...And then there were three...

We had our first doctor appointment yesterday, and all went well. So it's safe to announce that Neil and I are expecting our first child!! We can't even BEGIN to describe how excited we are! It's a huge step in our lives, and it comes with a lot of responsibility, but the time feels so right! We can't wait to be parents and hope that in the next 6 months we can learn as much as possible to hopefully not be completely caught off guard by the changes that will take place.

I am about 11 1/2 weeks along - my due date is October 14th. We were able to hear the heartbeat yesterday - WOW! What an amazing experience!! I've been incredibly fortunate to have not been very sick. Besides the occasional 'queeziness' if I don't snack often enough, and the overwhelming feeling of tiredness, I've felt GREAT! Hopefully that will continue the entire time.

As this whole experience is new to us, we are suckers for information. I've spent countless hours online reading and researching anything I can get my hands on. I love to hear stories, experiences, or advise, so anything anyone wants to share would be wonderful!

We'll keep eveyone updated as we hit some of the major milestones along the way. It's such an amazing journey and we are so excited and feel so blessed to be able to experience it!!

(This is not OUR baby - but one at 11 weeks)

Europe #1 - Part III

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After our day in Montreux, we stayed in a city called Sion. We didn’t do much touring there, but it’s a cool little city with two big hills that have castles on them, and then the city surrounds them. We did get some cool pictures. Unfortunately, as we were leaving the city, our car bumped another persons in the parking garage. Luckily, he came out of the mall we were parked at pretty soon after it happened, and was VERY cool about the whole situation. Little scary as it was a BRAND new rental car, and now had some scratches on it. Luckily again, the rental company didn’t charge us for it and we ended up being just fine in the end! My brother snapped this photo as we were trying to speak to the guy about the situation - in French of course. Luckily my brother and his wife are fluent!

We drove to this town in the Alps where you could take a train up to Zermatt. It’s a ski resort town with a really neat view of the Matterhorn. Because it’s mostly a ski town, only permanent residents are allowed on the road that takes you there – but the train ride was beautiful. There was a really neat cemetery there for people that had died trying to climb the Matterhorn and a few other surrounding giant mountains. It was kind of sad because a lot of them were in their late teens, early twenties.

We spent some more time in the cities that surround Lake Geneva. This castle was in a town called Nyon. The courtyard in front of the castle had these strange face sculptures – Weird! We also went to the Olympic Museum in Lausanne. They mostly had a bunch of statues and things commemorating all of the places where the Olympics had been.

Our last stop in Switzerland was Geneva. It was a pretty rainy day, so we didn’t get a whole lot of pictures. We mostly shopped for souvenirs in the market places. The Jet d’eau was shut off when we were there – it’s a big water fountain that Geneva is famous for. I put a picture of what it’s SUPPOSE to look like, even though we didn’t take it.

After bidding my brother and his family farewell, we made the drive over the Swiss Alps into Italy to continue the rest of our trip on our own. We encountered quite the storm as we were nearing the peak of the mountain we drove over. It was a little scary, but made for a cool picture.

...To Be Continued…

Europe #1 - Part II

So…I need to post more often. Life gets so busy – what can I say?

So after Luxembourg, we spent a day touring around the city of Metz – that’s where my brother was going to school. They have a really cool cathedral, and the oldest church in France (Built in 380 A.D.)

The next day, we went to a castle in the Alsace region of France called Haut-Koenigsberg. It was definitely an awesome choice for our first castle to visit. It had been remodeled to look like it would have ages ago – it was really neat. Here are some of the favorite pics…

On our way to Switzerland, we drove through the Black Forrest in Germany, but it was getting late, so we didn’t get any really good photos. That night we ended up in Zollikofen , Switzerland and got some cool shots of the Bern Temple at night.

The next morning we were able to do a session in the Bern Temple – really cool! Then it was off to a city called Montreux that is right on Lake Geneva. The setting there was BEAUTIFUL with the Swiss Alps in the background – breath taking! We went to one of our favorite castles called Chateau de Chillon that is right out on the lake. There’s a train that you can take around the lake that stops at all of the towns along the way. We had fun smashing coins on the tracks – just like little kids! :) This was definitely one of my favorite places in ALL of Europe.