10/10/10 -- Chihuly at Cheekwood

Most people who know us know that we were really hoping for Little Bit to have a 10/10/10 birthday even though his due date is 10/15/10.  I think it would be a pretty a cool birthday to have, and from Cayne's perspective, it's binary so it would be appropriate for Little "Bit" to have a binary birthday.  Well, it doesn't seem like that's going to happen as Baby Wagener seems perfectly content where he is, for now.

That didn't mean that Cayne and I didn't get to have some fun on October 10, 2010 anyway.  Although Cayne had to get up early to get some work done, by 11:00 we had left the house for a yummy brunch at Ruby Tuesdays before heading to Chihuly at Cheekwood to pass a few hours and then visiting mom, dad, and Sarah at mom & dad's house in Franklin.  We then caught an early evening showing of "The Town" (a pretty good movie) before heading home with some Cold Stone Creamery ice cream.  It was a great day/evening out and we do hope the baby decides that he wants to meet us soon!!

A good "39 weeks" picture!

A spider and web we saw in the Japanese Garden

These "Walla Wallas" are meant to look like onions.  And they kind-of do!

I'm not so good at staring into the sun... 

Me, very happy that I made it all the way to the 13th and final installation.  

Chihuly at Cheekwood was really neat, so anyone in Nashville who hasn't seen it, I recommend stopping by -- it's only there through the end of the month. 

How we spent Week 38

First, Cayne finished painting the nursery and added the cute animal decals to the wall.  We may have gone a little overboard on nursery decorations, but we think it really does look cute!  

First attempt at adding decals was good.  Time to do more!

I put together the little "cubby" shelf

Cayne putting on the tree decal

Adding leaves to the tree decal

And more decals over the crib

Then we went for a walk in Crockett Park in Brentwood on Wednesday.  We were there a little over an hour but have no idea how far we walked.  The City of Brentwood doesn't post maps in the park (at least anywhere we could see) that show where the walking paths go or how far they are.  We thought it would loop around, but since it seemed like we were just going farther and farther up Wilson Pike, we eventually just turned around.  According to the map I found online, we starting on the black trail near the soccer fields and went up the red trail to the second call box (about halfway between Crockett Park and Concord Road) before turning around.  

Of course, on the way back to the soccer fields, I had to take some time to rest

On Thursday, Cayne decided to try installing the infant car seat in our car.  We can't believe how much space it takes up.  No wonder so many families have minivans or crossovers or station wagons!  I'm not entirely sure if anyone else can fit in the back seat now.  

He doesn't look too happy trying to figure it out

The instructions (and our prepared Childbirth teacher, Carol) said to really press the car seat base into the cushioning when installing.  

Yay!  It's installed!!  Eventually, we got the angle correct too. 

Baby Shower

 On Saturday, my sister, Sarah, threw a baby shower for me and Little Bit with help from my mom, sister-in-law, Ashley, and niece, Mackenzie.  It was a wonderful party and a great relaxing day for me.  We had delicious food, good company and lots of cute and fun things for the baby to enjoy once he arrives!

The adorable cake Sarah ordered from Becker's Bakery (one of my favorites)!

You can see some of the rubber ducky decorations. 

I'm always ready to dig into the food!

The shoes have sheeps on them -- for Cayne!

More cute clothes!!

Prepared Childbirth "Graduation"

On Monday, we finished our fifth and last "Prepared Childbirth" class at the Vanderbilt University Children's Hospital. Part of the graduation included having the fathers put on a 30 lb Empathy Belly and practice walking around, sitting down (and standing back up). It was a fun end to a good class. Of course, the real "graduation" will be when Little Bit decides to make his appearance.
Classes were taught by one of the NICU lactation consultants who has been teaching these for over 15 years -- we also took one on taking care of your newborn and breastfeeding. We think we've learned a lot but we'll see in a few weeks!

Color for the Nursery??

The nursery is really starting to take shape now that we have gotten some furniture set up. It is a work in progress but I feel good about the fact that we have something in Little Bit's room. Dad put together the crib for us...it is a used crib and a couple bolts were missing from the package that we needed him to reconstruct using the existing bolts as a guide since they don't sell the exact same type at the hardware store. The pack n play will move into either our bedroom or downstairs but everything else will stay in the nursery. We still need to get a chair, a ceiling fan, some wall shelves and a bookshelf for the room.

Another thing we need is some sort of wall decoration and Cayne and I have a difference of opinion on this one. He wants to leave the walls the off-white color they are now and just add some decoration. Cayne would like to paint a tree or some NZ plants on the wall to add some color. I think that is a great idea, but I also think the nursery walls should be painted something other than white. My thought is to paint the walls a soft yellow and then add decorations on top of that color. Let us know what you think!!

Little Bit will have a pretty good-sized closet as well. Here are the clothes that we've received as gifts from friends. Thanks to everyone's great taste in cute clothes, I think he will be a well-dressed little boy and I also think it's about time for us to go shopping for some additional clothes for him. I'm getting scared by the number of outfits I hear a baby can go through in one day!

All said, we feel pretty ready for Little Bit to make his appearance (we have 31 days before he is due). I think we have most of the essentials and the rest should be just details.

Getting Ready for Baby

Over the weekend, Cayne and I decided to put together some of the furniture and the gifts that Little Bit has been receiving. I put together the pack n' play, spa bath, and did some things in the nursery while Cayne tackled the high chair and swing. I think the baby is going to love all his new "toys"!

This is Cayne putting the finishing touches on the high chair, just before I told him I didn't think we'd been using it for another few months! It's now in our dining room. This was one of the sweet gifts the NIH graduate students sent to us as a going away/baby gift.

Cayne put together the swing and I figured out the mobile.

Here you can see the little bathtub on the floor before I put it together. And a confused-looking Cayne as he tackles his first bit of baby furniture.

A Walk through Edwin Warner Park

Yesterday, Cayne and I decided to get out of the house, stop tidying-up and go for a walk in one of the many parks in Middle TN. We drove over to Edwin Warner Park and started one loop trail, decided it was a little short and detoured to another trail. I think that we started on the "Nature Loop" and then tried taking the "Harpeth Woods Trail" but once we made it back from the top of the hill onto the section that goes on the old roadway before picking up the trail again, I needed to use the restroom, so we stopped by the Nature Center before taking the trail back to our car. We weren't really sure what to expect and were pleasantly surprised that although the trail head parking was almost completely full, we didn't run into too many people on the trail -- just a few families and some runners.

I think we both had a good time enjoying the weather and the peacefulness of the park and we'll have to go back to the park and actually plan to do one of the full trails someday.