Ginger and Bella's Christmas

After many Christmas' of watching my parents dog excitedly open her presents, this year Jason and I thought we would see if our dog's have the same talent!

Bella's obsession for food paid off in this instance, she did pretty well!

Ginger on the other hand tried for a couple of seconds and then waited us to get the bone out for her!With all of the snow we recieved on Christmas, Jason spent a lot of time outside shoveling so we could get in and out of our driveway.

Nursery Update!!

So since Jessica promised pictures, I guess it's up to me to deliver. ;) I was able to get our new baby furniture together over the past couple of days and it looks awesome!! We had to wait a LONG time for it to actually arrive, but now that it's in the room it just makes the reality that our little girl will be here before we know it hit home that much more. We got a dresser/changing table and a 4-in-1 crib (it will convert to other types of beds as she gets older). About 4 hours and roughly 15,000 turns of a screwdriver later - viola! Baby furniture! Check it out...

Here are a couple of "in progress" shots that Jess took of me building the furniture.

You might notice that option #2 from our blog poll on what colors to use in the baby room turned out to be the big winner. Pink better be this girl's favorite color because she's going to be seeing a ton of it as she grows up. :)

We've still got lots of things to do before our little one arrives, but for now we are definitely glad to have the room painted and the furniture put together. Those were huge steps. Now it's just time to take care of the little details...and complete her wardrobe (great...).

Finally, here's the latest baby bump picture that we took this morning. Doesn't Jess look amazing?!

Week 32 and more tests

We are currently in our 32 week and things are going as well as can be. This Monday (and every Monday after this) I will be going to the Doctor for a biophysical profile. With the 2-vessel cord, the biggest concern is that the pregnancy will result in a still-birth and from here until the end is where the risk is the greatest. The biophysical profile will measure a lot of different things with the baby (and me) and if we pass than the risk of still-birth drops to a 2-3% until the next appointment. If we don't pass, then our baby will most likely be delivered early. As uncomfortable as I have been the past couple of weeks, I am not ready for the little one to make her appearance yet. On that note, the nursery is almost finished. The painting is done, we just need to finish putting the furniture together. We promise to have pictures posted by the end of the weekend!

Week 30

I can't believe we are already at week 30. This baby is going to be here before we know it! Time is flying by and it is weird to think that in 2 months it is no longer going to be just Jason and I. We are going to have to change our focus and add a little one into the mix! This past weekend we started painting the nursery and yesterday we picked up our furniture! We should be done painting and the furniture put together by the end of the week (fingers crossed), once we get to that point we will post pictures.

I have another doctors appointment in an hour, it should be a quick one. Next ultrasound is in 2 weeks.

It's been a crazy week!!

Wow, it has been a busy couple of weeks!! It seems like we have had somewhere to be or something fun to do nearly every day. Don't get me wrong, we've had a lot of good times, but it makes it hard to get something posted on this blog. So we decided to tackle a bunch of activities in one GIANT update. :) Get ready...here it goes.

First off, we failed to mention in our last update that we recently attended a day-long marriage conference at our church. The speaker for the conference was Dr. Gary Chapman, author of The Five Love Languages as well as tons of other helpful, bible-based, relationship books. It was a wonderful experience and we think we really got a lot of good out of it! Dr. Chapman was a very entertaining speaker and made the day very enjoyable. :)


Next, some Thanksgiving activities. On Thursday morning, we got up early (kinda) and headed over to the Sprint campus for the Thanksgiving Day Sprint 5K Run/Walk. It was a HUGE race with over 5,600 people participating. Jess' parents ran/walked with us, and despite the bitter cold wind, it was a pretty good time. As you can tell from the pic, we tried to be prepared for the weather.



After the race, we headed over to Jess' parents to have a Thanksgiving brunch. It was sooo good! Thanks to Kim for the AWESOME cheesy potatoes!! My favorite...

Next up, it was time to head over to my Grandma's house for the annual Heine/Elliott family gathering. There were 23 people there to enjoy the 2 turkeys and tons of other food. Jess and I also took a second to have a couple pics taken to be put on our Christmas cards this year. This one didn't make the card, but we liked it anyway. ;)


On Saturday, we got to go to the K-State basketball game that was here at the Sprint Center. My brother Jeff got us some student tickets and came with us. We had great seats - third row! I tried to get a couple of good action shots of the game...this was my best one - Curtis Kelly with a monster dunk!


Me and my bro...


Me and my bride...


Finally, we were also able to get some of our Christmas decorations put up over the weekend. Before going to the game, Jeff came over and helped me get the lights on the house. I added a few additional strands that we didn't have last year and I think they turned out fantastic!! I could be a little biased though...

Jess took care of the inside decor. Our fireplace and mantle are ready for Santa! We still don't have our tree up yet, but I'm sure we'll get that done before this week is over. :)


Whew, I think that's all for now. No slowing down now though - Christmas will be here before we know it! We hope everyone had a happy Thanksgiving. Jess and I are certainly thankful for all of the wonderful people we are so blessed to have in our lives.

Latest Dr. Appointment

I just got back from the Doctor and everything is progressing as it should. In fact, baby Heine is continuing to grow ahead of her due date. Our due date is technically February 12, but today she was measuring at February 4. She already weighs almost 3 pounds and as the sonographer lovingly put it, she is going to be quit the chunk! While all of the measurements were being taken, we were also told that she has very long legs. Since we have all seen Jason, I am sure that is no big suprise to anyone!!! It has been such a blessing every appointment to be reassured that everything looks good and there are no more red flags to be worried about.


On a personal note, I did take my glucose tolerance test today and that was NOT a fun experience. The drink was so sweet I thought I might throw up after every sip. I won't know the results until the end of the week, but feel confident that the blood work will come back normal. I also recieved the H1N1 shot today, so I feel ready for the flu season to begin!

Bathroom Progress...

OK, so I just have to get this little bit in really quick. I am finally making some real progress on our bathroom project!! I took the past couple of days off work so I could really focus on getting some major work done. So...I've got the tile grouted and walls almost completely painted! It's really starting to look finished again. Just a few more steps and I'm done!! (Plus, I have to brag a little because I think the tile looks amazing!) Check it out. :) :)

This past weekend

Nothing much new to report from the Heine household, but here are a couple of pictures that we took this weekend. Saturday we went to Manhattan, KS for the KSU football with Jason's parents and his brother. Unlike the last game we went to, this one did not turn out as well. Lets just put it this way, we didn't score a single touchdown and at one point we had the ball inches from the goal line. Yicks...ugly game. Even thought the game was not good for our team, the day itself was a lot of fun!

Sunday we stayed around the house watching football and getting some things done. As you can tell it was a lazy afternoon. It still makes me laugh, our dogs must think that they are also human.


Here is a picture that we took when we got home from the game on Sat. Week 27, it is flying by! We were pleasantly suprised to read that from this point on, the baby has a very high survival rate! I hope she waits a couple more months before she makes her appearance, but it is comforting to know that no matter what everything should turn out OK!

Baby room ideas??

Now that the bathroom is starting to come along, Jason and I have started thinking about how we are going to decorate the baby room. Right now this room is our office, so there is nothing baby about it. You'll notice the brown chair rail in the room, I think we have decided to keep that up, but paint it. Right now it is kind of a weird shade of brown...very hard to describe.

A couple of weekends ago, we went to Babies-R-Us to register and picked out the bed set that we would like to use. We bought the blanket that goes with it, so we would know exactly what the colors are. We have a lot of colors to choose from: pink, brown, green, and an ivory/white. Oh, and the furniture we picked out is dark chocolate brown as well.

Option 1: Pink wall (top and bottom), brown chair rail

Option 2: Pink wall (top and bottom), ivory/white chair rail

Option 3: Pink on top, ivory/white on bottom, brown chair rail

Option 4: Green wall (top and bottom), brown chair rail

Option 5: Green wall (top and bottom), ivory/white chair rail

Please let us know your ideas, we can use all the help we can get!!!

Dr Appointment Update

I had my most recent Dr appointment this past Monday and everything checked out great. The sonogram showed that she is growing just like she should and is even a little ahead of schedule! She already weighs almost 2 pounds, as Jason said, "she is very healthy." I can tell she is getting stronger, because she sure is a kicker, off and on all day, every day. I am a little nervous because if she kicks this much now, what is it going to be like when she gets even bigger and stronger. OUCH!

A Hard Workin' Weekend

So this was a weekend that has been a long time coming (if you're talking to Jess...) and I finally got to the point of tiling our hall bathroom! I actually started this bathroom project back in August with some deconstruction - taking out the old tile, tearing out walls, tearing up the floor and removing the toilet. After weeks of doing this and that and slowly getting things prepped, I finally got everything ready and was able to tackle the toughest part. I was actually pretty excited to put up the tile. It's not something I have ever done, but I was definitely thinking I could pull it off. My dad came over to help me - he hadn't ever tiled before either - and we spent a good portion of today putting up our new shower walls. Jess poked her head in a couple times to make sure we were sticking to the plan she had laid out for us and she took a couple action photos too. :) I'd say that for two complete amatuers, we did a pretty darn good job!! It turned out as good as I could have imagined. Check it out...

On the baby front - Jess is now at 25 weeks!! That officially puts us into the 3rd trimester! After the bathroom is completely done, I will have to get crackin' on that baby nursery. Man time is flying by! Also, tomorrow afternoon, Jess is going to the doctor for her next ultrasound. We will let you all know how everything goes! Anyway, here's the latest baby bump picture. :)

K-State Football and More...

Here is our week 24 tummy picture. As you can see, our little girl has grown a LOT in the last 3 weeks. I can no longer look down and see my feet. Ginger and Bella were a little jealous of the camera attention I was getting and wanted to be a part of photo shoot as well! How cute is that!!!

Yesterday, Jason and I were given tickets to the KSU football game. It was so much fun, we wish we lived a little closer so that we could go to every game!

Our view was a bit different than our student days of sitting on the 50, but these were awesome seats too! Plus we actually got to sit down every once in awhile over here...wow, saying that makes us sound like old folks!

