moving sched.!

Hey everyone...

here's the plan,

loading at 6pm at my parents house on Friday!!! (bonfire shortly thereafter???)

unloading at 10am at our new home on Saturday!!! (the beach isn't too far away if you want to make a day out of Holland)

also... if you're interested in throwing paint on the walls, the only day I will be working on it will be thursday... any help is welcome, but we will still be friends if you have something better to do! : )

just give me a call for directions...

thanks ya'll...

rm

We're Moving!! Finally!!!

Hi all! Sorry it's been a while since we've posted. We've been playing the waiting game with our lives...waiting for the baby to get here already...waiting for my grad classes to finish (3 weeks!)...waiting for our house to close...

Hopefully on Tuesday we will be in our new home. Unfortunately, I will be leaving for WI on Tuesday as well, so that leaves Russ with all the work! So, I am calling all troops to come to help paint and move. Russ will be painting and staining Tuesday evening, Wed. evening, and Thursday evening from about 6-9. Friday evening we need Rockford peeps to help pack up our loot over at the Miller's house in Rockford. Saturday, we are calling on all Holland peeps to join in the effort and help unload the uhaul in the morning at our new place. If anyone can help, please call Russ. I feel terrible that I can't be there...but someone has to open the presents at our baby shower in WI, right? ;)

Here are a couple pix that I took of the house during inspections. Not the best shots, but I'll post more once we get moved in.

30 Weeks!

Yesterday we were privileged to have another ultrasound, since Caleb was so shy at our first. However, he once again was quite shy. It took about 45 minutes to get these shots and they still aren't the greatest. So, let's see how good you are at finding the baby in the picture :)

And here's everyone's favorite...Amy's expanding belly bump (yikes).

Day 11

Well... we're back, safe and sound, and on the ground... i don't think we even took 1 picture of our trip home....so here's the last of the pics... thank you rhianon and heath so much for being our tour guides... we had a blast!

day 10

Day 9

Guam 7 & 8

On Saturday, we swam a little and snorkeled a little. When we got back, we got ready for the wedding of a co-worker of Rhianon's. It was a HUGE wedding! Beautiful too and good food.

On Sunday, the family had plans to go snorkeling at GabGab, but we locked the keys in the truck (oops)... So we went to the pool instead. Once the spare keys arrived, we went to GabGab and snorkeled, swam, bbq'd and played a while. Then we got ready for another family dinner at Pedo and Flo's house (neighbors and "adopted family" of Rhianon and Heath).

Day 6 in Guam

On this day, we toured the southern tip of Guam and learned a little bit about the culture. We also went to our first "family dinner". We all had a great time!

day 4

refrigerator down!

Days 4 and 5 in Guam

Day 3 in paradise!

Guam, Day 1 and 2

Possible torpedo belly??

Okay...so a couple of times I have seen pregnant women with a rather pointy belly that I refer to as "torpedo belly". I wonder if that will be me. Judging by the looks of it...I think so....yikes!

(6 months)

Introducing...

CALEB RUSSELL MILLER!!!




Here are the few ultrasound pics that we had at 20 weeks. They are tricky to figure out, but for you experts moms and dads, I'm sure you'll have no problem!

This is a profile picture. Caleb is sucking his thumb so his knuckles are also in the profile.

This is the 3-D picture. I know it's difficult to tell what's what, but if you look closely, you can see his little button nose and his mouth. His hands are up next to his face as well. You can even see the umbilical cord!

This is the proof that Caleb is in fact a boy! The was taken as if he was sitting on the camera. Look closely between the legs...:)

We have another ultrasound in June. Hopefully we will get some better pictures then.

for those of you who wondered...

...what I would look like if I gained 10 pounds, I thought I'd give you a little peep show.








The photo below is rated PG-13.

Yup, that's right...I'm wearing sweatpants. They are lovely too. So are my stretchmarks. Simply lovely. Actually, I had both before I got preggo- and wore both the stretchmarks and sweatpants proudly.

