Our last few childless moments

This past week we got to celebrate my sister's 20th birthday, celebrate my 27th birthday and our 4th anniversary, spend some quality time with my parents and we BOUGHT A NEW CAR! We're trying to get out of the house and enjoy the ease of being spontaneous before Baby L makes his appearance. We keep hearing how life changing it will be so we figure we may as well make the best of last few childless moments!

So to celebrate Sarah's birthday Mom, Sarah and I went to the Burke Williams spa in Torrance for some massages and girl time. It was so much fun to relax and laugh with them, and we may or may not have gotten in trouble for talking and laughing too loudly in the spa area but it's probably because they need to lighten up a bit over there. :) Amazing massages, great atmosphere and we loved all the amenities-- we will definitely be going back!

While we were spa-ing it up Dave, Dad and our good friend Jonathan were doing some car shopping. We found out earlier that morning that our stroller was not going to fit in the back of our little car. Literally. Would. Not. Fit. We were already planning on cramming the car seat into a position that would make it uncomfortable for Dave to drive, but now the stroller wouldn't fit. What about the other "stuff" that we will undoubtably be bringing with a new baby?! With a little panic, we stepped up our car shopping and Dave found two great deals and took the men to check them out. It was so successful that he came home with a new (to us) GMC Acadia! It is going to be perfect for us and we are so excited.

Here is a picture of it in the garage.

Then we spent some more time preparing for Baby L. Here is Dad and Sarah putting our swing together. Thanks guys!

And the car seat is officially in the back seat!

We are pretty ready over here for this little guy to show his face but is seems he is going to hold out on us for a little while longer. I haven't been feeling great this week and have had contractions on and off since Sunday night but I hear that's very normal and doesn't necessarily mean labor is imminent. We keep hearing "it could happen in a few hours or in a few days". Thanks Doc, that's so helpful! :) So we're still waiting (not very patiently) over here. We'll let you know when the time comes.... hopefully SOON!

The Baby's Room and Waiting Game

We've been busy busy busy getting ready for our little guy to come into the world! I think we finally feel ready for him to come home now- although Dave's current joke is we're as ready as a person who buys an earthquake kit is ready for an actual earthquake- but I guess we won't really know if we're prepared enough until he's actually home with us! We're ready for the challenge... how about that?

Here are a few pictures of the nursery for all of our non Southbay friends. We were able to move things around so there is still the guest bed in the room which we hope will come in handy when people come to visit us when the time comes. (He'll sleep in a pack 'n play in our room-- in theory!)

The walls are the same color as downstairs and we went with a beachy theme.

Here's the chair that's my perfect size! We have a hard time finding furniture that fits both Dave (6'4") and me (5'3") so we decided that I would be spending the most time here so I got to pick it out. That means my feet actually touch the ground when I sit! :)

This isn't the best picture, but I wanted to show off our creativity. We found a picture of a seashell garland in the pottery barn catalog and thought "I can make that!" So I did! It ended up being a lot easier and cheaper than I thought it would be. So we made the garland and we painted some old frames we had. They're up and ready and now just waiting for some pictures of a little boy to go in them.

And our find from the Fiesta Hermosa a couple of weeks ago.

We have had fun planning out this space for our little guy and can't wait for him to come home and use it. There is a closet full of clothes, a dresser with tons of blankets and onesies (what else exactly are we supposed to put in the dresser vs the closet???), and even some toys for when he gets a little bigger. I hit 37 weeks last Saturday, which apparently means I'm officially full term, so now we're just waiting waiting waiting for him to decide to come. It could still be a couple of weeks but it could also happen any day now! I'm feeling a little anxious as we play this waiting game and every day Dave wakes up and asks me, "Is today the day?" to which my answer is always, "I don't know!" I wish we knew!!! I just hope we have enough warning to be able to tell our families to hurry up and get on the road so that Dave has someone to run out in the waiting room to tell our great news! Fingers crossed!

Till then, we'll keep waiting and praying for a healthy, happy baby boy to come soon!!!

The Long Awaited Wedding

Charlie and Christina's wedding was beautiful! They couldn't have asked for better weather (85 in the end of June in Merced? Who would've thought?!) and the whole day went off without a hitch. We've all been waiting a long time for these two to get married and we're so excited it's official now. They're currently enjoying their honeymoon in Hawaii, but we can't wait for them to get back so we can just live life with them now that they're married and living on the West coast again.

Here's a sneak picture of the Lockridge family after the ceremony.

Dave, Me, Diane, Christina, Charlie, Mom & Dad

Me & Dave

Christina & Me

I got to sneak into the bride's room to spend some time with the girls before the ceremony. She has such amazing friends and I really enjoyed getting to meet them and hang out with them this week. They were so thoughtful to include me in their special times together during the bachelorette and on the wedding day.

