1 week old

I see how quickly all our posts have turned into info only about Zuri, but seriously, what else is there in life now? Our friend Brinn who took our maternity photos was awesome and shot some of Zuri yesterday. I simply love them. She's kind of a rad lookin baby. There are more on Brinn's blog:
http://bmwphotographyblog.blogspot.com

We have officially made it a week with a baby! It doesn't seem like it's even been that long, but I've had a good time even with the lack of sleep. At least it's for a good cause, if we were loosing this much over school someone would die for sure :)

all the pink

Mysteriously, since I've been prego with baby girl my house has somehow gone from no pink...to acquiring everything pink. Including my child. And I'm not even mad, it just comes with the territory of having a baby girl right?

So when I first saw a picture of Chris as a baby with yellow leg warmers I totally laughed and thought they were kind of silly. Until I thought about it more and saw how dang cute he was with them as a babe then I realized, hey leg warmers are pretty freaking rad I need to get our kid some of those. I found these at good ol' Target when Cami had her baby, and I like 'em. (Sorry it's a blurry phone picture.) And here is my pink all over Zuri:

More of the babe

These first three were pretty soon after the birth.

A classic baby congregation

Kelso is trying to figure out where he fits into all of this.

Zuri!

She came! This morning at 1:48. So Chris won the guessing with what day she'd come. I honestly don't remember about half of the labor, but Chris was awesome, he got soaked from holding me in the shower and kept me breathing and alive. and it was good to have my mama there too, she's a good woman to have around in an intense situation. I was attempting to do it all drug-free, but that didn't last once my midwife broke my water and everything doubled intensity wise. Epidural saved me for sure, and I take back all I said about me thinking it was a scary idea...It was fabulous:)
Baby girl was 8 pounds 2 onces and 19 1/2 inches. She's a chunky monkey with a whole bundle of hair. Chris got a lot more awesome pictures, but since we're just chillin in the hospital we'll make due with phone pictures. She's been pretty calm and has been snuggling with Chris all day, I gotta say it is freaking precious. We are stickin with the name Zuri Rose, she looks like she can pull it off, right?




We were watching TV when this awesome commercial came on and probably all of you have already seen it, but we don't have cable and this seriously made me laugh for a long time(which feels really weird when your used to having your belly super full and now there is just a slab of skin shakin :) I wanted to share the laugher though, his flowing hair is my favorite.

D-Day

Well, D-day has arrived! And nothing is happening...big surprise. I'm not even mad though, life is nice and relaxing right now and I'm not in the biggest hurry to loose my sleep :) plus Chris is currently sleeping off his weekend night shift which is very good cause I need the man rested and ready to go when the big show comes around, so baby girl can take her time I don't mind at all. I am super excited to meet the little thing officially though, it's pretty nuts to think it's any day now...I really thought the day would never get here and it still kind of feels like it won't sometimes, but alas! She's gotta get out somehow!

My oldest brother Yancee and his wifey Kimmy came into town last night and it was so fun to have more family around. My parents and little sister, Carmel, are on their way down from DC airport as we speak...(type?) and the rest of the siblings (KJ and Wifey Courtney, Chanson and Ammon) arrive in a few days along with my Papo and Chris' parents will soon follow. It's going to be one heck of a party here in BV and I'm so excited for it! And to think, all I had to do was have a baby to convice my family to come out here...how simple, why did I not think of this sooner? :)

I hope everyone is doing well and enjoying their break or are looking forward to their soon-to-be break! We love you!

hm...snow anyone?

If baby girl decides to come tonight we may be in a sticky situation. Pretty sure we wouldn't be able to make it to the hospital with all this snow dumping down on us. So as much as I am ready for her to come on out, I think now may not be the best timing.... Sorry wee babe, you may have to hang out for a few more days.

But the snow is awesome! How girly is this? I totally love the sparkles and how it stays super light outside throughout the night. It's just a pleasant sight. We walked Kelso around the block and watched him disapear in snowbanks multiple times. He came back with mass snowballs stuck to his fur, it was so funny to see him try and eat them to get cleaned off. It took us a good 20 minutes to get to my sisters house just 3 minutes away too. It's just a little adventurous! I'm entertained:)

We did it!

