Belly Shots

I had never given any thought to preserving the memory of being pregnant in photographs. I mean, who feels cute when you feel like you're carrying around a tummy the size of a watermelon? ...Until a few weeks ago when I was getting dressed and Jeff brought it up. It got me me thinking. Since this is the last time my body will ever experience this, I figured I should look into it.

A friend of mine is a budding photographer and we were talking about these types of pictures and she offered to take some for me. So here are a few of my favorites...
I actually had no plans of ever sharing any of these. But seeing the finished results -I figured why not? Pregnancy isn't something we do very often and this also serves as proof that there is a belly here (for my kind friends who have said that I don' look very pregnant--HA!!). Thanks Liz!!

Showered with Love

My most awesome friends threw me a baby shower. It was such a fun morning with great friends, yummy food (a delicious quiche, sinful cinnamon roll cheesecake and yummy parfaits).

I was so overwhelmed by how much time and effort all my friends made to make this so special. You ladies are truly amazing!! Thanks for all who came to show their love and help me get ready for this little boy.

All You Need is Love...

Ok, I really don't agree with that statement, but I do love Valentine's Day. I usually try to make a fun breakfast for everyone, but Jeff had meetings at 6:30 that morning and we had church at 9am so that was out. Instead, the girls and I snuck into Jeff's car and filled it with balloons and decorated the outside. He loves all the attention and was thrilled to clean it off :) Tehee!

I was not in the mood to deal with restaurant crowds that weekend at all. Instead, I made a nice dinner for Jeff and the girls.

Since my traditional creme brulee wasn't ready in time to get the girls to bed, they had mini red velvet cakes (which worked out better since there was more creme brulee for me! ).

Getting Ready for Brother

Cara and Natalie are so excited for their new brother. They wanted to do something to help get ready, so we went to the fabric store and they picked out a few fabrics (with some guidance from mom). They cut out all the squares by themselves and I taught them how to use my machine.

The finished product!

We also signed them up for the sibling class at the hospital. The videos were hilarious, and maybe a little young for them, but they had fun changing diapers on their dolls, learning about how they can help take care of the new baby, getting a tour of the NICU and a room set up like where mom will deliver.

Happy Birthday Cara!

Wow! I can hardly believe my Cara is already 9 years old.

Time needs to slow down just a little.

For her 9th birthday, Cara really wanted to go ice skating. Since I can't get on the ice in my pregnant condition-and it's torture for me to just sit and watch the fun, Jeff took Cara and Natalie ice skating.

Later that afternoon, Grandma & Grandpa Moody, Uncles Mike and Ian and Aunt Kara and Desire came down to share her birthday dinner at one of our favorite dining spots.

Cara is growing up so fast and there are so many things I love about this child. She is such a sweet girl. She is so kind to her sister and always doing little thoughtful things. For no occasion, she will often make breakfast for me and bring it while I'm still in bed. She loves being busy. Reading, sewing, cooking, and drawing are some of the things she loves to do. She is very musical and I enjoy listening to her play the piano and sing. I am so excited I get to be her mom and love watching her grow up.

Christmas

I love Christmas. It is my absolute favorite holiday. I love spending time with my family, waking up and watching the girls and everyone open presents and staying in my pajamas all day.
We had our traditional Christmas Eve with Jeff's family. It was at Aunt Alison's house this year. Cara sang a solo and both girls enjoyed participating in a poem with all their Knight cousins.
This year the girls decided they wanted a Wii from Santa. It was our first year without a ton of "toys" as they've moved on to the electronic gadget stage. It was kind of sad to see the ending of all the dolls and dress up type things of the past. But I was so happy to have their new stuff take up much less real estate when it came time to put it all away :)
One of their favorite toys they received were the DSi's from Grandma and Grandpa Moody. Not only did they have games to play, but what they seemed most amused by were the built in features of the camera and sound recorders. After being banned from screaming into the device and replaying it (over and over), the girls spent countless hours of taking photos of everything. It was interesting to see what subjects each was most interested in. Cara seemed to enjoy photographing people while most of Natalie's pictures consisted of all the animals around Grandma's house.

Christmas 2009 was fantastic spending time with all our families around.

A Family Babymoon

With the impending changes due next year, we decided to get some travel in before it becomes extra "fun" to go anywhere with an infant/toddler for the next few years.

In November Jeff and I had a weekend away in Vegas without the kids, so for Christmas we asked the girls how they would feel about going on a cruise with us in December for their big Christmas gift from us. They were thrilled at the idea so we planned for an 8 day trip.

It came so quickly and before we knew it, we were getting on the ship. The girls loved all the big staircases (I only let them take the elevator once- because of my selfish desire to burn the extra calories climbing the stairs), having their meals served (without having to set the table before or do dishes after), deserts every night, someone making their bed every morning, the turn down service at night and of course---THE WATERSLIDE!!

Once we were further south the weather was nice and warm, but closer to San Diego, it was a bit too chilly for us adults with the 70-ish weather plus the chill from the wind caused by a sailing ship. However, it didn't deter them one bit.

Before making it to our first port, the ship had to make 2 unscheduled stops. The first actually took 4 hours as the ship had to turn around and go back to San Diego for someone with a medical emergency. The second morning we woke up to find they had stopped again for another medical emergency in Cabo San Lucas. (Yikes! There must have been some real sickies on this ship).

We made it to Acapulco (only an hour later than planned) and it was off to explore the city--the girls first experience out of the country. We took them to an outdoor market so they could shop. They were so fun to watch bargain with the shopkeepers there. Both girls had divided up their money for the 3 ports we were going to stop and had given themselves budgets for what they wanted to spend at each. Of course the wheeling and dealing was customary with the salespeople but the girls were so good about sticking to their budget. They walked away from many a souvenir before each deciding on a pair of earrings (thank goodness they didn't fall in love with some crappy magnet, tacky shirt or any of the other thousand cheesy trinkets that I'd have to look at forever :) After they had made their purchases, we decided it was time to head back to the ship and wanted to walk since it was only a few blocks. The girls experienced a taste of Mexico traffic (sans any traffic signals), the lovely sidewalks filled with trash and the other delights of the big city :).

The next morning we were in Zihuatanejo/Ixtapa. This was my favorite port of the three we visited. It was a smaller town and we had to be tendered to the dock, but I liked the smaller feel. We hired a driver to show us around and take us to see the Ixtapa resort before dropping us off at a beautiful beach. Jeff and the girls played in the waves for hours and I loved just relaxing on the beach. We took a water taxi back to the dock and did a little shopping before going back to the ship.

Our final port was Manzanillo. We took a bus into town and did some shopping. We had an interesting experience with one of the shopkeepers who had trouble with some basic math. It ended up being a good teaching moment for Cara and Natie. The town was definitely small and I didn't find it as charming as Zihuatanejo had been so we headed back to the ship after a few hours and had some fun in the water.

The final two days at sea flew by. We spent lots of time relaxing, playing with the kids and just enjoying the downtime. The girls were such a joy to bring and the trip was just what we all needed. They didn't even complain when it was back to school on Monday. I'm sure it didn't hurt that they had a week of Christmas programs and parties to look forward to.