Monday, February 27, 2012

Winding Down...

The 2011/2012 hockey season is officially comming to a close! Woo Hoo! Don't get me wrong, it's been a great year and I love watching Gino play 2-3 games a week doing something he is so passionate about, BUT WE HAVEN'T BEEN HOME SINCE AUGUST 4TH.  I am beyond anxious to get home for the obvious reasons (see family, friends, good food, Summer, etc) but also to finish my nesting tendencies! You can't imagine how hard it's been to have so much time on my hands and all the planning that has been going on in this brain of mine.  So, like any "normal" pregnant woman, I've been making lists, lots and lots of lists. 

From a RUSH list, things that we'll need to get on ASAP once the baby is born (passport, birth certificate etc), to what to bring back overseas with us, to the nursery.  I know this looks crazy, and it probably is but for some reason the lists don't stress me out, they actually make me feel better.  As you can see alot of the lists are in email form that I received from an amazing friend, Katie Sertich :) who also lives the hockey lifestyle in Croatia with her hubby and baby boy.  If you're reading this, you have been a lifesaver!   The type A personality in me has definitely made a huge appearance the last few months and I've already fully designed our baby's nursery as well as set up baby registeries at home.  So, I'm feeling good.  Just need to get back to MN to execute! Ok, enough of the craziness and nesting.  You get it...or maybe not but thats OK.

I think the last time I wrote was about a month ago and we hadn't found out the sex of baby G yet.  Well, if you haven't heard already, we're having a Girl and couldn't be more excited.  I will honestly say, I was fully prepared and expecting the doctor to tell us she was a he.  To the point where Gino and I had looked at boy names a bit and I had researched bedding etc.  I just figured since Gino came from a family of all boys, I have a brother, ALL of our friends except for one or two have boys, it just seemed like the logical choice.  But when the doctor looked at the grainy ultrasound and said in her thick Norwegian accent, "I don't see any boy parts", I was in shock!  I think Gino was too.  We just sort of started laughing nervously. 
After having the doctor check about 4 more times to make sure she, "didn't see any boy parts", it started setting in that we were having a baby girl!  So many emotions were running through both of our heads.  We would have been excited for either a boy or girl but for some reason, having a little girl feels so special to us and our families.  The very first thing that came to my mind was,  the thought of seeing Gino be a first time dad to a little girl, just melted my heart.  He will honestly be the best dad in the world and I'm not just saying that.  He has such a big heart and I know how much he loves me, I can only imagine how he's going to feel towards this little baby girl.  I feel extremely blessed to be having a child with this man and that he will be my partner in crime with raising her.  We have alot to be thankful and excited for in the very near future. I was on pinterest the other day and came accross a list of "50 rules for Dads of Daughters".  All you Dad's with daughters will love this.  Here is the link if you want to check it out.
50 Rules of Dads of daughters

Since finding out the sex we have had many discussions on how we want to raise her and certain rules etc.  Now lets see if any of these stick:) The 2nd thought that came to mind was, "Oh crap!" (used a different word in my head), "We'll have to learn how to someday raise a teenage daughter!".  Maybe she'll be a mini me...ugh.  Sorry mom and dad for anything I put you through in my teenage years, I have a feeling it's going to come back and bite me.  Gino's already said that he thinks putting a GPS in her cell phone is a perfectly reasonable thing to do. So here we go!
So I told you we were pretty confident at this point that we were having a girl...well not me I guess.  A couple days later I started thinking about the ultrasound and how the doctor never really showed us the "girl parts" or why she thought she saw a girl.  All she kept saying was, "I don't see any boy parts".  Well I decided we better schedule another ultrasound to be sure.  I was about 18 weeks when we found out the last time.  We went in today at 24 weeks for the "double check" ultrasound.  The doctor told us that he usually doesn't like doing 3D ultrasounds before 28 weeks because the picture and the details in the face arn't as pronounced but he did one anyways, which was great.  Thanks to that ulrasound we now have FULL confirmation Baby G is a girl!  He also told us that she's measuring a little shorter than average at this point due to her parents being a little shorter than average...hmm, I guess I never considered myself short at 5'5?  I tried taking a few pictures to share with you of the 3D photos the doctor gave us but they turned out pretty blurry.  So I guess you just have to imagine what she looks like in my belly pic below:)

24 Weeks

What else do I have for you....hmm...like I said before, the regular hockey season is coming to an end.  Gino has 2 games left this week and playoffs start the following Sunday 4th.  Then they will basically play every other day, best 4 out of 7 wins the series.  At this point, Lillehammer has clinched the 4th seed which is a great accomplishment!  They have been playing really well together and are still in the running for 2nd or 3rd place.   I think I explained this last year but only 8 teams make it to playoffs so the #1 seed plays the #8 in the first round, #2 plays #7, etc.  So that would leave Lillehammer, if they were in the 4th seed, to play the team right below them in 5th, Sparta.  It would be a VERY good and a very close series.   Lillehammer has a 3 and 2 record against Sparta this year.  If you would like to follow the rest of the season or playoffs you can check on the stats by clicking on the link below.  You may need to switch the year on the left hand side to 2011/2012 season.
Pointstreak

As far as everything else, it's been getting warmer here! Suprisingly, the last few days have been in the 40's.  Spring has sprung! It was a little weird yesterday walking around outside without a coat amongst all the snow drifts. 
Here's a little story for you...We had to bring our car in for some repairs a few days ago and had to drive to a nearby city about 25 min away to another dealership.  Anyways, since we rarely leave Lillehammer, Gino and I, without even really noticing it, started packing a bag of snacks for the trip.  Seriously?  you can tell we don't get out much!  We had our google map directions and we were ready to go. Well, as it turns out, it was a good thing we brought the snacks.  We made it to the town just fine, but once we got there we couldn't find the stupid Mercedes dealership!! We literally saw every other dealership known to man in one little area of the city, but not the one we needed.  We ended up stopping at a gas station to show someone our directions and the address but of course the man behind the register was past the age of 50...hence, they don't speak or understand English very well.
 So we continued to drive around for another hour (not exagerating).  Finally, we called the dealership in Lillehammer and they had to talk us through the directions.  Turns out the Mercedes dealership was about 5 miles outside of town up in the hills so we honestly never would have found it.  Yup, thanks google maps.  This is the 3rd time this year, you have disappointed me.  When we got there, the man we had to meet with asked us why we didn't set up an appointment, which we were told by the Lillehammer dealership to just be there by noon.
 (since living in Europe, we've come to assume that everyone is basically on their own schedule and appointments arn't really needed or favored)
 We showed up at a little past 1:30.  Luckily, they were kind and took our car as soon as they could and we waited around for another 45 min and then were on our way back to Lillehammer.  I should tell you that the only thing they needed to do to our car was take pictures of some corrosion damage, which apparently we hadn't noticed, and wash it...  Gotta love the European way!  No rhyme or reason to anything.  I find myself puzzled all the time.

Oh, I almost forgot.  I have a great soup recipe!  I made it a few weeks ago and we made it again lastnight.  Really easy and delicious!  We didn't add the ham and it still tasted amazing. 
Ham and Potato Soup

I'll be sure to update you on the next couple weeks and how playoffs turn out.  It should be an exciting time.  Hope you all have a great last week of February!

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