Das Shields Leben: Christmas 2011 with The Shields!

Hey All! This post is a little late, story of my life now! Anyways, we were so blessed this year to have yet another amazing Christmas! We were able to make Christmas Eve candle light service and then got to celebrate with both our extended families on Christmas Eve. Brian also worked at the firehouse on Christmas day. But it worked out great because we got up super early had our Christmas together, a yummie Christmas morning breakfast and opened presents together! Okay I will admit I was sad when 7:30am rolled around and he had to leave. I think I hugged him for like 5 minutes straight cause I didn't want him to go! I stayed with my family most of the day. Then I went to the firehouse, brought the guys a yummie dinner and got to hang out for a few hours in the oh-so-comfy recliners! :)

For Christmas we got lots of baby stuff which is awesome!!! We are so thankful! I cannot WAIT to get the cute little clothes washed and put away. Maybe this will be the first time ever that I will enjoy doing laundry. Oh yes and we are super ready to get things going in the nursery. First step was new carpet. DONE! Looks amazing! My sweet hubs worked SO hard all week with my dad and our close friend Shawnski to get all the old carpet ripped up, seal the floors, replace all our stairs, and fix all the creeks in our floor! Woohoo!! Pictures to come soon. I'm still deep cleaning everything and of course putting up some new decor. Did I mention that I cannot WAIT to get hmmmm..... every single room repainted in our house! Well YUP I can't wait. Looks like we will start on the guest bedroom and nursery very very soon, right babe? :)

Here are our Christmas cards this year. I got the template on a cute website: www.groopdealz.com .We soooo badly wanted to do maternity pictures for the actual picture but ya know we ran out of time. So we used our engagement pictures which were done in January 2011. Maternity pictures will be hopefully this January sometime before I get tooooo huge! :)

Now for a baby Shields update:

How far along: 23 weeks

Total weight gain: not sure around 15lb or so.

Maternity clothes: nope- wearing my belly band with my jeans love that thing!

Stretch marks: nope but I'm freaking out at any little mark I see.

Sleep: great. Really loving my wedge I sleep with

Best Moment: I was in the bath the other night and I felt the baby moving all around. I then noticed I can actually see my tummy move when the baby moves! SO cool! Also loved loved loved seeing Brian open all our baby gifts this Christmas. He is getting SO excited and I just love seeing that excitement in his eyes, so cute!

Miss anything: nope- just my husband when he is at the station.

Movement: lots. The kicks are getting stronger which means baby shields is growing, yay!

Food cravings: ORANGES! Salads! But did I say ORANGES? Well this week, as of Christmas day I have been eating oranges like crazy. I had 4 on Christmas day, the small cuties though. Now I have at least 2 or 3 of those a day. I can't get enough of them. Also chocolate now that it's the holiday season. I also started drinking a small amount of coffee in the mornings again. I think it was a temperature thing before, I just didn't like drinking warm/hot things. So now I down a big glass of milk with all my vitamins and then have a small cup of coffee in the mornings.

Anything making you queasy or sick: nope

Started showing: OH YES. I had a lady at the register ask me, " Oh are you getting close to you due date?" I replied with first laughing and said, "No not really I have until April!" Guess she thought I was big for almost 6 months! Sweetness.

Gender: It's a mystery. We might, might, might find out Jan. 9th.

Labor signs: nope

Belly button: In and still have my belly button ring in

Wedding rings: on

Mood: HAPPY! Who isn't happy when they are on Christmas Break!

Looking forward to: Getting the guest bedroom and nursery painted within the next week or so!

Pictures: