Yesterday my dear friend Kristen threw a baby book shower in Raleigh for Baby Fernandez! I had fun seeing friends that I haven't seen in a while, eating Kristen's chocolate cupcakes, and reading the fun baby/children's books that they gave. From left to right: Kristen, Acella (Nuri is on her lap), Emily, me, Allison, Rebecca, and Meghan. Missing from the photo are Shelly, my mom, and Peggy. They are sweet women and have already given me lots of good baby advice in addition to the books. I hadn't seen Emily since August! She and Travis are doing great in Fuquay. Her sister's due date is the same as ours, June 21, except she's having twins!
I was glad Acella and Nuri came. And Wansoo stopped in for a few minutes, too!

filling up baby's book rack! We are looking forward to many fun times of reading to and with Baby Fernandez

We are finally ready to start inviting everyone over for dinner, to make use of our new kitchen! On Tuesday night Nathan and Erin came over. Aaron prepared most of the meal for us and I helped with the small details. We loved their company. Afterwards Erin helped me clean and Aaron got this shot, saying that we needed a picture of women "doing their work"! You have to understand his sense of humor...And on Wednesday night Aaron invited Robert from work over to eat with us. Robert has been washing batteries at the shop for 21 years. We enjoyed treating him (and ourselves) with steaks that Aaron grilled.
Thanks for joining us, too, dad! Except maybe next time you could pick a different shirt to wear to our house. ;)

Aaron and Bryan drove to Philidelphia on Saturday and came back on Sunday. They went to visit Gray and Pam, who are from Nash County but moved to PA a couple of years ago after they got married. Gray is studying there to become a dentist. The guys also went to run in a 10-mile race together on Sunday. It was a long trip but definitely worth the fun. Aaron took a lot of pictures to show me what it was like (I stayed behind...let the men have their male bonding time!).
They just hung out for a while at Gray and Pam's apartment when they first got there...tired from the traffic they endured on I-95.

And then they made the venture to downtown for a famous Philly cheese steak. Gray and Pam knew exactly where to take them.Ahh, the big city. They drove around for a while (sort of purposefully, to see the city, but also looking for a parking spot).Wonder why he took a picture of this? :) This is a picture of City Hall that Aaron took because it looked so cool. I agree that it's awesome.
This was taken at lunch on Sunday, after the race. They both ran well- I don't know Gray's finish time, but Aaron finished in 1:45. Bryan went to church instead with Pam to help with the kids.

Aaron and Bryan took turns driving. Both of those are scary thoughts. The Lord is merciful.

One end of the tableThe other end

Thanks for driving down to eat with us, guys!

Aaron and I decided not to take the labor and delivery classes for this pregnancy, but this past week we did go to a one-time baby care basics class. We learned a lot actually...how to take the baby's temperature, how to swaddle, how to change a diaper if you have a boy, how to wash the baby the first few weeks, etc. A lot of things seemed like common sense, but it was good to get our minds thinking about these things before the fun begins.

and my sweet husband is concentrating on how to be the class clown. Yes, all the dads in the class turned around to look and laugh. How embarrassing.
Our instructor. She was pretty helpful...here must be the part where she emphasized, "never shake a baby".

The anxious but grateful parents. I know you're wondering...what's Aaron doing at the baby shower? It was a couples shower :) There are lots of men in the choir and Sunday school class that we didn't want to leave out! They came for the food and then went off to do manly things while the women helped with gift opening. Aaron was quite the good sport.

Baby is not as excited about these gifts as he/she is about...

all this food!and this gorgeous cake! These three women, including Carissa, are faithful to meet with me once a week to encourage me and each other. We are also studying 1 Peter together. I was glad they could celebrate the baby with us!Ansley, the baby girl, had to eat too! She belongs to Jody, in the brown dress. Baby Fernandez doesn't know it yet, but Ansley is going to be a great friend.MaryLynn, the gracious servant! She was also the one to order the cake.Thanks to Gretchen for hosting us! She is giving me lots of good advice about parenting...she has 5. She's also helpful with nursery decoration ideas!Tabitha and Sarah are continually becoming great friends of mine.Now that baby is satisfied from all the food, he/she says bring on the gifts !

These three girls really blessed me. Cami, Ava, and Gracie were right up front to help move gifts along. I think they were excited about their jobs until their gifts were opened, and then they lost interest and went outside to play.Opening gifts can be so intense :)When Aaron arrived to help halfway through, things started moving more quickly. He is so efficient.The men disappeared from the house after the food was served. Here they can be seen posing for an abercrombie ad (especially Ryan!). Who knows what they're looking at, but I think they spent their time outside or downstairs.

Or playing football.

If Baby Fernandez is a girl, this would be a great 4 generations picture. Aaron and I are blessed to have multiple grandmothers to love on us!
We were glad that Granny and Gene came to be part of the group. Gene looks like he's ready for the buffet line to start.
Uncle Calvin and Elsie came from the Richmond area.

A lot of chatting going on among the women!

On Saturday Aaron ran his 2nd marathon of 26.2 miles in Nashville, Tennessee. He and Bill Cundiff, a man from church, have been training together for many months for the big day on Saturday! I wasn't able to go to cheer him on, but he did great without that. Here are the results from the Country Music Marathon page:

Bib FName LName City State Age Sex ChipTime Overall SexPl

12220 Aaron Fernandez Salem VA 26 M 4:42:15 2770/4373 1734/2463

Here are the few pictures he took of the weekend:

I think they had a hard time finding parking for the Expo on Friday afternoon. Bill looks excited to have finally found a spot. Aaron respects this man a lot. He is a great example of a faithful follower of Christ and a loving husband. And he can run really fast!It was raining early in the morning but stopped once the race began. There marathoners and the half marathoners started together...there were about 25,000 runners altogether!

He said it wouldn't be his last one, and he's already talked to some guys about the next one to race. Anyone interested? Not me!

I've finally finished putting together the baby furniture that we've gotten so far (still waiting on the crib). Here is a picture of baby's dresser/hutch and our first baby outfit that we've received! How adorable! We needed to get the hutch because there is no closet for Baby Fernandez. Thanks to Grandma for such a needed gift, and thanks to Peggy for the cute clothes!