Hi Dad

Hi Dad,

While you were in Atlanta, I may or may or may not have gotten a PINK Christmas Tree.

Oh Santa's elf is watching, I better tell you the truth.

I got my very own Christmas tree. You like?

A bow because, duh, I am a girl.

A horn because I LOVE music.

AND a snowflake because I got the tree the day of my very first snow.

Announcing Mr. and Mrs.

Julesbug made her first trip to Shreveport for this joyous occasion. After 8 years of dating Uncle John and MC tied the knot. Everything was absolutely beautiful and Mary Claire was the most stunning bride. I did a horrible job taking pictures of anything. They had the coolest photographer from Birmingham so I can't wait to see the professional pictures.

Jules made her apperance at her first rehearsal dinner and wedding reception. With both Marc and me in the wedding , she also had her first babysitter before and during the wedding ceremony! Of coures she was absolutely:



perfect for all of it! Didn't make a peep through anything but of course it helped that she had a TON of loving aunts, cousins and friends to help keep her entertained. Marc and I even got a chance to bust some moves on the dance floor.


As cute as the ab0ve tiffany blue onesie is, she did not wear it to any of the aforementioned functions. She wore a beautiful gown smocked by her KK but I failed to get any pictures. I'm planning on having some professional pictures made in the same gown so hopefully you can see it!

A bonus to trip to Shreveport was all the family that Julia got to meet for the first time. We couldn't have made through the weekend without all the help of the family. There was always a grandmother, aunt or cousin ready to help with the bug when Marc and I had wedding duties. Again failed to get any pictures....so I'll leave you with this preciousness.

Pumpkin

This pumpkin has something to say:

Happy Birthday to all our friends and family with October birthdays!
Uncle Sandner
Grandaddy
Great Ginga
Uncle Andy
Cole
Great Mammaw
Most of these are belated but Jules wanted to give a shout out and to All a Happy Halloween!


I can't keep my hands out of my mouth- mom has promised candy and birthday cake next year.

Thanks Goodson's for the attire!

Happy One Month to You!

Happy One Month Birthday to you Julesbug! Wow the month has flewn by.

We moved you from the cradle in our room to your crib. You don't seem to mind but when you wake up for your 5:30 ish feeding, mom usually sneaks and lets you sleep on her chest for a minute.

You absolutely love any music and your mobile.

You try so hard to talk back when we talk to you!

The books say you aren't smiling yet but I am convinced you are smiling at us.

You don't mind tummy time at all. You already seem so strong.

You love for dad to carry you in the baby bjorn.

You still aren't crazy about bathtime but maybe it will get better.

You used to enjoy walks, until today. (For those of you that haven't come to visit, our house is at the top of a HUGE hill) Today we took off for a walk and your clumsy mom was talking to you and tripped. I fell forward going down the hill and pulled the stroller down with me. Thankfully, you are safe but it scared me to death. From now on, we will drive down the hill and walk at the park or something. I'm not sure I will ever trust myself to walk you down the hill again.

We are still working on your feeding schedule. You are definitely a hungry growing girl, sometime you eat every 3 hours other days it every 2 hours. We go to the dr on Monday. I can't wait to see how much you have grown.

Tell me that isn't a smile!

We LOVE YOU SO MUCH and can't wait to see what the next month holds.

Update - At your one month appt you weighed 9lbs 9ozs and were 23.5 inches long!

Roll Tide Roll

This is how I found Julia watching football with her dad last Saturday! She at least had on her Alabama booties (thanks Katie and Luke!)

Marc is at a bachelor party this weekend and when Dad is away the girls will play. So thanks to a best dressed Aunt Sarah our game day outfit was much improved this week!!!!

Hey Dad...hurry home!

It's kick off. Again, thanks to Katie and Luke I have the perfect gameday kicks.

Enough with this blogging business - it's game time.

She is Here!!

I started writing the below post 2 weeks ago and am just now getting it posted. I'm going to have to become a more efficient blogger. Julia (aka- Julesbug, Julesbean, the bug, punkin seed, julsy-I think we have only called her Julia maybe 3 times) has already changed so much in her 3 weeks.

Julia Laird Price was born at 5:42 p.m on September 1, 2009! She was 8 lbs and 5 oz. and 21.5 inches long. As her Aunt Caroline says, she is 8 lbs and 5 ozs of perfection!!
After everyone waited so patiently for her, she has had tons of great visitors.