Finals for me are done! Chris has one more tomorrow, but he's a lot better at handling the stress of finals then I am. Which is exactly why I'm not the one planning on going to grad school:) I must say that I'm so grateful to have a hubby that knows how to handle me when I'm freaking out. I had a minor (he may say more then minor actually..) freak out yesterday getting ready for the two hardest finals and he was so good about it. He helped me study and got me cereal, which was of course deeply appreciated. Thanks to him I hopefully did decent on my final today instead of horrible, good man I tell you.

So now it's just his final, I gotta get the house all cleaned and baby ready and then for real we will be as ready as we can be for ze baby. So the polls are open, who thinks she'll be early? exactly on time? or late like most babies tend to be? We have one friend saying she'll come tomorrow, so let's see who's got the mama sense on these things! Hopefully it's soon cause I think my belly size doubled just today, she's getting too big for me.

Thank you again to our families who are being so awesome and coming out to see us since we can't come see you. I'm really so happy that you're all coming! And Natelyn I'm sorry I'm missing your wedding, I'm really sad to be missing the party, but I hope all of it is awesome and everything you want it to be.

A Few IPhone Photos

Thank you Much

(Haven't experienced anything this awesome personally, but it looks pretty rad)

We just wanted to thank everyone who's been so great to us with this whole baby thing we are doing. Especially our moms and sisters. It is such a blessing to have family and friends who are excited with us to have a baby and are always so willing to answer our many questions:) Thank you to those who have given us baby necessities, you've saved us sooo much money and I like that those gifts have more sentimental value then if we had just gotten them ourselves.

D-day is only a 12 days away! Although I hope she comes on the 18th so that I can hang out with our families when they come out and I can get through finals as well....Chris wants her out asap (I guess I can say I want her out too) but she's just got to hold on a little bit longer for her mom's sanity of getting her degree eventually :)

So thank you to everyone! We love you and I'll try to get Zuri here in a nice timely manor.

I love Pleasant Saturdays.

We had a nice relaxing Saturday. We woke up (after a nice sleep in...which I feel we must take full advantage of pre-baby) to a snow flurry! It was very exciting to see that weather.com told the truth, and to have a nice walk with Kelso with puffy white stuff all over the place. We watched a show and then had a sweet snuggly nap for a few hours. It was awesome to not worry about anything I must say.

Chris went to the school to take some first snow pictures

I did do something today though, cleaned house, did laundry and finished painting our livingroom. So it's finally done and I love it. We painted it a grayish blue w/ white trim. (Chris sees a hint of purple, but I think my eyes are funky and miss it). It's a huge step up from the "boat" look of being surrounded by dark wood walls, plus our Christmas tree doesn't look like it's in the forrest either! Pictures to come.

One more week of school and one week of finals and we are all done! I'm so excited for Christmas and I've been having contractions all day...which have only been practice, but it makes me feel like baby girl is closer. Chris gets super excited everytime I tell him I'm having one, it's pretty cute I can't wait to see him and baby girl together.

I hope everyone else had a great Saturday too!

Break time!

I'm so excited for this break, mostly just cause I don't have to work (although sadly Chris is working far more night shifts..the man is a tough one) and I can get a bunch of Christmas presents done. Thank goodness cause having a big family at Christmas time is intense! (and that's not including the Vial side) Chris' brother, Kevin and two cousins are coming down from their Vermont adventure to hang out with us so we'll have a big family feast with them and my sister with her family. I hope everyone else has a fabulous Turkey day as well. thank you pilgrims for coming into existence.

Four weeks from yesterday is D-day. It'd be awesome if baby girl came on time, but alas, I'm pretty sure she won't. I'll just keep saying that I think she'll be super late so if she does come early then it will be a pleasant surprise!

