Preparing for baby...

So prepping for baby has led us into a frenzy of registry preparation and reorganizing the house to make it less "chaotic" for when baby T arrives. Donna has spent most of her free hours after work and weekends trying to accomplish this main objective. She has a long list of "to-dos" and like Donna's belly, the list seems to keep expanding.

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One item on the list was purchasing a glider rocker. At first we didn't think we wanted one, since they don't really go with our decor, but once Donna sat in one, she realized that she wanted to get one. After spending a few days on craigslist we hit the jackpot! We saw an ad that was offering two for $40, so we went and looked and offered $20 for one of the chairs and the guy said, "no, I will take $15". So, no fighting from us, we willingly paid $15 for a glider! Donna took this glider from dull to doable by using fabric from our old duvet cover and made new cushions. Voila! New and super inexpensive glider! Below is the before and after. Ahh, love the lighter colors and plush cushions! Super comfy and perfect for when baby comes! Here is one belly pic for those who would like to see the progress! Week 30! You can go and look back at the last blogs and Donna is pictured wearing this same shirt—you can see the definite change in size through these last 3 months! Along with getting a glider rocker from craigslist, we also scored an AWESOME chair for baby. This is very much like the Stokke chair but this one was used and from the UK (according to the seller). We love that this chair can transition from being used by infants to toddlers to kinders all the way up to being used by adults (because of the adjustable components). We thought it was a worthwhile investment. We will be refinishing this to match our kitchen chairs, but since we won't be using this until Faye is 6mos we are going to focus on other priorities. Right now all the kitties love the chair. They rotate who sits on top throughout the day. It is pretty funny. Our largest update for this post is that we got a new family car! We traded in our beloved little yellow Beetle for a 2009 Jetta Wagon. We did much research and test driving and decided on this guy below. (tons of storage space for baby accessories!) Our only pic was with Donna's phone and the "photographer" was the sales guy who obviously was too excited about the recent sale he made to care about centering the picture! Corey did an amazing job working an incredible deal for this car, he had Donna fooled on his little show that he put on through the buying process (that lasted over 5 hours)! He got it down to below bluebook used price (though this was a new car)! Nice. One of our favorite features thus far is the seat warmer on the passenger and driver seats for our cold Eugene morning commute to work/school.

Pics and a Heartbeat

So here are some updated belly pics. (Donna poses out of love for friends and family because she REALLY does not like being in so many pictures alone! But she is not fully alone, little Faye is in each picture, more and more!) We are into the THIRD trimester—if you can believe that! May 4th is going to come sooner than we expect, though we are really excited. We go to our first "birth class" tomorrow. Make sure to check out the video at the very bottom... it is our favorite! Below is Donna "holding" little Faye. Feist decides to pose in this one, though she is not very still (she doesn't really care about the picture, just the fact that Donna is petting her)! Trying out the left side for this shot... Here Donna attempts a more "abstract" version of the belly pic. A little blurry but you still see the bump! It is getting so much bigger! The belly button is pretty much flush with the rest of the belly (and super sensitive). Here is the video that was taken from Donna's phone at the last appointment. (it was taken for what was heard, not seen) That is the nurse midwife holding up the doppler speaker. (you can see Donna's shoes at the end of the table) Doesn't it sound like galloping horses—or maybe little ponies?! Such an amazing sound to hear, we love it!

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Until the next bump pics...

And the baby bump grows...

Here are some updated pics of "the bump"... Cheers to the New Year. What an amazing year it will be... the coming of our baby girl! Below Corey is saying "cheers" to Faye. (of course we are bringing in the new year with apple cider!) Our last New Years before our kiddo comes... awww. (Yes, Corey has since trimmed his beard down so it is not so large!) Since the New Year, a few more belly shots have been taken to show the progress from last time. Corey is singing and playing for Faye to hear... hopefully she will come out singing (more likely wailing, but that is ok!) Donna doesn't much like taking these pictures on her own so she roped little Psapp into taking one with her. Psapp is just so excited to be apart of this, can't you tell? (Sarah C. recognize the shirt you gave me? Love it, and I love that it is stretching along with my belly!)Soon the toes will not be able to be seen. Soon we will be entering the 3rd trimester! Can't believe it! May will be here sooner than we can imagine. Close-up of Faye (a few layers in). That's all for now...

