The Luck o' the Irish

Happy St. Patrick's Day (a little belated)! I love St. Patrick's Day, though it was a little different this year not being able to toast my heritage with a beer :). Nonetheless, it was a very exciting day, as we had our second ultrasound, and another doctor's appointment, and baby Lehr is growing rapidly. During our little session, we saw him/her flip over, dance around quite a bit, and it even looked like the baby was sucking its thumb! Pretty exciting stuff, considering I still can't feel a thing!!

Spring is my favorite time in Austin . . . it finally gets a little green, the weather is spectacular (low 80's with no humidity), and the end of school is in sight! We took advantage of the amazing weather yesterday and celebrated St. Patrick's Day with some of our favorite people--Jon, Sarah and Peter and our neighbors, Eston and Brenda. I love to entertain--something about being surrounded by your favorite people, eating, drinking (water for me), and laughing. I always like an excuse to cook for a crowd too. It is much more fun than just cooking for Philip and I (although Philip is a great guinea pig--he loves just about every food).

This weekend Philip and I are off to San Antonio to see Billy Joel and Elton John. I cannot wait. Not only have I never been to San Antonio, Billy Joel is pretty much my favorite musician of all time. Add that to spending time with my favorite person, and it is bound to be a memorable weekend. I. Can't. Wait.

Here are the latest ultrasound pics of baby #1. It is insane how much he/she has changed in the last three weeks, and I know it will be even more changes in the coming weeks and months! Almost done with the 1st trimester--thank goodness! Though I still have avoided nausea, I am literally exhausted 98% of the time. I look forward to getting some energy back (I know Philip looks forward to this too--I think he is sick of losing me to bed at 7:45 each night :)!

And so it begins . . .

I cannot say I entirely understand the complete fascination with blogs . . . me, I have enough trouble remembering to do the little things each day, let alone remembering to keep up with a blog. I was terrible at keeping a diary, and worse at keeping a journal, until I did so for Philip when he was gone on his six month deployment to the Western Pacific. Then, I remembered to write every night. So in keeping with that idea, we have decided to start a blog to keep our friends and family who are far away, up to date on Baby Lehr #1 (coming September 2009). I figure since I am keeping it for other people (technically), I might remember to post more often. In addition, quite a few friends of ours have blogs, and I find reading them incredibly interesting and amusing. I'm not sure my life is quite as interesting, but we'll see how it goes.

So far pregnancy really has not been too difficult. I have avoided the dreaded "morning" sickness pretty much altogether, though there have been a few nauseous days. I do feel tired all the time, but really, there's not a big difference between what is happening now and my normal life. I really like to sleep and find very few excuses to stay up late.

The most thrilling day so far was the day I saw the baby (Cletus the fetus as Philip calls him/her) on the ultrasound. He/She is definitely extremely active, and it is totally surreal to see this baby moving around like crazy, and not being able to feel a thing. I know that is because the baby is really quite small still, and it won't be long before I feel the movement. But, I've had such few extreme pregnancy symptoms, that sometimes I worry about how everything is going. So to see such an active baby in there was completely blissful. Still quite a bit of time to go (I am almost 12 weeks), and I can't wait to experience all that lies ahead. Stay tuned . . .

Here is our first "picture" of baby Lehr. He/she is tiny but already adorable!