30+ Weeks and an almost complete nursery!

Busy busy busy!! That has definitely been us since our last post. We have been in full mode on trying to finish up the nursery as much as we can so we can have one less thing to worry about. We have come a HUGE way with it. Here are some pictures from what we have completed in there. Mind you it is still not 100% complete but if you look back at some of the other pictures in our older posts it is just about there. We have lanterns that are going to be here Thursday and we will be hanging them above the crib. That will definitely help finish off that part of the room. As you will see in the pictures we did take down the crib bedding for now. There was a lot of dust and work going on on as things were completed so they will be washed again before they get put back on. So in the next days and weeks we should have more pictures to share.

- New Blinds, The Infamous Dots, Rocking Chair, and Bookcase

- Completed armoire and new "art"

- New Bookcase fully stocked!

- New closet door

- Changing table area (lamp most likely to move, and whole in the wall will have a speaker in it :) )

- Entry to living room. Cross that Gabrielle had as a very young little girl.

As of Thursday we were at 30 weeks...wow only about 10 more weeks left. We aren't totally sure if we think it is going to be a super fast time passing or if it will be slow since we are anxious for her arrival. We had our 4th birthing class (out of 5 total). It has been pretty interesting and we think we have at least learned some new things. It has been at least worthwhile.

This week is Gabrielle's birthday (Wednesday)- and is her big 30th! Ack!! We will be heading to the Jack Johnson concert on Thursday and that is something we are both looking very forward to. Hopefully Camdyn will appreciate his music like we do :)

Not much else to report here. We wanted to get the pictures up and shared with you all since we have been asked about them. We hope you are all doing well.

Love always,
Ben and Gabrielle

Thank you!

We can not even begin to thank everyone enough for all of the great presents we received this past weekend at Camdyn's baby shower. We also want to thank everyone who was able to make it to the shower. It was really great getting to spend some time with so many family and friends. We know that Camdyn is loved already so much more than she knows! Thank you as well to Gabrielle's parents for hosting a truly lovely event. We are extremely grateful for all the work that went into everything and making it honestly a perfect day!

We wanted to post some pictures from the shower that we have received. Ben is going to work on trying to get the video we took up and running so we can get a link posted on here for everyone to see. We have posted some pictures at the end of this entry for your enjoyment :)

Tomorrow we will be at 29 weeks. We had a Dr's appointment today and everything is looking good. Belly is measuring right on track and her heartbeat is still sounding fantastic, we love getting to hear that every appointment. We have one more appointment in 3 weeks and then we will be going every 2 weeks, for two appointments and then every week till she is born. Our doctor is really happy with our progress and everything is coming along very nicely.

We have been working hard on trying to finish the nursery up and were even able to get most of the gifts from the shower unpacked. We are trying to get all the last items ordered and bought as we can. There are many days where we think, wow 11 weeks is so far away still, but then when we start working on getting things done in her room 11 weeks doesn't seem like enough time!!! Ben should have the armoire finished this weekend. The changing table should be here next week and will have to be put together. Once those two things are here and up then more laundry can be done with all of her blankets, sheets, burp cloths, etc and then put away...and then we can also start to really decorate her room. We will definitely put up the pictures as we get them taken!!

We meant to report in our last entry but forgot but we have decided on an official middle name. So without further delay, we are so pleased to announce that our little girl will be Camdyn Elyse Rivera.

Well everyone, this was a lot longer than probably what most of you were expecting. Again, we thank you each and all for everything you have done for us! We are truly grateful and feel beyond blessed.

Enjoy the pictures and we will update more soon!

Love always,

Ben and Gabrielle

Every centerpiece was a gorgeous outfit for Camdyn.

Awesome Diaper Cake with a cute monkey on top :)

The Rivera Family

Grainger and Rivera Family

Grainger Family

Camdyn's gifts!

And yes more!

After opening up gifts and putting stuff away, Camdyn's closet now looks like this:

Third Trimester- we have arrived!!!

Today at 26.667 weeks we have officially hit the 3rd trimester (though most people just round up to 27 weeks)!!! However, our due date is 3 months from today!! It is crazy to think! We have been so busy trying to get things taken care of while we can and as I am sure most people know it just never seems like enough time.

The latest project in the nursery that Ben finished was starting all over in the closet. He did another great job. We still need to go and buy more shelving and rods but the one we started with was enough to hold us over with her ever so growing wardrobe. Attached you can see what Ben has done and the start of her clothes collection (there was still more clothing that wasn't hung).

This Sunday we will be starting our first child birth class. This one will be 5 weeks long and then we have a couple other classes after this one is completed. Should be interesting :)

In a little over a week we will be having our baby shower. It is weird to think that we are already approaching that as well. It sounds like it is going to be an absolute wonderful time and we are looking forward to spending time with our family and friends. Camdyn is already such a loved girl! We will post pictures after on here to share with those of you who couldn't make it!

We wanted to wish our friends Ian and Alix Congrats on their new addition, Nolan Alexander, who arrived on July 20th, at 6 lbs 15 oz, 20 inches. He is absolutely adorable and we can't wait to take a trip up to Jacksonville and meet him! Congrats again to you guys!!