Going retro for Christmas cards

Here is the "Excelsior", the 5x8 table-top letterpress that was used to make the Christmas cards this year. Finally putting together rollers from the UK and springs/hooks from a press restoration store we got this little beast working!

Here is the vintage 1950s press die locked up in the "chase" and ready to go into the press.

This picture below is an action shot of Donna using the press, making sure it is ready and functioning before adding ink.

Below is the press all inked up and ready to print! (fact: we were able to dig up the ink we used for our wedding invitations back five years ago.)

We had to bolt the press down to the table and reinforce the table to make this guy work efficiently.

It took a little "make ready" time to get the press making the correct impression, but we eventually got it dialed in. Corey and all his 170lbs were used in making the deep impression that Donna demanded. (Donna didn't have the strength/weight to crank that little press down enough) If you received one of the Christmas cards, make sure to feel the lettering on the front and notice the impression (it came with blood, bruises, sweat, and tears!). He had a bruise going across the palm of his hand and thought he might have a stress fracture in his forearm, but seems to be just fine now (and Donna said that the sacrifice was worth it...easy for her to say)!

Donna "the riveter" flexing her arm and showing off her baby bump under her press coat. The cards turned out wonderfully for a small table-top press with not much psi but lots of heart (from the press operator, Corey)! Hopefully not much dust will collect on this press and it will be used again for future cards...

Coming soon: May 2010

So most of you know we are expecting by now... but if you missed it, here is a recap. Back on Donna's birthday we decided to announce the coming of baby Templeton. The picture below is what we used--Corey decorated a birthday cake with "the whole family", represented by the Incredibles. The Mr. and Mrs. Incredible adorned the top of our wedding cake back in July 05. Our due date for baby T is May 4th, 2010! Just a couple weeks ago we had a long-awaited ultrasound appointment when Donna was just over 19 weeks. We were excited to find out whether we were going to have a boy or girl. Below is Donna waiting to have the ultrasound. Here is our baby's first picture! Beautiful! It was amazing to see an image of the miracle growing inside of Donna! The technician was doing all the measurements to see how baby T is developing. All is great, and we have a healthy baby! Below you can see she was measuring the heartbeat. The original due date still stands, May 4th...only time will tell whether baby T decides to come into the world on that date or pick another! We decided that we did indeed want to know whether we were having a boy or girl - AND we are having a girl! Little baby T is now named little Faye (middle name TBD). The 4D ultrasounds are crazy...so amazing to see little Faye's hands up in front of her face (I wonder if she is going to stay that shy...living with us, we will see)! After MANY requests for "belly shots" here are a couple...and we will do our best to update as the weeks continue. At this point we are actually half-way through the pregnancy! It has taken awhile for the bump to show, but there is a little one (taken a week ago).Christmas shot with Donna and the bump! Recently we have been able to feel baby Faye move! Of course it is Donna that has been feeling the little kicks, what a crazy feeling! But Corey, desperately wanting to feel the baby as well continued to put his hands on the belly anytime it was mentioned that the baby was moving. One night he was actually able to feel the movements. It was like little Faye heard that her daddy wanted to feel her kick and she put on a show. Corey JUST NOW felt baby Faye kick again! We are sure there will be much more of that to come. Like we mentioned above, we will be updating belly shots, just keep checking back!

The Little Fluff Ball: Psapp

So we have mentioned that we got a new kitten but have not blogged about it. We are ashamed! Here is the blog on the little crazy kitten.

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The story of how we ended up with a third cat (we were not intending to get a third...it is then that you seem like you are those crazy cat people... I guess we are now). Donna met her friend Teagan at a cute bakery in Eugene and while enjoying great company, Donna was somewhat distracted with the wild kittens that were running around. These kittens pulled at her heart-strings—especially when she saw that they had a "teenage" mom who didn't seem very motherly. Toward the end of the discussion, Donna was quite sure she would be taking one home. Teagan—being the good reasonable friend, questioned this decision saying, "what will Corey say?" to which Donna's response was, "how could he resist this little kitten?" (even though the fleeting thought of being the "crazy cat lady" did pop into her mind—it was pushed away, reason being: you aren't crazy with three, it is four or more—as shown in this crazy cat lady action figure)Just as they were getting up, Donna saw a young girl carrying over the most precious wild kitten, and from that moment on she was determined to take THAT one home. Yes, she snatched a little kitten out of the girl's hands and said, "this one is mine" (Donna is not normally one to use her adult powers over a child, but here it paid off). The little girl was not going to take it home, she was just holding it (or so Donna would like you to think). SO, off to show Corey the new little addition to the family, Donna let this wild critter roam in the car. Psapp (she was named from the moment she was snatched) liked hanging out on Donna's shoulder and seeing the cars go by. Once Corey met this new little surprise, he too was captivated and there was never a question as to whether we would keep Psapp! So now that you know the story, here are some pictures of her!

