7 months old!

I can't believe it, but my darling baby is 7 months old! Last Tuesday he was official. It seems like only yesterday I brought him home from the hospital! He started sitting in his high chair last month and we have stopped taking him inside restaurants in his infant carrier because he is getting so big. I estimate him to be around 19.5 lbs, but I won't know for sure for another couple of months at his 9 month checkup. He is a great baby, and I can't imagine our lives without him! Here is a pic on his official 7 month birthday. I will start posting the professional photos I have taken of him from now on too.

We spent last weekend with his Aunt Becky in Charlotte. We had a great time visiting with her, and I got to go to my first Coldplay concert! It was a blast. I love hanging out in North Carolina, and I miss the burning hot weather (believe it or not). We also got to see Brandon's college baseball friends and had a good time catching up with them all! This week, Brandon and I are going to head to Blowing Rock for a dinner with friends at The Gamekeeper. I can't wait to have the bread pudding again....yum! Just 11 days left until vacation time! I hate the summer is almost over and can literally feel it slipping through my fingers!

Where to begin? I have been a terrible poster on the blog since October (I think?) before Brady ever came into our lives! Well, I have a lot to catch up on! I won't be going over every little detail because there is obviously months and months of stuff to talk about. As you all know, we were blessed in January with a beautiful little boy, Brady Benjamin. He is a sweetheart, and he will be seven months old on August 6. Today was actually a big day, he got up on all fours! He swayed back and forth for a long time, and I was just sure he was going to move forward, but nope. Haha, soon enough. I will dread him being mobile, because then I will just have to chase him around even more!! We will need to start baby proofing the house soon:) Brady comes to work with me everyday and Nana watches him. He has been such a blessing to us. I will try and post more pictures when I have time. Anyway, I just want to say hey, and that we will try and be more diligent from now on with posting blogs! Hope everyone is having a great summer!!

Well, this weekend was a very busy one indeed. Brandon and I drove to Roanoke for my 27-28 week checkup on Friday. I had bloodwork done and a flu shot, measurements taken, etc., so I was ready to rest when I got home. BUT, I couldn't, because we had the carpet fixed downstairs for our 2nd guest bedroom and Mom came over and helped me fixed the baby's room. His room is adorable, here is a pic of the almost finished product.

I am going to put his name above the crib when we concretely decide on it. Although I am sure it will still be Brady, we haven't really definitely decided on it. So, I'm going to wait and order the letters when I know for sure. We worked on the room all day until Friday and finally finished around midnight. Saturday we shopped a little and fixed up the downstairs second guest room. Whooo, I am still tired from all of that, but at least the house is completely finished now, and I couldn't be more thrilled with the results! My Mom passed a great milestone this week...15 years being cancer free! We went to Boone yesterday to meet my sister and eat and shop to celebrate. After a nice meal we went to the outlets and shopped for Christmas, although I couldn't really get anything because I'm so big right now! I still picked out some things at my fave store (J.Crew) for after the little guy arrives and I no longer have a stomach ;) Here is my most recent picture (27 weeks, 28 tomorrow wow!).
We had a great day and were able to see plenty of the beautiful fall leaves. This week proves to be another busy work week and the weekend should be very fun, because I get to judge the Miss Virginia Teen USA pageant this year! I'm extremely excited to see everyone I used to know and be on the other side of the fence this time. I can't wait! Well, that's all for now!

Well, we finally did it....we painted the baby's room! It's adorable, and I'll post pics of it soon!

After battling a rather fierce head cold for the past 2 weeks, my family and local friends suprised me with a beautiful baby shower honoring our soon-to-arrive little boy. Here are a few pictures.

The party was a complete surprise to me, but everyone else, including Brandon, had known for quite some time! My family lured me out of the house under the pretense we were going to eat for an uncle's birthday. My sister had called earlier and talked me into wearing a blue and white outfit, because it really was the only maternity summer clothes I had. So, after plenty of coercing under false pretense, they successfully kept the wool pulled over my eyes until I walked outside and saw a sign for the shower with blue and white balloons they had posted in my yard pointing me down to my subdivision's clubhouse. Looking over, I saw all of the guests standing there waiting to surprise me! It was a great and very welcome distraction from house work, colds, and every day life in general. Baby Blake got plenty of wonderful presents to help welcome him upon his arrival in January. Plus, it's always nice when my family can get together like that, considering we're a pretty large group and it's hard to bring everyone around on the same day. Here are a couple of pictures of Brandon and me and our diaper cake (kudos to Aunts Karen and Melissa, and Mom!) and some of the women in my family minus a couple who had to leave early. What a great day it was!

