Celebrating Easter & Baby Boy’s Name!

My heart was touched by Christ’s amazing love and sacrifice for we celebrated Easter and remembered Jesus’ greatest expression of love for us as He gave His perfect, sinless life for us so that we would be freed from the penalty for our sins.

There was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow. The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men. The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’ Now I have told you.”  - Matthew 28: 2-7

I am so thankful for God’s great love for us, and I pray I am reminded of His ultimate sacrifice for me all throughout the year.  Thank you Jesus for saving me from the ugliness of my sin!

We had an amazing worship service celebrating Christ’s resurrection at our church!  It was a beautiful time of worship and joy!  After church, we went to brunch with family.

Love him!

Mom & Dad S. at brunch

Momma & Daddy

Of course, we had to take some pics with the Easter bunny!

Natalie & Gene

CJ & the Easter bunny!

Pretty view of the golf course, but it was very sunny!

Nat asked me to be her Matron of Honor!!!  She had me open a gift which was a onesie that said “Will You Be My Matron of Honor?”  She’s so creative!  I’m so excited for Natalie and Gene, and I’m thrilled to be her Matron of Honor!

The Revealing of Baby Boy’s Name: we had Easter eggs with all the letters of baby boy’s name and the family had to put the letters together to spell out his name!  It took teamwork!

More team work… does it start with a “c”? Nope!

Baby Boy’s Name is

JACKSON

meaning “gracious gift of God”

RYAN

meaning “little king” after his Daddy

 

Baby Boy’s Nickname is

JAX

We can’t wait to meet baby Jax!  We are enjoying finally knowing his name and getting to talk to him and call him by his name!  We love you baby Jax!

Next, we had an Easter egg hunt and then had a medley of “Minute to Win It” games!  Lots of fun and laughs!

Even though we’re all adults, we still have fun hunting eggs!

After the egg hunt, we had to see who could put their puzzle together the fastest!

1st “Minute to Win It” game- pulling tissues out of tissue box one at a time!  (Don’t worry we recycled these!)

Block stacking game

Way to go Gene!

Catching ping pong balls on sticky lint brush!

Pregnancy Update

Ryan affectionately calls me “preggers” most of the time now and likes to rub my belly and feel baby Jax move lots!  He is quite the kicker!  It is so much fun getting to experience new life growing inside me, and I am thankful God has blessed us with baby boy!

My friend Haley and I with our baby bumps!  Haley is about 2 months behind me, and she is having a baby girl!  It has been fun experiencing pregnancy together!

Tummy Pic at 29 weeks!  Baby is growing so fast now!

Now at 31 weeks!  Notice the big change in just 2 weeks!

We’re getting so close to meeting baby boy!  We’re in the middle of our birth classes through First Birth Ministries which focus on childbirth through a Biblical perspective and depending on Christ for our every need.  It has been a huge encouragement to us already, and we are praying for God to keep our hearts and minds fixed on Him and His provision for us and our baby during this time.  God is faithful!

Cozumel Babymoon

Ryan and I were able to get away for 1 week to Cozumel from April 9-16, 2011.  This was the first vacation we’ve been able to take just the two of us since our honeymoon almost 5 years ago!  It was an absolutely amazing week together, and God blessed us with a great time of reconnecting, relaxing, resting, and having fun together!  We jumped on the opportunity to take a vacation before baby boy arrives.  God’s creation was truly majestic!  Here are some pics from the week in Cozumel:

View from our balcony at the Park Royal Resort

Melissa & baby boy at 27.5 weeks in our room

We decided to take a walk from our resort into town on Sunday since Ryan thought the walk wasn’t too far.  We enjoyed all the beauty of God’s creation we got to see, but the walk ended up being 1 hour each way and almost 3 miles each way.  A little longer than we expected since it was the heat of the day!  Being a derm PA, we were prepared for the sun with our hats and sunscreen!  We enjoyed walks along the path near the ocean almost every morning, but we didn’t walk all the way into town on the other days!

We saw several iguanas on our walk

We stopped to enjoy the ocean- Gorgeous!

Sunday night before dinner

Us at the Mexican restaurant at our resort on Sunday night

Ready for the beach!

Sunset on Monday

We went on a catamaran for a snorkeling excursion on Tuesday to 2 different reefs in Cozumel.  The fish and underwater scenery were breath-taking and we had a great time seeing more of the ocean!

View from the main pier waiting for the catamaran

On the catamaran heading out to the reefs

View of Park Royal (our resort)

Cool pic of the sail on the catamaran!

Snorkeling Time!

After snorkeling, they took us to a beach where we had hamburgers for lunch.  We also took out a kayak and Ryan paddled us around!

Tuesday night before dinner

View of the beach at our resort- we spent a lot of time hanging out under the tiki hut and enjoying the beauty!  We also snorkeled several days right in front of the resort and saw lots of fish and an eel!

Melissa at the beach

Ryan chilling under the nice shade of the tiki hut!

Baby boy at 28 weeks!  He’s growing!  We both enjoyed getting to slow down and feel baby boy moving more and more during the trip!  Baby boy seemed to enjoy the relaxation!  Ryan got to feel baby boy’s movements getting stronger since we got to spend all day everyday together! We first saw Melissa’s tummy moving when baby boy kicked or moved during our vacation at about 27.5 weeks!  This was cool to actually see some of baby boy’s movements from the outside!  We can’t wait to meet our little son!

Tummy pic at 28 weeks- getting bigger!

We rented a car from Thursday at noon until Friday at noon to go sight seeing and explore the island on our own.  Our first stop was lunch at Palmeras Restaurant downtown near the main pier.  We had one experience just after lunch that makes you realize you’re in another country!  After lunch Ryan was driving us toward the Mayan ruins (he did all the driving), and we were going down a one-way street close to downtown with several houses where the locals live (most of the smaller streets are one-way).  We came upon a large utility-type truck parked in the middle of the small one-way street with absolutely no room to pass.  We sat there behind the truck for a few minutes wondering if someone would move the truck soon or what we were going to do.  In the meantime, another car pulled up behind us and we were both sitting there with nowhere to go. A few minutes later the car behind us started reversing all the way to the previous intersection since there was no sign of the truck moving anytime soon.  Ryan decided to do the same and we turned onto the previous cross street.  It was an adventure!

At lunch at Palmeras Restaurant downtown

We toured the Mayan ruins at San Gervasio.  It was interesting, but it was very hot outside!

Ryan in front of a large Mayan temple

We drove over to the east side of the island and it was gorgeous!  There is no electricity on this side of the island since a hurricane wiped out the electricity in 2005.

We went out to dinner at Casa Mission restaurant downtown for dinner on Thursday

We thought Ryan’s “Coca-Cola Light” glass bottle was pretty cool!

Pretty view as we drove further south on Friday

At the beach at Carlos’n Charlie’s

Last dinner in Cozumel at the Italian restaurant at our resort

Thank you Lord for blessing us with a wonderful vacation together and lots of fun memories in Cozumel to cherish!  I’m thankful for the time we enjoyed just the two of us, and we’re getting excited to meet baby boy who is growing everyday!