Best Week Ever!

Hiya folks! I do apologize for my absence as of late. Finally I am afforded the opportunity to write a 29 week post! Things in Minnesota are just as they should be in the Midwest this time of year: Hot and sticky! Of course, the danger here is that you compensate with various cooling devices (fans, central air, etc.) and oftentimes you end up too cold! The picture above is a perfect example of just that and a great way to introduce this week. That big pile of blankets and pillows is what I like to call "Fort Ricardo". The empty space is where I was laying a mere half hour earlier and between my rising and when I snapped the picture, he had managed to take all of the blankets, one of my body pillows and a regular pillow to block the cool air coming from the fan. This is how I left him when I went to work that morning. Hey...I felt just fine!!! (Yes, my pregnancy heater has been kicking in in FULL force. I can see why they call it a bun in the oven!)

Last week was a busy and fun week. I have many more thank yous to dispense this week and as a general statement continue to be so grateful for all that people have done/are doing for us.

Tuesday we headed to dinner with our buddy Lindsay who Ricardo met at Best Buy. She quickly became one of my favorites and it's always nice to get together with her. Here we are with the adorable gifts she picked up for us...Hooded towels that say "Fishing for Kisses" (CUTE!) and my favorite, letters and numbers that stick to the bathtub when they are wet:

Not to toot my own horn, but my fondness for these letter and number toy concept come from my father teaching me how to read at three years old on the refrigerator with magnetic letters. If she's interested, I would love to be able to teach our daughter to do the same thing at such a tender age and hopefully she will then maintain a love for reading as I do now. Thanks for starting her education, Melbs!!!

Wednesday, my favorite South of the River mom-to-be Jess and I went for a much-needed walk. She is at 20 weeks and is just starting to feel those kicks more and more herself. The big debate is on: She and her husband Dennis are still trying to sort out whether they will find out the gender at the ultrasound or keep it a big surprise until baby's birthday! Here we are rearin' to go for our hardcore workout (yeah right...):

Thursday...Night out with my girls!!! Liza, Angie and I have been trying to find time in our schedules to get together forever now!! Finally, we found a gorgeous day to meet up at Jake's and indulge in good conversation, good food, and drinks (for some) :)

Friday: I wish I had taken a picture of the MOUNDS of clothes that our friend Aimee dropped off at our house. Aimee is one of those whose girls are always dressed to the nine in OUTFITS! Not a shirt and pants, or a onesie and skirt, but bona fide outfits! She was kind enough to drop off a huge amount of them in all different sizes! Let's just say that our little girl is going to be looking SNAZZY! Thanks a ton Aimee! We will be sure to take pictures of Baby Torres modeling the clothes...They'll be even that much cuter that way. :)

Saturday: A day trip up to Nancy's folks' cabin for Gabriella's 4th birthday party. It felt FANTASTIC! Sun, watersports and good food were enough to keep this girl happy, happy, happy! By the end of the day, my skin was about as red as a strawberry, but darn did it feel good. Thanks Angus family!

Sunday: Headed out to Lowe's and picked up some NEW CERAMIC TILE! Hallelujah! Cannot wait to see our new floors post-installation. Let's be honest, I've stopped caring about my current disgusting, torn, dirty linoleum that has been in the house since it's been built. We'll be redoing our kitchen, downstairs and upstairs bathrooms. Hooray! In completely unrelated news: Here are the prerequisite Sunday belly shots!



And this week has been going well too! Partly because we are anticipating going home for my baby shower, and most importantly, to see our families!!! We are taking a different route this time which I am thrilled about. Evidently, 94 in Wisconsin is flooded and so now we are going to head to Michigan via the UP. What has two thumbs and will be stopping for pasties and checking out the awesome scenery on the way back home??? This girl!!!


Yesterday I received the most adorable package in the mail from my favorite Disney person ever, Megspert!! In it were the three fairy godmothers from Sleeping Beauty and the most adorable Cruella DeVille jacket! (Let's just hope it really isn't made from real dalmations...After all, it is an AUTHENTIC Disney item! ;)) Thanks, Her Megcellency!


All of this excitement and still more to come! I will have tons of updates and pictures from our trip back home, so look for an update post-travel. We will be returning after Independence Day so there may be another delay in an update.

Have a safe and fun 4th of July!

xoxo

D

I Promise...

This is my "Oops, I know I owe you an update and I've been slacking" face. I promise you an update this week as I have a ton to talk about and lots of pics to post. Just wanted to post a quick disclaimer to say that I haven't forgotten about you all and you should see something shortly as soon as I have a few minutes to rub together.

