Counting Down!

In 18 days we will be shacked up in a wonderfully cozy cabin in the Smoky mountains with our dear friends, the Johnsons, Sabelhauses and Mayers. It's our second annual trip to get some serious R&R, catch up with good friends and do whatever we feel like for a few days. Last year was our first trip, hopefully the beginning of many to come, where we can all get away sans-children for a weekend of fun. This year will be slightly different with two babies on the way... probably no zorbing or hot tubbing (for two of us) and less of Jason's margaritas to be consumed, but it's going to be fabulous! And the outlet malls will definitely be glad to see us!

As I sit here post-Christmas no more rested than last week, I am oh-so-anxious for our getaway!

Thanksgiving 2008

Thanksgiving this year was celebrated St. Louis-style! My Uncle Brett and family invited the whole Campbell family out to St. Louis for a weekend of fun and family celebration. It was a quick car ride with my parents and Abby, which was much needed. With so much busyness in our life and even more in my parents', we were finally able to catch up and get excited about their new granddaughter!


Brett and Lisa were incredible hosts with an abundance of food for all 27 of us day and night -- for FOUR days. My baby belly was stuffed with constant deliciousness. Of the 27, 20 of the family stayed the weekend at their beautiful home. I just couldn't get over how generous and thoughtful they were with hosting. We had such a fun weekend!


The day after Thanksgiving, all 27 of us took a trip to the St. Louis zoo in the morning. That afternoon we went our own ways, going shopping, swimming (the kiddos) and the guys visited Jim Weddle, managing partner, at the home office of Edward Jones. But we were given strict instructions to be back at the house and ready to leave at 4:30 for a surprise.


Shortly after 4:30, Molly the Trolley pulled up in front of their house, ready to take us all on an adventure! Brett had packed coolers full of soda, beer, wine, and my favorite: Jack, as well as pretzels, goldfish, etc etc. We drove through two different parks that had beautiful light displays. It was beautiful! And even more enjoyable to watch the little kids get excited. After a few hours of driving, laughing, snacking and drinking, we ended up at a pub downtown Kirkwood for dinner and more family time. Brett and Lisa outdid themselves once again!


We had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend and can't wait to do it again in 2010!

Brett & Robin carving the turkeys...
Rachie & Shaun...
Mike and one of his biggest fans, my (2nd) cousin Morgan...

Me and my adorable cousin, Isabel...

Molly the Trolley!

The whole gang on the trolley...

Bretty carefully mixing drinks on the trolley...

My sweet hubby and me...

My scary hubby and me (in Brett's halloween costume)...

Mike and his 3 biggest fans of the weekend (Morgan, Emma & Hannah)...

Molly and Carter - Go BSU!!

At Jim Weddle's car warehouse. Like I mentioned before, Jim is the managing partner of Edward Jones. He also is one of my dad's good friends (and his best man from his wedding). Jim has always been an avid car collector and recently upgraded warehouses for working on and showing off his collection. The cars were unbelievable, some of them were limited editions, and a few were the ONLY ones made like it. He even has a car made from an airplane body from the WWII era. Needless to say, the guys were drooling as Jim explained each of the vehicles to us.

Trip to Cali

My big event for work, The Winner's Circle, is going to be in Newport Coast, California. Last November, I took a hard hat tour through dirt, rocks and a few beams to try to envision what The Resort at Pelican Hill might someday be. They promised an opening date of November 2008, and I figured it would be perfect for our event in Feb 2009!

This November, I went on a site visit to see the finished product. It wasn't quite ready for opening, but they were within 8 days. The property was AMAZING! Rooms begin at $700/night, and I don't think I've ever seen anything like it.

My mom was able to squeeze a trip into her schedule to get to go with me on my site visit, and we had an incredible time! I met with people and took tours during the days, and she and I went shopping, site seeing and out to restaurants in the evenings. We managed to get a ton of R&R in, plus one of my clients met us for a whirlwind tour of Beverly Hills and Hollywood. SO FUN!

Me on the steps of the Kodiak Theatre...

Mom and me in front of Grauman's Chinese theatre where all of the handprints are...
'Ahnold's' feet prints...
My favorite, mom and me in front of the Hollywood sign. (If you look very closely, it's there!)

Happy Birthday, Sarah Land!

It seems like everyone has "I'm sorry for not posting for a while" on their blog... Well, I'm sorry, too! Life has been crazy, the holidays have compounded that, and baby thrown on top makes blogging impossible these days.

What I've forgotten to show you are some of the fun we've had this past month! On Nov 22, our sweet little friend, Sarah, turned 1 year old! Katie and Cam had a birthday party for her, which was precious. Sarah had all sorts of new experiences: opening presents, eating as much cake as she wanted and then one not so new: being the center of attention. She was quite the little lady! We know she's going to be a great "big sister" for our little girl.

She was a very patient present opener!

One of her favorite gifts: a cell phone, from the Hughes! Mike made sure to program his voice into it so the Lands could get to hear from him every day. :)
Happy big O-N-E, Sarah!

The verdict is in!!!

In case you can't tell, she's a GIRL!!!! Mackaveli is a girl!!! We are THRILLED :) Now we are celebrating... details later.

Waiting!!!

No, we don't know yet!! I love how excited everyone is -- I am sitting at my desk staring at the clock waiting for 3:00 to appear so I can leave work and drive south. Our appointment is at 4:00, so until then, we wait!!

Jack or Jill??

