Baby Boy's Nursery

My labor of love is finally revealed--baby boy's nursery!!! I'm SO excited to reveal the adorable and fabulous nursery that we will *soon* be bringing baby boy home to!

Here are some pictures of the nursery being transformed:

Someone is looking very preggo!

Tom's wainscoting makes the room! It is gorgeous, he did a fabulous job. And, as with any project, he taught himself, figured it out, and made it look incredible!

You'll notice a theme, that we have a lot of people who love baby boy enough to spend a lot of time and energy on making his nursery very special. We're so thankful for them!

I chose this fabric [from Hancock Fabrics] for the draperies and my talented mother in law made beautiful draperies. I wanted to try grommets, so she made them to my measurements, and I added the grommets. It was fun to figure out something new. Grommets? EASY. Measuring? HARD. My hatred of math didn't help here!

The "during" pictures of my biggest labor of love: the Alphabet wall. I found some inspiration on Pinterest [of course] but I wanted to make it my own. I LOVE how it turned out! I got most of the letters from Hobby Lobby [don't forget your 40% off coupon!], Buy Buy Baby, Babies R Us [the Life Preserver], and my own creativity. The y is a rope, the d [vinyl] and f [framed cut out letter on cute paper] I created using my Silouette Cameo, the J is a painted canvas with buttons, the v is a photo [found online] in a frame, and the t is a cross from my parents. The hardest part was getting them up on the wall! My mom helped and we measured, measured, measured. I recommend created a "border" of top and bottom, then spacing them out along the floor and working on hanging groups of letters at a time. For instance, the top row we hung A, B,C, then L, M N, then the middle. On the bottom we anchored the big letters S and W and then spaced the smaller letters around them. Whew.

The Alphabet Wall

Walking into the room

Refinished armoire

Wreath from my family baby shower on the door

Oh. my. cuteness. Maggie loves the baby's room and likes to take her naps here. And leave her toys here. I think it is a sign she's ready to be a big sister!

It's a...

I was one of those people who totally mocked the idea of a gender reveal party. I mean, come on, now you have to attend a party to find out the baby’s gender?! SO cheesy. It probably didn't help that I felt like everyone around me was having babies and it wasn't happening for me.

So, fast forward, and here we are: 20 week ultrasound ahead and what do I insist on having? Why, a gender reveal party, of course!

I am so glad that we went through with the party, though, as it was the highlight of our pregnancy so far.  I wanted to enjoy the fun and creative details, and of course, I had a grand vision. I tried to keep it simple, but I did create ties and tutu clips with my brand new Silhouette Cameo (thank you Tom!) for everyone to wear based on their guess. I bought some poufs off Amazon that I fluffed up, and we had a casual and fun BBQ one Saturday in April to announce the big news. Tom and I found out ahead of time, as it is pretty easy for OBGYNs to read ultrasounds. It was actually very special for us to find out together and have those moments together, then share that with family.

I really wanted to do something creative, and I had seen on a blog—but never heard of anyone doing it in real life—a question mark piñata filled with pink or blue confetti. Being who I am, I thought, I can make that! :) Well, about two weeks beforehand, I realized I had NO time to be making my own piñata, and had a bit of a meltdown. Thankfully I have the best parents in the world who said they would attempt it. And it turned out great! They created the shell and I spray painted and decorated it. I thought, wouldn’t it be cute to do little poufs of tissue all over? And 7 hours later, it was done {how do I always do that to myself!?}!

It was such a joy to have our closest friends and family around us as we announced our little one’s gender. And, we have it all on video, too! We are so thankful to be at this point and overjoyed about our bundle of…

BOY!!

The BIG News

There aren't adjectives to do this post justice. We are thrilled! excited! thankful! and oh so joyful to [finally] share the news we've been praying for, dreaming for, waiting for, and are in awe of...

WE ARE PREGNANT!

God is so good, and oh so faithful. Despite a rough year and a half, filled with loss, and waiting, and waiting, and more waiting, God has seen us through and we joyfully on the other side! It is unbelievably unreal and sometimes I want to pinch myself that I'm not dreaming! The queasiness and all-day-sickness has helped me feel like it is real...and I have never been so thankful to be sick in my life.

We are due in September and are praying for a healthy baby!

What did YOU do for 4th of July!?

BBQs, parades, fireworks and snow cones might be the norm for 4th of July, but we stepped out a bit. Tom was off (yea!) but we both have early mornings tomorrow (like 4am early) so we did all things us to just enjoy the day and relax: walked to Starbucks, read on the couch, ate bruchetta for lunch, did some yard-work and talked on the patio drinking diet coke. It was wonderful!

Oh, and we shaved our dog. YES, I guess we're *those* people now. I feel so bad for Maggie, she hates the heat, but who wants their dog to look like *that* dog. {You've seen 'em before, it's bad.}Don't worry! It was pretty minimal and she still looks pretty darn cute if you ask me! And hopefully, a little bit cooler!

Happy Fourth of July!

Summer Bucket List

Each summer I make a list of all my to-do's of what I need and should accomplish for the summer. Sometimes most of the time I don't finish everything. For a to-do-list-loving-person like me, that calls for some serious disappointment, but I try to not get toO hung up on it. My list usually morphs as the summer goes and items come up or disappear. What is on my list this summer?

