entered reality again. It was really nice to get away.
All else is going well. I'm still feeling great aside from a cold that's lingering longer than I'd like. James has been feeling her move a lot more, and we even saw my tummy moving the other night as she kicked - pretty cool. We purchased the crib and changing table and James has them put together. It's so weird to walk by that room and see a crib now. We're thinking about carpeting that room to make it warmer and hopefully more quiet. Our next ultrasound is on 2/24, and we'll officially start painting and decorating the nursery after that. We're excited to see our little chica again!

I hope this finds you all well!

Archive - From 1/26/06 - Baby's New Home

Hi, everyone,

All is going splendidly in the Wiebe world. I added a photo album with pictures of our home. There are before and after shots so you can get an idea of how much work James did. I must say that the old kitchen picture really doesn't give you an appreciation for how ugly the wallpaper in there was, so you'll have to take our word for it. We did the colors in there and in the breakfast room the same as we plan to knock out that wall someday. We also hope to remodel the kitchen with new appliances and cabinets someday as well. In the bedroom picture, you can't really tell the color of the wall because of the light. We did sort of a muted plum. We really like how it turned out. The yellow from before was okay, but it looked lime at night and I didn't like that, so we went for it.

The one room you might notice is missing is the nursery. While we've ordered some of her furniture and such, we're waiting on one more ultrasound before we decorate - just to be sure. That should happen the first week of March, so it won't be long now. I'm so excited to start putting it together, though.

I realized in my initial post that I focused mostly on some of the clothes she's gotten so far and didn't talk about some of the gifts she's received.

Her first gift ever was a really cute soft teddy bear from Uncle Mark and Aunt Jocelyn. Every kid should start off life with a teddy bear, right?! Then, the Wiebe family was really kind to our little girl at Christmas as well. She picked up a couple of books and also a Weebleville Town! (You know, Weebles wobble but they don't fall down.) Seems so appropriate that Baby Wiebe has Weebles! :)

As for me, I'm still feeling really great. I wish I had a little more energy still (I told James the worst part of my day is getting out of bed for work every morning!), but I really can't complain. I've been feeling her move a lot, which is so fun. James was able to feel her a lot a couple of nights ago as well, and she even seemed to respond to his voice!

Our other big news is that James and I were planning a small 'Babymoon' for sometime in March or April. We were doing the research and figuring out what we wanted to do when we came across an really good deal on a last minute cruise. We prayed about it, and basically everything fell into place - with my work, finances, and even Cousin Joe to come stay and watch Abby for us. So....we're heading to our Carribean cruise on Sunday!!! I still can't believe it. I'm so excited. What will I wear? I have no idea, but I'll figure it out between now and Sunday! It leaves from Galveston, so we can just drive down. We'll be stopping in Montego Bay, Grand Cayman and Cozumel on the Carnival Conquest. We'll be sure and post pictures upon our return.

Jamaica, Bahamas and Mexico - Here we come!

Archive - From 1/8/06

Hi, everyone!

We thought since we have so many friends and family out of town now that we'd start up a website to chronicle the last half of the pregnancy.

A quick recap:

9/15/05 - Found out we were pregnant! James and I were about to share a bottle of wine when it occurred to me I'd better check before I downed half a bottle. :) I checked without telling James and sure enough! I went downstairs and told him I'd be unable to imbibe after all. Needless to say, he was very excited.

11/4/05 - We heard the heartbeat for the first time via doppler. All sounded normal!

1/3/06 - We saw our little girl on the sonogram machine for the first time. It was a really special moment. The doctor said everything looks healthy! He did say that my placenta was sitting a bit low, which is very common. For that reason, he wants to do another ultrasound in 2 months to make sure it has moved up, which it should. Since they're known to make mistakes sometimes on gender, we decided to wait until after that appointment before we ready the nursery. We're pretty sure it's a girl, though! In the photo, she's face down and you can really see her spine well. You can also see one of her legs and her head.

1/5/2006 - Our little girl gets her first few sets of clothes from Cookie and Crouchburger (my parents)! She got an adorable newborn swimsuit so she can enjoy our pool this summer, a pink jumpsuit, and a red and white checkered dress with matching hat.

1/7/2006 - Our little girl got her first clothes from Mama and Daddy. We got her two of those bed dress things that say Thank Heaven for Little Girls and Sweet Heart. We also got her a navy blue and white polka dotted mini skirt with matching top. So cute!

My pregnancy has gone amazingly well - I'm really counting my blessings. I've slept well so far in general, and I only got mild nausea for a few weeks during the first trimester. I'll admit I'm pretty tired most of the time, but if that's my only symptom most days, I'm doing really well, right?!

Oh - some of you may be wondering if she has a name yet! Well, that she does, but you'll have to wait until she's born to hear it. Something has to be a surprise, right?!

We'll post more pictures of my growing belly and more of our little girl soon!