I'm finally 31!

Most of my friends have their birthdays before mine so by the time I turn a year older I already feel like I have been this age for a while. Not that I'm complaining. It's better this way then dreading getting a year older. But still it does make you stop and think when people ask, "How old are you?"

Today, on the day I actually turn 31, I couldn't be more grateful for everything I have.

• This morning I was surprised with cards and presents to open and enjoy at breakfast, a breakfast cooked for me by my amazing husband. 
• I am spending the day with baby girl swimming around in my belly sharing her birthday kicks with me. 
• I'm being showered with birthday love through emails, phone-calls, text messages and Facebook posts.
• Tonight I start training for a new consultant job providing online weight loss coaching from the comfort of my own home. 

But most of all today I am just enjoying being me. Having time to myself and doing what I want to do.

For Irene

My good friend Irene is getting ready to head off to India for a fellowship through Kiva, a micro-finance organization. I couldn't be more excited for her! If I wasn't currently carrying around Baby Aquila I would be figuring out just when I was going to be visiting her. I'm a little bummed I won't be able to go not only because I've never been to India before but because Irene came to visit me in Mexico when I was studying there for two months,

and we traveled around China together while she was studying there.

 

So instead of traveling around India with her I'll have to live vicariously through her adventures and hope that she takes lots of pictures and posts lots on her Kiva Blog about her project. Before she left I wanted to share a few things with her that we talked about on our last phone-call together.

One of her requests was more pictures of the fall foliage. So here's one of the trees by our pond which is probably a few weeks old now. 

I also took a short video of the pond and the river after the rainstorm we had last week. If you turn your speakers up after the music ends you can just about hear the sound of the water. Hopefully this gives you a better feel for the size of our pond and some of our "backyard".  

For Irene from Christina A on Vimeo.

Irene - We hope you have a fantastic trip to India and are successful on your projects. Marc wants you to remember to wash your hands twice before you eat and don't drink the water. I want you to take lots of pictures and share them with us while you're there. Baby Aquila would like you to come home safe so she can meet you in person! 

Pregnancy Update - 19 weeks

The Nursery
Now we know we are having a little girl, Marc and I have been thinking about the nursery. We've always known which room in the house was going to become the baby's room. When we moved in it was covered in blue wallpaper and blue carpet. We quickly got rid of those and replaced the carpet with the same carpet in our bedroom but under the blue wall paper we found red walls. Who paints a room red?! To have some fun we decided to paint our announcement on the walls for our parents to see.

It was so much fun to have such an exciting message on the wall but we realized that we couldn't leave it like that forever. So while my parents were visiting earlier this month we finally got around to painting the closet white and painting a grey primer over the red walls. Now we can think about what colors and theme we want in our baby's room and then start thinking about furniture and everything else.

Due Date
Last night we had our latest Centering Pregnancy group meeting. I have to admit that I am very lucky to be a part of such a wonderful group. The other moms and dads are so chatty and friendly, we really have a great time when we meet. Plus the midwife who runs the group is super knowledgeable and really knows how to run our group well.

At our meeting last night we got to hear Baby Girl's strong heartbeat once again. It is such a reassuring sound and even though she was trying her best to hide from the doppler, we found her. We also found out that our due date was updated since our sonogram a few weeks ago. Now instead of a due date of January 25th we are now expecting our baby girl on February 11th. That means that I get to reach halfway of our pregnancy all over again! Baby is growing appropriately and everything measured within normal limits on her sonogram with no noticeable abnormalities. Oh and me, I'm feeling great!

Prenatal Yoga
I have to admit that so far, knock on wood, this pregnancy has been pretty easy going for me. In order to help keep it that way I decided to start prenatal yoga. We meet once a week on Wednesdays and as of yesterday there was only three of us in the class. The teacher was great and it was such a nice way to stretch and relax and really feel connected to the pregnancy. Plus the yoga studio is just a couple blocks from Marc's office so we can either carpool or I can drop by and say hello afterwards.


Hand Me Downs and Baby Gifts
Marc and I are also very lucky to have lots of people in our lives who have recently had children. This means that not only do we get to learn from them what to get and what to avoid, we are also getting lots of offers of hand me downs. I've heard that my sister in law has 4 boxes of stuff for us to look through from Cousin Josie and Marc's coworker has started leaving presents for him on his desk. On top of this we have also started to receive a few baby gifts. Here's the rundown so far . . .

Adorable Vintage Socks from Kate

Fortune Cookie Booties from Jen and Brandon

Baby Towel and Outfit from my Mom
(once she knew she was having a granddaughter)

A Board Book to get baby ready for the homestead from my Dad

Baby Seat, Baby Bjorn and Bumbo Seat from Marc's coworker

I guess this is motivation to get the baby's room worked on so we have places to store this stuff instead of just piling it up in baby's closet. 

Family, Football and Fun!

Marc and I had a great weekend full of family, football and fun. On Friday night Marc's cousin Jess, who officiated our wedding, came to visit. It was so great to have her over for the night and to show her our new home. We also had her parents come for dinner on Friday night. I have to admit that I really love having people visit. Not only do I love having a house full of activity and people but I love trying out new recipes. This Friday was no different when I tried out a cannelloni bean and kale soup - with sausage meatballs for the meat eaters - and stuffed mushrooms. Thankfully the recipes were a hit and everyone seemed to have a great evening. It was also a chance for us to show Marc's Aunt and Uncle what we had done to the house so far. You see, they had come to see the house back when we were in the process of purchasing it, so they know just how far it has come since we took over.