Love and miss you all!

xoxo
D

Happy Father's Day!

To all my favorite dads out there...Happy Father's Day and thanks for all you've done to contribute to my life. Pictured above is a "dad-glomeration" of my favorites! Numero uno of course is the good looking chap to the left, my dad!!! Love you daddy! In the middle is my baby's daddy :)...You know who! Let's hear it for Ricardo!! And finally, none of this (especially Cardo) would be possible if it weren't for his dad/my father-in-law, Dad T!!! Love all of you guys!

Here's another one of my favorite dads with his whole family...My brother!:

From left: Meatball, McKinley, Marley and Alison.

This weekend was a splendid time, I must say! On Friday, Cardo and I had a "date night" comprised of what else?? Dinner and a movie! We enjoyed the culinary delights of Bonfire and then endured the disaster of "The Happening". I won't bore you and transform my blog into "Critic's Corner", but let's just say that you ought to wait until it arrives on DVD so that you feel much more justified in spending that hard-earned money of yours.

Saturday afternoon we perused the Stone Arch Bridge Art Festival which has become sort of an annual tradition for us. Taking place in one of my favorite areas of Minneapolis, all of the artists set up camp along Main Street (or St. Anthony Main as some call it) and parallel to that runs the St. Anthony River which runs into the St. Anthony Falls. They call it the "birthplace of Minneapolis" and there are several of the original buildings and cobblestone streets still standing. Beautiful, and darnit, we forgot to bring our camera! The temperature hit 80 that day and I discovered that I have officially entered the wimpy and whiny stage of pregnancy. Shouldn't that be an alternative name for third trimester? After walking for an hour in the hot sun amongst thousands of people, I had most assuredly had my share of people watching, art gazing and bipedalizing. (An utterly fabricated word, but necessity calls for creativity, what can I say?!?) And by the way, speaking of art gazing, please excuse my quick rant: Where in the h-e-double hockey sticks do these people get off charging as much as they do for their work?!? I would actually consider purchasing some of the items were they not asking for half of my mortgage for it! Seriously, I understand you put a lot of work into your art, but it's not even that aesthetically appealing to begin with. Save yourself some time and money and get a job curating an art museum or something. No, really. Phew, I'm done! Now, to continue our evening, Cardo and I stopped and got some yummy marinated meat from the local butcher and took it home to grill out and eat on the patio. We sat out until yet another incredible storm swept through faster than anything I've ever seen and that ended our Saturday evening.

Sunday, I made Cardo a pancake breakfast and then we cleaned out the garage. Man, did that feel good! Let's just hope that the garbage man takes all of the rubbish that we set out and doesn't leave us another nastygram like he did last week. Top the day off with some Mexican eatin's at his fave restaurant, El Loro, and we concluded our weekend just right!

This week still feeling great and can't believe we are already at 7 months! Am beginning to notice a couple of aches and pains but for the most part they are pretty mild and tolerable. No swelling so far, and thanks to either genetics or religious lotion-slathering, no stretch marks yet either. In terms of my 26 pound weight gain, it's going in just a couple of different places. Sadly, they are not good places. I seem to be thickening in the hips, thighs, and rump in addition to tummy and boobs. I am beginning to feel like a jockey at the Churchill Downs with my saddlebags! I am certainly short enough to qualify, but poor Secretariat the Third would probably crumple under this Oompah Loompah's weight! Still pretty short on breath and am now beginning to feel my girl underneath my ribs which means she's getting nice and long. I hope she's tall like her dad!

Here we are at 28 weeks:


Enjoy the rest of your week!!

Hugs,
D

Some Random Midweek Fun

Just thought I'd share a smathering of arbitrary delights for your viewing pleasure. It's little things like these that get me by another week:

Been having some fun with a makeover website discovered on Amy D.'s blog. Thanks Amy!

How's this for some excitement? Anyone in need of a Liza Minelli doppelganger? I'll have to work on the show tunes first. Which one is Liza and which one is me? It's a stumper!



Kristi dorked herself up with some helmet-head bangs too:

If you're interested, go to www.taaz.com and then show me what you've done to yourself! No serious makeover efforts need apply. I need something to make me blow milk out of my nose when I see it!

Also scored some new pictures of Marley, Mac and Alison. Here's one...I'm saving my favorite for my Father's Day entry though:


And finally, been meaning to post this one for a couple of weeks, but Angie passed this one along. A pic of Jesse's parents with B.O. (the good kind!):

Hooray for Thursday fun!

