Our cats are geniuses!

After only 7.5 months, I think they're starting to realize that something's up. They're brilliant! Seriously, what can you expect when their brains are the size of a pea. They're sniffing all of the toys, and were very curious about the stroller. Camper tried to hop in the bassinet when we took it off the stroller frame. They're doing lots of investigating these days.

We had a baby shower last weekend, as most of you probably know, and were the very lucky recipients of many gifts. We've spent the last week trying to organize the nursery a little bit. Our stroller arrived this week, too, so Markus immediately put that together as soon as he walked in the door from his Tampa trip. He's a boy, he likes to put things together. What can I say? I just captured it on camera -photos are off to the right.

Markus had refinished the floors in the nursery so we couldn't put anything in there. My parents dropped off the crib headboard (it didn't fit in the car) as well as the rest of the shower gifts so now we can put the crib together. Once we know where we're putting the crib, we can place the bookshelf and rocker and start decorating. We still need to buy a dresser, which I think we're going to try to do in the next two weeks.

We also have to order our diaper bag. We had ordered the one to match our stroller, but neither of us really cared for the style (lots of pesky clasps instead of one easy zipper) so we sent it back. There's a super cool place in Philly called Viv Pickle where you can design your own purse (pick your purse style from one of their templates, then select a fabric, the handle type and material you want, etc). As luck would have it, they make diaper bags! A friend has one and likes it, and the bag won the Best of Philly diaper bag award last year so we're sold. We can also get a matching changing pad. And they're super cool looking - and unique! So, we just have to head to their store to look at the fabrics and make our selection. We're going to go together so that I don't end up picking some girly fabric that Markus would be embarrassed to carry. :-)

I finally spent the time to load some of our vacation pictures from the cruise in February. It seems like it was so long ago already - how depressing! In any case, if you're interested, take a look. I'm not always looking my finest, but, well, you've all probably seen me looking less than fine at least once or twice. :-)

If it's not obvious by now, it's another night that Mr. Markus is working late. He had a phone cutover in their State College office today. Fortunately, he's on the road and should be home around 11. He got sick this weekend, I think because he's been so busy and not getting enough sleep. He slept much of the weekend, poor guy. He's got another cutover on Wednesday, so there's no rest for the weary. We've just been making sure he stays hydrated and keeps taking his decongestants (it's more of a congestion/runny nose/fatigue thing than the flu). I think he may try to work from home tomorrow to take it easy before the Wednesday cutover.

So tomorrow is our big day - the 3D ultrasound! Well, the point is to see if the baby has cataracts. About 1-2 weeks ago, the baby began opening its eyes; I guess that's why we had to wait until now to get this ultrasound. Can't see cataracts if the eyes are closed, right?! Anyway, they can't guarantee if they'll be able to tell anything, which is fine with us. We're just excited to see this little munchkin in 3D, especially since its facial features are pretty well developed at this point. We just have to make sure that we don't watch when the tech first starts - who knows where the head will be, and we might see the lower body (and the gender!) by accident! We're not too worried either way, since cataracts are a very correctable problem and minor compared to the struggles, illnesses, and challenges faced by many other young children. I'm not trying to minimize the difficulty of a potential vision problem for our baby, but we both try to keep it in perspective. Many other parents must face much more severe and potentially life-threatening ailments in their children, and we're lucky that thus far, all signs indicate that our baby is healthy. It sure kicks and punches a lot, and now that it's learning to use its diaphragm as practice for real world breathing, I feel it getting the hiccups occasionally. It makes me smile. :-)

On that happy note, I have to wrap up. Big Momma here needs to get her big belly to the gym! We'll report on the ultrasound when we can.