As soon as I get over to the Miller's house to use their scanner, I will post a picture of our little Caleb. He's very active these days. I think he thinks my uterine wall is a hamster ball. It's not.

Okay. There you go. Now all of you who have been asking for a picture can look at it and go "Oooohhh, so that's what pregnant Amy looks like". Notice I didn't let you see my face...that's because I was pale with nausea and my eyes were watering from my newly developed allergies. Good times.

(I just realized that this message is coming across a bit unhappy...that is not the case, just so you know. I am still thrilled to be Caleb's mom and can't wait to hold him in my arms, instead of in my belly!!)

So....

Today we had our ultrasound. Our little bean was not shy at all. In fact, our little bean decided to give us a little glimpse of his manlihood. Yes, that right folks, we are having a BOY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We have decided to name our little bean Caleb Russell. Already, he looks like he's going to be a big one!

As soon as we scan in our pictures, we'll post one for you all to see.

Ahhhh!! We have a son!!!!!!!!!!! crazy!!!!!!!!!!!! I still can't believe that we're pregnant!

Whoa.

Happy 30th Birthday to MEEEEEEEEE!!!!

Yes, that's right peeps...I'm 30...and proud of it! Thank you so so so much to all of my friends and family that were able to make it- and especially thank you to Russ for being the party planner. I love you all and I had a GREAT time!

Here is a picture of a few of us at Marie Catrib's enjoying a delicious dinner. Dawn... you may now officially begin signing autographs for making it on to our famous blog ;)

After dinner, we went to Naked Plates and showed our creative sides! This is Whitney and Chase painting a...well...a something.

Here is the whole crew busy at work. I can't wait to see how my plate turned out!

Easter at our place!

Yup, this year we were blessed to have Easter "dinner" and our famous Easter egg hunt at our place. Rhianon and Heath and Whitney and Jen ...you were greatly missed!Here are a few pictures of the action.
Katie was the winner! (as you can see)

A whole new life... almost...

yes... as you all may have heard, we were surprised and excited to find out about an addition coming to our family towards the end of the summer! If not, well you're out of "the loop" and you should stay in touch with us better... :) In addition to that crazy exciting addition, my first Sunday at my new church is the day after tomorrow, our house is for sale, I have a new computer, Amy and I switched cars, I got a hair cut, gained 20 lbs., got a new pair of kicks, and drink much less coffee than ever before. I have what seems like a completely new life.... it seems like, anyway. We're really excited about all of the changes, hoping and praying we sell our condo soon because the drive to holland is terrible, especially with all of this stinkin snow... maybe if I had a better realtor... :) that's assuming there is a better one... not likely though. I am going to keep the real estate gig going to be able to help friends out and make a little side cash now and then, so if you're thinking about buying/selling, or just want some info or advice, give me a call. k... advertisement over, now, back to vain discussions about myself. :) jk... I'll spare you that train wreck (for now).
Anyway - I wanted to show you all my new church! With all of the sadness about leaving friends and family, we are almost equally excited about this place. It's great! The people have been great, co-workers great, Facility is well... they're building. But it's not about the building anyway. anyway... here's their website http://www.immanuel-church.org/ .
Enjoy... and visit sometime... k?!

gotta go -
blessings,

rm

the holidays

Hello everybody.... (last comic standing, anybody?)

anyway... just wanted to let you know we had a great Christmas. thank you all for the gifts and more warm fuzzy stuff to say.... really we had a great time though, first with my family and then with Amy's... we even got to spend some time with the Guamarino's via skype. here's a few pics from the miller's Christmas.

ok... guess i only had one pic from that, and it was of a pile of bacon. guess you can tell where our priorities are. When we see piles of bacon, we take pictures because they last longer. We did get some video from the Miller's Christmas though.... ironically it isn't of any people... just of their dog showing off her new shoes...

From there we went to the Cottrell family Christmas Celebrations.... we had a great time as Amy's mom waited on us hand and foot, which seemed like a week long thanksgiving feast. We also got some great snowshoeing in...