19 Weeks!

We're off on our babymoon! Ned has taken me and the poodles away to Palm Springs for a family getaway - probably our last before baby arrives. We've just been hanging out, reading books and enjoying the gorgeous winter weather - sunny and low 70s, SoCal is the bomb!
I hit 19 weeks yesterday, so we're pretty close to the halfway mark. Hard to believe. I've been feeling really good, and the belly is definitely growing. I've gained a fair amount of weight, up probably 14 pounds so far. It's strange putting on so much weight so fast, but I guess it's for a good cause :)
I have started to feel little kicks. They're still very slight, but increasing in frequency. When we watch the baby on the sonogram, s/he seems very active so I'm hoping to have some more powerful movement soon, I think Neddie will love to feel the baby moving around!
We're also entering the phase where the baby can hear us! I'm really excited about that. Just seems so cool that they learn how your voices sound. We got a treasury book of kids' stories from the library and we'll try to read baby a story every few days, just to say hi.
That's all for now! Back to sunning and reading with my little family :)

14 Week Pic

Took this pic on Christmas Day! I want to start cataloging the growth of the bump :) Here you can't really see too much, but I've definitely filled out some since then! I'll take the next shot next Sunday, at 18 weeks.
We had an ultrasound last week - the progress is pretty unbelievable. At eight weeks, baby was kind of baby shaped, but just like a little blog with stumpy appendages and such. Baby now looks like a real baby - we could see arms, fingers, toes, spine, nose, etc. S/he was moving around, waving their arms and moving footies and everything. It was very cool to watch.
So far health-wise everything is great! A lot of my energy is back and Ned and I have burned through a bunch of the stuff on our to-do list. We've almost finished the rumpus room (new slider, window treatments, paint, carpet, bookcases for Two Poodle, etc.) and hopefully we'll be listening to records and working in there soon! Lots of things to do before baby arrives :)

Baby Engelke!

It's super official, we're pregnant! We had our end-of-first-trimester checkup this week, and everything looks great. We've been keeping the baby under wraps a bit until now, so it feels great to be able to tell everyone. I can't wait until I start to show so I can get some good pregnant lady perks! More soon :)

Comfort, Texas

Comfort, Texas. Not too shabby. Neddie and I have been in Texas, visiting fam and friends and we've taken a two-day sojourn into Hill Country. We're treating ourselves with two nights in Comfort, a small town outside of Austin. Pretty much the cutest place ever. The B&B sits creekside, and we've spent the last few hours either swinging by the water or on the porch admiring the bougainvillea and watching the (nice) locals drive/walk by.
Our Texas trip has been great. I love visiting with Neddie's parents and we even managed to coordinate with Uncle Solly and Aunt Bets for a delicious dinner in Houston. And the weather in Comfort right now? About 75 with a light breeze. Um, yes please.
Each time I'm in Texas I like it more and more. And, I've realized that Texans are right - Californians have NO IDEA what real barbecue is. :)

the landscaping projects begins; happy fourth!

Ned and I have taken the first step to our new, fabulous yard! On Saturday a landscape crew came out to clean out almost everything in the backyard and trim down a ton of other stuff. In the 3+ years we've lived here, we've never really addressed the yards before; other than mowing and some minor planting/weeding. Things had gotten out of control! Messy and out of control.
Here's an a before/after shot:















I LOVE the rock wall! So cool. So we're going to start drawing up some plans and figure out what to do to make over our yard. Exciting! we can't wait to spend some more time back there with the boys.

Also, today is the Fourth of July! Weeee! We started off the morning with some salmon for the doggies and some homemade blueberry pancakes for us. They were bomb! I had never made pancakes from scratch before, super-easy and just about as fast as using a mix. Later, we hung out with the fam at Uncle Jeff's place and played horseshoes and drank tequila. Awesome. Hope to catch fireworks tonight off the deck. Double Awesome.

happy faja day!

To celebrate Father's Day, we're having my parents over for dinner. I made arroz con pollo, one of my pop's favorites, and for dessert - lemon bars! I hadn't realized as I never made them before, but lemon bars are almost entirely butter and sugar - escalando!
So I found a solid recipe and just kinda winged it, left out a bunch of butter (a whole stick!!!) and some of the sugar. They came out awesome - a little sticky, but super delish.
I have to perfect my arroz con pollo recipe and then I'll add it here. Right now it's kinda from memory, which means it's a bit different each time, ha!
Happy Father's Day!

our estate sale find of the year (probably)

On Fridays, Ned and I have been nerding out and hitting up the local estate sales. We're mainly looking for records, but of course we sometimes see cool stuff we have to have. I've found a few small art pieces, retro kitchen stuff, mid century knick knacks, that sort of thing.
Well, a cool bar has been on our want list for about three years now - and we finally discovered great one at an estate sale just down the street. It was a total score, complete with all the glassware (that fit in custom-made niches) and in great condition for just $140. We were stoked! Our record room is really turning into a hip, pulled-together space. Haha it's only taken us like 4 years to do it.
Also this weekend we went to Antiques Roadshow! How funny is that? They were filming in San Diego and my parents won the ticket lottery - they would have totally gone, but they had a vacation this wknd, so Ned and I got the tickets!
I have to say we had fun, but it was a lot of waiting - I mean like Disneyland-in-Summer-want-to-go-on-Splash-Mountain kind of waiting. We had to queue to get into the event, then again to get into the main room, then again in the individual item line. But, I did get the see a few of my favorite appraisers, and there was definitely some good people watching, so we had a really fun time.
Have to run and do some housework, then we're making some BBQ!