Troy and Melanie (dot com)

Melanie and I seem to have luck with yard sales. The last one we had we recouped a few hundred dollars and this morning we had another one (making room for Peanut) and we sold nearly $500 worth of things. If you had looked at some of the prices items were sold at you would have been amazed (32″ TV for $22, receiver and speakers for $50, PS2 for $40). The most important thing for us was getting rid of items that we no longer use… mission accomplished.

I ran the sale from 8am until 11am (Mel got to sleep today) and sold nearly everything that was put up for sale. The last item to go was the TV so that should explain the crazy low price. I just wanted to get the dang thing out of the house. Stopping at 11 was perfect… the traffic was thinning out, I was running out of things to sell, and it was beginning to get hot.

Pregnancy tour 2009 will be making it’s lone stop in Lancaster, PA from 6/20 through 6/28. Mark your calendars

Melanie called me downstairs tonight because she said that Peanut had been kicking her hand and she wanted me to feel it too so I let Mel place my hand where he had been kicking and I waited… about 2 minutes later our little guy gave my hand a kick… and my face lit up with a Cheshire Cat grin It is an amazing thing and an amazing moment that I’m going to remember for quite some time.

And what good is a post without a photo? Here’s a picture of me that Aunt Georgia took when we were in San Antonio last week.

In the world of blogging I’m known as a late blogger. The kind who, rather than writing a post at the beginning of the day, writes at the end of the day. My intentions are usually get the post up earlier rather than later, but time flies and I find myself writing before I go to bed. Such is the situation with today’s post. I just wanted to post a big thank you to all of the mom’s out there (2 in particular) and to share a few photos of my baby mom-to-be with our fur baby (Bella). Enjoy!

This is the necklace that I got Mel for Mother’s Day… the left side of the heart is a mother and she’s holding up her baby, which makes the right side of the heart.

(continue reading to see 4 more photos)

This weekend has been pretty eventful so far. The new car that I’ve been negotiating for with the dealership finally arrived on Friday and we went to pick it up after work. We’re the proud new owners of a 2009 Toyota Venza (yes, the VW streak has come to an end). We were looking for something stylish, great reliability, low cost of maintenance, and full of utility (read not a minivan)… the VW Passat wagon was in the running, but the Venza looks so much nicer and the interior feels more like a Lexus than a Toyota. I will post more photos in the coming days, but here’s one to tide you over…

On Saturday we attended our friends Jeff and Jennifer’s son’s birthday party. Ethan turned 2 this past week and we celebrated with lots of running around, playing with bubbles, eating cupcakes, and tearing open presents. The weather was a bit warm and humid so we were constantly going in and out of the house, but the heat didn’t seem to bother the kids. Again, I’ll try to post more photos soon but here’s a teaser… Ethan knows that the best way to eat a cupcake is icing first

Tomorrow the plan is to go to church in the morning, grab some more photos of the Venza down by the 360 bridge, Mel is going to see 17 Again while I go to the gym, and then we’ll work on preparing to move Mel’s desk out of her office and into the loft. Should be jam packed day… and with that I’m going to get to bed (yes, it’s after 1am here… I’m definitely a night owl).

Just wanted to post a quick note to say that we made it home safely. We got into Austin around 11pm yesterday after a pretty full day of travel. All of the flights were on time and we had a smooth trip. Look for a post or two later this week with a recap from each of us.

And here’s a photo of a very happy puppy to have her parents back

Many of our friends who have young children have given us some sage advice: spend time with each other now before the little one arrives. Amen to that advice!  We have some wise friends… and who are we to ignore all of that wisdom?  So we decided that we’re going to take a babymoon and fly out to San Francisco and drive the Pacific Coast Highway down to San Diego.  We’re planning on blogging during the trip so hopefully we’ll have internet along the way so we can share stories and photos.

We leave very early Friday morning and we’ll be back in Austin on Saturday the 25th.

Here’s a map, compliments of Google maps, that shows the route.  Check back often to see how the trip is progressing.  We are soooo ready for this vacation!

What a day!?! We watched with breathless anticipation as the ultrasound tech worked her magic and brought our baby into focus. She took us on a tour of his little body… by all accounts he’s 100% healthy… head to tiny little toes. When she pointed out his, um, boy parts a flood of emotions and thoughts began flowing. We’re still wrapping our minds around the fact that we’ll have a son.

Wow… technology is awesome! Enjoy the movie (it’s about 3 minutes long)… you’ll see his face, head, hands, feet, legs, and boy bits (he ain’t shy).

Ultrasound of our baby boy from Troy Schneider on Vimeo.

This is somewhat of a preview of the nursery theme… Eeyore will play a prominent role regardless of whether Peanut is a boy or a girl.

I know it’s not nearly as exciting as last November’s vote, but we think it’s pretty darn exciting ourselves.  There is a poll on the right side of the page regarding the sex of our baby and we’d love to hear what you think we’re having (bonus points for you if you leave a comment and let us know your reasoning).  The good news is you will only have to wait a week to find out… we have our next ultrasound on Tuesday 4/14.

If you need some additional questions answered to help you make an educated guess leave a comment and we’ll help you out.  For the record we have no premonitions or thoughts about what we’re having.  We’re just hoping for a healthy baby!

(this post will be sticky until next week when we reveal the results of the ultrasound)