I have a few weeks' worth of posts to bring me up-to-date, but who knows when I'll have time for that. Between our usual social life, Christmas, and the baby, life has been hectic! We enjoyed some down time this weekend and simply vegged. It was wonderful!!

While I have 30 seconds, I wanted to make sure you know that we find out if baby Mack is a boy or girl on WEDNESDAY!!! Just two more days of suspense!

I thought I'd throw that out there so you can get your guesses in, too. :) I'd love to hear your best guess prior to the big announcement. We are SO anxious to find out. Every day, we remind eachother of the current countdown. Today I got a text from Mike that just said "2 days!" It's going to begin yet another whirlwind of planning/shopping/excitement that we are so ready for!

Will keep you posted....

Colts Sunday!

Tailgating with the Jameses!

Mackaveli Update!

It's been a while since I've been able to write. Our lives have been so busy we've barely had time to even be home this month! And it's just getting crazier. Regardless, I know it's time for a baby update!

We are 16 weeks along right now, and my pregnancy has been wonderful thus far. God has blessed me with no sickness, no abnormalties, and only a teensy bit of craziness. I was exhausted for the last six weeks of the first trimester, but now I am back to a normal level of energy and alertness. No more naps in the parking lot of Kohl's on my lunch hour (Yay!).

We had our first OB appt three weeks ago, heard the heartbeat again and praised the Lord for 160 beats per minute. Everything is great, and we go back on Wednesday the 3rd for our next check up. If all goes as we hope, we will have our discovery ultrasound the week before Christmas so we can start planning in pink or blue!!

We've been tracking my belly, or lack thereof, since we found out we were pregnant. Everyone at work has been teasing me because I don't really look pregnant, yet, when I have a shirt on. I'm okay with that and would love for just a giant belly to appear one day without all the in between sizes and looks-like-I-have-skipped-the-gym-for-months appearance. But as long as Mackaveli is happy and healthy in there, I don't care what I look like!

(SEE, there IS a belly there!)

We will keep you posted on the exciting news when we find out!

Halloween!

Better late than never, right? I somehow managed to not take any good pictures the whole night. Must have been all that water I was drinking, right? Well, thankfully Sonya had a few, so here's the recap of our fun Halloween/Mike's birthday party!

There were plenty of other super cute couple costumes, but like I said - no pictures! Oh well...

All About Biz

I've been tagged by Heather to tell you about things nobody knows about me. It was kind of fun to think about. So here goes:



- When I was 12 years old, my best friend and I created, developed and ran a day camp for kids. It was called Kids Kamp. We had craft time, song time, activity time, even snack time. We hired our friends, volunteered our sisters, and even had a lawyer draft up a waiver form for the parents to sign. We ran it out of my parents back yard and made serious money. That's when I knew I was an entrepreneur!


- I have the recipe for Nestle Toll House cookies memorized, and have had it memorized since I was 11. My next door neighbor and I used to make them almost daily. We would add small amounts of cinnamon and think that we had a crazy new recipe. Now, I just love to make cookies. I can whip up a full batch from pouring flour to washing the cookie trays in 40 minutes, tops.


- I want to pierce my nose. I have wanted to for a while, but now that I'm pregnant I'm scared to. Just a tiny little stud. My friend Jennifer just got a tattoo for her 30th, and I figure that a piercing is similarly adventurous, but less permanent when I turn 40 and decide my kids shouldn't get piercings yet.


- I would rather wear my husbands sweats any day of the week. (I am wearing them as I write this!) They're giant on me, super comfy, and they remind me of when we were dating. I would go straight to his apartment after work, change into his sweats, make dinner together and watch movies all evening. Ah, the good ol' days with zero responsibilities.


- At the risk of being rather risqué, I cannot wear clothing to bed. Socks, sweats, tank tops, no matter what it is or how freezing I am when I get in bed, they all are on the floor by the middle of the night. I love to be warm, but I hate to be hot while I'm sleeping. Oh, and I love to sleep. I love my bed. And I love sleeping next to my husband.


- I was bald until I was 2 years old. Now my hair is thick, but it was non-existent even after I started walking. That, combined with Mike going bald at 18, gives any boy we have a solid 16 years with good, thick hair. Then the poor things are screwed. Although I think Mike's baldness is hot, so it's really in the way you look at it.


- I desperately want to own my own business (see the first one). I haven't figured out a lucrative way to do that, but I love every aspect of running a business. Plus I am terrible at working for other people. I'm very efficient, and 48 hour work weeks drive me nuts. I love to be creative, and I know there's a perfect opportunity for me to do something, I just need to find it.



I now tag Molly, Aimee and Betsy! Tell us what you've got, girls. :)

Mikey's Birthday

Happy Birthday to Mike! Last weekend was his big 2-7, which we celebrated in style.... dressed up in Halloween costumes!

The night before, we had a leisurely, romantic dinner at The Melting Pot. It was wonderful to slow down for an evening, catch up and be with my best friend. We have been so crazy busy lately, and we loved having a night to ourselves. Just to think that in 6 months we'll have to hire a babysitter to have a night out!

I adore that man!

Weekend in Tennessee

My sister had her white coat ceremony for med school last weekend. We packed up the family and drove down to nowhere, Tennessee to celebrate her. The pictures pretty much tell their own story.

I cried at the ceremony (probably hormones) thinking about how proud I am of Rachel and all she's accomplishing. It's quite an honor.

The rest of the weekend was wonderful with the whole family. As you can tell, we got a little silly once in a while. :)