Baby Shower Numero Dos

I am so grateful to have such wonderful friends in my life.  I had my second baby shower yesterday, and it was truly fabulous! 

Guests that attended are former co-workers from Cheeseburger in Paradise, and present co-workers from Bonefish.  We're basically one big family anyway, so it worked out perfectly! The shower was thrown by a few of my closest friends, Susan Partaker, Meghan Hinton, and Brian Warren. Brian was kind enough to host the shower at his house, so therefore it became not only a baby shower, but a co-ed baby shower.  Surprisingly, if you offer alcohol at a baby shower, boys are likely to attend!  Who knew!?  

I received some great gifts, including a basket full of books that are all personalized by the person who bought the book.  I loved this idea, because they are now super meaningful to me and each one will have a story behind it.  There was also a diaper raffle, so I got a huge stockpile of diapers that I'm sure will last me the first few months.  Congrats to Beth for winning the raffle and a great bottle of wine!

My favorite gifts came from my amazing friend Meghan, who hand-crocheted this adorable pink elephant cuddle blanket, booties, a hat, and a beautiful blanket.  I was completely shocked when I saw these gifts, and I really feel so blessed to have a friend who would take the time to put such hard work into a gift for our little baby.  These gifts will be cherished for years to come!      

After all has been said and done, it was truly a day I will never forget.  I only hope that as my child grows up, she will meet loving people and form lasting relationships along the way.  I really do feel so blessed to have such amazing people in my life and I am very thankful to have found each and every one of you! 

Baby Showers, Hospital Tours, Swollen Feet, Oh My!

It has been quite a busy couple of weeks I must say, but I have finally hit the eight month mark in my pregnancy.  I still can't believe that this is all really happening, but reality has definitely begun to set in over the last few weeks with all everything that has been going on!  This may be a long post, so bear with me.

Rob and I had our Baby Shower last weekend on Saturday, May 5.  It was held at Cary Country Club and was hosted by my amazing mother and mother-in-law.  We had a delicious lunch, followed by games and lots of gifts.  I felt truly blessed that most of our family members and closest friends were able to join us on this special day.  Special thanks to the Eastman/Kenison clans from traveling all the way from California and Georgia to celebrate new beginnings for the Patrick/Rourke families.  I was also surprised at the amount of baby items we received.  I could not thank everyone enough for their kindness and generosity!  Baby Patrick will definitely have everything she needs (at least for the first 3 months or so).

Another new event in our lives is that Rob and I started our child-birth classes.  I'm really glad we signed up for these because there sure is a lot of information out there that I would have never known about!  One part of our class last week was a tour of the maternity ward at Good Shepherd.  There are about 12 labor and delivery rooms, but only half have been completely renovated with updated everything.  The other half are fine rooms, but I'm really hoping for the "good" room.  It was actually pretty terrifying being in the delivery room.  I had all of these thoughts going through my head, and pain seemed to be all I could think about.  I know I have options, but as some of you may know, I'd like to try to do without any medical interventions.  Call me crazy, but if they could push out babies in fields years ago, I'm pretty sure my body could handle doing the same in a hospital.  What I absolutely love is the fact that the baby will be able to stay with us at all times, as long as she's healthy.  It makes me feel much better knowing that I will have full access to her no matter time or day.  Once it's all over, no matter what I decide to do, I will have the most amazing reward at the finish line and that makes it all okay.

So, a little bit about me in the past few weeks...I AM SO OVER BEING PREGNANT! Everything hurts, my feet and hands are swollen, I have developed a definite "waddle," I'm tired, I'm crabby, I hate heartburn, I pee 80 times a day, and there's nothing I can do about it!!!!! And now with summer quickly approaching, it's not looking to get any easier.  8 weeks left, and I hope they fly by! Good news is that baby is in the head down position and we are both perfectly healthy.  I have my appointment on Friday, so if anything changes, I'll update then.