Hello everyone! Well, we went for our 23 week ultrasound on Friday. Everything was going great, according to Dr. Keene and the baby is currently in the 50th percentile of growth. He is crammed in pretty tight, however, so it was very difficult getting good pictures this time. Here are a couple. I have also gotten quite a bit bigger in the past 2 weeks, it's crazy. Here are my pictures from just a little over a month pregnant to 23 weeks pregnant, I'll be 24 tomorrow!

We also went to Chapel Hill to visit my best friend from dental school, Lindsey E who has a birthday tomorrow (happy birthday!), and also to watch to VT vs. UNC game. I naturally cheered for VT even though I went to both. I was happy to see us pull out another win, even if it was late in the game. Can't wait for the next home game! Here is a picture of my sister and me at the VT vs GT game last week.

My shirt says "future Hokie" :) We got to see Brandon's parents this weekend which was nice. We hardly ever get to go to Marion anymore, I wish we could see our friends there a little more often, so any time we get to drive through there is great. I wanted to go visit Heather and baby Addison, but that didn't happen this trip. Yesterday I broke down and decorated for the fall season even though it was in the 80s! It's another warm day here in Johnson City, and I'm not going to complain, but it's nice to get in the fall mood this time of year. That's about all for now!

Well, it has been another eventful few weeks for us. First, I want to congratulate Heather and David on their beautiful new arrival! Addison is gorgeous! We have been trying to get our 3rd floor guest bedroom moved down to the 1st floor. So, last Saturday we attempted to clean up our "junk room" which was full of things we never bothered unpacking when we moved in, Christmas decorations, extra dining room chairs for when we put our table wings in, assorted junk from dental school, etc. You name it, it was in there. After several long hours of cleaning and unpacking and reorganizing the garage to accomodate some of these items, we were finally down to the end. To our great dismay, however, Brandon stepped into the back half of the room to pick up a random tv stand and discovered the back of the room was flooded! We quickly moved things out and recognized it was really the whole back half of the room! SO, we spent most of the weekend ripping up carpet, throwing away padding and wet/dry vacuuming the room up. Needless to say, even though our baby furniture is ordered, we cannot move the room down stairs until our carpet has been reinstalled. But, we have received all of the bedding! We decided to go with a Pooh theme after debating over safari for a long time. I saw it and loved it so we went ahead with it! I can't wait to paint the baby's room too, right now we're thinking yellow or pale blue, we might go this weekend and actually pick the paint out. In other news, I'm going to VT tomorrow with my parents to see my sister and support our Hokies against GT. I also get to eat at one of my favorite Blacksburg restaurants, Backstreets, and I have been craving it a lot lately. The baby definitely isn't lacking even now on Hokie and Tarheel wear. We have beanies in both for him to wear in the hospital! So exciting :) Well, that is about all for now. I will try to post some pictures on here in a day or two. Have a great weekend!

Baby Boy Blake :)

Well it's official....we are expecting a little boy! Here is a picture from the ultrasound. He is an avid thumb sucker already, and we as dentists can't let that go on for long! We are thinking about calling him Brady, middle name not decided yet. My due date has been moved up a few days to January 14 because he is a little bigger than they thought initially, but right on track. I had the pleasure of going to my childhood friend Aimee's wedding yesterday and got to see several old friends from when I went to Covenant Christian school! It was really nice. I also was able to talk to my mentor Dr. Pete, and he said my old friend Marsha had seen I was pregnant, so I'm sending her a message, if this is where she saw it, send me an email sometime!!! Mihorn@vt.edu. I will be expecting it ;) We have had a lazy weekend here at the Blake household and have just gotten in from the pool and exercising, so I'm going to go take a shower. That's all for now!