She has been able to spend a lot of quality time with her KK and her Aunt Caroline.

Met her Granddaddy and GrandKate

Spent some good time with Nanny

And Aunt Kari, Uncle Brian, Reid and Olivia.

She was entertained by Aunt MC and Uncle John. Uncle John has already introduced her to YouTube.

And she was entertained by Aunt Mel, JES and that silly dog cowboy

We also had all kinds of great visitors at the hospital and since we have been home!!!!! One of my favorite times was when Julia's friends Mary Lynne (6 months old) and Malie Kate (16 months old) were both at the hospital! It was so fun to see the 3 girls at different ages. I can't wait for Jules bug to get to know these girls. We are going to have so much fun watching her learn from them. Mary Lynne's mom and dad (Sandner and Rhonda) have been so much help to Marc and I. We would have figured out a lot of these things but it has been nice to not have to figure it out on our own. Thanks guys!

We have also already had her first drs. appt and everything was perfect.

She has had her days and nights confused! She loves to sleep all day and play at night but I think we are slowly getting that turned around.

She was well worth the wait and we LOVE her more than we ever imagined.

The Waiting Game

Oops so I have almost let 6 weeks go by since my last post. No baby yet but we have had alot of exciting things happen in 6 weeks!

Our amazing friends celebrated baby girl's soon to be arrival with not only an awesome baby shower (I need pics Lou) but an after party too! Marc and I have been so humbled by the generosity of our friends! Between our work, friends and families we have literally been given everything we need to bring this child home!

We have finally finished her room. We love the way it turned out. She will never fully appreciate all the loving help and work that went into her room but I sure do.

The rest of our time has been filled with cleaning and baby prepping. Yes, her clothes are washed and our bags are sort of packed! Now all we need is her.

Dr. Seuss is one of my all time favorite authors. I don't think there is a book of his I do not love but Oh the Places You'll Go is one that I have related too 1,000 times in my life and right now we are in the "waiting place."

"The Waiting Place…for people just waiting.
Waiting for a train to go or a bus to come, or a plane to go or the mail to come, or the rain to go or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow or waiting around for a Yes or No or waiting for their hair to grow. Everyone is just waiting.
Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for wind to fly a kite or waiting around for Friday night or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake or a pot to boil, or a Better Break or a string of pearls, or a pair of pants or a wig with curls, or Another Chance. Everyone is just waiting. "
But Baby Girl Price
"No! That’s not for you!Somehow you’ll escape all that waiting and staying. You’ll find the bright places where Boom Bands are playing. With banner flip-flapping, once more you’ll ride high! Ready for anything under the sky. Ready because you’re that kind of a guy!"
-Dr. Seuss



Despite Mexican food, this eggplant parmigiana http://www.wchstv.com/gmarecipes/eggplantparmigian.shtml, storms and every other natural tip to induce labor, we are making no progress or showing any signs of labor! She is apparently perfectly content where she is. Each visit to the Dr. ends with a reminder that she could be a week late. Marc and I are so ready to see her face!!!! The anticipation and waiting is driving us both crazy but wait we will. We have been so lucky throughout our pregnancy that we shouldn't start complaining now.



I did have a small scare today but again we were reminded how perfect her heartbeat was and how far away we still may be from labor!!! As a fairly active girl, I have never had an issue feeling her move until today. I did not feel her at all from the time I woke up until 10:30 a.m. 20 minutes after the phone call to the Dr., I was in Dr's office with the Doppler that picked up a perfectly normal heartbeat. Just to be sure everything was okay- I had a NST - which again showed our little girl's perfectly strong heartbeat. Apparently, baby girl was just very very tired today! We are so glad that everything is okay. The Dr. also checked my amniotic fluids which were still great and showed no other signs of labor.



So here we sit in the waiting place but we know we can't stay here forever! I promise my next post will have pictures, hopefully of our newborn!

To Do List

Wow- it's been a busy 6 weeks since my last post!
Here is our completed task list over the last several weeks:

Watch this amazing basketball team play as a proud Aunt and Uncle
http://www.rickeystokesnews.com/article.php/dothan-gymrats-11u-2009-usssa-state-champs-3195 - CHECK

Decide and ORDER bedding - CHECK

Celebrate Dad's Nuptials - CHECK

Order Glider - CHECK

4-D ultrasound - umm CHECKish
We attempted but because baby girl was not behaving (she was breech) we could only get one photo of her precious little profile.

