More Fabulous Showering

Saturday night we had a wonderful baby shower with our small group (which isn't so small anymore) at church. These couples are so precious to us and we couldn't be more thankful to each of them for coming to help us celebrate Fulton's upcoming arrival.

Sister was in charge of the camera, so she didn't make it in many of these, but here are some random shots. We had such a great time getting to catch up and visit with everyone. And not to mention delicious food! Obviously you can tell in the bottom picture that I haven't missed a meal lately. Geeze!!

What kind of party would it be without a fantastic cake by my friend Hope. That is me on top :) And I didn't get a picture, but there were some yummy cake pops too... I sampled all the sweets.

Cute plates... They did such a good job with all the cute decor!

Did you think the fam wouldn't come?! Bless them.... they are all so sweet to keep coming to all these showers and helping us celebrate, nothing like 2 in one day for mom and sis! Dad was such a trooper too, he had knee surgery the day before and still came, doped up on pain meds and all.

Oh goodness... we are so blessed!! We were showered with some wonderful things that are going to be a huge help when little bambino arrives. And some really cute stuff too!!

And we had to play a quick game too. A few of the guys had to change a baby's diaper blindfolded, but first they had to find it in the diaper bag. Let's just say I think Matt's diaper changing skills will be better when he can actually see.

And sweet friends!! Hope and Whitney did a lot to make this a special day for us and we appreciate everyone being there to help celebrate!! Fun day !!

Celebrating Fulton

Saturday was a big day for celebrating little Fulton. I started the day with a wonderful lunch shower with the coaches wives. Aren't these the cutest Buc cupcakes to celebrate with?! They were from Edgar's Bakery and oh they were delicious!

We were so thankful to get a generous gift card to Buy Buy Baby that will help us get a few more things that we need before the little buddy arrives. Mom gave us these cute AL burp cloths and onesies. He will be ready for football season!

Sister hooked him up with more precious stuff again! Someone said the other day, what if it's really a girl?! I said, well, "she" would have a lot of blue clothes with Fulton on them because sister loves the monogrammed stuff!

Here are some of the coaches wives. We were missing a few, but it was such a fun morning getting to fellowship with these women.

Mom and sister are always there to support!

My Little Painter

Let me just give a big warning before you read this post....there is a lot of skin showing in this next picture, I hope you don't lose your lunch. So, my sweet friend Ryan Lee who is due about 2 weeks before us, had someone paint her belly and it just looked fabulous. So, I told the Matt and the fam about it and I mom and keri were going to paint something fun on the big ole belly, but the hubs got all excited about it this past weekend and decided he wanted to do one too... so, here you go!
Matt was very serious about this whole thing. He kept saying, don't move, you will mess me up. He was concentrating real hard and as soon as we finished, he started talking about the next one and what else he could paint.

Here's the final product. He did a flower. He did pretty good, I was impressed. No worries, this is non-toxic body paint. Don't let the back of the bottle fool you, it said it comes off easily with soap and water... I thought I would have that purple on my stomach forever. So, I know... the belly is freakishly huge and I really cannot believe I am putting this on here... but if anyone tries to use it against me, I will deny it's me.. that's why I cut my head out.

Last Hoorah

I guess you can consider this past weekend our last hoorah of the summer before school starts back. Our family, the Bouchillons, all came in town this weekend and we enjoyed a long weekend at the lake seeing family that we don't get to see enough.
My cousin Mark and his wife Katie have the newest member of the family. This is me with sweet Caleb. He is almost 10 months old and even though he is a Clemson fan at heart, he was sporting his Roll Tide outfit just for us this weekend.

We finally had everyone together at the same time for a delicious steak dinner, so we used the opportunity for some good ole family picture time.

And here's our sweet fam. We almost missed taking one together because we were photographing everyone else, but we got a quick pic before the sun went completely down.

And here's the whole crew. That's mema and papa on the couch surrounded by their kids, grandkids, and now great-grandkids. We usually only get one or two of these pictures a year... it is pretty painful for everyone and lots of complaining is involved, but it's all smiles once the flash goes off.

This is my cousin Amber and her fiance Patrick. They are getting married in just a few short weeks and we had a little mini shower for them. Poor Patrick flew straight from East Asia into this family madness weekend.

Matt finally got to open a baby gift... of course he said, what is this?!

We spent the next day playing in the water and it was a million degrees outside and ole momma senorita and little bambino just can't take the heat anymore, so I camped it out in the shade for a good bit of the day. Good weekend on the lake with family, hate to go back to work.

Our Week

This past week was our last week to have a vacation and we took full advantage of it and headed to Gulf Shores with the fam...or at least part of the fam. We missed Sister and Steven, but somebody had to stay home and work. I guess I am saving up for when little man is born, but I just didn't take many pictures at all. We ate out every night, of course, you can never have too much seafood. This was at Tacky Jacks...one of my faves.

