Ellicott City, MD and Loch Raven Damm

Frank had to keep me busy yesterday for the Baby Shower surprise party and we went to Ellicott City, MD and took a look at it. We're planning on seeing this city already the last time but we haven't had much time then. They say it has a european touch to it and is also very old. We liked it but it was very small, just one main street that was historic and then of course the houses in the city itself were very gorgeous.




A new house that was built matching the rest of the city:


We were able to spot some very old store signs. That was cool


The Look Raven Damm we drove by on the way home...

Baby Shower - surprise

Uiuiui... that was quite a day. Since we came home very late yesterday we slept till 930AM (that was so good)... but then... it wasn't very relaxing anymore since Frank wanted to leave soon to 'get going' and start the day... gosh was I upset... being on vacation and he's rushing. I gave him a very hard time ;)... his crazy pregnant wife *lol*. Well... it turned out that he had to get me out of the house by 10AM (which totally wasn't the case)... Frank's Mom was already sitting in the neighborhood waiting for us to leave the house... well while Frank and I went on a nice sightseeing tour to Ellicot City the family was preparing a baby shower for us!!! When we came back home to Patty and Ray's... soooo many cars were in front of the house... so I kind of knew what was going on. It was a great time, meeting so many other family members I haven't met yet and also Jay and Nancy + Kids came as well. Here some pics:

Mmmmhhh, the home made food was DELICOUS:

The youngest and the oldest ;)... Jay and Frankie:


This little rabbit was hanging around in Jay and Nancy's kids room when they were little and they wanted Zoe to have the rabbit hanging around in her room now... that's so cute:
This bathing duck is glowing in different colors... we were cracking up:

An american tradition, all the ribbons and bows of the gifts put on a plate and the parents have to wear the hat:
isn't he a Cutie :)
And a family picture:

Dinner

Yesterday we had a very nice dinner with Ray, Patty, Doug and Paula. Man, that was fun :)

North of Baltimore

Today, Frank and I checked out a little bit of the area that is north of the place Patty and Ray live. Look how beautiful it is here.

This was a horse farm and it really looked like in the movies so I had to take a picture, I've never seen any of this in real:






Of course did we go into the Harley Store... I thought this one looked cool. Made as a 'barn':

Happy Thanksgiving Dinner

And also we had a very delicious Thanksgiving Dinner with a Turkey of course, mashed and sweet potatoes, corn, cranberry sauce, beans, stuffing, Sauerkraut and Rosenkohl. Man... it was sooo delicious... would've loved to eat much more. But I didn't wanna feel like being ready to deliver a turkey right here and now *lol*.

Ray was cutting the turkey into nice pieces:
Patty and Ray:
Patty's Ma, Brother and daugther:
Me, Patty and Jake:

Was that delicious....

Did you notice? Zoe moved into her second to last flower... uiuiui... she's almost here. I have to enjoy her in my belly as much as I can. It goes way to quick. I feel awesome and enjoy every minute of the rest of the pregnancy.

31 weeks

Another week gone already... 9 more weeks to go.

Here our belly... i'm telling you... it never looks the same:

Disgusting grease

Grease the musical is totally cool, but not if you find all that grease in the oven. I cleaned the inside of the one oven the other weekend and now Frank takes the front apart to get the glass cleaned. He took out a lot of grease... *urgh*... The people who owned this house before us, left the house in a very good condition... but you can tell they spent a whole lot time in the kitchen and cooked/ baked A LOT!!! Over the Thanksgiving weekend we'll get the kitchen floors redone :)... I'm a little afraid of the dust from the sanding of the wooden floors but on the other hand I bet it'll look awesome in the end. Just a little bit more cleaning for me to do afterwards :(... we'll see... maybe it's not too bad.

King Bed - just like heaven

What a dream... we finally took out the Queen Bed apart and put down our new King mattresses... is that comfortable. And then additional to the comfortable mattresses we bought a mattress pad. Look how big this bed is :)We love this bed, haven't spent a night in it yet but did some testing:
Here for the Europeans ;)... the box spring is on the floor (for now until we find a nice bedroom set we love and can afford). Then the king mattress that has an additional pillow top on it already (that was already comfi enough) and THEN we bought this very dreamy mattress pad (down) which lets you think you're in heaven. The bed comforter we'll put on top of all the sheets so it'll warm us at night because we sleep with open windows and it can become very cold in Michigan ;).
Now we're waiting on the washing machine to get the sheets and pillow cases washed and then we'll have a very good night tonight (not that we slept bad in the Queen, but we just love a King size bed). The other good thing is now, when Zoe has a bad night, no problem... she'll have enough space in our bed without us three squeezing together, we can just all spread out and have a good night sleep.

Talking about Zoe, she's very mean today... stretches into places and kicks that are not very comfortable. That's her paying me back probably because I poke and try to feel her sometimes ;). Also she is positioned so low nowadays that I have to run to the restroom every 30 minutes *rolling eyes*...

more pics

And here some more pics, this time with Frank:and Franzi:

30 weeks

And here we have our baby belly at 30 weeks. We have only 10 weeks left, or you can also count in days... 70 days!!! Boah... time is flying by.
Today we had another Midwife visit and I brought my huge list of questions with me (the midwife loved that). I had again Barb who I've seen today for the 3rd time, it seems that she'll be our No. 1 Midwife ;)... she's sooo nice. So we did took my blood pressure 3 times because it was high the first time and she wasn't hearing right, then we listened to the babies' heart beat (all good) and then we tested again my blood pressure and it was still quite high... I learned today that the first no. is counting the heart beat and the second no. counts the heart at rest. My heart beat was always very high so she wanted to go through all my questions and then test again. So I finally got off this terrible patient chair/bed and sat down next to it to feel more comfortable... we went through the questions, and then we tested my blood pressure again and this time it was only: 120/70 *YEAH*... isn't that awesome? So now we know that I have to get tested when I'm NOT on this stupid chair/bed :). Too funny...

Zoe is doing awesome. She's positioned herself already with her head down. Also her movements are feeling different now... you actually can start feeling her body through my belly... I'm still testing to feel her and 'define' where is what... Frank is always a little worried and says: 'Don't poke my daughter!!!' But it doesn't bother her... I heard if you give her a lot of massages already when they're in the belly they won't need that many back rubs anymore when they're outside the belly. So Frank can save those back rubs for me *big smile*.

Also our coworkers' in Detroit gave us a baby shower today (here in the USA they have a 'gift party' already before the baby comes). It was a pretty moving experience... getting our first baby clothes for our baby!!! It hit us both... WOW... soon there will be our little one in these clothes! They've brought in very delicious food and after a nice dining with everybody we unwrapped the gifts: We got a crib :) and some very cute clothes, all in pink ;) and also a gift basket with this and that.