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These next few shots were taken the first day we got her. We took countless pictures (love digital cameras) and here are the cutest of cute pics below. She likes climbing. I think it makes her feel like she has conquered something in her little state. Since she was a wild cat, there are a lot of "wild" tendencies that we are trying to rid her of—one being the claws that come out! Doesn't the one below just melt your heart? See why Donna couldn't resist her? She put up with a lot in these first few days. We felt that when Feist and Frou-Frou were young we didn't take enough pictures—so we are making up for it with Psapp's! (By the way, "Psapp" is another band with a girl lead singer...just like Feist and Frou-Frou. You should check the band out—very funky music called "toy-tronica" I think) Also going along with being wild—she had severe ear mites, flees, and worms—eeekk! So we had to quarantine her in our little downstairs bathroom. (so sad!) Donna took her to the vet immediately and though not in the room with Psapp, she heard her yelps and little cries all the way down the hall as they gave her shots, flee treatments and tried to rid her of all the ear mites. When we would come in and check on her, she would be curled up in the little window as shown below. She works as a great accessory—and already loves purses almost as much as Donna does! This shot has captured an expression showing that she is still getting used to people bombarding her with hugs, kisses and putting cameras in her face. We wanted to get a perspective shot so that we could take a picture of her later and see how much she has grown. Here she is about the size of Donna's spin shoe! As any cat, she LOVES to nap! We would prefer that she run around more in the day so that it would calm her down by our bedtime. The first few nights she just didn't know what to do on our large bed except bounce around on us and nibble at our fingers to get our attention. (she didn't last very long in the room before we shut her out until she settled down as she got older) Here Corey and Psapp are found taking a nap together. Awww, what great pals. (Corey does pretty well with 4 females in the house now! Maybe when we get a dog—not for a long while—we will get a male...) Psapp has quite a playful side. One in which the other cats will probably never get used to. Her favorite pastime is to torment the cats by chasing them all around the house. I don't think there is a day that goes by that there is not hissing going on. (Psapp never hisses, I think the hissing just entices her to continue the torment) It is pretty funny watching a kitten 1/3 of the girls size chase them around. She does also enjoy little toys. The other girls like watching her play (from a safe distance) with the toys. She is a bundle of energy, I think the girls get exhausted just watching her play. Look at how fearless little Psapp is! She will place her life in danger of being eaten by these large beasts called "humans". She gets quite curious when we eat food and if we let her, she would probably eat our half-chewed food in our mouth. Here Corey soothes the little savage beast with his guitar-playing. (I think she was content in the fact that she was sleeping directly on the sheet music) I forgot to mention that Psapp—like the other cats is a Siamese-tabby mix. Feist and Frou-Frou are "Flame-Point Siamese" because they have a mix of orange tabby and Siamese, leaving them with orange/brown tipped ears, striped tales, and faintly striped feet. Psapp is "Lynx-Point Siamese"—a mix of grey tabby and Siamese—which is why she has grey ears, striped tail, striped face, and striped feet. They go so well together! As rainy season comes, we get to see Psapp almost double in size. Instead of being the size of Donna's spin shoe, she is now big enough to fit in Donna's large rain boots. We did our duty as responsible cat-owners and had her "fixed" (even though she is an indoor cat like the others). They said to keep her from jumping and playing for 5 days and keep her limited in running for up to two weeks. Yeah right! She lasted 5 minutes before she was back to terrorizing the girls and jumping everywhere! Here she is jumping up for a toy (you can see her shaved belly). Psapp has definitely become part of the family. She loves being right in the middle of the activity—even if it means sleeping on your computer to get your attention! That is it. Our cat-obsessed blog is complete. Next blog will be focused on humans—we promise. And we can promise you we will NOT be getting any more cats! Three is quite enough for us.