In just one day...

We will officially find out if we are becoming parents to a boy or girl!  This week has been a mix of emotions-- lots of excitement about how our life is changing, an ounce of trepidation about how or if we will ever find all the time and money to be great parents, and a bit of tiredness (let's be real, all this party planning can be tiring for a mama-to-be).  We only want a healthy baby but the reality of this is starting to sink in.
  
Tomorrow our life will change. 
We will find out if...

Denny will have a daughter to someday walk down the aisle,

OR

If I will have a son to teach about how to treat your mom.

We will find out if...

Denny will have a son to take outside and show him the essentials of baseball,

OR

If I will have a daughter to take to dance lessons, cheerleading tryouts and Prom dress shopping.

It is incredibly exciting yet very surreal!  It will be a great day regardless if the box is filled with pink or blue balloons.  We want to savor it and remember every minute of this because I'm pretty sure the next 18 years will fly by, and before we know it we will be spending our Saturdays in May at Graduation ceremonies, college Parents weekends and perhaps even weddings (speaking of, do we need to start saving for that too?)

Have a great weekend everyone, and an especially Hapy Mother's Day weekend to all those amazing women out there that we love, that we miss, and that we admire for their compassion, endless energy, and amazing courage.  XOXO Mamas!



May Fun Part II

It's Thursday night and Denny and I are both off work tomorrow, yay!  But before we get ready for our ITSA party, I wanted to share the rest of the pictures from this past weekend.  Take a look...

Melissa got crafty before the party!

 

So surprised!

 

  

Nothing says Happy Cinco de Mayo
like a fake mustache or three!   

 

Ole!



More 1st Birthday Fun!!

Someone loves cake!!



Ryan's Adorable Birthday Cake Train! 

  

Lots of cake & fun gifts!!

 

 

It's his party and he'll cry if he wants to! 
Even the Birthday Boy has his limits!





May Fun!!

It's only May 7th and we have so far had two awesome parties this month!

Melissa and I tend to get a little bit excited when it comes to throwing and hosting parties and this weekend was no exception. 

We knew this weekend would be the much anticipated 1st Birthday weekend of Ryan, but as we started planning that we also realized this weekend would be the perfect time to throw Mom a Surprise 60th Birthday.  Her real Birthday is not until June 2nd so we figured she would not suspect a thing.  Plus Melissa already had a tent in her backyard and enough food to feed an army so nothing seemed out of place to Mom. 

I took a vacation day Friday and by 7:45 AM I was cruising to Ohio to get the part(ies) started!!  And started we did.  Melissa and I (along with the awesome support of Dad, Thad and Denny) managed to throw Mom an awesome Cinco de Marilyn surprise bash and then Melissa turned around to throw another awesome party Sunday for the cutest little one-year old I know!

I haven't even had a chance to upload the pictures from my camera yet but thanks to some speedy Facebook posters, here are some weekend snapshots! 

More to come, stay tuned...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Day One: Happy Surprise Birthday Mom!!

Decos... check!



Awesome chocolate (thanks to Cali Dolce girls)... check!

 

Surprised Mom... CHECK and CHECK!! 

Mom still surprised that Dad, Melissa and I pulled it off without her knowing. 



Les and Mom practicing the royal wave!



Even Ryan was excited for Mexican mustaches and cold beer!  Ole!

Aunt Lorraine tested out the margaritas before having fun with Ryan's toys!  She's always the life of the party!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Day Two: Happy Birthday Ryan!!



Family photo!
Adorable Birthday Boy enjoying the train theme in his conductor outfit!

Runaway Birthday Boy!



Happy Birthday Boy and his smash cake!!



Birthday Cruisin in the Cozy Coupe!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hope everyone had a very Happy Cinco de Mayo!

Happy Birthday Ryan!

On May 3, 2011, I woke up at 5:30 AM to find out Melissa was officially in labor!!  Hooray!!

So off to the hospital we all went...



Mama-to-be Ready to go!!



It turned our Ryan wanted another Birthday; he wanted May 4th to be his day.  And he was the one in charge of the day so we waited...

and waited...                 

My cousins Leslie and I made Melissa pratice for the scary parts of labor...

Then we ate...

Then we waited more...

When we got bored waiting, we pretended to sleep while we continued to wait...

 

And FINALLY about 26 hours later,

one of the cutest, sweetest, most beautiful baby boys arrived to the world

(well worth the wait and the calories)!



Family photo!



Meeting Nana and Papa

Little cutie!

Happy Birthday Ryan Paul Bixler! 

We Love You so much and you have brought more happiness into our lives

than we could ever imagine!

We can't wait to watch you grow up!

xoxo Uncle Denny, Aunt Erin & Cousin Bean

"It's A..."

Who doesn't love Pat from Saturday Night Live?!?!

Awkward, Nervous, Mysterious, Hilarious...  As much as Denny and I love SNL, we didn't want our baby to have a lifetime of uncertainty when he or she needed to use a public restroom, so we figured we'd unveil the mystery sooner than later.  Plus Denny and I decided many years ago (before the Bean was a Bean) to find out boy or girl as long as we had an ITSA party to make it a fun reveal.

Fast forward a few years, a positive pregnancy test and another 18 weeks...

We told the Bean that if he or she cooperated during the sonogram appointment today we would make him or her the coolest room a Bean could ever imagine.  Apparently bribery even works on babies in utero because today our little one shared the boy/girl secret with the sonogram tech.  So now we have a very happy Mom-to-be and Dad-to-be (us), and an envelope full of a delicious little secret.  So far, things are working as planned.

Luckily our families will be in town next weekend so we have a date for the ITSA party.  And thanks to my super creative sister and the brilliance of Pinterest, we have a fun way to reveal it (assuming the associate at the Wegmans balloon counter next Saturday doesn't spill the Beans - yes this was an intentional play on words).  Now all we have to do is wait and hope this plan continues along as planned.  

(Disclaimer:  The couple shown is this photo appear to be J Crew models and are way cuter than what our families will be looking at on May 12.  Plus this couple clearly lives in a house that backs up to a lush park, while our backyard includes a dilapidated shed)

_____________________________________________________

In the meantime, we can stare at the envelope while we speculate and make predictions based on unrelated facts.  So far, here is the current Team Pink vs. Team Blue tally...

Denny and I both think Boy ~ 1 point, Team Blue

The Q family thinks Girl ~ 1 point, Team Pink

Chinese Horoscope says Boy ~ 1 point, Team Blue

When we bought our house it had a pink bedroom and a purple bedroom.  We painted both within 3 months of moving in, so it seems inevitable we will someday end up with 2 girls (and a pink bedroom and purple bedroom) ~ 2 points, Team Pink

Both Denny's parents and my parents already have grandsons, which means we are bound to have more boys ~ 1 point, Team Blue

So there you have it folks, we are 10 days away from knowing the real truth.  Team Blue is tied with Team Pink at 3 points each, and our quarterback is going to be the Wegmans associate at the balloon counter next Saturday.  Fingers crossed all works as planned.  Until then, keep on guessing!