Pretty much what I'm trying to say is: yay for holidays and come on baby!

some awesome baby bump photos

Our friend Brinn is a shnazzy photographer and offered to take some maternity photos for us. I was super excited she did them cause she does amazing stuff. Plus Kelso is in a bunch which makes them just fabulous family portraits:) So this is one picture just for taste, the rest are on her blog, her set up is much prettier then mine so i'll let you view it there :)

http://bmwphotographyblog.blogspot.com

recent entertainment

I'm not gunna lie, I like Taylor Swift. And this is totally why.

A nice adventure

Chris and I were able to go to civilization today, it was very exciting I must say. We had a doctor's appointment up in Charlottesville (about an hour and a half drive), because at our last appointment my midwife found a heart arrhythmia in little girl so we went up to UVA to double check everything and make sure she was ok. Well thankfully she is ship shape and seems pretty comfy in my belly. I was excited that we got to have an ultrasound even though it was hard to see much of her since she was curled up and facing my back. But she's a chick for sure, her insides are all healthy and she's got lots of hair! (that's my favorite part). Thanks to everyone who prayed for us, I'm glad baby girl has a good family to come into.

After the appointment we went and got Chris a new phone, after three and a half years his poor Nokia wasn't doing too hot, so we upgraded the man to have a nice shnazzy Iphone. It's almost weird cause I've never seen him with a different phone, but I'm glad he got it, it was deffinatly needed.

After Iphoning we went to Five Guys and Chris treated me to a yummy Ben and Jerry's peanut butter chocolate milk shake. awww it was delightful!



So yes, probably not a very different day for some of you, and I realize it's a tad strange that I am indeed writting about it, but it was nice to be in a bigger city for a few hours where there was a ton of food choices and easy access to anything our little hearts desired. It was a fun day out with the hubby.

The Deane Family

Chris and I were asked to take some family photos for the Deane fam. Since Chris is way better with kids and getting good shots of them so he ended up taking more of little Lorraine and I took more of Morgan and Shannon. Which actually worked out well. I like taking pictures with Chris he's getting really good with what he does. He was very excited to use his new wide angle lense, and I think it works great with his mind.

Our sunday afternoon walk

We just got a new lens so I wanted to play around with it a bit.Kenni is officially pregnant, two more months to go. She was a little reluctant to have a profile photo. Kelso was also a good sport, letting me put the camera right in his face.

Baby Geeb

Cami and Tysons' new edition: Caleb Benjamin. (although I seem to keep calling him Geeb). He was born on the 10th, so these are already outdated, he looks different. I just think his huge top lip is rad. Chris took these when he was only about 8 hours old He's a cutie...I've only seen him when he's sleeping, but he seems like a pretty chill kid. From what I've seen Josh is awesome with him, just calls him "bebe?" and wants to hold him a lot. It's cute brotherly love. Cami is doing good, she recovered quick like a bunny rabbit :)

Our first win of the season.

This week I was able to spend some time with Russ Dixon. He is married to one of the alumni of the school and has been doing most of the photography for SVU. After the football game we spent a few minutes going over some simple Photo editing tips. They're not perfect, but it feels like a huge step in the right direction. So thanks for the time Russ and Hopefully it'll get better from here.

By the way the score was 52-12

Glee....

I've become a fan of this new show, Glee. And this is why.

yay!

Finally, Chris and I got a picture together with dog and child belly....true it just looks like I ate a large lunch, but whatev. I'm happy.

There are more to come with two prego women with mom and sister...

o the spam bam

Spam tagged me to share ten honest things about me... Let's see how long this takes me to do while Chris and I watch Hero's.. it's no 11.21pm.

1. Like Cami, my favorite house chore is laundry. (is that something from childhood that I don't know about? maybe cause it was the only thing we weren't told to do?) I LOVE the smell of clothes right out of the dryer, it's the best smell...ever.

2. Everyday I think how incredibly lucky (or blessed, whichever way you want to look at it) that I ended up in random location of Virginia and met my best friend...aka, the hubby. He's my favorite person in the world. And it amazes me everyday how good he is to me. His parents raised him fabulously.

