20 Weeks and a Birthday Boy

Friday was a fun, albeit exhausting, day.

Shannon turned 37. The day started with birthday pancakes and a skype call with his dad.

My first attempt at number pancakes. Not too bad!

Then we walked Lane down to some friends' house where the dad babysat Lane and our friends' kid while we all went to IKEA. Thank you, Tim, for giving us a relaxing day shopping instead of a stressful one!

Lane loves to ride on daddy's shoulders.

No photos of IKEA. I mean, it's IKEA. We did eat lunch there and spent a long time there. Our friends needed to pick out big things like a couch, so they wanted to be sure to get what they liked. Our list was much shorter and was mostly things for Lane's room. When her room is all put together you'll see photos.

After IKEA, we rushed home in order to spend a few minutes with Lane before heading out again. Our friend Kristina came and babysat so that we could go out for dinner. Thankfully Lane loves Kristina, so it wasn't any skin off of her back that we only saw her for about two hours all day long!

Technically this was our anniversary dinner, but we went on Shannon's birthday since Fridays are less hectic than Wednesdays, generally speaking.

My chargrilled chicken sandwich. It was yummy!

So, on Shannon's birthday, on a Friday, we went to TGIFriday's! We hadn't been before, and quite honestly probably won't return. The food was good, but by the time you take into consideration the hour it took us to get there, the hour it took us to get home, the fact that they didn't have their air conditioning on and it was about 87° outside (and inside too), and that our dinner was about $40 (a burger, a chicken sandwich, and two small waters)...it was good, but not that good. Shannon's still on the quest for the best hamburger in Istanbul, as Friday's burger was not, in his opinion, worth the extra cost over and above NumNum's burger.

Shannon with his birthday/anniversary burger, complete with fake (not pork) bacon!

We were so hot after traveling an hour in the heat and eating our meal in the heat that we were honestly not up for being out in heat anymore. So, despite the fact that Kristina was spending the night at our house and we could stay out as late as we wanted, we headed home and were home by about 8:30. Shannon bought ice cream and we all made banana splits/sundaes and watched You've Got Mail, which Shannon had never seen. I assembled the step stool we bought for Lane, and we stayed up way too late. It was a good birthday/anniversary celebration!

20 weeks + one day.

And lastly, Friday marked 20 weeks, or halfway through this pregnancy. Only 4.5 months to go!

Date Night!

Without the baby.


A mocha, a cream-filled chocolate iced doughnut, and a cocoa-cappuccino doughnut.

Fantastic.

One Last Date

Last Thursday, the day before my induction, Shannon and went on our "last date." We know that we will get to go on dates in the future, but we'll either have a baby with us or we'll have to find a babysitter, so it was our last date without worrying about any of that kind of stuff.


Veronica's. It's located in Old Town Kenai, right across from the Russian Orthodox Church and about a two-minute walk from the bluff overlooking the ocean. It was a beautiful day, as you can see from the sunshine and clear skies!

We went to a coffee shop named Veronica's for lunch. We've been in there before for coffee, and we went in with Shannon's family, but we only had coffee that time too, other than a cup of soup that I had. I've been dying to go in there for their tomato-basil soup, which is the best I've found outside of Eastern Europe, but they haven't had it any of the times that we've stopped in. So, I called on Thursday before we left, and they had tomato-basil soup. I was ecstatic.


We sat on the closed-in porch, next to the fireplace. Sometimes it's chilly out there, but it was nice and toasty last Thursday!

We took our time getting ready, ordering, and leisurely enjoyed our lunch, talking about how at that time the next day our lives would be totally different and just enjoying our time together.


Chicken-cashew sandwiches, tomato-basil soup, and sun-dried tomato pasta salad with cornbread. We wanted dessert but were too stuffed!

It was really strange, going about our day knowing that we'd have a baby the next day. Usually when you're pregnant and in the last weeks there's the "it could happen any time" anticipation of going into labor. However, I had given up hope and knew that we'd be going in for the induction, so the suspense of the "surprise" aspect of going into labor was removed. It was weird doing everything that last day with the knowledge that it was the last time things would be that way.


The view out the window where we were sitting. The Chapel of St. Nicholas is on the right.

However, now that we have our baby girl, I think that we're ok with things being different! I'm sure that the day will come when we long for privacy or for the ability to make decisions without feeling responsible for other people, but for now...loving on and taking care of Lane is proving to be wonderful. As of now I wouldn't trade motherhood for anything in the world!

Date Night

Flowers that Shannon bought me on Sunday. Unfortunately they didn't last very long!

Today I got a surprise. Shannon called me at about 3:00 this afternoon to let me know that he had made us dinner reservations. I was shocked. First of all, you have to understand that we just don't eat out. I mean, if we're traveling and on the road, then yes, we eat out. But we rarely go out to eat after church or any other time. I personally can't justify doing it very often because I can feed both of us for a week on what it costs us to eat out once at a nicer place (think...not Chili's or the like). So, anyways.

He brought me a change of clothes (I had marker on my shirt and water six inches up my pants legs) and then whisked me off to an undisclosed restaurant. About 20 minutes later I find myself at a little place called Cafe Tiramisu. It was positively wonderful. It's a small, family-owned Italian restaurant in Raleigh. The atmosphere was romantic and the service and food were excellent. Our dishes were reasonably priced, and the tiramisu was the best I've ever had. My eggplant parmigiana was so large that I'll be eating the remainder for lunch tomorrow. And Shannon loved the olive oil to dip his bread in and the cream sauce in which his spinach raviolis and shrimp were swimming. It was a good date and a great surprise.

