Life with the Elliott's is about to change....DRASTICALLY!! :)

As the majority of you now know, we are expecting our first baby February 13, 2011!! I am officially 18 weeks and 2 days pregnant(yes everyday makes a difference in the life of a pregnancy and a NICU nurse!!) We are both super excited and anxious for February to get here! Before posting it on our blog we wanted to tell all of you personally, so hopefully no one is finding out for the first time on the blog.

Already our lives have changed....first of all, our spare bedroom is now full of baby gear that we have either bought at yard sales, on craigslist or have been given to us as gifts. I have had to clean out the closet and pretty much "stuffed" stuff into the closet to store for awhile, until we can organize it and put it to use!







Yes that is my crib sitting in the box, waiting to be put together!

Now I know some of you are going to say why are you buying all of this stuff, but you can't pass up great, clean baby items for a dollar at a yard sale! While I was in Ohio Louis bought the majority of this stuff at a yard sale for a total of $7.00 I am pretty sure he was super proud of himself not only for finding a bargain, but for finding nice baby items!!

So not only has our house been taken over with baby gear, I now have to wear maternity clothes! YIKES! Actually the bump is really just starting to make an appearance...so I can't complain. In fact I am having a hard time gaining weight which seems to make Grandma Hollen and Grandpa (Poppy) Parfitt more concerned than me or my doctor (I guess once a parent, always a parent). We took our first bump picture:



18 weeks, prior to going to work and for some reason my husband doesn't think you need to include my head in the picture!! :)

Louis and I have decided not to find out the sex of the baby, although I think had I wanted to, Lou would be all about it! I think that is the biggest surprise anyone could have in their lives so why spoil it! So we wait!! Many of our friends and family have voiced that they think it is a girl, I have no "feeling" one way or another. Louis thinks it is a boy or I think really would like a boy! I just want a healthy, full term baby. I know I use to think people were full of it when they said they wanted a healthy baby and didn't have a preference, but I can honestly say I just don't care. I think a boy would be fun, because there are not many boys in our family, and I always wanted a brother, but girls just have so many cute clothes to dress them in (insert Lou rolling his eyes at this comment!) So needless to say I am excited either way!

Talking about clothes we have been blessed with a few outfits from Grandma Hollen and I must say the OU socks are adorable!! Our kid will be set for OU homecoming next year, which I mean you can never start out the homecoming tradition too early!!



Our next appointment is Monday September 27th for our 20 week ultrasound. We are both pretty excited to see the baby, since we have not seen it since 8 weeks. I am sure we will be amazed at how big it has gotten. We read every week what our little "peanut" is doing in utero and approximately how big it is....this week a bell pepper! The little monkey definitely is a mover and a shaker....it tends to kick and move all the time in the evenings and when I lay down or am hungry! Louis can't quite feel the kicks on the outside yet, but I don't think it will be too much longer because they are getting stronger and harder everyday!

We will definitely keep you updated monthly after our appointments and I am sure we will post more bump watch photos!! :) Once we start working on the nursery we will post photos of the finished product!