Matt and dad both ordered the garbage nachos. As you can see this is a huge plate of nachos with all this madness piled on top. The waitress was a little concerned that they were both ordering one and not sharing. But these guys don't share. You can see the before and after, they did pretty good finishing most of it.

Much time was spent on the beach, relaxing in the sand. I realize it won't be like this next year, so I was trying to soak it all in. This was right before a storm blew in and Matt, dad, and I kept trying to "hold out" and not go in... but once the sand started pelting me in the legs, I cashed it in. This is random, but you see that girl laying out in the back of the picture. I started thinking, do you ever wonder if you are in the back of people's pictures like that... freaks me out.

We got to come back out later for a little more time before dark and the waves were huge... that leads us to this....

This guy is crazy! Matt didn't wear his swimsuit back down since it was late... mistake. He kept watching all these kids swim and laugh and have a good time, he couldn't stand it any longer. He ripped his shirt off like David Hasselhoff and ran straight into the ocean with his shorts on. He loved it.

Harley man almost didn't get to come on the trip.... he was really sick last week and we took him to the vet the morning we were leaving and they wanted to keep him. I just couldn't stand the thought of the little buddy staying in the vet all week by himself... so we took the meds with us and nursed him back to health on the coast.

The last day the hubs decided he wasn't going to wear any sunscreen... but he is proof that sitting under the umbrella will still get you burned without your handy dandy SPF.

Last night to soak up the all you can eat shrimp platter and grease up the insides real good! It was a good week at the beach... sad summer is coming to an end...makes me want to cry.

Fabulous Shower

Sunday was a day that we were showered with love by friends and family to get ready for Fulton's arrival. Look at these precious decorations and amazing table that they did. Mom made that door hanger with little buddy's name on it (She is very talented) and her and sister worked so hard on this cute diaper cake. I don't want to take it apart it's so stinkin cute, although I know his little bum will need those diapers very soon. Those cupcakes were delish!

Here are the sweet ladies that helped host this come and go baby shower for me. They are all such precious people in our lives and we were so blessed by all they did to make this a special day for us.

Me, Mom, and sister...nothing like putting big bertha in the middle of these 2 beautiful ladies!

For the record, I absolutely LOVE monogrammed stuff.. so much that I think I want to monogram Fulton's underwear one day. He got so much cute monogrammed stuff I just had to pinch myself (sister has been stockpiling this stuff for months). Mom also made him an adorable smocked bubble that he is going to look so handsome in!!

And Aunt Keri got him his first backpack.. I love it!! I am thinking about getting Matt a matching one for school.

I don't think I have shown what our bedding looks like, but my mom got it for us and made a quilt to match it... seriously, it is beautiful!! She bought extra fabric of the bedding and had been working on this secret project for a while. She also did some curtains. His room is finally starting to look like a real room.

Me and sister with the Monroe girls. Our families have been friends since before we were born... we love them!

And here are some other random shots of sweet people who came to celebrate the day. We are beyond blessed.. literally, I sat and looked at all this wonderful stuff that people have given us and I am just in awe. We don't deserve it, but we are so grateful for all these precious friends and family who are helping us get ready for this little fella to enter the world!!

30 Weeks!

It's finally here... we are on the home stretch and I am 30 weeks pregnant! Woohoo!! I haven't done one of these ole preggo posts, but since I know you are on the edge of your seat dying to know the details, I will share some fun facts with you.
How far along? 30 weeks

Size of baby? This week they say he is about 3 pounds and if you are into comparing that to vegetables, he is the size of a head of cabbage.

Maternity clothes? It varies day to day... I still wear a lot of regular shirts, but most shorts are maternity. I am still looking for that perfect maternity blue jean jumper with the school house on it for the first day of school.

Gender? It's a boy! Fulton Maddox

Movement? This little booger moves all the time. He likes to do karate chops in the middle of the night too.

Sleep? Oh sleep... it's a love/hate relationship. Lately, I have been getting up at 3 am and then sometimes I will go back to sleep about 6. This is going to be a problem when school starts back. Maybe I can get my 8th graders to start having nap time. We are up to 7 --hear that--7 pillows in the bed now. Matt says if I add anymore, he will have to sleep on the couch.

What I miss? Hmmm... what do I miss... not really anything too life altering that I miss. Probably just being able to sleep through the night without going to the potty every couple of hours like a five year old.

Cravings? Since the beginning I have loved fruit and dill pickle chips. I have been laying off the chips more lately due to the fact that I almost have a mini heart attack every time I get on that stinkin scale at the dr's office. You know what else I love?? a good strawberry slushi.

Symptoms? The ole back has been aching a little more lately... and I am super clumsy. Is this even a symptom? I don't know, but I drop things all the time. Good thing I am not trying to win us a championship on the balance beam.