Go Big Green!

On Saturday we spent the day playing catch up with Marc doing some work from home and baby girl and I taking a lovely one and a half hour nap. Then in the evening we met up with some of our local friends for dinner at 3 Guys Basement Barbeque and the first home game of the season at Dartmouth. The barbeque was delicious, especially their dry rubbed and smoked chicken wings. I wasn't a big fan of some of the sides but I would say it's definitely a place worth going back to. The football game was also entertaining to watch, Dartmouth won 35-7 against Butler. It was a night game but thankfully it was warm enough where we didn't have to bundle up too much. It was also my first opportunity to break out my maternity jeans with the stretchy waistband. So comfortable and a great way to keep my midsection warm.

Sunday we decided to get some work done on the house. I mowed the lawn while Marc finished up cementing the chimney. The chimney project has been ongoing for what feels like the last month. I'm going to leave it up to Marc to share the process and the pictures but it's pretty impressive what his dad, his brother and Marc have been able to accomplish. Then at lunch time Marc's cousin Cristine and her husband Dave came to visit. It was fun to give them the full tour of the house. I always like to hear what people think about the space compared to the pictures they have seen. For lunch we tried out another new recipe - southwestern chicken and black bean soup.

Ready for the game! 

To top it all off we were able to watch the San Francisco 49ers beat the Detroit Lions on Sunday Night Football. Since we don't have our cable setup yet we were grateful to know that NBC Sports airs the Sunday Night games online for free. Yay NBC! So we had our dinner in front of the TV and watched the first half before heading to bed. Then I watched the second half in bed while Marc slept. I forget that on the East Coast evening games are a little challenging to watch because they don't end until midnight.

Baby Boy or Baby Girl?

On Thursday we had our first ultrasound of the baby. It was amazing and surreal at the same time. On the one hand, Marc and I loved seeing our little baby and all the features. On the other hand, I still find it hard to believe that the little being is actually inside my belly. We were blessed to have my mom with us for the experience and also to have a fantastic ultrasound tech. So without further ado here is a little video to let you know we are having a little . . .

Gender Reveal from Christina A on Vimeo.

Labor Day Weekend

Who doesn't love a three-day weekend? Cause the Aquila's certainly do! While Marc, his dad and his brother were busy working on our roof and chimney I made sure to take advantage of all the weekend events.

Yard Sale

On Saturday I headed over to Hanover for the Hanover/Dartmouth Community Yard Sale. Seeing as it was a community wide yard sale, I expected it to be a little larger then it was. Then again, for this area, it was pretty big. I was hoping to find a steal on a mirror or maybe some furniture for the baby's room. After wandering back and forth around the stalls I ended up purchasing a wooden toy train for $0.50. I'm not sure whether I'll paint it or just clean it up and leave it as is but right now it looks at home on our mantelpiece.

I always use guests as an excuse to bake and try out new recipes and this weekend was no different. I made some banana bread from the Sweet Melissa cookbook, onion strings from the Pioneer Woman, and some homemade bagels. It was the least I could do to reward the men for their hard work on our roof and chimney.

On Sunday I headed out to the Norwich Craft Fair. It's held at the same place where the Norwich Farmer's Market is held so I knew what to expect when I headed over. I wasn't really looking for anything specific, I just wanted to get out of the house and see what kind of items were for sale. There was jewelry, knit goods, wood cutting boards and pottery but nothing that caught my eye enough to purchase. Afterwards I drove around a little ended up finding a nice basket for $3.75 at the thrift store. I was hoping it would be big enough to put newspapers in for the wood stove but instead I think it will become a toy basket for the baby's room.

On Monday my friend Michelle, whom I've known since high school, came to visit. She was one of our first guests when we first moved out here in March so it was really great to be able to show her where we are now calling home. We took advantage of having a guest visit to head out to Riverview Farm for some blueberry picking.

This was Marc and my first trip to a pick your own farm. Upon arrival we ran into one of his coworkers and quickly found out that not only could we pick blueberries but there were also raspberries, apples and pumpkins ripe for picking. So after picking up some buckets to collect our goodies and smothering ourselves with sunblock we headed out to the fields.

Our first stop was the honeycrisp apples. We decided that to fuel ourselves up for an afternoon of fruit picking we should have an apple. We also wanted to make sure they were in fact ready to be picked on our way back from the blueberries. 

We spent most of our time picking blueberries. I think it was Michelle who commented something along the lines of "now I know why blueberries are expensive at the grocery store". Even though the bushes were full of berries it took some work to figure out which ones were ready to be picked and then some time to fill our buckets. Once we had had enough of blueberries we quickly filled our bags with apples and then went in search of raspberries.

The farm grows raspberries in three different areas. The farmer told us to head out to one area but after a fruitless search to find that area we ended up following the painted signs to the raspberries. Sadly a lot of the bushes had been picked over so there weren't too many for us to gather. Growing up my family had raspberries in our backyard and I had forgotten how wonderful they taste fresh from the bush and warm from the sun. We ended up gathering about a cup of raspberries and then headed back to the "office" to pay up and also purchase some apple cider. 

Sadly for me the cider was unpasteurized which meant it wasn't safe for the baby but from what I hear, and what I smelled, it was delicious. It was definitely a great day to be out in the sunshine and we're so glad that Michelle came to visit us and join us on this adventure. We will definitely be going back next year, if not later in the season for other types of apples.