I think my new job should be “Pregnancy Advocate”! I’m telling you I really can’t find a reason why everyone isn’t jumping on board… LOL, granite I have had probably the easiest pregnancy ever but even with that aside look at this:
Surprise presents delivered like to your door step!
Thank you Grams, Aunt Doreen, Jessica, Lauren, Nicole and Ana!
Apparently a casual dinner date night is another excuse for Christy to buy more presents for this baby girl…. (you are allowed to see me without showing up with gifst Christy)!
Her first piggy bank.. complete with money in it ;)
Thank you Christie and Vincent!
Let us not forget the cards! I have finally moved them up to Lola’s soon to be nursery because they literally would not fit on my dining room table anymore!
I even got a card from my sweet hair stylist!
Seriously though, thank you to everyone who was so thoughtful in sending us cards and to the mamas (mostly) who wrote a book in each card describing how absolutely fortunate and lucky we are to experience this!
We also got to meet Tara several times this past week due to an audit for her work near Atlanta…. meeting Tara came with a lot of “baggage”! LOL, literally… Tara came in contact with mom which is enough on it’s own but mom recently came home from New Jersey where she came in contact with Billy, Angela, Mommom and Aunt Gloria who all felt the need to spoil Lola some more!
We looooove it all!! Thank you, thank you!
Notice uncle Billy winning points with the “I love my uncle” onesie!
Oh yes, and the flowers! One of Lou’s many batches of “thank you for carrying our baby girl” flowers that I kindly welcome on any given day!
I have also welcomed Sunflowers from Andy, Rachel and Cara!
Lola says thank you Cara, Aunt Rachel and Uncle Andy you certainly know how to make her mommy smile!!
Here was Lola’s little shrine of gifts about a month ago before it got WAY too big and had to be moved to her room! 
This was before our last “delivery” or even moms visit… those hangers on the right are all now full plus 3 more packs of hangers!
I don’t think i have shown the finished masterpiece that Tara slaved away remodeling…..
Lola’s first masterpiece, how gorgeous?!?!
It should go well with the chandelier, rocking chair and changing table Tara also bought to fix up adorably for Lola!!
I can’t wait for some real before and after pictures to come!
The only two not seeing the point in spoiling mama is guess who….
We have had many more frequent “oopsies” lately but i think it’s their way of saying “mom remember you are having a baby and even though we are: happy/worried/anxious/scared/jealous/excited but we are setting all of that aside to “warm you up” by trashing the house and giving you someone to clean up after to prepare for your duties to come!
In that case, how thoughtful of you Tucker and Milly thank you!
I will say although Milly has been taking the “suspense of waiting on baby” much harder that Tucker I now think they both know mommy is pregnant…. Milly has known since probably before I did however we are just now noticing her being more protective of me. Last week she got mad at Tucker for “snapping” at me while I brushed his tail (ok i will be honest, i was trying to pick out a dread lock and he HATES that) so Milly instantly ran over to us and got between Tucker and I with her hair up and blocked him from me. He then apologized to her and she refused to let me continue brushing his hair or even get close to him. Of course her daddy praised her for this, i guess i have 3 protective little people in the house now!
You just wait Lola, they are ridiculous!!
Tucker has even started a cute new “Mr.Safety checklist feature” too, I guess he has picked up on everyone kind of getting nervous when i go up or down the stairs lately so every morning when we typically go down together he pauses and then won’t start going down until I start. He also will only go on the left side forcing me to use the right side of the steps (where the handrails are) and then halfway through he rushes to the bottom to turn and watch me go down the rest of way…
Oh the heart that little boy has for his mama is too big!
This week has been one of the MOST exciting! I have been anxiously awaiting my 20 week appointment/ultrasound to see our little girl wiggle around again and cross some more fears off the list confirming she is still growing and getting healthy!
A week or two before the appointment I got so excited thinking my belly “popped out” but look at the difference between 18 and 20 weeks! I think Lola was waiting to “pop out” for all the company we had this weekend (more of that to come)!
