Wow, a lot has gone down since I last wrote. First we have been continuing on the we need to get as much class time knocked out as possible trek. We had our weekly birthing class one night where I got the pleasure of wearing a fake belly and pretending to be pregnant. Basically it was really easy, I have no idea why women complain about that or any other part of pregnancy, seems almost like a non event. . . I kid, I kid. Anyways we attached a few of those pics below. We also had the pleasure of going to breastfeeding class last week. Let me tell you, there is no better way to spend a Wednesday evening than talking about breast/bottle feeding for 3 hrs. Wasn’t awkward at all, especially since it was the first of the 1,000 degree days we are now having and I had gone out to play fetch with cooper before class and forgot to pour on deodorant, so I may or may not have smelled for the 3 hrs. Oh and someone who works for PwC (where Lela works) sat next to me, so combine the videos with the fact that I may have smelled like a hog shed (Lela wouldn’t tell me if I did) to make it a great time. In all seriousness though, these classes are really helpful, especially for me, so they are definitely money well spent. I will be glad when every night isn’t filled with a class or a meeting or something as we hit the home stretch in coming weeks

Then last weekend, we headed up to Alden for a baby shower that Mom and Jill put on. It was more of a couples bbq baby shower, so there were no games or any of that, just hanging out and eating mostly. Anyway, Jill decorated and did an unbelievable job, to the point where I wonder if she should quit teaching and start a baby shower planning business. Mom did a great job of getting all the food and everything organized with the help of Dad, so that was greatly appreciated also. Lela and I were definitely humbled and felt very blessed by all the gifts and enjoyed getting time to interact with everyone, so it was pretty much as good as a weekend could be.

It was also Coopers’ first non tiny pup trip up north and he did great. He slept most of the drives in both directions and played approximately 3 hrs total of fetch on Saturday, which is pretty much his idea of a perfect day.

On the home front I am 90% sure Lela is in full fledged nesting mode, so there is a lot going on! We got the exterior of our house painted last week also, so that was good to get done. We didn’t go crazy with a huge color difference, but got something new and they also took care of a few boards of rot for us. Overall, it looks great and its nice to have it done, now its time to refocus on getting the rest of the stuff ready for the arrival of Mila. Mila is a very um, mobile child. There are many days and nights when Lela laughs and looks at her stomach and I can literally see a limb moving across. Maybe she'll get it all out now and come out ready to nap?

Hope everyone out there is keeping cool. Looks like this week is going to be one the hottest on record for June here in KC. Does that mean we’ll have some nice cool weeks in July???? I think we both hope so (me because I am generally a natural inferno, Lela because she’s you know, pregnant). Lela’s doing well still, everything’s on track so there’s no news to report, in a good way.

Belly to Belly.

Naps wouldn't be that hard!

Mom and Dad with the 3 of us.

The 5 ladies in the Huebner clan (Mila already included in the count). What's the overunder on shopping trips already planned for this crew?

Travis and Missy who made the trek up to the big A!

Presents galore. Looks like based on the brightness behind us we might be in heaven!

Lela and I in front of one of the many tables.

Mom and daughter matching. . . is this a sign of things to come for us?

Mila's first Hawkeye onesie. We will definitely show her the ways of the Hawkeye at an early age. Would have been much easier to just put a tigerhawk on her wall. . . I'm just saying!

Some of the decorating.

More of the decorating.
Even more decorating!

Tasty treat

Mila's first ride's. Based on how much she's been moving lately, she'll be ready to go!

Pregnancy Picture

Realized that we hadn't posted updated pic of the pregnancy belly...so here you go: here I am at 31 weeks after a morning run (excuse the dark nature of the photo!).

Thoughts at 32 weeks...

So the day is finally here...for me (Lela) to add some thoughts to this blog of ours! Life has been pretty crazy and hectic during most of my pregnancy and I'm hopeful that work (and life) will slow down a bit these next couple months to allow for Mike to prepare for the new little one's arrival.
On Friday, I had my 32 week doctor appointment and am happy to report that everything went well - good heartbeat and I'm measuring at 32 cm. I have remained very active through a combination of running, swimming, lifting weights, and prenatal yoga and must say that I truly feel that this has helped contribute to how great I have felt throughout pregnancy (and help to keep me sane:).

Other thoughts on pregnancy....
- I have been very entertained and amazed by the various kicks and other acrobatic moves that I've been felt from the baby the past few weeks and I am happy to say that Mike has even had the pleasure of feeling many of these movements too! I can safely say that these baby "movements" are the one thing I will miss after pregnancy.
- Continue to notice the "interesting" looks various people give me in public, especially from various co-workers as I'm generally heading to the restroom several times a day it seems! The looks seem to vary from a general stare at the belly when I'm at Target and the same look when I'm on my neighborhood running route. Not sure that I've adopted the pregnancy "waddle" yet but I'll keep you posted...
- Luckily I still have retained the ability to sleep as if I am hibernating (or in a coma) but it is a challenge knowing you no longer have the option to sleep on your back or stomach. I will see how the rest of this journey goes with my sleep patterns but I do have a boppy pillow that I use to support my belly and have to say that one night after returning to bed from a trip to the bathroom, Mike had swallowed up my pillow and claimed it as his own in the few minutes I had been away...he had joked on multiple occasions that he would like his own boppy and apparently he really wanted one that night!