My family came to the wedding too (with the exception of Sarah who was still in Europe)!

And of course we danced the night away at the reception!

It was an awesome trip home and a great reason to celebrate!

Wedding Rehearsal

After a week of fun and celebrating, it was time to get down to business with Charlie & Christina's wedding rehearsal. They got married in Merced at the First Baptist Church where Christina grew up. It was really fun to be a part of it and sort of crazy to think that it's been almost 4 years since Dave and I were preparing for our own wedding. Time flies!

Dave & I

The Lockridge Men

Best Man Dave, Groom Charlie, Officiant/Father of the Groom Dad

The almost-newlyweds getting ready for their trip down the aisle.

The wedding party! The each had 9 attendants and 4 flower girls and 2 ring bearers. And believe it or not, we still got the rehearsal dinner on time!

The Nordman and Lockridge families (minus Diane who flew in later). We're so excited to officially welcome Christina into our family. It's about time! :)

Fun in the Valley

We went up North for Charlie & Christina's wedding and wedding week festivities, but we were able to do lots of other fun things while we were there. We had our last baby shower thrown by my best friend Crista, we spent lots of time in the pool, we made strawberry jam with all my girl cousins, we went to Bachelor/Bachelorette parties, we made it to Concert in the Park, the Modesto Farmers Market and even to the Merced County Fair! It was a BUSY week but so much fun! It will probably take a couple of posts to get all the pictures up but here's the first part of the week...

Dave, Me and Alison lounging in the pool. The weather was perfect!

My parents' dog Molly has recently found a love for swimming. Here is Dave teaching her how to jump off the diving board!

Strawberry jam time! This year we made about 8 or 9 dozen jars of strawberry jam. It is sooooo yummy!

Aunt Sharon, Amy, Grandma, Jessica, Mom & Alison

We missed having Sarah there to help so we found a picture of her on Grandma's fridge and had to have her represented. It wasn't the same without her!

We had so much fun at home getting to see everyone and spend some time at home before Baby L comes! More pictures to come...

It's Wedding Time!

We're heading home to watch one of our favorite couples get married! Dave's brother Charlie and his fiance Christina have been dating for a very long time and have been living in Virginia attending Liberty University. We so excited to have them both back on the West Coast and to welcome Christina into our Lockridge family! We can't wait for it to be official!!!

Here's a picture of the soon-to-be-newlyweds the day they got engaged at Thomas Jefferson's house in Montecito.

On a side note, I'm missing this girl:

She's currently galavanting around Europe doing a study abroad program for the summer. She's having so much fun and we get to live vicariously through her pictures and hilarious facebook updates. But I miss her jokes, and her smiley face and the option of picking up the phone whenever I want to talk to her. Come home Sarah!!!

Baby Classes

We are in full baby mode over here in Lockridgeland. I signed us up to take a few (ok, A LOT) of baby classes at our hospital and they have started! I heard that they were all good so I picked out a couple recommended ones and then the free hospital tour. Dave has been such a trooper through a couple of really crummy classes (Baby Care Basics? Yes, we'd like to watch a video from 1990 about how to do things just to be told that it's not entirely up to date and that's not how we do things anymore. Super helpful, thank you.) and one pretty great one. We really enjoyed "The Happiest Baby on the Block" where they showed us how to soothe a baby by using a few techniques. The best (weirdest?) part was being able to practice on a baby doll. Dave was a champ and by far the best swaddler in our class... he even had other people in the group asking his opinion! I guess we'll see how beneficial it all is once Baby L comes into the world...

Here's Dave practicing his baby swaddling technique.

Hmm, I think this is two techniques in one: the swaddle and the side laying position.

Also good for a laugh is our creepy baby. Dave picked him out, of course!

Obviously this did not happen at a class, but we've also been getting things ready around the house. We took out the car seat and guess who is letting us practice on her? Hannity! She has no idea the rude awakening that is going to be coming to her in a couple of weeks but so far she's been a great sport. She even let Dave swaddle her while our friend Angela video taped it! (The video is on Facebook. Not quite sure how to upload it here but it's worth checking out!)

We're also taking a lamaze type class with our good friends Tim & Sheri. That class seems to be pretty great and we usually walk away feeling like we've learned something and are a little better prepared for what is coming. I haven't taken any pictures there because the only thing worth documenting is our "relaxation time" and I'm pretty sure the teacher would frown on me snapping pictures when I'm supposed to be feeling like my "hands are as heavy as lead..." Haha! But you can be sure that we're enjoying walking through this stage of life with close friends and having plenty of laughs in the process.

Other than that, I'm feeling great and Baby L is growing and super active! We're measuring a little ahead of schedule but no one should be shocked that we might have a baby on the bigger side. :) We can't wait to meet him!