Oh yeah, may as well update you on how my 28-week appointment went yesterday as well. Let's just say that 140 was the magic number of the day! I had my glucose screening done and I wanted to be under 140. I tested 118 right after lunch so that's good! Baby's heartbeat was at 140 bpms and my weight was also 140! I recall two months ago when my doctor was encouraging me to indulge a bit and hold off on the exercising since I wasn't gaining enough. Fast forward two months and now I got the indirect lecture..."Are you walking? No? Feel free to start!" Also making all of these seem VERY real, we scheduled all of the rest of my appointments. Beginning next month, I am to start going in every two weeks, and then the month after that, every week until she's born!! I have a feeling that this is going to go very fast from here on out...

Take care and enjoy the rest of your week!

Danielle

Third Trimester Begins

Grand Marais, MN

----Well folks, the great summer time is upon us and I decided to post a few pics of our favorite places last year. We do not currently have a new pic of Danielle this week, but we will have one by this weekend.

----The past 6 months have just flown by and we are actually entering the third trimester this week. This has so far been a chill tempered summer, but I think Danielle is still hot at night. This is the first time in my life where I have ever seen Danielle with no blankets or sheets on her at night. I do have to admit, I love her body pillows though. There are times at 5 in the morning, we are spooning the same pillow and she reminds me who owns that pillow with a brisk shove to my chest. So I roll over like a good husband and wait for her to go to work so I can claim the pillow for the last 45 minutes of sleep.

----Last Saturday we decided to invest in a new camcorder from Best Buy and get ready for the new arrival in September. (Even though I have a feeling she will come in August). We decided to have the camcorder for our Baby shower in Michigan and start to record our family events. So get ready to be taped when we are home. Danielle will be having her baby shower on June 29th at the Saginaw Country Club. We are very excited to go home and see everybody and we are also very thankful for all of those who have helped organize this celebration of life. We have also decided to stay for the week, so we can enjoy the 4th of July with our families.

----Danielle and I discussed possibly going camping this weekend, so who knows if we will have any new camping pictures. Are favorite place to camp is Grand Marais (picture above), but with the chilly temp, I think we will stay south of the cities.

----I have posted a few of my other favorite pics and hope you enjoy them. Thanks for keeping up with us during this exciting time of our lives. Enjoy!!!!!!

----Ricardo and Sidney at Grand Marais :)

Is that a blackberry on a camping trip? Come on!!!!!! Danielle sticking her head of the tent at Mt Rushmore. Thanks Aunt Judy for the tent!!! Gianna and her uncle.

**Update**

Hey all! FINALLY got a chance to update this weekend myself...Sorry for the delays lately! Cardo's entry this week was more than sufficient and I absolutely love when he writes an update. Sometimes it's nice to hear what's going on in his head while all of this craziness is happening. Nevertheless, I wanted to add a couple of things in as some thanks are in order today.

First of all--Again, thanks Cardo for updating. Love you!

Second -- A HUGE, huge, GIANT thanks to Toto. He helped Germa Filly out with some hearing aids which is much appreciated. She has made the decision to move into an assisted living situation with Uncle Ray (her brother) and what a perfect time to hear well! She'll be making a ton of friends because after all, who wouldn't love to make friends with little old "Emiline"???

Third -- To Granny D and Mom T for putting together our baby shower. I received the invitation in the mail today and it is adorable! Thank you so much for throwing this for us and we are so thankful and lucky to have such wonderful families who we love so much. I snapped a picture of the invitation for memories:

And last but SO not least -- We received a wonderful and fun package from my oldest and best friend Kristi. She is "that girl" when it comes to being fun and thoughtful. Why can't we all be like her?!? I had so much fun opening the package! Of course, she had to give me a "key" to all of the gifts on the card so that I could identify which each item was. Everything was fun and kitschy...Check out this stash of fun stuff!: Some of the fun stuff included in this amazing package: A "Whoozit", a teether attached to a rattle so her hands won't get cold when she's sucking on it, a "Munchkin", a cool way to introduce solid foods into her diet! It's got a little mesh part that you put berries, ice chips, etc. into. "Shrimp Roll Bento Box", a cute sushi inspired Bento Box with a little Shrimp Roll onesie. Plus, all the fixin's are little non-toxic baby soaps! A "Boo Bunny", a cute little bunny-shaped washcloth with a little slot for an ice pack for when she gets her first boo boo. :( A "Taggie" blanket, someone was genius enough to figure out to make a blanket with "tags" sewn everywhere around it since babies seem to concentrate on the one tag on your everyday average blankies. A Hello Kitty doll...We need SOMETHING to remind our girl of Aunt Kristi, that's the best way to do it! Little Mary Jane socks and my favorite...A pacifier that says "No Hablo" on it. ALSO...She got something for yours truly too!! The white underneath all the goodies is an adorable baby doll tank and a tank top to go with it. Hooray for goodies!!!

