ChRiStMaS!!!

It was my family's year for Christmas this year, so we went to my mom's house in Orem. I was kind of sad that my two little brothers and my sister weren't there (they were with my dad in WA), but it turned out to be way fun! My brother Jeremy and Cassie were there, and of course my mom and her husband, John, and we just played games all day and ate a TON of food! I did, at least. :) And don't make fun of how fat I look... The dress seriously added about 50 pounds!




Russ got me a sewing machine, which is something I've been wanting for a while; especially since I'll be staying home once the baby's born and I want to start being all domestic and stuff! ha ha! No, but seriously. ;) I've already bought material to make my first project: a baby blanket for Little Rusty. I'm so excited! And I was extremely excited when I opened this gift, as you can see. Russ is the best gift-giver ever!


I got Russ a really nice coat and some tools, which he later got from my mom and John, as well, so he's totally prepared for whatever fixing-up that needs to be done. He's such a handyman! I love it! I don't know what I would have done if he wasn't... going from my dad, who can literally do ANYTHING, to someone who couldn't do anything would have been kind of hard, so I'm glad that he can fix pretty much anything, as well.


What a cheeseball! :)
I also got him the new Boys Like Girls CD

These are the set of tools I got for him:

And these are the set of tools he got from my mom and John:
What a happy man! :)



We had a great Christmas and we hope you all did, too!

New Pictures... And More To Come!

I know, I know... everyone's been bugging me to post more pictures, which I have on Facebook (yesterday), so here are a few.

6 1/2 Months:


And here's me at 7 months:

I'm about a week and a half away from being 8 months pregnant (scary!!), so I'll post some more later... preferably not in a black shirt again! ha ha! I HAVE gotten bigger, though! The little guy has chosen to make me even fatter... he's definitely getting a spanking from mom when he finally gets here. ;)

Here's some pics from our CA Thanksgiving:

Russ and his dad fishing out behind his parents house. Pretty, huh? These two are literally inseparable whenever we visit! It's really cute and I'm sure this is how Russ and our little boy will be, too. Aww!!


Grandpa caught a fish and our little niece, Zoe, was so fascinated by it! After they put it back she kept saying, "C'mon, grandpa! Just put your pole in and catch another fish!" If only it were that easy, love. :)


My honey and I.

Apparently the sun is right in our eyes!
Poor, Russ.. No fish for you!
Thanksgiving this year was way fun! We were able to stay for almost 6 days, one of which was not by design... our car blew up, literally, the day we were supposed to leave. Of course that day had to be a Saturday, so we weren't even able to get it into a shop until Monday, but luckily Russ is amazing and was able to save us about $500 by doing the majority of the work with the help of his dad. He's just kind of amazing. And he's mine! :) Anyway, I'm glad it worked out that way because it meant an extra day with his family, which I absolutely LOVE!

Anyway, our new house is almost all set up, so I'll get pictures of that posted soon, as well as Christmas pics. I always think about taking pictures for important things, but then I either never take them or forget to do anything with them, so I'm trying really hard to do better at it. I'm sure I'll be better once the baby's born, so be patient with me.

Merry Christmas, everyone!! We love all of you and are so thankful for amazing family and friends in our lives!

Love, The Schafer's

NeW hOuSe!!

Russ and I are officially new home owners as of Tuesday, November 17, 2009! We signed our lives away for a brand new condo in Springville... it's a top-floor condo with vaulted ceilings, granite counter tops, 3 bedrooms and two bathrooms. It's beautiful! We're so excited about it and can't wait for people to come visit us (hint, hint)! Now, if we could just MOVE IN! I know it's probably a hassle with EVERY home purchase, but I've gotta tell ya, I could definitely do without the stress. We should have been completely moved in this week, but alas, they have yet to clean and do the patch-up work and they can't give us a straight answer as to when it will all be completed, so needless to say I've been a little crazy this week. :)

It will all work out in the end and when we're all moved in and unpacked, I'll for sure post some fun pictures.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!!

I wanted to do something fun to show everyone that we were having a boy....

And I came up with this! :)



I can't believe how much bigger I've gotten, just in these last few weeks! The growth is crazy and it's getting to be fun now that you can actually tell that I'm pregnant and not fat. :) I feel him a lot more during the day, too, which is so fun and I'm starting to feel a really strong connection with him now. I just love this little guy so much!

Meet Russell Tip Schafer III (Almost)

Here are some pics of our little man! And trust me... he's DEFINITELY a little man! ;)
This one's my favorite... RIGHT when he put his little hand to his face he was instantly calm and relaxed. It was the cutest!!

