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Saturday, January 23, 2010

HGTV Rate My Space

Joey's nursery is finally complete. We were pretty proud of what we did. I posted it on HGTV's Rate My Space. We were curious to see what other people thought!

Check it out:
Joey's Nursery on HGTV

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Wont be long now

I was put on bed rest this past Monday (1-18). After being hospitalized last Friday night and being put on meds to stop the contractions. I know this is whats best until I have the baby, but it has been very hard and extremely boring past 3 days. I will be 36 weeks tomorrow. At that point they wont do anything to stop the baby from being born. As low as Joey is he definitely wants out! :)
All the test they have done show that he is extremely healthy and boy is he an active one. They did an ultrasound Friday night. It was amazing to see how much he had grown since the last one around 24 weeks. I can't wait to meet him!

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Awaiting arrival

I had set up this blog a while back to start writing in when our baby boy Joey is born. One: to be able to keep family and friends updated on all of the fun things Joey will be doing as he grows up, but also a place to be able to look back at and remember. Everyone who is a parent says that "time goes by quickly" and "they grow up so fast" so I wanted to be able to look back and remember all those little moments.

But then I realized that really the story doesn't begin with him being born. There are a lot of memories leading up to our family becoming 3 (6 with our dogs, yes they are family).

Our family started small: Christian, Kristen and a dog named Lexie (2005). The first place we lived together was in Columbia, SC (2006).

In January of 2007 our family grew. Christian wanted a dog that was "his". I had Lexie for 5 years, and not that he didn't love her, but she is a min pin and he wanted a "guys dog".

With all intentions of getting only 1 puppy we to an animal rescue place. We found two of the cutest little beagle mixes. They were sisters and the last two left in their litter. We just couldn't seperate them. So a few hours later Maggie and Annabelle came home with us. They were only about 6 weeks old and training 2 dogs a time is alot harder than you think. So now we were a family of 5...

On Valentines Day 2007, Christian proposed to me. It was at sunset at Lake Carolina. it was freezing outside, but could not have been more perfect.



In May 2007, we had the opportunity to move to Hilton Head, SC. So in a few weeks time, we looked at houses and with my Dad's help bought our first house together. We closed on the house in June, but were not able to move most of our stuff down from Columbia until July. So now that we had moved in, wedding plans were well under way. We were married in Savannah, GA at the Mackey House on April 19, 2008.

We always knew that we wanted to have children, but had never really thought about when. I always believe that everything happens for a reason so when the time was right we would know...

We found out we were pregnant on June 18, 2009. I was about 5 weeks then. We only told a few people at the the time. The grandparents were of course extremely excited! On September 22, we found out it was going to be a boy. I had known in my heart that he was a boy since the beginning. I guess what they say about a mother's intuition is right. His name would be Joseph Alberto Arroyo. Joseph is my father's name and Alberto is Christian's father's name. We will call him Joey.

There are definitely ups and downs of pregnancy. Some days are better than others. For the most part I have been lucky to have a pretty normal pregnancy. Until week 31 where I began to have alot of pain and pressure. I have carried Joey very low the entire time and the more he grows the more uncomfortable it is. The doctor cut my hours at work to only 30 a week and told me that I need to try to be off of my feet whenever I can.

I havent worked only 30 hours in over 10 years. So while I know its best for me and the baby, it has been extremely weird and hard for me. At times I feel useless. I am not a person who sits back and watches things happen. I do things! I am very hands on at work and home. To have to be so dependent on others these past few weeks and unitl Joey is born has not been easy. I am lucky to be surrounded by people who love me and have been so helpful.

I am extremely lucky to have Christian as my husband. With out him I would not have been able to make it through these past few weeks or for that matter, my entire pregnancy. He truly is my everything and will be an amazing father.

I am almost 34 weeks pregnant as I write this and taking it one day at a time. There are good days, there are bad days, but everyday is one day closer to when I get to meet my son...