Half way there!

I can't believe that I'm halfway through my pregnancy already. The time has gone by so fast. I'm feeling so good that sometimes I have to look down at this growing belly to remind myself that I'm pregnant. Last week we got something even better than my bulging belly to show us what's going on. Here are some pictures from my 20 week ultrasound. I was absolutely, completely amazed by how much we could see. Oh, and for those of you wondering, we didn't find out the sex. We're just going to wait until this little one makes it's grand entrance.

We caught baby sucking his/her thumb.

The baby was really moving around a lot. Legs and arms were moving all the time. Here's a shot of the legs. You can see where the ultrasound tech. typed in "knee" on the picture. The lower leg goes up to the left from there and then there's the foot. I think that's the other leg/foot to the left of that.

And now on to a couple belly bump shots...

My brother and sister-in-law are expecting their first (a boy!) in December. Our due dates are only a week apart (and hopefully the babies will come at least a week apart or my parents will go crazy driving all over to meet new grandbabies). Here we are at my cousin's bridal shower on July 12th. Megan was just starting her 20th week and I was at the beginning of my 19th week.

Here's my bump at the end of my 20th week.

I figured I'd throw a shot of the dads-to-be in here, too. Here they are back in May at my cousin's wedding where we shared our good news with family.

Bridgett's baby shower

Bridgett made it home in June and we were able to have a little baby shower with the Sturgis girls. She was looking great and it was so much fun to see her and the rest of the ladies.

Fieb Fest 2009

In June, Russ and I were able to make it to the 2nd Annual Fieb Fest BBQ Cookoff in Sturgis.

My brother rounded up about 7 cooks for a BBQ showdown of ribs, chicken, pork and steaks.

Here are the seven carefully chosen judges. You might recognize the 3 judges on the right side of the picture. They are all well rehearsed eaters and know good food when they meet it.

Here's the family relaxing and enjoying what was a perfect summer day.

Oh baby!

Here is the first picture of the little peanut growing inside me. Looks like he or she is waving at all of us. We had an ultrasound today and it was moving around like crazy. I'm at 11 weeks and the baby is almost 2-1/2" long.

Chicago Trip

Near the end of April, we spent a long weekend in Chicago to celebrate our birthdays and our anniversary. We did a LOT of walking around (I have plenty of blisters on my feet to prove it!).

Here I am at Navy Pier with downtown Chicago in the background.

We also went to Shedd Aquarium. They're doing some construction so we didn't get to see a few things. Russ was especially bummed about not getting to see the penguins.

We did see a HUGE anaconda though. Well, we saw parts of him. He was all wound up but what we could see was enough to make us glad there was a thick glass wall between us.

We also walked through Millenium Park and stopped by "The Bean" for a picture.

Saturday night we met up with friends, Mel and Stephen, for dinner.

Detroit Tigers Spring Training

My mom and I decided to go to Florida this year to catch some Tigers spring training games. First thing we did when we got down there was drive up to my uncle's in Jacksonville for a visit. We had a short but really nice visit and were really glad we made the trip to spend some time with them.

Uncle Allen, Irene and Amira

We got a quick tour of the Jacksonville area and took a minute at one of the beaches there. It was a bit windy and cool, even for us Michiganders, but there were a lot of people laying out, soaking up the sun.

Joker Marchant Stadium
Winter home of the Detroit Tigers

It was a lot harder than I expected it would be to get close to players/coaches for signatures but we managed to get a few. We were able to get a lot of pictures though.

Manager Jim Leyland

My boy! Brandon Inge

Jeff Larish

A couple of oldies but goodies...Al Kaline

"Sweet Lou" Whitaker

Vegas Trip

A few weeks ago we headed out to Las Vegas for a long weekend with the Saddlers. Here are a few pics from our trip. Unfortunately, we didn't hit it big but we had a great time.