3. I bite my nails too. While I'm watching intense parts of movies or when I get to boring parts in books.

4. When I walk into Target, I want to buy so much crap it's ridiculous and I justify that want in my mind by thinking "One day I'll have a lot of money and I'll buy what I want." Then I come home and see how much stuff I actually do own and think..."hmm...so where would I put anything else anyways? I'm retarded. but I still want more stuff" don't judge, I'll admit I'm worldy:)

5. When i'm gone from home for more then 3 hours at a time I sometimes get way too anxious to get back as soon as I can so Kelso isn't alone too long. It breaks my heart thinking of him waiting for Chris and me. It sounds pathetic, but I love my dog he's my best mini friend.

6. I like to think that I know what our baby girl will be like from the way she moves around in my belly. She's super mellow, she'll always kick Chris back when he pushes my stomache, and it never hurts when she does kick, she ends up tickling me more then anything. So I just assume she'll be this super funny, calm, daddy's girl who likes her space type babe. Watch, she'll be super loud and crazy. :) We'll still love her.

7. I wanted to be a Blue Angels pilot when I was 16. I thought it'd be awesome to fly jets. still do actually.

8. I get embarassed when I admit to people that I love watching Grey's Anatomy cause it's such a chick drama. But it is seriously the most entertaining show to me.

9. I've had nightmares that all my siblings have died because of me. I looked up what they meant on the dream dictionary: apparently, it means I miss that person. I believe it. I always believe the dream dictionary for my dreams.

10. When I was in Kindergarten I had a dream that I married a tall, blue eyed man. and hey, what do you know? I did!

it's now 11.56pm. guess it was a little faster then I thought i'd be. I tag (if they want to)....Hailey, Caitlin, Mom and Dad Vial, Chelle and...well whoever else is interseted and wants to share some stuff about themselves.

ps. Hero's is better this season.

Instead of Spanish...

I should be studying for an exam I have tomorrow...But instead I'm thinkin:


How much better(by better I mean cooler as well) would this be then a regular diaper bag? Women who are in the know about babies, what say you? impractical? (all assuming it has inside pockets of course.)

Juuuust in Case:

Cami and I used to joke when we were younger that we would live by eachother after we got married and have babies at the same time...well strangely enough that actually happened. So I wanted to document the fact. Spam is having a boy in a few weeks, but she's been having contractions all night and all day (sorry if i'm not suppose to share that info spam!) We hadn't gotten any pictures yet so Chris did these for us real quick today. I have a wee bit of a cranky face cause there were swarms of face diving insects around us...but yay for babies!



Cami with her first born:
And me with mine:

Hopefully we'll get some more that are better before Cami has her second.

A Lucky Series

The ball just missed the goal, but it was a good move from the goalie. I know this has kind of turned into a sports photo blog, but this weekend we're doing some pregnant Kenni and Cami pictures. So stay turned.

Back to school

It's been an eventful first two weeks of school. Chris has been crazy busy...and a mass majority of that time has gone towards his new favorite hobby of taking pictures. It started as sport pictures, but he seems to always have the camera in his hand. I like it, he's capturing lots of moments. He's a skilled fella.



Boys soccer. (Ezra)
Girls soccer scrimmaging against W&L Soccer team. I now babysit the kids(who I took to the scrimmage) of the soccer coach for the W&L team, and we live in the basement of the SVU coach...So...I'm glad it wasn't a real game, I wouldn't have known which side to sit on.

I'm taking a bookmaking course this semester. One of the many specialties Professor Himes has. It's already been really interesting and I'm excited to get more into it, it seems like a skill that can stick with you for a long long time.

A classic Professor Himes face, he's so fun to listen to. He loves using words such as "wonderful, beautiful" and our personal favorite, "glorious!" Maybe it's the calm tone he uses when he says them that makes it so fun.

SVU's girls' volleyball team is really good... although I don't think i'll ever stop making fun of the short short booty shorts...what's the purpose again? (no offense to any of the girls on the team, they're all awesome!)

The head football coach, Fitzgerald....he's hard core.

The band Shapiro came to our school last week. The most interesting mixture of guys i've ever seen together in one band. My favorite part was they played more indie music....and they were head banging(?) they were fun to watch though! It was good for the school to have a good show the first week of school.