Below is 20 weeks, Well hello there Miss lola!
I am sooooo happy to report our 20 week appointment was smooth sailing and all looks good (except that Lola was so sleepy she made mommy dance all over the room 2 separate times to wake her up so we could get a better picture of her)!
It was so worth it so see her wake up, roll over and take a big “practice breath” before she immediately started sucking her thumb! Our wonderfully sweet ultrasound technician actually pushed on my stomach just a tad to get Lola to quit sucking her thumb so they could see her nose and you could actually see on the screen where she pushed down and poor Lola hit herself in her face with her hand, I felt so bad but it worked and it was so cute!
The left was our 8 week appointment, she was the size of a kidney bean and the right is her at 20 weeks, a close up of her face in between sucking her thumb :)
What a difference! What lucky parents we are.
As we were walking out the doctors office this week after seeing our sleepy little girl I asked Alex, what do you think it is really?
Why is everything so easy for us? We have we had the easiest pregnancy? The 20 week appointment they checked her all out and said she is looking like one very healthy girl so far and in general this matches everything else about this journey!
We had the easiest time getting pregnant, smooth sailing so far in trimester 1 and 2 as far as not being sick or tired (even though when the doctors continue to ask about symptoms, specifically tiredness.. Alex almost frustrated blurs out “NO! she hasn’t been tired at all!” Poor guy he just craves times when I slow down and “relax” or get tired! He loves to find days when I’m not “go, go, go”!
Sorry, Lou no slowing down here just yet anyway!
Later that night he finally “answered” my question…..“We deserve this life and this little girl” he said. “We are good people and do good things and so good things happen to us”.
Typically I hate this answer because bad things happen to good people all the time so does that make them “bad” people or undeserving? I don’t know.
His answer does seem so easy though and I’m not going to say I haven’t heard a million other people tell me this same reasoning. So i decided to go with it. I have fought against the tide way too long and he’s right. My new philosophy will be “When bad things happen to good people it should be the minority and the unexpected not the typical what to expect”. I just happen to work with 100% of the minorities which makes it seem like everyone, everywhere! I have to keep that in perspective so i can enjoy this goodness! So here’s to embracing our lives not being in the minority but the majority, the goodness! 
Besides I have a little girl who is practicing being a big sister and she needs way more attention now for mommy to waste time wondering why good things keep happening to her!
Here she is on my desk now!
Real life news!
Lance and Kayla are home for good…. even better, Atlanta, GA home for good and the boys were a mess when they got to be “re-united”.
My favorite time of the year is creeping just around the corner and I couldn’t wait to “rush it by getting ready for Fall with the first Clemson football game! So we decided to throw together our first batch of Chili and pumpkin bread!
MMMMM mmmm mmmm!
Oh H there TJ, what are you and Cara doing?
The first few weekends of Fall are always so bi-polar! It’s cool one day and we all get excited and the next day we are sweating and trying to get in our last few rays before winter!
Corey’s birthday falls right in between this fickle time and it was a perfect day to enjoy their BEAUTIFUL backyard!
We had a mini Zetterower reunion! Oh how i love when we all can get together!
Desperate for some rays= 5 months prego at a pool party!
Gizzy in his submarine! 
Happy birthday Co! 
Shot number 9??
I think this is their “what the hell did we order?” 
Love this crew! 
The next day was all business and a mile marker belly shot.
(please excuse the mess!)
We were off to tackle the most challenging task off all…. registering for this girl!
I think its a right of passage. If you can conquer this a baby will be a breeze type of thing!?!!?
We started off strong in the easy section of the store and then Lou decided we had to test out the rockers….
I fell in love with the gray one, not the one he is sitting in!
Isn’t it adorable?
The much harder part was the stroller which has to match the carseat… which isn’t as easy as you would think!
Mission complete after coming home, more researching and more cleaning up of the registry!
I think we deserve a diploma!
Or maybe just a nice prego reward…. 