For now that is about all. I know that some time has passed since our last entry but we will try and keep things up to date. Posted below you will find our new belly shots for the start of 3rd tri.

We hope you are all doing well!

Love and miss you all,

Ben and Gabrielle

24 weeks tomorrow and dots are done!

Tomorrow we will be at 24 weeks!! Holy crap :) Camdyn is now the size of a papaya, weighing about 1.5 lbs and about 8.5 inches in length. She is on average gaining about 6 oz a week!! Her face is just about fully formed and she is complete with eyelashes, eyebrows, and hair. Our big milestone this week is we will be at viability.

Camdyn has been increasingly moving around. She doesn't have any exact patterns that I have been able to notice, but is definitely much more active when I am just sitting around relaxing (or even at work). It is pretty unreal to feel. She is definitely getting stronger in there and every now and then you can see it on the outside but that is still a little bit away from being more noticeable to others.

Ben has completed the big dot project in the nursery. He did such an amazing job. It looks so great and it is going to to really complete the room when it is done. So without further delay, 255+ dots later here is the final product:

The rest of the bedding has come in as well but we will have to post pictures of that later. It needs to get set up still. We will still need to finish up the armoire and then closet. We are also on the prowl for a changing table. Once that is in place we will put up her letters with her name. We are planning on getting some lanterns (like ones we had at the wedding) to put above her crib and be her "mobile." Then just some last touches, still have some ways to go though.

And here are some more pictures. These were taken this evening so just a day shy of 24 weeks. Enough to get the point though :)

Well that is about all here with Camdyn. We hope that everyone had a great 4th of July weekend. I know that we certainly had a great weekend and enjoyed Ben's family visiting. Tons of food and good times, can't go wrong there!!! :)

Love always,
Ben and Gabrielle

Dots, dots, galore!

The past couple of nights have been spent working on adding in the dots to the brown stripe in the nursery. We will continue to post as the progress is made since this is going to take us a bit of time to complete. The first picture below shows the first two color dots painted. The second one is how we have been stenciling and shows getting ready for color 3. Ben had already penciled in the dots on the brown paint and then the size of the circle was cut out of the tape (thanks to a scrapbooking tool) and placed on the pencil lining. We are pleased to see how it is turning out.

As we have mentioned before as well, Ben has been working on re-staining an armoire of Gabrielle's grandmother. He has finished the main part and we have moved it into the nursery. Here is a picture of how it has come out so far, the drawers and doors are still left.

Another new thing for the nursery was a beautiful painting that our friend Trish made for us. She is such a good artist!!! It is going to look great.

And finally, as promised in our last post, here are some new belly pictures. The ones in the dress were taken yesterday getting ready for work (22 weeks, 4 days along) and then the ones in the black tank were from today (22 weeks, 5 days).

We hope you have all enjoyed the new updated pictures. We will definitely be posting more as the nursery progresses.

Hope everyone is having a great week and looking forward to the holiday weekend!!

Love always,
Ben and Gabrielle

Lots of painting!

Well since we last posted we have been really trying to get things going in the nursery. Two of the three things we ordered for the crib have come in: an extra fitted sheet and the bedding quilt that we had Camdyn embroidered on. Picture is shown below of the quilt and the sheet. We are still waiting on the bumper, crib skirt, and another sheet, all of which are on backorder till sometime early in July.

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On one of the walls we decided to try and replicate the dotted sheet. Not sure how it is going to turn out..the stripe looks great, but painting the dots to match the sheet are going to be a challenge. Below you can see the picture of the stripe and Ben working on his circle stencils....there are going to be over 250 dots to paint. If the first few don't go so well we will advise what plan B is, however, we like having the stripe there regardless.

The other thing that we have decided to try and do ourselves was to have Camdyn's name spelled out with painted letters. We aren't 100% sure where we are going to put them, probably over the changing table though (once we get one :-) ). The colors all match the bedding and we are actually pretty happy with how they turned out. We took two pictures of them, one on the actual bedding and then one in the kitchen so you can see them better.

Ben is still working on trying to salvage our armoire that we want to use. He has been working hard on trying to re-stain it to match the crib. If we decide to use it we will post that once it is done. So this has all been keeping us pretty busy. We definitely feel like there is a lot to still do but we still have some time. We are going to try and take more belly pictures this weekend and will update if we do.

Hopefully everyone is enjoying summer! It has been great here. We have been able to use our pool almost every day which has been good exercise for Gabrielle as well as very relaxing after a day's work. It is hard to believe that June is just about done. We aren't quite sure where the time has gone!

We hope that this finds everyone well.

We love and miss you all and hope to talk to you soon.

Love always,

Ben and Gabrielle

Half-way There!

Hard to believe that we are at 20 weeks today! Our baby girl will be here before we know it. Time has definitely flown by already. According to our weekly update, Camdyn is the length of a banana and is swallowing a lot more these days.

There have been some requests to post some new belly pictures so here are a couple, kind of hard to tell, but hopefully you can get the idea, we are definitely growing!! These were taken tonight before we went swimming.

We don't have much to report tonight, it has been a very long work week and we are both extremely glad that tomorrow is Friday (though unfortunately a work Friday).

Hope everyone is having a good week and has an even better weekend.

Talk to you soon.

Love always,

Ben and Gabrielle