Hey All, it's been a while since we posted last. I have been trying to wait until we find out what the baby is before writing again, but that won't be until next Friday. When we went for our last doctor visit, the baby was moving around quite a bit but gave us a good "view" all the same. Unfortunately, the ultrasound tech wouldn't give us a definite on what the baby might be but was inclined to think it could possibly be a boy. We asked the doctor what she thought and she debunked the tech and said both girl and boy "parts" look the way our baby's did at that early stage so there couldn't be any certainty until the next appt. Oh well! I have been looking at different nurseries for either gender and can't wait to start planning when we finally are told what it will be! Not much other news going on....just getting extremely busy at work. I am gaining wait (boo) and am not very excited about it, but I guess it's going to have to start sometime! I've just gained around 5 pounds, but that is definitely quite a bit to me, especially since it's hard to fit into my jeans at this point! I'm around 4 and a half months and was hoping to keep wearing my regular clothes a little longer, but I don't think it's going to happen! I haven't scanned in our last ultrasound pictures, but will try to do that later and add to this post tonight. Until then, everyone have a great day!

Well, we definitely have some exciting news! Brandon and I are going to have a baby!! Our friend Lindsey actually was with us when we found out and took an amusing video of our reactions, but it is probably too big to post here. We were actually on vacation and had no clue until I figured out I was a few days behind schedule and started wondering. Finally Lindsey took us to the store and to our very pleasant surprise on May 9.....

It was a definite positive! What a vacation and what a beautiful happy place to find out such great news!! We were all very excited, but Lindsey was sworn to secrecy and we've not told very many people until I could go to the doctor.

Here is our first pic right after we found out, Lindsey insisted she get one!

Today was my first visit and I'm approximately 9 weeks 2 days, our due date is January 17, 2009! We're very excited! During the ultrasound the baby kicked his or her little legs and waved once! We saw it's heart beat and heard it, it was so amazing! I scanned our first ultrasound picture in, here it is! Anyways, we are so excited and happy to share the news!!

Hey everyone, well I finally decided to update the blog. We've done quite a bit since the last time I wrote, and I thought I'd share a few pictures to show what we've done! My name finally got posted in February, so I thought I would show a pic, even though we ended up changing the letters to a different font. But, it looks basically the same!

We were able to go hiking with our friends Summer and Josh in April at TableRock Mtn. We got a little lost and most of you have heard the story, so I won't go into that any further, but we did manage to get some nice pics before disaster struck!

The day after our anniversary (May 6) we were lucky enough to get to take a vacation to the tropics with our best NC girl Lindsey! Her parents and her were so much fun to hang out with and we took lots of great pics. Needless to say, it was a very EVENTFUL trip and we had an amazing and unforgettable time :) Right Linds??




Here Lindsey and I are in front of her parent's condo relaxing in the hut, because it was just too hot in the sun!















































Beautiful view down the beach....




























View from under the hut...


Here is beach bum Brandon in a hammock
































Awww... :)


















At the Ritz-Carlton
















Ritz Poolside



















This is about all I have time for today but I will post more tomorrow!

This is the painting we had done in HI. I finally had it framed! Carolina blue of course :)

Above is our second story living room with a view of Boone Lake off the deck. And of course, there is Maverick modeling. The top one is the fireplace with the still beautiful flowers Brandon sent to my office on V-day. :)

Above is my kitchen. Someone who has visited has been telling people I have a pink kitchen with pink appliances which I have been questioned about. Obviously this isn't true. My kitchen is green, so maybe this can clarify that rumor. Below is the other wall, sorry I can't rotate the pic on this blog. Again, green kitchen.

Above is a picture of our breakfast room where we eat most of the time. This also has a great view of the lake.

This is the 2nd floor bathroom. I can't show the whole room, but it is really pretty and matches my butterfly meadow china in the kitchen.

This is the 3rd floor living area. It's mainly my space where I go to watch tv and relax in the evening. Below is a partial picture of the 3rd floor guest room.

This is the guest bathroom adjacent to the bedroom shown above.
This is a picture of Brandon's and my bedroom above and below some more views.

Below are some partial views of the master bathroom.

This is the basement living area and below are the basement level bathroom and bedroom pics.

That is basically it, and I'm tired of posting pics!

Pictures of the house

Hey well, here are some pictures of the house we've been in since August. I apologize for some of the clutter, I need to clean! I hope all my family and friends who haven't been here yet can view these pics, because I know I've been asked to post them online for months now! Here goes... below is a picture of our office. Obviously I can't show the whole room, sorry!

Above is a picture of the dining room and hutch with our china.