Weekend Fun

The past two weekends we have had visitors! My folks came into town last weekend at the tail end of my mom's spring break. We went to Azusa to visit my sister and watch the Fresno Pacific baseball team beat the Azusa Cougars, we went out to a couple of fun dinners and just enjoyed their company. Again, not a lot of pictures but we took the dogs to the park by our house for a little exercise and Dave and my dad took the opportunity to play catch. There were some pretty impressive throws coming from both of my favorites guys!

Here is Dad throwing it home. They even had some spectators in the stands!

Then Dave had a busy week as he was preparing for some upcoming meetings at work. He took the time out of his schedule to indulge me in playing in the baby's room. I've been trying to get things done little by little but it was killing me to have the baby's stroller in a box just waiting for us! So Dave assembled it and I get to look at it every time I walk by the room.

Our new "Bob" stroller. Can't wait for some great walks with my little guy in it!

Then this past weekend, Dave's folks came in to town to visit too! It has been awhile since they were both able to make it down our way so it was extra special to get to show them around our favorite places.

We took the drive into L.A. to eat lunch at Phillipe's. It's not only a pretty famous L.A. landmark, but it's also where Dave's Mom's parents met for the very first time! Dave's grandma was working at Phillipe's sometime around WWII and his grandpa came in for a sandwich and then fell in love. It was so much fun to eat those amazing french dips (with spicy mustard!) and get to hear an incredible family love story.

We also picked up our baby furniture this weekend! We thought it would take a little bit longer to order, but it came in 7 days. Again, who wants boxes laying around? Not me! So Dave and his dad graciously put the crib together on Saturday afternoon. They looked like they had it under control, so Dave's mom and I went off and got a pedicure.

And when we came back the crib was finished!

Two fun weekends in a row! Thanks to both sets of parents for loving us and making the journey south to visit. I know I say this a lot, but we are so blessed to have two families that love us so much. Thanks for your time and the yummy meals, and baby Lockridge thanks you both for his new furniture!!!

Growing Boy

I had my anatomy scan done this week with a great perinatologist near my regular OB's office. He was great and spent about a half hour looking at our little guy and making sure the everything looks good and healthy and is working properly. Baby looks fantastic and is growing so fast! It's hard to believe that a few short months ago he wasn't even here, and then we could see our little peanut all in one picture, and now they have look all over my belly to find him and we get see him in little bits and pieces. What a miracle! He's right on track growth-wise and the doctor even used the word "BIG" when referring to him. Usually people make that assumption when they meet tall Dave, but Dave was not present at this appointment so the doctor made that call all on his own. It makes me a little nervous that we already have an overachiever but I keep telling myself that we want him to take after Dave and be tall and fast and strong!

Here is a picture of the pictures they gave us to take home. They also gave us a dvd copy of the entire ultrasound so we could re-watch it and try to guess what exactly we're looking at.

Just in case you need a little help:

-Top Left picture is a view of him looking straight at us. (I think he already has Dave's chin!)

-Top Right picture is a profile shot of his good looking face.

-Bottom Left picture is a little arrow pointing to his boys bits. (The dr assured me that if he is wrong that he'll do our babysitting for free for life!)

-Bottom Right picture is of his little foot.

We're over half way in the pregnancy and we're getting more and more excited every day. I can't wait to meet this little guy and I'm feeling so blessed that Dave and I have been entrusted to take care of this precious gift. July can't come fast enough!

March Madness

We're sitting here on this beautiful first day of April and wondering "What happened to March?!" We were super busy this month with a few out of town trips and lots of busy weekends. The bad news? Not a picture to be had from a single important event!

You'll just have to take my word for it that we had a great family dinner with our soon-to-be sister-in-law's extended family up in Merced, Megan attended a bridal shower for the lucky bride, Dave had a boys weekend in Phoenix to watch some Spring Training baseball games, another fun trip to Fresno to go to a wedding, and another set of friends came to visit and stay for the night! All the while Dave is working hard at his new job and enjoying every minute of the new challenge it provides. But seriously, where did March go?

In between the family dinner and the bridal shower I stayed up in Modesto with my parents and Hannity. We spent a lot of time playing with their yellow lab puppy Molly and even went up to Knights Ferry for a hike. Dave was at Spring Training this day so I'm representing with my Dodgers shirt! :)

While Molly enjoyed a romp in the river Hannity preferred to stay high and dry on the rocks. Thanks Mom & Dad for letting me stay for so long and congrats to Molly for graduating from Puppy Training this week!