Here's his cute, little foot... Russ hopes that he has his feet, but for all of you who know what Russ's feet look like, you'll agree that that is the LAST feature I want our children "blessed" with!

It's a boy!! Ha ha!
And here's the proof... :)

I wish I could get an ultrasound every week just so that I could see the progress, but this will have to suffice until we actually get to meet him. Goodness, I can't wait!

21 Weeks Pregnant

So I promised everyone that I would post some pictures of me right now, but I only have one. It's hard to post pregnancy pictures when there's not a whole lot to show (Russ always ends up laughing after he attempts to take pictures of me...), but here's one for now. As I start showing more I'll post more. This is of me at 21 weeks. :)

IT'S A BOY!!!!

Alright, everyone! The wait is over! Russ and I found out yesterday at approximately 9:10 am that we're having a little boy! Russell Tip Schafer III is due February 26, 2010 and we can't wait to meet him! It was such a surreal and exciting experience to see him yesterday, if only for a little while, and to be reassured that there IS a little baby growing inside of me! He's a completely healthy and strong little guy and we're extremely grateful for that.

Right when the ultrasound tech put the ultrasound to my stomach, we got to see the baby moving and wiggling around, which was so fun! As some of you know, I'm not that big yet, so it was nothing short of miraculous to be able to see an actual human being in there. Russ and I couldn't get over the fact that the baby has already gotten so big since we saw him last, which was at 10 weeks, so 10 weeks ago. It was the most exciting and spiritual moment I think Russ and I have had together thus far. We couldn't stop laughing and marveling at how precious the experience was and we're so grateful to our Heavenly Father for entrusting us with this little spirit.

We've already caught a glimpse of his personality-- at first he was wiggling around and showing off his ability to move, but then about halfway through the ultrasound he put his hand up to his face and was instantly calm and relaxed. At first we thought he might be sucking his thumb, but the tech said that there was no sucking motion, so he was obviously just comforted by his little hand. It was so cute! And then I realized last night that I do the EXACT SAME THING!! Whenever I fall asleep or wake up in the middle of the night, 9 times out of 10 MY hand is somehow touching my face! I told Russ that he's already so much like his mom!! And as Russ pointed out, "Well, he may be like you except for the fact that he's a boy." Thanks, Russ. :)

We have ultrasound pictures and tried to scan them in last night, but it wasn't working right and Russ and I (definitely more me than him!) were so tired last night that we said that we've figure it out today, so hopefully I'll have some fun pictures to post really soon. I'll also include my belly shots... which apparently STILL isn't that big, even though I can definitely feel the change and feel huge. Oh well. I'm grateful I'm not that big, but at the same time I think it's going to be really fun to have a giant belly and FINALLY get compliments from other people that I'm pregnant. I still get the, "You're five months along! I was that big when I was 3 months!" Yeah, well, whatever. Everyone carries differently and my time will come soon enough. ha ha!

Thanks for all of the "congratulations" and happy wishes! Russ and I couldn't be happier right now and I know that in February we'll be a lot happier! Life has been a blast so far, so I'm really looking forward to this next chapter!

Is it a BOY or a GIRL??

Okay, everyone! It's time to cast your vote! Russ and I go in on Wednesday to see if it's a boy or a girl, and if all goes well, we'll be posting the results that day! Let me know what you think it is! I'm DYING to know myself, so it'll be fun to see what everyone else thinks it is! Good luck! :)

Russ thinks it's a boy and I'm leaning more towards a girl... WHO WILL BE RIGHT??

Labor Day Weekend- Camping, Family, and BBQ's!!!

Russ and I had a really fun Labor Day weekend! We went and saw GI Joe on Saturday and it was really good, we went camping by ourselves (AWESOME!) and hung out with family and went to TOO many bbq's... I wasn't really looking pregnant until after this weekend! And it wasn't the baby! :)

Anyway, here are some pics we took of camping... I don't know why I didn't take any of hanging out with family, but I didn't. I'm kind of bummed about that, but I can only remember so much! I'm pregnant and apparently, as I've learned, memories for pregnant women is pretty much non-existent! Fun times at work sometimes! ha ha!

Our two-man tent... PERFECT for us! We went to bed around 11 and got up around 1oam! It was awesome! :)

Russ thinking that tucking in his shirt would be a funny picture.

Oh, Russ...

Our HAPPY morning/ camping smiles!