Birthing classes

Lela and I have now been to 2 birthing classes. Class 1 was very informative and luckily nothing too graphic. Basically we learned the basics about the whole birth process. By “we” I mean me and the other 12 or so dad’s in the class as I think most of the mom’s were just there to support us and say, "yeah honey I knew that like 5 months ago." Yes, birthing class appears to be as much as the future mom’s helping the dad’s get a clue as it is about the dad’s learning how to support the wives and get them through the glory that is labor. The class starts at 7 and lasted til almost 9:30 on the first night. Is it really a good idea to keep pregnant women up that late? They at least have snacks so the pregnant ones might just be suffering from sleep deprivation and don’t have food deprivation anger increase any problems. Of course since Lela wants to stay up til 12 every night, no worry of either! Second class they showed some video, basically what you would expect, not exactly fun to watch, but it has to happen.

Lela is still doing well. We joined a new gym that enables her to swim in addition to other workout things so that’s been nice. She says the baby seems to move practically all day, which at this point sounds like she thinks it’s more fun than a pain. I have even gotten to feel a few times when she’s moving around in there, it’s pretty funny really. No creepers have tried to touch Lela’s belly, hopefully we can stick with that pattern for the next 2 months! We are still buying stuff, holy crap there are many things to think about. I mean I thought you bought a crib, some clothes and diapers and a dresser maybe but there’s a lot more thought to it. We have been using a Baby Bargains book that my ex coworker Nicole gave us in addition to consumer reports so we have to run everything through those sources before buying.

We are getting our house painted. It was probably overdue; some of it was really starting to peel. Decided to roll with a similar simple plan and keep it brown, though a darker brown and change the trim to white. I will drop in some before and after pics once its done . . . being done will depend largely on if it ever stops raining. I am not going to complain about the rain as its nice to just keep it cool in June as long as possible and keep the grass growing.

No real developments on the Cooper front. He has gotten pretty good at catching the Frisbee in the air. Not sure if that’s more fun for him or for us, but we’ll take what we can get for either party.

I dropped a few pics of Lela, Cooper and the 2 of them together. Please note these are the few times we could get Cooper to remain down!

Long time no write!

Not sure why, but I haven’t posted in awhile. Lela is doing well (I knock on wood when I say that). She’s still running and keeping active and work has finally slowed down so she can get some additional rest. Of course, with Lela that doesn’t always mean she does because she’s a bit of a night owl, a trait which seems to be shared by Mila who likes to work on her gymnastics in preparation for joining the Blue Valley gymnastics club starting at 10pm or so. If that doesn’t make sense, see some of the original posts about our girls future in gymnastics and the origins of the name Mila. Though the length of Lela’s sleep sometimes suffers with the whole pregnant and just being Lela thing, she still sleeps soundly through the night (sans going to the bathroom once) so that has been good.

With this additional time we have also been able to get going more on house projects. Mostly its focused on prepping the baby room, but there are a lot of things we have to do pre baby as it sounds like we aren’t going to be ready for taking on any project the first month or soJ Tonight is also the first night of birthing class. I, um, can’t wait! It’ll be interesting to say the least. Not sure what I am the most scared of, the knowledge I will obtain or having like 10 pregnant women in one room. I know they have this class all the time, but how is it legal to have that much in hormones and estrogen in one room?????

We have also been on an adventure looking for baby furniture. So far we have the glider and are now on a mission to find a dresser that we like and you don’t pay crazy amounts for. When you stamp “Baby” on anything it seems to increase in price by 15%, probably due to the hormones and estrogen mentioned above. I am surprised they don’t just put a baby furniture store in the building where the birthing classes to capitalize off the decreased level of logic that is occurring. Did I say decreased logic? I meant to say increase in love and everything niceJ

Cooper is trucking along, he had a big weekend last weekend. First of all Saturday morning I decided I was going to take him for his first run of any distance to see how he did and wear him out. We went about 2 miles and he did great! He was also tired for at least a couple hrs, which for a 8.5 month old golden is phenomenal. Then later that day he caught his first Frisbee in the air! He can catch tennis balls on the hop but hasn’t mastered the Frisbee until Saturday. He even caught one where he had to jump. Granted 80% of them still bounce of his chest, but we’ll take what we can get and its pretty good for a dog of his age. With how excited we get over events like those, it might get obnoxious when baby Mila first says, “Go Hawkeyes” or something of the sort, so beware.

I will post some pictures tomorrow.