A Fun Filled February

Sorry bloggers for the late update...we've been so busy and I'm still having some computer issues, so it makes getting pictures up here very difficult! We've had a lot going on this month so I'm going to try to give you the highlights:

First up...Ryan and I started attending a new church in the summer of 2008 and joined a small group in August. It has been such a blessing to us over the past few months! Out of the six couples, three of us have been pregnant so it has been a lot of fun going through this time together. We welcomed the first new addition, Austin Henry Ethridge, on February 5th! He is just precious and I can't believe that he is finally here! Cyndi and I are both due at the end of March so we are praying for 2 more healthy babies!

I decided it would be good to get Ryan some practice holding a newborn!!! Isn't he cute (both of them that is)!

Next up....Step Sing! For those of you who don't know, Step Sing is a production at Samford University where different student groups (Greek & non-Greek) perform in a competition. It is a huge event on campus - lasting 3 nights with crowds of 3,000 people each night! Every year they have one male and one female emcee and wouldn't you know that sweet Meredith auditioned and was selected as the emcee this year! We drove to Birmingham on the 14th to see the final performance. We met up with my family in Birmingham and were able to do an early dinner with Meredith before the show. She did an AMAZING job - she was beautiful, articulate, funny, and truly she just SHINED! She had great chemistry with the male emcee, Ben (pictured with her below), and I wish I could post the adorable video of them from the intro to the show...I'm not even kidding when I say that it looked like the preview for a TV show. Meredith loves working at the church, but Hollywood might be in her future!

Next up....Pregnancy Pictures! My talented friend from small group, Cyndi Goodman, took my pregnancy pictures in mid- February and they turned out amazing! Some of our favorites are below. THANK YOU, Cyndi!!






Last but not least...my Atlanta Shower!! Ryan and I drove to Atlanta this past weekend for the shower. We continue to be so overwhelmed with the generosity of our friends and family...we are truly grateful! The shower was beautiful and perfect thanks to my great hostesses - Joanie Sewell & Vicki Bachman...THANK YOU, JOANIE & VICKI! It was so special to have so many people from different stages of life there to support us - friends from Haynes Landing, GACS, Stockamp, and of course my family (grandmother, aunts, cousins & sisters)!! Thank you all for your love and support!




As you can see - a fun filled February for us!! I can't believe the next time we go to my house in Atlanta, we will have Madison Claire with us! I'm now at 36 weeks and will try to take some belly shots this weekend. I go to the doctor now once a week until she comes - it is hard to believe we are on the 30-day countdown to her due date! We have our childbirth class this weekend so are looking forward to that. Please continue to pray for us - for a healthy baby, healthy delivery, and that Ryan & I can enjoy these last few days together before Madison Claire! Love you all....

Pictures!!

Finally some pictures!!! Here are some new belly shots - these were taken 3 weeks ago so I'm much larger now. I'll try to get some more up soon:

Shower pics:

My AWESOME shower host, Anne

Small group friends

The CPA gang

The grandmothers

Love this picture of me & Jenny

I was so thankful that Sarah & Ryan were able to come up from Atlanta!

Ryan somehow escaped without being pictured, but I did grab this one with dad after the shower before they left for Atlanta

It was so much fun and I'm excited for my shower in Atlanta this weekend!

Baby Shower and Contractions - OH MY!!

There is so much to update on, I don't know where to start! Let me start by saying that my computer has been having BIG TIME issues and for some reason I can't get my camera to sync to my computer to upload pictures. I'm so bummed because I have so many great pictures to share - including some new belly shots and some pictures from the shower! Oh well...hopefully Ryan will remember to bring home his computer sometime soon so I can upload them and get them out on the blog. Until then...here is our update...without pictures :(.

I’m at 33 weeks now and have definitely had an eventful week - some ways good, some ways bad. I had a doctors appointment on Friday of last week and told them that I had been feeling frequent contractions. Dr. Macey said if they got worse or increased in frequency to call them back because we needed to try “really hard to keep her in there for 3 more weeks”. I’m like 3 more weeks…how about 8 more weeks!! The problem with the contractions is they don’t hurt at all and I can’t even really feel them unless I happen to touch my stomach and it feels hard as a rock! So unless I have my hand on my stomach all day long, it’s hard to track how many I'm having and how frequently they are coming. I guessed on Friday that I was having 15-20 a day and they said that was a lot for 33 weeks.

