Baby Shower

In the midst of my scurrying and hurrying to get ready to leave this weekend (yes, this weekend!!), my wonderful sisters-in-law organized a "baby" shower for me!!!! It was so great to see so many friends and family members from different areas of my life come together to support Mark and me as we step into this new adventure!

In preparation for this, we went to Target about a month ago to register….it's actually kinda hard to register for a 12-year-old baby!!!! As many of you know, for a traditional baby shower, you can register for diapers and bottles and onsies and crib stuff and rattles. For a pre-teen, you get to register for a bike and a helmet and a sleeping bag, and a CD player that plays MP3s. And you have to worry that you'll pick the wrong color or the wrong size or the wrong pattern!

Fortunately, our experience with Masha has taught us that "you can't go wrong with pink!" and all of our friends followed that well! We received so many wonderful and thoughtful gifts, and Masha and I will both think of all the special people in our lives whenever we see or use everything! Our dilemma right now is to figure out how to give all of these things to Masha without her thinking that Americans are all rich and that money grows on trees!!

Thanks to everyone for your continued love, support, thoughts, and prayers. Every one of you is special to us, and we'll be thinking of each of you often during our travels! We are hoping to be able to update the blog often during the trip……feel free to leave comments on the blog so we know you're still reading!!!