Well... it has been awhile since I posted an update here. But that's not to that say we haven't been busy! Since my last post we have been to Fort Pierce, Florida, twice to visit our friends up there [photos]. And Jennifer has been spending a lot of time with her two new Filipina friends here in the neighborhood. In fact... she and Sherry just spent the afternoon at the Swap Shop and came home with Yaleana's first little baby clothes set!

Isn't that just the cutest?! I figure she'll grow into it
by the time she's about 6 months old... hehehe

Now we are beginning the last phase of preparations for the soon coming arrival of our little bundle of joy. Jennifer is still feeling great and she is having none of the typical pregnancy troubles I have always heard so much about. And you have no idea just how happy that makes me!

Anyway, let me bring you up to date on our latest happenings...On Tuesday, July 6th, we went to meet our new pediatricians. What an experience that was! We walked into the office to see the walls all painted with zoo animals, and a mock captain's wheel and deck built right into the middle of the "Well Children" waiting room on the left. Around the corner to the right was the "Sick Children" waiting room with, as you would expect, quite a lot less for the kiddies to play with. What child is going to want to captain a boat when he or she is tossing their lunch and crying an ocean of tears anyway, right?!

Well... we don't plan to be visiting that room ourselves in the years to come. So, thankfully, I will not have to miss being the captain of the boat whenever I get to take Yaleana to see her doctor for checkups. By the way, from now on you can just call me Cap'n Rod... hehehe. Man that was really fun!! Of course Jennifer has informed me that she WILL be getting her own driver's license shortly after Yaleana comes... and they will NOT be needing my driving services to get the two of them to the doctor's office! ( I did not think it was possible for a Filipina to actually blush... but Cap'n Rod at the helm in the doctor's office sure proved that one wrong! )

All kidding aside, I have to say that this July 4th holiday weekend was quite unlike any I've had in the past. As many of you know already, Jennifer and I live in a one bedroom apartment here in South Florida. We've been kicking around the idea of buying a house for awhile now. But we have finally decided that, since Yaleana isn't even going to be aware that she does not have her own bedroom for at least a year or more, we are just going to stay put for the time being and make do with what we've got. And that brings us to the holiday weekend...

On Saturday morning I went and rented an "extra closet" at the local Extended Storage, and then we set about cleaning house. It is truly amazing what you can collect in a year and a half, even in a one bedroom apartment. We cleaned out closets and drawers and cabinets, and I shredded a large accumulation of old mail, computer reports and program listings that I had stacked and stuffed just about any and every place I could find for them. I must have taken 14 or 15 kitchen-sized trash bags to the dumpster over the course of three days, and still we packed enough boxes to just about fill up a 5'x7' storage area.

But it was all worth the effort, let me tell you! Jennifer had begun to get really disgusted with our apartment because it was always so cluttered, and the closets and pantries were just stuffed full of things, many of which we hadn't even seen since we moved in. Now, though, it almost feels like we have just moved up to a larger apartment. We can actually breathe again... and not a moment too soon! Because now that the apartment is cleaned up we get to move on to the REAL baby prep. In the coming weeks we will have three Childbirth Classes, one Breastfeeding Class, one Baby Care class, take a tour of the hospital and have a baby!! And just like that we will be three.

WHEW!!! I'm tired already... hehehe.

For now, though, all we can do is wait patiently for the arrival of our little Yaleana Jenell. Oh yeah... and take all those classes that I have already decided are more likely just intended to keep you busy than they are to actually educate you. After all, when that time comes and Jennifer tells me, "Poppi!! I think we need to go... NOW!", I am sure that we will both promptly forget everything they ever tried to teach us and immediately go on the new-parents-to-be auto (panic) pilot... hehehe. Thank GOD for hospitals, and for doctors and nurses who know what they're doing!!