Skip to Saturday...my first shower!!! It was *SO* wonderfully amazing and I can't say thank you enough to everyone who came to celebrate with me. It was so great to have so many friends there to support us!!! Mom & dad came in on Thursday night from Destin and Sarah & Ryan drove up on Friday with my Mama & Papa Howard. Anne came over on Friday night and we spent the night getting the house ready & prepping the food for the shower...it was definitely fun...and exhausting! Saturday morning Ryan took the guys and my grandmother to breakfast at Loveless Cafe while mom, Sarah & I all slept in - shocker, I know! This is actually a huge accomplishment for me because I've been waking up at 4am consistently these days and having a hard time falling back asleep. Anne came over around 11am and we finished all of the decorations & cooking. The shower was from 2-4pm and it was so beautiful. I can't wait to get some pictures up! I was completely overwhelmed with gratitude and love for friends & family! It was so much fun having people from all stages of our lives there - there was Ryan's mom & her friends, my friends from Vandy, our friends from small group, CLC and CPA, my mom & sister & grandmother, and so many others - all in one place...it was like a mini-wedding! We got so many great gifts - THANK YOU to everyone!! I also want to say a special THANK YOU to Anne for hosting the wonderful shower all by herself. She was such a gracious host and I wouldn't have done anything differently if I were throwing it myself! THANK YOU ANNE for sharing in the daily details of this time with me...I love you dearly and cherish your friendship!

We spent most of Sunday going through all of the pink little girls clothes - I got all of the tags off and got them all washed and ready to be put away. If this little one comes out a boy, we are in BIG TROUBLE!!! Ryan and I had fun watching the superbowl and eating way to much on Sunday night. I noticed during the superbowl that my contractions started increasing so decided to track them on Monday morning. I tracked them from 8:15am – 9:45am and I had 14 in that hour and a half! I called the doc and they had me come in to be checked. They said I hadn't started dilating but I was 60% effaced. He said that was more than I was at the Friday appointment and the baby's head was also lower than it had been on Friday. So…they put me on some oral medication to stop the contractions and also ran a FFN (fetal fibronectin) test that would tell me if I am at risk of delivering in the next 2 weeks. If it came back positive, they were going to give me a steroid shot to help the baby's lung development. I got the test results back yesterday and it was negative so that was a HUGE relief! Basically…that means that I’m not going to deliver in the next 2 weeks so I’m for sure safe until 35 weeks which they said is a big milestone. They don’t have me on bed rest, but did tell me to avoid heavy activity!

I’m trying not to be anxious about it…and just trust that she will come when God says she is ready to come but it’s hard because I don’t know what to expect or what labor will feel like and it’s driving me crazy - time to totally trust in the Lord!!! When I was having all of those contractions, I kept thinking I was crazy…I’d think, maybe this isn’t a contraction but then when my stomach went back to normal and it was squishy again, I thought – I guess that really was one. It’s just playing mind tricks on me!!

Please pray that little Madison Claire stays in there to bake for a few more weeks - I'm so looking forward to going to Samford to see Meredith be the star of Step Sing on February 14th and then I have a shower in Atlanta on February 21st and then we have childbirth class on February 28th so I really hope we can get through all of those things before Madison Claire makes her appearance!

Thanks for checking in on us...and for your prayers for us!

Love,
Lauren & Ryan

Petunia has a name...

After much deliberation, looking at every girl name in every baby name book (thank you Julie for the books), more than a few heated discussions and lots of back & forth, Petunia finally has a name! Ryan initially had the idea for the name back in August but we weren't ready to pull the trigger. I came home one day in early December and said I was ready to make it official, but he then changed his mind and wasn't so sure.

Ryan painted the nursery last weekend and while spending the time in the nursery, had a sense of peace about the name and it just "felt right". We've been calling her by the name this week to make sure it fit her & she liked it and tonight we made it official. Petunia is now officially

Madison Claire McSwain

Love to you all,
Lauren & Ryan

Is vacation really over?!?

This is going to be a LONG blog entry because the past few weeks have been so eventful, so don't say I didn't warn you!! Ryan had a doctors appointment on the Friday before we left and everything went well - he got a great report from Dr. Roth. I went so we could show Dr. Roth that we were pregnant...he was so excited! We *LOVE* Dr. Roth - can he be an expert in everything we need a doctor for??

