It's a ...

By now most of you already know that panda baby is a panda GIRL! We are very excited to put our little one in dresses, bows, and tights! We are so thrilled to meet her around Thanksgiving.

Baby Predictions...

As most of you know Ashley is pregnant and with a due date of November 25th. We are so excited!

We sent out a questionnaire to some family to allow them to make their prediction and are offering a prize for the person who is the most right! I thought it might be fun to publish some of the highlights.

We'll find out if it's a boy or girl this Tuesday and will it here.

To view your and all other responses click here.

 

What we've been up to...

We bought an ice cream maker! Yes we were just a little bit excited about this one.

Our first batch of ice cream was classic chocolate. Very creamy and yummy. We made some cinnamon chocolate and cinnamon strawberry later on for Devin and Bridget's Hot Luck in the Spring.

Through work Patrick got tickets to the Zoo Lights. We enjoyed the lights, walking around, eating cookies and sipping hot chocolate. We also took a little ride on the zoo train. We are excited to go back when the weather warms up and the elephant land is completed.

We visited the aquarium. It was pretty fun and we got to touch rays. We were mesmerized by the jellyfish and octopus.

Our Christmas Tree! Since we both had to work a lot during the holiday we stayed here and spent time with Linda and Devin and Bridget's family. Somehow I managed to get Christmas day off which was amazing. We slept out by our tree, opened presents, and rushed over to watch the kids open their presents Christmas morning. It was fun to see them so excited about their gifts.

We made gingerbread houses and then decided to use the BB guns to shoot them. This is Patrick's house. So lovely, he put everyone else to shame.

It was fun to spend Christmas in Portland. We have only had one other Christmas here and that was when we were engaged! It was nice to spend  time with Linda.

We have done more hiking in Forest Park and it is so fun. Crazy how green everything always is here.

Red velvet heart pancakes made by Patrick. It was my year to plan and I'm not sure how he snuck these in on Sunday morning. For Valentines Day we went for a hike, ate lunch at the Original Pancake House, enjoyed Qdoba burritos for dinner, and made chocolate lava cakes. Yes it is all about the food for us!

Danielle and Chad visited us over a long weekend!

                        We ate, shopped, hiked, and did all sorts of fun while they were here.

 We tried some super fancy desserts too.

Of course we played some rounds of Adventure Time Munchkins. I even stayed awake.

Just a cute picture of us to end on :)

Surprises...

The Friday in November before Thanksgiving I got home from work to discover the first of many surprises from Patrick. He knows first thing I do when I get home is shower and so I found a gift bag on the bathroom counter. I didn't know it at the time but I was in for amazing surprises all weekend long!

 I opened the bag to find some chocolate and another box to open Saturday. There were also glitter hearts in the shower!

 Saturday morning came around and I opened the box to find another box to open later on. Thankfully he also included some tasty cookies for me to eat in the meantime. Since these pictures were taken in bed I'm pretty sure that's were the cookies were eaten :)

 The cookies were so pretty. We had been eyeing them at Whole Foods for some time so it was fun to finally try them!

 Later on I opened the box to find this. Yep, that's right a bikini! Actually there were two so I could take my pick. I chose the one pictured here. And of course another something to open later on.

 Patrick let me open the card early instead of waiting until Sunday morning. I learned we were going to the beach! I was totally surprised.

All packed up and ready to go!

 We unloaded our stuff in our beach front room and checked on the private hot tub on the balcony! Good thing we checked because it was pretty cold. Patrick talked to the hotel people and they were going to get it fixed while we went to dinner.

There were even more surprises from Patrick after dinner, sparkling juice, see's candy, and we watched one of our favorites, Pitch Perfect! Then we got in some hot tube time.

The next day we spent more time soaking up the view from the balcony.

Patrick gave me one more surprise. A locket with my initials on it with a picture of us inside. It was so sweet and I love it. We spent the rest of the morning walking on the beach before heading home. 

It was such a wonderful getaway and nice to take our minds off of things and to just have fun together. I'm so lucky to be married to Patrick. I love him so!