An update on how I'm feeling this week: Still for the most part feeling pretty good. I must say though, as if on cue, third trimester has definitely begun with this here mother-to-be feeling, well...pregnant! As Cardo mentioned above, I am feeling hot a lot. I am also having trouble breathing and I must say that I believe I am starting to waddle. My bladder seems to be back in full force again and I find myself getting up quite often in the middle of the night to take advantage of the facilities. She's moving a ton now and it will for sure be one of the things that I miss the most post-pregnancy. My June prenatal appointment is tomorrow and I'm anxious to see how much weight I've gained. As of May, I had gained 18 pounds, so I am most definitely well over 20 pounds by now I presume. I started this journey at 114 pounds and to think of myself at almost 140 pounds is crazy! Soon I will outweigh even the manliest of men! Hulk Hogan, I challenge you! Here are this week's pictures. I'm kind of liking to see how I look in clothes and outside of clothes as this belly progresses, so I'll post both:

Happy June!

Who says a girl in the family way can't look unbelievably elegant? Okay, okay, I concur...Not so much. All the same, short of a small struggle with some late night acid reflux when I lie down for bed, I still feel great! Here's the baby girl and I at 26 weeks and 3 days. I'm sorry to report that there's not too much more in the pregnancy category to update you on! Maybe that's a good thing...

In other news...Seems to be my primary topic of blogging as of late, but darnit, I'm excited! We are finally in the midst of some presentable weather and I have every intention to enjoy it fully. This weekend was no exception although in true Minnesota fashion, we were treated to some pretty gnarly storms that interrupted the sunshine for just a spell.

On Saturday we decided to pay a visit to the always trendy Uptown area since it happens to be a choice area to stroll around and people watch. Should I also mention that I had a couple of gift cards burning a hole in my pocket from Christmas that were in dire need of spending?!? Done and done! To top the evening off, we were able to slip into our favorite restaurant and grab a highly sought-after patio table to indulge in some appetizers and drinks. Add our friends Liza and Joey into the mix and a few hours later we were having dinner and dessert too! The only tiny hitch to our lovely evening was when the tornado siren went off and one of the above-mentioned storms unleashed its fury on all of the Twin Cities. The hail was the size of golf balls and by the time it was finished, there was so much ice on the sides of the road that it looked like it had snowed! Finally, Liza and Sawyer stopped back to the house to visit before we called it a night. Sawyer is getting huge and is so adorable! To see how much he's grown, check out my entry back in March when he was born!

Here he is just getting ready to take a snooze in the swing:

The close of the weekend left me feeling just as satisfied as Saturday did. You know it's going to be a good day when upon hearing your phone ring on a summer Sunday, the name "Toto" flashes upon your caller ID. To us it can only mean one thing...BARBECUE!!! I'm guessing that most of my readers haven't had the good fortune to sample Toto's ribs and brisket, but if you have, you would know that when Toto summons you for a visit to eat his food, don't walk...RUN! And if you know what's good for you, be sure to secure yourself a spot closest to the grill to ensure you aren't left sopping up what's left of the delectable juices with a piece of bread because everyone else got there first and left you with nothing. Needless to say, I whipped up a few of my famous sides and trucked my butt on down to Toto's faster than you can say "Feed Me Seymour!" After all, yours truly, Pregger McPreggerton can never get too much to eat these days.

Even though I'll never know Toto's trade secret completely, what I do know is that he starts smoking those bad boys first thing in the morning. Then he bakes them. Then he grills them in a charcoal grill, brushing his homemade barbecue sauce everywhere. This meat is absolutely falling off of the bone.

Probably the first picture of Toto to interpret the following caption in a productive way:

Toto Smoking!

The final spread:

The crew and I...Are we back in Saginaw? (L-R: Me, Khoa, Scottie, Toto, and Stephen):


Is Cardo going to try out for the MLB?...:

...Only if they serve Ron Diaz before the games!!!

There you have this week's news! Talk to you in week 27 which according to some resources is the beginning of THIRD TRIMESTER! No really, where has the time gone??? Before we know it, we'll be a fresh set of parents without a clue in the world.

Hugs,

D. :)