We celebrated Christmas with Ryan's parents in Nashville on Friday night. We had a great meal at Maggiano's and exchanged gifts at our place. It was fun to have the "baby gifts" this year! We then left for Atlanta for the holidays. We had a great visit with the Morgan family on our first Sunday...it was *so* great to see them. Ryan and Missy are both doing well - please continue to keep their sweet family in your prayers!

My mom & dad planned a trip to the King Tut museum for all of us on Monday so that was a fun adventure. I went registering with mom, Sarah & Meredith for baby girl at Babies R Us - it was overwhelming and a long day, but fun nonetheless! The entire week when I was gone shopping with the girls, Ryan was on the computer doing research on cars - I seriously think he could run a car dealership after all of the time he put into looking at various cars! We are still on the hunt...but leaning towards a Honda Pilot or Toyota Highlander...maybe?

Christmas Eve we went to church & our traditional family dinner at the Japanese Steakhouse. We started a new tradition this year where we divided up and did the "Secret Santa" so we didn't have to buy 7 gifts! We opened up gifts that night and just had a great time together! Baby girl, a.k.a. "Petunia" got more gifts than anyone! Check out the stockings...yes, one says Petunia:

Sarah & Ryan spent the night at my parents house for most of the week and Meredith & Patrick were also there all week, so it was great being able to spend so much time with my family! I MISS THEM ALREADY!!! Meredith & I stayed up all night the night before we left to sew the baby bumper! I can't believe we really did it...THANK YOU, Meredith!

I got to see my extended family and had fun comparing pregnancy stories with Shelley who is 4 weeks ahead of me. I also got to see Heidi & Lauren which was such a treat!

Now on to the BABYMOON!!!! The irony of the entire trip was that we were surrounded by inconsolable children! Our flight to Orlando had a poor little guy that cried the ENTIRE time and then we had one particular ride at Hollywood Studios where we had another little guy scream bloody murder for at least an hour! We kept saying...okay, okay...we get the picture!!! Taking that aside, we had a FANTASTIC time in Orlando. The weather was great - somewhere between 75 & 80 degrees every day we were there. We took it easy, I read Twilight, Ryan did Sudoku and continued to look at cars online, spent time out by the pool - I even got sunburned, went to Hollywood studios, watched Vandy win the Music City Bowl in leather recliners at the ESPN Zone - GO DORES!, marked an item off Ryan's bucket list by attending the Capitol One bowl, had breakfast every morning on the boardwalk, ate entirely too much thanks to some great dinners and fantastic sundaes from Ghirardelli & the Fountain! It was so much fun to just spend time together before our life turns upside down in a few short months! A few of the highlights are pictured below:

We were so sad to leave, but had to come home sometime. We got back on Saturday afternoon and Julie & Rebecca were waiting in Nashville! We had a fun weekend celebrating Julie's 30th birthday! Big THANKS to Don & Scout for keeping the kids for the weekend and to sweet Ryan for letting us girls rule the house right when we got back from vacation.

It's back to reality this week...and reality is certainly setting in! It is hard to believe that in less than 3 months, we will have a baby in our house! It feels like the time is flying by so fast...sometimes it takes my breath away. I was in Chicago this week for work - my last official trip for work until after the baby comes. I hope I don't go crazy being at home for the next 6 months!!

As we reflect on 2008 & embark on 2009, we are reminded of how truly blessed we are and how much we have to be thankful for. God has blessed us more than we could have ever imagined or deserved - we pray that His blessings pour out for you as well in 2009!

Almost 26 weeks

Well...everyone has been asking for new belly pics, so here they are! Ryan took these this morning:

I'm feeling good & really looking forward to going home for the holidays! We'll be in Atlanta for one week with my family and then Ryan & I are off to Orlando for our official "Babymoon" a.k.a. last vacation together before baby. We're planning to go to the theme parks and also got tickets to the Capitol One Bowl on January 1st! It will be a fun 2 weeks!!

In other news - Ryan is sick again so pray for him that he feels better. I also found out yesterday that I have been promoted to Recruiting Manager at work so we're planning to celebrate once Ryan starts feeling better! Hopefully soon....