After dinner we went to The Fresh Market. Now, I've heard a lot about it but had never actually been to one. I was pleasantly surprised. The prices were not exorbitant, their selection of flowers was magnificant, and overall, we had a good time just wandering around the store. We also bought some bulk coffee...they have it in bins so you can try before you buy a whole pound! Usually I just buy cheap coffee and we fix it up with flavored creamer, but we decided to be coffee snobs for a couple of days and go with spendy stuff. So, we bought some Decaf New Orleans French Roast and some Decaf Molten Chocolate. The French Roast was my choice and the Molten Chocolate was Shannon's. He's more of a chocoholic than I am! So...we'll try out the coffees and cast our vote. Perhaps it will become a regular thing until we've tried all the varieties.

Speaking of coffee, we are on a virtually caffeine-free diet. No caffeinated sodas, tea, or coffee will be found in our house (except for the box of tea I found at triples for $.14 and couldn't resist). But Shannon works with a guy who roasts his own coffee and gave Shannon three samples for us to try, so we've been drinking regular coffee for the past ten days or so. Today I didn't drink my usual morning cup because I felt dehydrated and opted instead for water. Well, as a result I had a killer headache all morning and into the afternoon. Stupid caffeine, messing me up! Hopefully by tomorrow I'll be back to normal, no headaches and perfectly satisfied with a good cup 'o Joe and curling up in the papasan to read a good book. Ok, maybe not a good book, but a book that I have to read for class.

Oh, so after we went to The Fresh Market, we headed to Old Navy because I needed to return something. While we were inside I noticed that a couple of things I'd bought last weekend were now on sale. So I asked if they gave refunds if something went on sale within a certain period of time, and they said yes! If an item goes on sale within two weeks, you can bring your receipt in and they will refund you the difference. I just happened to have my receipt with me, so I got back $12! I went in to return one thing, pocketed that money, and simply let them scan my receipt while I bought a couple of smaller things (which I also had a 40% off coupon for), so I left with two things and an extra $1.60 or so in cash. That was fun. I love saving money.


Shannon playing football with a new "friend" while I'm checking out at Old Navy.

This weekend will be spent doing homework and cleaning our apartment. We're having company for dinner on Monday, so the much-neglected housework will finally get done, and I have about 40 pages of reading and two quizzes to do for one of my classes and then as much reading as I can manage to do for my other class, plus menu prep and grocery shopping on Sunday. Oh, and going to REI's Garage Sale to hopefully buy new running shoes. The ones I like are a whopping $125 (or $135 after tax), so maybe, just maybe they'll have Asics' Gel Kayanos in my size for only $50 or so. Here's hoping...I really need new shoes!

Since this seems to be an extraordinarily long post, I think I'll quit before everyone is too bored to read any more. Maybe Tropical Storm Hannah will give me something interesting to write about, although hopefully not of the "my car got smashed by a tree branch" variety. Until then.

Birthday/Anniversary Celebrations

So, on Friday night Shannon and I went on a date. We went to see Batman at the IMAX theater in downtown Raleigh. It was pretty good! Shannon gave Batman a five on a five-point scale. As for me...I'm not that big into movies, so I thought it was good but don't want to put a number on it.


Me and Shannon at my first IMAX! And I'm wearing my new sweater that I bought with money that Shannon's mom and stepdad Milton gave me. Thanks, guys!

Next we went to one of Shannon's favorite restaurants in the area: Shuckers. We don't go there often because it's fairly expensive to us, but for special occasions (like his birthday!) we get to go.


Shannon with his fried oysters. We were backed into the corner, so he had to duck so I could get his picture.

Then on Saturday we drove up to Virginia to go to a wedding. Here's Brian and Bonnie, the happy bride and groom, cutting the wedding (cheese)cake that Brian made!



After the wedding we headed up to Richmond so that I could see a couple of my Polish friends from when I lived in Warsaw. We didn't get to stay very long, but considering I hadn't seen them in nearly four years, it was a great treat, and we live close-by, so we should get to see each other again. Thank you Facebook for getting me back in contact with Gosia!


Ania, me, Shannon, and Gosia, with Ania's sister Ola in the back

After we left Ania's, Shannon drove me to a surprise location...a Bed and Breakfast in the Virginia countryside! This is what we saw when we drove up:



But Shannon had requested the private cabin by the lake, so this is where we went:




It was hard to get a good picture because it was small!

Anyways, we just got to do a lot of relaxing and we spent some time praying over the upcoming years of marriage and thanking God for the last one. We re-read our vows to each other and just had a great time watching tv, reading, and playing Scrabble. Then it was back to North Carolina where we've been relaxing for the rest of the evening. All in all, I'd say it was a pretty good anniversary, and I was way impressed that Shannon was so romantic as to surprise me! It was a weekend of firsts for me: my first time to an IMAX, my first time at a Bed and Breakfast, and my (our) first anniversary! They were all great.


Hanging in the hammock by the lake


An anniversary picture by the fireplace