Look Mom! I sewed!

Growing up my mom used to sew everything. She made all of our Easter dresses, halloween costumes, matching camp clothes... you name it, she could make it. (Including one ill-fated praying mantis costume for the second grade insect play!) During the summer she would give me sewing lessons and encouraged me to learn the skill but I wasn't always the most patient when it came to the precision sometimes required to make something "just right". The last few years my only sewing experience was the occasional fallen hemline or a button that needed reattaching, but I got the great idea that I needed a sewing machine so that I could be crafty, just like Mom. So thanks to Santa Claus I am the proud new owner of a Singer sewing machine with 30 built in stitches... now I just have to learn how to use it!

Here are my first few attempts. The lines aren't perfectly straight (it's that precision thing that I need to work on!) but I'm really enjoying my time being creative!

Can you tell what it is? Probably not.

It's a burp cloth! I found a website that was selling these for $15 each and I thought "I can do that!" so I found some cute fabric and went to town trying to sew straight lines.

Another variation.

After a lot of burp clothes, I found a dress that looked pretty easy to make. It's called a pillowcase dress and now I just need to find someone to wear it! What do you think?

Updates around the Lockridge house

With a baby coming this summer, Dave and I are both finding ourselves doing a little extra cleaning and organizing around the house. We're also finding things that we've been wanting to do but haven't gotten around to it in the four years we've owned our house. So here's a quick preview to what's new around here!

Baby Lockridge is now the proud owner of half a closet! I know that doesn't sound like much but we have a small house so that's what he gets at this point. :) But the extra special part is that Dave built him a shelf in the closet. Hopefully we'll get some better storage options in there but at the moment it's so fun to walk in the room and see little boy clothes hanging in the closet on cute little boy hangers.

If you look closely here are two new additions to our living room. We got a new leather chair for some extra seating and picked out a new rug for our floor. We have wanted both for a long time and we're feeling like our living room is finally coming together.

With the baby's room housing a guest bed in there we needed to relocate our office furniture. Dave has graciously found a new place in our spacious garage. (Pictures of the finished product to come when it's actually finished!) And my desk and home computer moved into our bedroom. Good thing we have a nice sized room!

There are still a list of projects to accomplish before the baby gets here but at the moment we're feeling productive and excited about some of these changes. We'll keep you updated with the baby's room and Dave's new office as they get done.

Or you could come visit us and see these things for yourselves! Hint, Hint!

Birthday Boy

Friday, February 26th was Dave's 29th birthday. It was special because not only is this his last birthday in his twenties but also his last birthday without kids! We grabbed a big group of friends and headed out to C&O's to eat some yummy Italian food and those addictive garlic bread balls.

Here's the birthday boy with his tiramisu.

Me & Dave

Matt & Becky came and even brought Kylie! She was so great and seemed to enjoy the loud atmosphere and all the twinkly lights.

Here is most of the group after a great dinner. We also got to celebrate with our friend Matt (in the hat) because he and Dave share a birthday!

We really made it a celebratory weekend with homemade chicken cordon bleu, an ice cream cake and movie night with the Bakers too. I'm so thankful for my husband and the amazing man he is today, and I appreciate all the love and friendly wishes that came to make his day extra special. Happy Birthday Dave!

Edge Outreach

This past weekend I was given the opportunity to work with the Edge Outreach conference at my church here in Manhattan Beach. This is a ministry that seeks to bring clean water to indigenous people around the world with a simple filtration system consisting of a car battery and various parts you can buy in country. Their goal is to bring the gospel to these people while providing a very practical solution to a devastating need in their lives. What an inspired idea!

I have gone on a few mission trips myself and have noticed that sometimes when you take a group of Americans into a random country for a couple of weeks the effectiveness is questionable. Don't get me wrong, I believe we are all called to help the needy and share in the great commission but I just wonder if taking 20 high school kids without any practical skills into Mexico is really a blessing to them or to us. We go one time and come back changed, finally realizing how blessed we are to live where do and have the things that we do. But the focus is usually on us. What WE gained from it. How it makes US feel. And then we show the pictures of the building that WE helped build. All of those are great, life changing moments that I think we should all experience at one time or another, but what I learned this weekend is something so basic and practical that I truly hope it changes the way we do missions.

If you're interested in learning more about this awesome organization, including their participation in the recovery in Haiti, check out their website at edgeoutreach.com. Our conference was also mentioned in our local paper yesterday on the front page. You can find it here.