Help Mom and Caro find a place to live about 5 blocks over (YAY!)- CHECK

Celebrate Jeani's Bday with Dr. friends - CHECK

Enjoy time at the Beach with Mom and crew - CHECK



These two snuggle bunnies took a few pictures of Marc, baby girl and me - unfortunately we didn't get a shot of everybody together.



Pregnancy pictures aren't really my thing!
This trip also included Caro catching a baby hammer head shark and JP and Marc finding themselves in a school of stingrays!!!

Be generously showered by the Price Family in Slocomb - CHECK - We had a fabulous shower in Slocomb! We came back so prepared for baby girl!! Thanks to two of our favorite people we are now the proud owner of a video camera! I just need to figure out how to post some of these videos on our blog.

Celebrate the 4th of July with Dad and crew - CHECK - This trip to beach did not include the aforementioned sea life but it was just as enjoyable and did include a lazy river.

Finish painting nursery - CHECK - Thanks to awesome friends, mom and my hard -working husband our beautiful bed is no longer sitting in a crimson red room. This has turned out to be a much harder feat than what was imagined.

Get car seat and stroller - CHECK



Thanks to Nanny and Papa we now have baby girls car seat. I LOVE IT!! It makes it seem so real. She now has a way to get to and from.

Paint door to nursery - again CHECKish - In between weekend travels, Marc has been working so hard to get everything perfect in the nursery and unfortunately he has run into a 1,001 issues. We are on the 5th coat of paint for the door. Hopefully he will finish this weekend.

So that is what we have been up too! I have to say it's been fun and we have managed to get alot accomplished. The crazy thing is if I wait another 6 weeks to post an update, it will be likely that Marc and I will be parents but I hope to not leave you hanging until then!

Entering the Third Trimester and Loving it!

Whoa - I officially entered the third trimester today. According to What to Expect here is what baby girl is up to: Your little work in progress is now about 2.5 pounds and almost 16 inches long. She's busy adding new skills such as blinking to an already impressive repertoire of tricks like coughing, sucking, hiccuping, and taking practice breaths. Your baby's sleep now includes the REM (rapid eye movement) phase — and that means he could be dreaming already (what do you suppose she's dreaming about?). Though her lungs are nearly fully mature (so both of you might breathe a little easier if he were born now), your baby still has plenty of growing to do.

I felt baby girl hiccup this past Saturday night! Not only did we enter the third trimester today, Marc and I start Planning for Parenthood tomorrow. Dorky - I know but Marc and I want whatever advice we can get!

So here is a list of a few things we are loving right now:

• Spending time with family and friends- We spent Memorial Day weekend in Slocomb with Marc's family and it was so great! We spent some time looking for baby furniture and then the rest of the time doing the amazing lesurely country things like looking at Papa's fruit trees and chickens but most importantly we LOVED spending time with our family! There was no hurry to get anywhere! (i wish i had taken some pictures!) Then this past weekend we went to Shreveport for JP and MC's engagement party. Again it was so great to spend time with our families! It wasn't quite as leisurely as Slocomb but just as wonderful. We enjoyed late night visits, eating at our fav Shreveport hot spots and the party was great!!!Marc and I are so fortunate to have such awesome relationships with both families....now if we could only get them to move closer together. The pictures below are from the engagement party (Thanks MC!!!)








• Jackson - of course - and Jeani for keeping him the last two weekends in a row so we could travel (see #1)



• Baby Girl's Crib - After much agonizing I finally made a decision on a crib (as most of you know, decisions do not come easy for me!) Thanks Mammaw and Pappaw! I smile everytime I look at her crib. It was totally worth the agonizing.....oh if I could only make the rest of the nursery decisions. The picture below is courtesy of brattdecor.com. Our crib is sitting in a red room without a matress or bedding---eeks!






• Garage Sale and Consignment Shopping - I have found a pottery barn duvet, a rocking horse, 3 dresses, a lamp, cookbooks, and a blanket all for less than $30.00. That is true Recession 09 style. We also found the chest for the nursery at a great consignment shop. Marc is in the process of stripping and painting it!


• Ebay - We are a little late to the Ebay phenomen but I love winning an auction!!! Other than a fake Lacoste shirt, our ebay experience has been quite flawless thus far.
  

Speaking of, I'm off to check an Ebay bid and then off to bed. Peace!

