Meeting Family and Friends

Lydia has had many excited visitors!! Here she is meeting Grandma and Grandpa for the first time.

Aunt Robin and Uncle Jon came to visit. As you can see, she instantly fell in love… :)

Peter and Erica also visited. Here’s Peter (aka Dwight Schrute) making a distinguishable mark on Lydia that only we know of so that we can be sure she doesn’t get switched! ;) (It’s an Office thing…! And don’t worry, no mark was made!)

Jeff and Erin got to meet Lydia also. John and Lydia hit it off immediately ;)

And of course, Lydia couldn’t wait to meet her cousins!!

Hannah and Micah LOVED holding her!

Lydia got to spend a morning with “Auntie” Erica while she did a photo shoot! (Pics coming soon!)

Lydia can’t wait to meet the rest of her new friends and family!!

Lydia Joy!

We’re so happy to announce that Lydia Joy was born on January 8, 2010! Right on her due date!! 

Labor started pretty abruptly Thursday night and then progressed for about 12 hours in the hospital before our little girl arrived. I’ll share all the details another time if anyone’s really interested. But for now, on to the exciting things about LYDIA!

She was born at 8:05am on Friday at a healthy 7 pounds, 7 ounces and 21 inches long (nice and tall!)

Blessed to be is now a complete understatement. We can’t begin to describe the joy that she has already brought to our lives.

These first few days, Adam and I have just been in awe of her beauty and God’s amazing creation. I think it’s still sinking in that we are parents and that she is ours to raise and grow in the ways of the Lord! What a privilege!

Thank you so much to all of our loving friends and family who were praying for Lydia and me throughout labor, delivery, and recovery. We couldn’t have asked for a better first week. Praise the Lord!

Lydia has had a lot of “firsts” already in one week… We’ll try to keep you posted on all of that soon!

waiting :-)

Well, I've made it through 9 months and I'm still feeling pretty good! Our little miracle is technically due to arrive on January 8, but ultimately we know her arrival is all in God's perfect timing.

I decided it'd be fun to post a poll: When do you think our little girl will arrive?! (See above)

And any tips on what to add to this list (It's mostly for Adam- stuff to grab while heading out the door!)

home for Christmas

With baby Hunter’s arrival quickly approaching, we are spending Christmas and New Years close to home this year :)

We hung our little girl’s first ornament, a “Superbaby” onesie

Our daddy, mommy, and baby gifts from Grandma Bond:

Our Christmas present to each other this year is a digital SLR camera!! It’s so cool!! I still need to read the manual to figure everything out. So far, I can turn it on and take an auto focus picture, but that’s about it!!

Adam has figured out quite a bit this last week. Check out some of the cool photos he’s taken:

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Mom and Dad drove in from CT to spend the next several weeks out in the midwest visiting their 6 (soon to be 7) grandkids!!    

We had a pre-Christmas dinner with Robin, Jon and the kids here on Saturday. It was a fun excuse to get out our fancy china from Grandma Bond :)

Merry Christmas everyone!! Hope you enjoy sweet time with family and friends, but most of all reflect on the most amazing gift ever given: our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!

MGB owners!

A friend of Adam's coworker was looking to get rid a “project car” he had sitting around. When Adam found out about it, he was more than willing to take off his hands!

So we are now the (blessed?) owners of a free 1974 MGB roadster!

Since it’s not currently running, it was quite a task transporting it to our garage. Here Peter and Adam are working on backing it into the garage. The front right tire went flat during the move which made it much harder to maneuver (but pretty fun for me to watch from our bedroom!)

As you can see it needs A LOT of work- both inside and out. This would be a pretty intimidating task for me, but Adam is THRILLED about it! He is totally up for the challenge and I know he’ll have so much fun working on it!

Despite the body damage, you can tell it’s going to be a really cute two-seater convertible someday!! (Sorry baby Hunter- no car seats here!)

David, Hannah, and Micah had some fun playing in it. Adam heard David call it an “ugly” car- hehe :) Oh well. It’ll just make the total transformation even more impressive someday when it’s finished- and I’m sure David will be begging to borrow by then :)

Adam is contemplating starting his own blog about this exciting project- don’t you think he should!?!

Good luck, hun! I’m behind you all the way!

Just one request- can we install an intercom between our unit and the garage for when I need help with the baby!? ;)

babymoon-ing in Florida!

babymoon:  a vacation taken by a couple that is expecting a baby in order to allow the couple to enjoy a final trip together before the many sleepless nights that usually accompany a newborn baby.

Last month, I got to take an all expenses paid trip to Orlando to present my research at a conference!! We found a cheap ticket for Adam so we made it a “babymoon” :)

We spent the mornings working and attending the conference, but the rest of the time we spent reading and relaxing by the pool.

View from our room while I was practicing my talk:

We didn’t go to any Disney parks, but we hit Downtown Disney and the Disney Boardwallk which was right near our hotel.

While we were there, a space shuttle launched from Cape Canaveral. We completely forgot about it, but when we finally noticed everyone looking up into the sky, we were able to catch a glimpse of the plume:

We splurged on an excellent dinner at BOMA, an African buffet in Animal Kingdom Lodge. SOOO much good food- this is Adam’s dessert plate! I was too embarrassed to take a picture of mine ;)

Overall, a great and CHEAP vacation for us to enjoy- our last as a childless couple!!