What I am looking forward to? I have some showers coming up that are going to be so fun and I am really excited about. Also, this comfy, excruciatingly expensive, chair we bought for the nursery should be coming in soon. I will sit in that everyday so we get our money's worth.

Chicago

The Windy City! That is where we headed last week for our anniversary. It was an adventurous trip with lots to do in a few short days. Let me give you the quick and condensed version of our days in the big city. We arrived the first day and our plane landed at 8:30 am, so we had the whole day to play. We were set to see a show, Peter Pan, after lunch so we had a few hours to explore and figure out this whole city bus transportation stuff. Yikes... we got on our first bus and missed the stop so we kept riding it thinking it would turn around eventually.... not the case. This sweet man finally asked us if we needed help and told us to get off and walk across the street and wait for the bus coming the other way. Thankfully we had plenty of time because we got a nice tour of parts of the city that we probably shouldn't have been in. The show was great and afterwards we went to eat at Ed Debevicks... where they are extremely rude to you.. on purpose. It's quite the atmosphere!

The next day we were up bright and early and there you see me at that lovely bus stop again.. we were determined to get it right this time. We headed to Navy Pier and I guess you could call it somewhat of a big carnival on Lake Michigan. We took an architectural river boat cruise through the city and saw lots of amazing buildings that we probably wouldn't have seen otherwise. I will spare you the 75 pictures sweet boy took of all the buildings we passed, he loves some history. Matt even had a good conversation with some man in the park too.

We spent a little more time exploring Navy Pier, ate at Harry Carey's for lunch and then went to the beach. There was a beach on Lake Michigan about 2 blocks from our hotel. Matt put his feet in, said it was freezing, I sat on a stump instead. We had to hit up the Hershey store because they were giving away free samples (went back the next day too). I think I got a cavity just walking in that place.

That night it was time for the event Matt had been waiting for. He really wanted to go to a Cubs game, but they weren't in town, so we went to the White Sox game instead. See the bottom left picture of Matt glaring at me... it's because I was totally freaking out about riding this subway thing. Once we got on I swore that thing was going to fly off the tracks and we would die underground. Thankfully we made it. The Sox lost.. but it was a fun game. We even had some delicious hotdogs and nachos, dinner of champions right there.

The next day it was up and at 'em again (Matt kept me on a tight schedule) and we headed for the Shedd Aquarium. This was an enormous aquarium with lots of little creatures, big and small. Matt was so into it, as you can tell. I enjoyed it too... in between sitting on the benches and eating my poptarts. The view was beautiful outside the aquarium. In the right picture of the both of us, I know it looks like I have a twin in the water, but no worries.. it's just the whale swimming around.

After the aquarium we headed for some deep dish original Chicago pizza... this stuff is different, but good. We did a lot of yummy eating while we were there and decided to finish our last night with a fabulous meal at the Weber Grill Restaurant... and Weber Grill as in the thing you cook on in your backyard. Sometimes it takes me a minute to connect the dots... and when I finally saw the large grill on the side of the building I understood. We had a wonderful trip for our anniversary and Matt is already planning the next one so we can do everything we didn't get to do.

7 Years!

Today is our 7th wedding anniversary! Here's a sweet picture from back in the day when we were a lot younger (and thinner). What an amazing man God has blessed me with. He sure puts up a lot from me (and it's been taken up a notch lately with my precious mood swings). Matt is such a godly man with a servant's heart. I love this about him. He sees a need and he meets it. Matt has such a selfless heart and always challenges me to exemplify the fruits of the spirit on a daily basis. Here we are 7 years later with a little bun in the oven, about to start a new chapter in our lives. We are so undeserving of this blessing of each other and now a new life coming to our family. Thank you Lord for this marriage and the blessing of another day of life with each other!

The Fourth!

We spent a long weekend at the lake for the Fourth of July and it was fabulous! We had great weather, good company, and lots of delicious food! Saturday we stayed in the water literally almost all day because it was so hot. We got out late in the day to relax on the pier for a bit since we were all shriveled up.

Sister and me after a nice day in the sun.

Dad took us on a little sunset cruise and the weather was great. I am not supposed to ride in the fast boat because of the roughness, so we had to wait until late in the day when the waters were calm.

How pretty is this?!

Sunday and Monday we played again and Matt even entertained us with some jumps. This is his newest jump, his toe touch.

A little mini storm came up later that night and we were forced to get off the water, or dodge the lightning. I chose to go on up for the day. But the after storm sunset made for some good pics!

Our papa even came to see us... what a treat! And he was in a good mood... even better!

Since it was the fourth of July and all, I felt it was necessary for everyone to sing some patriotic songs and fly the flag for a bit. We had such a great weekend with family and friends!