Awww, the students...it seems like only yesterday that we were doing the Wabash with all of the other crazy Wildcat fans. :)

A Little Something For You

Just a quick little snip-it from our busy lives these days. We don't have any pics this time but just wanted to share a fun event that we were a part of last weekend. Jess and I decided (kinda last minute) that we would volunteer to help out at this year's Kansas City Marathon! We didn't do a ton, but were course monitors and traffic controllers for a section of the course. We also got to cheer on all of the runners!! Having been participants in the half-marathon a couple of times in the past, we have always enjoyed the encouraging words and cheers coming from all of the people along the course. This was our chance to return those cheers. And despite temperatures that I'm completely convinced that God did not intend us to be outside in (let alone running) we had a great time! We saw a bunch of friends who were braving the cold and running their hearts out. Plus we got free t-shirts and snacks...this may have been the real reason we did it, but that's not the point. :) According to Jessica, we are going to be back in the race next year, but we'll see what happens...

That's all for now. We will probably post another baby update in the very near future. :)

Baby Update...

Here is a picture that was taken a week and a half ago, my baby bump is rapidly turning into a baby mountain! Strangers have started asking when I am due, so I guess it is official, no more hiding it under baggy shirts.

Now, for the news you really want to hear! We had our level 2 ultrasound this afternoon and everything is progressing as it should. The perinatologist didn't find anything that we should be concerned with, which was very good news. However, with the 2 vessel cord, we are still at an increased risk for a few congenital abnormalities, but there are no red flags at this point. The good news is that we get to have sonograms every month to make sure she is growing like she should, so more pictures! Here are a couple of pictures that were taken today, it was amazing how much detail we were able to see. The first picture is of her foot, and the second picture is of her hands resting on her head. We must have a volleyball player among us because both times we were able to see her, her hands were over her head. It was really neat being able to see all the fingers and toes.

Other stuff...

In non-baby news... this past weekend Jason and I participated in a 3 mile walk with Jason's family and my parents and cousin. The walk benefitted the Alzheimer's association. It was a nice way to remember Jason's great-grandmother who suffered from the disease before passing away last year. It was a lot of fun and there were a LOT of people.

Here are a couple of cute pictures of our dogs. As they get older, they are becoming more and more lazy. We are really enjoying it!

Big News!!!

So today was definitely a very anticipated day to say the least. We were headed to the doctor's office this afternoon to find out if Baby Heine was going to be a boy or a girl. Needless to say we were extremely excited. We have both been dying to find out ever since we knew we were pregnant! The sonographer got a bunch of awesome pictures of our beautiful baby and everything seems to be going well. Just about every measurement you can think of was taken on our little one, and everything is right on schedule.

So it's officially a GIRL! The doctor was very confident in that assessment. :) Here are a couple snap shots that were cool too...

In this one, she's kinda upside-down...you can see her head and spine on the right and her legs pointing left.

This one is a little harder to make out, but you can actually see her little face here. The two dark spots in the middle are her eyes and you can see her right hand just to the side of her head!

It was unbelievable sitting there watching these images on the screen! You can hear the doctor in the video say how contorted she was sitting in there, and at first she wasn't sure we would be able to tell what the sex was. But it didn't take long before she had moved just enough to get a clear shot. :) Like I said, everything seemed to be progressing well. There is one item they want us to look at again though...the umbilical cord it what they called a 2-vessel cord, meaning that it contains 1 artery and 1 vein. Typically the cord will be a 3-vessel one. With a 2-vessel cord, there is a slightly higher risk of other abnormalities. The doctor says that from everything else they saw today there doesn't appear to be anything being affected by this, but we are going to be getting a level 2 ultrasound done next week just to be sure. It sounds like that will be pretty neat actually because they will go really in depth with everything and we will really get to see every aspect of our little girl. We will definitely give an update on mom and baby's status after that takes place. That's all for now!

20 Weeks...and much more!

Here it is! The 20-week photo. I can't believe we are really half way to our due date! Jess and I get to go to the doctor in exactly one week to find out if our little one is going to be a boy or a girl. We are both so incredibly excited it's getting hard to wait any longer!

This past weekend was a busy one. On Saturday, I spent a few hours finishing up the "deconstruction" of our hall bathroom. I think I finally have it ready to start the rebuilding process. Hopefully it won't be too long before we will be posting the "after" pictures for this project. (At least I know Jess hopes it's sooner rather than later) Ha!

On Saturday night we went to a wedding for our friends Kim Freed and Quincy Wiley. It was downtown at Club 1000 which was really a cool place to have something like that. It had a really cool atmosphere and we got to see a bunch of friends from K-State.

Jack Schwatken

One of my great friends, Kelly Schwatken had a baby boy on Wed, 9/9/09. Jason and I were fortunate to be able to visit and see the happy mom and dad. Jack is adorable and seems to be a very low maintainance and happy baby.

17 Weeks!

As promised, here is the latest baby bump picture. You will notice that I have always just come back from the gym when we take these pictures. I think workout clothes show off the belly the more than anything else!