So I wanted a picture of my progress thus far, but as Russ told me and as you can see, there's not a whole lot yet... to ME there is, though! That little pooch wasn't there before, but I'll be happy with that. I don't know... I want to LOOK pregnant and not just FEEL pregnant! Is that too much to ask for? I'm already 16 weeks along (this was technically taken at 15 weeks). I'll blame it on the long torso. Anyway, there will for sure be more pictures as I get bigger... who knows when that will happen, though. ?? :)

We camped right on a river kind of up American Fork Canyon. Beautiful!


I love seeing flags in everyone's yard. The cute Boy Scouts in our ward are always very diligent about putting one in ours, which we're very thankful for.

Well, we're trying to take as many trips as we can before the baby comes, so there will be more posts to follow. Keep us updated with all of your lives, too!

Cute Daddy Story

This story was too cute to not write down. I'm not very big on writing in a journal, so this is the closest I get.

Since finding out we are going to be parents, we've obviously been very excited about getting ready for the baby. I've been endlessly searching magazines and the web to find the perfect crib, stroller, playpen, etc. Russ, for the most part, has let me do this on my own, with grunts and mm-hmm's every once in a while whenever I ask him if he likes what I've "picked" out. Well, this last Saturday we had about an hour before the Salt Lake Bee's baseball game, so I said it might be fun to go to Toys R Us to go look at baby things and just go have fun looking around. Little did I know that he would enjoy it SO MUCH MORE THAN I WOULD!! It was HILARIOUS watching and listening to him with the wide eyes and all of the "ooohs" and "ahhhs" and "remember this?" and "we're so getting this for the baby!". I have to admit that I was really surprised, but more so impressed! This is the same guy that says, "You can decorate the house however you want. I know you'll make the house beautiful without my help."???

So then again today I asked him if he wanted to go to Babies R Us to go look at cribs (we still haven't seen any in person), and told him that we could go somewhere manly to balance it out.... he replied, "Sure! That would be fun! And we don't need to go anywhere manly. Being a dad is about as manly as you can get." HOW CUTE IS THAT??? It was so sweet I almost cried!

I don't mean to embarrass Russ, but I HAD to share this story! I really am the luckiest, happiest wife EVER! He's been such an amazing husband and I always knew he'd be an amazing dad, but I have been so thankful that he's been so great about being a dad way before the baby gets here. Having him enjoy all of this preparation makes ME enjoy it so much more! I love you, Russ!

Ok, so more of the story... We didn't find out until the Thursday before Father's Day, which was perfect because his family came into town that night and I was able to tell Russ by himself before the rest of the family showed up. And it was so perfect and fitting that it was just before Father's Day! I was so excited that I went to Wal-Mart and bought a bunch of cute baby things: a binky, a bottle, a multi-gender baby outfit, some toys, and a diaper which I had left over from babysitting my cousin's kids. :) I also got him a pair of sporty sunglasses because he has a hard time keeping any pair of sunglasses I buy him. ha ha! Anyway, I put it all in a bag with a Father's Day card to a soon-to-be dad and wrote his a sweet, funny letter telling him how much I loved and appreciated him, as well as how excited I am for him to one day be a dad. Each paragraph had something to do with each baby item and as he would read it, I would pull whatever it was out of the bag for him. Needless to say he caught on pretty quickly, but I still made him read through the whole letter and at the very end I told him that he was going to be the BEST dad... in 8 and a half months. :) He teared up, I teared up and it was just a really tender moment for both of us. He really is going to be a GREAT daddy! Here are some pictures of that day:

The Gift Bag

Russ reading the card... hasn't caught on yet! :)

The cute baby things :)

Our exciting moment!!!

Alright, let's skip ahead a little to my 6 week mark. Since I had a molar pregnancy last year (a rare form of pregnancy that doesn't quite make a baby... it's a lengthy explanation so if you want you can look it up) I had to be monitored pretty much from day 1. I went in two weeks earlier than most to my first doctor's visit and had my first ultrasound that actually showed something on the screen! YAY!!

Yay for my little dot!

Yeah, yeah... daddy can see you. Don't worry. :)

The Happy Family

I've had two more ultrasounds and I have the pictures, so I'll post those as soon as I can scan then in. It's so amazing that they grow so fast! It started out as a speck and now it's so big! I can't wait until I can stop referring to the baby as an "it" and start saying "he" or "she"! We'll have to wait about two more months for that, though, so I'll definitely keep everyone posted! It's so much better to actually have something to post rather than how the weekend was or another night sitting at home while Russ finishes his homework/class two weeks before it ends because he's a huge procrastinator. Yeah.

Anyway, I'm 11 weeks today! Time's already flown by, so February will be just around the corner!