Jackson

Blog - meet Jackson!
Jackson is the most near perfect Labordoodle ever. We got Jackson for Marc's birthday about 2 years ago. You know the drill - we were only going to go look. (Side Note - if you want to come home with a precious pet- you need Marc and MC -brother's fiance- with you . Marc was with MC when she picked out my brother's bunny and MC was with us when we got Jackson) After holding puppies for well over an hour, all the puppies in the litter had piled on each other and fallen asleep, except one - the one soon to call the Price household home....instead of resting like the others, he was pouncing on a leaf. Marc and I both said "we will take that one!" Why we wanted the most playful of the litter is beyond me?

With the exception of eating a Blackberry, chewing our back deck and peeing on my mom's Christmas tree....he truly has been perfect! He makes Marc and I smile everyday. He truly has the sweetest disposition. He HAS no idea what is about to come in August!

Jackson's favorites:
This is Jackson's first snow!!! Snow definitely top his favorites list.

• Taking out the trash - he LOVES it....when we take the trash bag out of the trash can, Jackson runs immediately to the front door!!
• Playing with any other dogs but especially Mary Frances. Jackson definitely has a playful spirit.
• Walks
• Finding the squeaker in any toy
• A visit from anybody in my family, b/c they all give him leftovers (which he typically doesn't get)
• Bedtime!!!! He absolutely gets so excited when it's time to go to bed. I guess it's exhausting to play all day!

We love you Jackson!! Hopefully he won't be too neglected when Baby Girl comes!

Curious Baby Girl

In light of Marc's post yesterday, I just had to share this story!! This is why we started the blog afterall. Let me preface this by saying, I started feeling baby girl Price (a.k.a nuggets) moving, kicking, flipping about 2 weeks ago. Dad's talk finally paid off. I love feeling her tiny little bumps.

Then 2 nights ago - Marc felt her little "love punches" for the first time

Then last night, Marc decided he wanted to read baby girl "Curious George goes to the Baseball Game," - we bought the book for her in Boston. Boston post soon to come!! So Marc starts reading the book. In the back of my mind I am thinking he is destined for disappointment when she doesn't move for him tonight especially since he is half-way through a Curious George book. Oh but I was wrong, right before Curious George saves the day at the baseball park, baby girl starts moving all over the place! Her dad was getting all kinds of little love punches!!! She absolute loved hearing her daddy read to her for the first time! Watch out world Curious Baby Girl is ready to embrace you in August.

Daddy Disclosures - We Got Caught

Heather has decided to share blog posting privileges with me and I wanted to share something that happened about four weeks ago.

I guess every dad to be questions what is going to be the first talk they are going to have with their child. I will be completely honest and say that I didn’t believe my first talk would happen so soon. We were right around the 20 week mark which signifies half way there or for Heather the time during the pregnancy that she was supposed to start feeling our baby girl move. Well, other than a questionable flutter there had been no kicks that Heather or I could feel. So, it was time for me to step in and have a little talk. Last night, much like any other night I got in to bed after Heather had fallen asleep. I decided this would be a good opportunity to have a little chat with my little girl without her mom hearing it. Given her current station, this is quite difficult. So I began talking and let me tell you, I talked to her like I have never talked before. No clue what all I told her, but we eventually got around to her needing to start kicking a little harder so that her mom could feel it. I went to bed convinced that she listened well and that Heather would be feeling her kicks in a few days. What I didn’t realize is that I must have been talking louder than I thought. The next morning on the way to work, Heather asked me what all our baby girl and I talked about last night. We had been caught talking about mom. It wasn’t until Heather asked me the next morning about my conversation that I truly realized just how amazing it was that I had talked to my little girl the night before. I am real excited about having a lot more of these talks and pray that God will give me the strength to approach each of them with the love and compassion that he desires of me.

Marc

Taking the plunge!

I'm jumping in!! I'm taking the plunge! After reading family blogs, wedding blogs, food blogs, health blogs, interior decorating blogs, baby blogs, the list goes on and on, I have decided to join the Blogosphere. So hello world, here we are.

Why are you starting now you ask?? Well, I'm a terrible scrapbooker / journaler so this is my electronic attempt to keep up with the events in our lives. This also gives us the opportunity to share our adventures with our friends and family that are spread all over the United States.

So what's in the name? Currently Marc and I are raising the near perfect fur child (Jackson) but in August we are expecting our first little girl! The blog will be about raising all the little Prices, meanwhile your comments and support will help raise two clueless parents. It takes the world wide web to help raise our family!

Welcome. We hope you enjoy the small glimpse into our lives!