The Fiscus Family Visit

In somewhat of a last minute decision Jenny, Jed, & the kids all came to visit this weekend. As part of Jenny's marathon training regime she needed to run a 5k and one was happening here on Saturday morning. So the whole crew came for a short visit arriving Friday night and heading out for a family gathering Saturday afternoon. It was great to get to see them all. On Saturday morning Jed & Jenny went to the race and Lara and I got to hang out with all the kids at home. Another congratulations is in order as Jen finished as the 2nd overall woman and got to take home a few $$$ in winnings along with her t-shirt!!!

Lara and I had a great time playing with the kids. As what is fast becoming tradition on every visit to our house, we printed out Disney princess pictures from the internet and colored them.
The new entertainment was Nintendo. Oh no, not those new fangled nintendo wii's. We busted out the original and everyone had a blast playing Duck Hunt and Tetris.


Well, almost everyone!
Thank you Jenny and Jed for coming to visit and thank you Emma, Anna, Ella, Ty, and Luke for being soooo good for us!!!

A few weeks ago I posted a picture from the ultrasound of how big the baby was getting. Aside from the ultrasound there is some real evidence that this baby is growing.

Everything is still going great. Lara's feet have started to swell but otherwise is feeling pretty good.

Lastly, our garden is really starting to produce now. We have been eating lettuce for quite awhile but are just now getting some other good veggies. Speaking of, you can see below our great looking yellow zucchini that will be ripening by the bushel. Please forward any and all zucchini recipes! Unbeknownst to me I planted yellow zucchini but I am told it tastes identical to the more traditional green ones.

What a Week!!!

Lara and I had so much fun this past week. It all started last weekend when her entire family, Dad and Brenda, and Connie and Lanny (Jed's Parents) came down to celebrate the 4th with us. State College puts on a pretty good fireworks show that lasts 45 minutes and shoots off over 900 shells. It was great to have everyone here. The 4th festivities started with the Firecracker 4k on Saturday morning. Last year Lara, Jenny, and I all ran it. This year "the baby" kept Lara from running so just Jen and I ran. It was nice that everyone came down to the race to cheer us on.

Here's Jen tearing up the course. Notice me at far left trying to keep up!

Here's us after the finish of the big race. Jenny followed up her first place finish in her age group last year with a second place finish this year! Great Job!!! She ran sub-7 minute miles. I was certainly no where near placing in my age group but was happy with my sub-8 minute miles.

After all the fourth festivities, we had an ultrasound on Tuesday morning. Here's Lara waiting patiently for the doctor. She has been feeling some flutters from the baby moving for a few weeks but finally felt some strong movements on Wednesday.

Here he/she is!!!! The baby has sure been growing since our first ultrasound. We decided to wait to find out the gender but we are both feeling it's a boy. Both Lara and baby are healthy and progressing as they should. We can't wait till November!!!


After our exciting ultrasound was another trip to the ballpark. On Wednesday my lab group from Penn State all got together to root on the Spikes. It was the first time that Lara got to meet everyone and we had a great time.

The other big news this week was that I started collecting data for my Ph.D. project. Everything is going great with it and I cannot tell you how happy I am to be progressing towards my degree.

...and we capped off the week with some maternity clothes shopping on Friday and some hiking at Bald Eagle State Park today. What a week!