Summer Bucket List:

 Make a special memory gift for my niece's 18^th birthday
Paint back door blue
Lose 10 pounds...aka work out and eat healthy
 Watch all 9 seasons of The Office
 See The Great Gatsby at the movie theater  Just saw it today, it was fabulous!

 Scrapbook/make photo albums for:

o  Yellowstone Vacacation (3 years ago)

o  DR vacation (2 years ago)

o  Pictures from our House (home improvement projects, etc.)

 See The Bling Ring 

 Go to the zoo
 Organize the basement

 Simplify clothes

 Read 3 books:

               o  Finish Sense and Sensibilty

               o  Memoir I ordered: Waiting For Daisy

               o  the first Harry Potter book (I've never read them!)

 Go to a [free] concert: Josh Turner

   

     I counted yesterday that I have 8 weeks left of summer...it goes so fast! Hopefully I can do all this, and more!  

Match Day

What a crazy experience! We knew that Match Day was going to be a nerve-wracking day, but we didn't know what we were in for. This was insane! But, it was a wonderful day...

We arrived at Busch Stadium and waiting in the FREEZING cold for 30 minutes. Someone was worried about getting good seats, and boy, did that pay off, when we got the best seats there! You're welcome, Tom. :) We were able to sit next to the wall of windows looking into the stadium, and less than 20 feet from the podium, directly in front of it. PERFECT!

We got our picture taken, walked around in the stadium to see the gorgeous sun coming up over the stadium and the St. Louis Arch, got some drinks and chocolate fondue, and listened to announcements. 

Then, it was 10:59am. At 11:00am on the dot they began calling names. What was amazingly fun was that each student got to choose a song, which played while they walked up to get their letter. This made it more upbeat and fun. Tom's song was Jason Aldean's Take a Little Ride. Then, the student took their letter and went back to the seat to open it. You can imagine, then, that  there is a lot going on: students getting their name called, songs played, students opening letters, people reacting. And that right there is where I began to get a little. bit. stressed. A girl to the left of us is screaming with joy. Another girl at her table is crying because she got her #4 spot. A group to the right is cheering when someone got into UNC. The guy at our table received his letter, crumpled it into a ball and walked out. He never came back. My eyes were wide and my heart was pumping. At one point they called a "Thomas" and I nearly had a heart attack. It wasn't Tom. I had the video camera ready and wanted to get it all on film, but I also wanted to survive. It literally felt like a survival situation. Don't get me wrong, it was a fun atmosphere, but there was this intensity that just hung like a cloud in the room until 12:00 when all names had been called. Whew.

Anyway, back to Tom. At 11:20 they called "Thomas Ganz" and Tom headed up to the podium. He looked fabulous and was all smiles. He came back to the table and opened the letter. I saw his reaction first: priceless. He was BEAMING, called out "YES!" and looked at me. Me? I was worried that he had read the letter wrong. Are you sure? Did it really say SLU? So, I desperately tried to read the size 8 font, and when I did, I may have given the rest of the table a show. I practically jumped onto Tom, gave him a huge hug and then a even bigger kiss. Oops! Who knew that's what my reaction would be!?  I was excited and thrilled and oh so proud of Tom! I'm so glad he was called at 11:20 because I am not sure I could not survived until noon. After that Tom just smiled and we were both so excited! And then, Tom got another drink, it was well deserved!

What does it say!? SLU!

After the Match, we had a wonderful lunch in the Redbird Club and we started to really relax. We talked about how this was the perfect venue, because people could get some space if they wanted to call relatives, and there was also something else to do after the Match. It was one of those events where you didn't want to stick around, but your adrenaline was too high not to do something else. Now it was time for fun! What fun tradition is for everyone to add their name to a map, to show where they are going for residency, which was neat. Tom added his name to St. Louis, mingled a bit, and then we headed to a tour of Busch Stadium.

We loved the tour! Here are some highlights:

The Press Box

We're on the field!

Making a call to the bull pen

In the dug out

They made a huge deal about NOT touching the grass. But, these guys were removing the sod and replacing it, so my 28 year old husband HAD to touch the "ruined" sod in the back of the gator cart just because they had said not to. Good work, Dr.!

After we left Busch Stadium, we headed to The Scottish Arms to continue celebrating. We texted friends and family to let them know we were staying in St. Louis. BUT, we kept it a surprise what program Tom got into. We wanted to reveal that at dinner with our parents. At 6:00 we met both sets of parents at Brio, where Tom gave a speech about wanting to be at SLU, but most importantly, be in St. Louis. Then, he announced he got his #1 choice: SLU OBGYN! Yea!

Dinner was delicious and then we continued the celebration once more at my parents house for a wonderful dessert and coffee. By the time we left at 10:30 we were EXHAUSTED! What an emotional roller coaster day.

We are so blessed to be able to stay in St. Louis, not have to sell our Nantucket home, and for Tom to be able to go to his top choice program in the field he wanted to be in. Praise God, He is so faithful! It is because of God's grace, and Tom's hard work and dedication that we have come so far, and we are SO thankful. It was also so neat to see our families and friends' reactions and encouragement as we went through this experience.

We are so blessed!