Our Tales of Two Cities: My Girls...

So as you may know...I highly value my time with my girlfriends. I had a big group of girlfriends in high school that did everything together...I was in a sorority in college...I've been blessed with wonderful women in my life. I feel like I value that time even more now since it's less frequent (how sad).

This makes me all the more excited to be having a girl as our first child. I look forward to seeing the friendships she creates during her lifetime and can only hope she'll be as lucky as me. There is truly something different and special about chatting with your girlfriends vs. your husband.

Over the past month I've gotten to see a bunch of my close friends...it's been like many happy therapy sessions and so much fun. Two of my best friends are pregnant right now too! I have loved talking to them about our pregnancies!

Nick and I went down to my hometown, Richmond, VA for a weekend to see my parents who we hadn't seen since before Christmas! The trip was also so I could see my girlfriends from college, Colleen and Melissa and Melissa's twin babies. She had them in December and I had been dying to see those two little munchkins...boy and a GIRL...Parker and Mackenzie. I had a great visit getting to hold and play with both babies and saw true life with twins...standing ovation to Melissa and her great husband Scott for doing such a great job as first time parents! Then Colleen, Melissa and I had a fun lunch just us girls. Colleen is pregnant and due a week before me, on August 16th...with a boy...luckily she already has a sweet little girl! Maybe my little girl and her little boy will date one day?! :)

Mackenzie Broaddus being sweet

Scott with his mini me, Parker

Mackenzie practicing her kicking skills on me

twins, but very different!

girls lunch :)

Tracy (friend from middle school...which let me do the math...about 15 years of friendship, whoa.) and her fun hubby Joe visited us in NJ for a weekend. Tracy was almost 30 weeks pregnant at the time and we talked everything pregnancy/baby...but also just had fun. We went into NYC for the day and shopped at a cute maternity boutique and had lunch, saw Hunger Games and had fun showing them around our area of New Jersey. Tracy is due June 4th...also with a girl! We hope one day they'll be close friends too :)

in nyc...i'm 18 weeks here and tracy is close to 30 weeks pregnant

In mid-April, I went down to the DC/Maryland area to celebrate my college friend, Jamie's upcoming wedding! I was also able to squeeze in dinner and a night with my girlfriend, Tina...it was so nice to walk around Arlington, VA...get dinner on a really nice spring night and talk, talk, and talk about our lives. Usually this is done over wine, but that will have to wait!

My college girlfriends celebrated Jamie with a really nice bridal shower thrown by her friends and family and a night out in Baltimore! My friends, Colleen, Melissa, Allison and I drove around together that day and stayed at Allison's that night...we love our adult slumber parties :) We were silly and had fun...it's just awesome when we're all together!

not the best angled picture of us, but my college girlfriends plus sorority sister, Stacy..clockwise from bottom left: Colleen, Melissa, Allison, Stacy, me, and Jamie (center)

ready for a night out!

party bus...my girlfriends and I are in the front of this picture and I have no idea what's in the cooler, haha.

Last but certainly not least...I recently spent a weekend with Casey, in San Diego!! I had 4 days out there visiting her and we had a fun and relaxing long weekend. Much different pace than my last trip...partly due to it being a sober weekend, partly due to that I get tired much faster these days! We went to the beach, out to eat, strolled through the farmers market, shopped around (I bought too many things for the baby), caught a Phillies/Padres game (baby girl saw her first losing Phillies game sadly enough), and got massages. We watched two terrible movies (never see Funny People or Young Adult) and just hung out. I wanted to visit Casey before I got too pregnant to fly and it was perfect timing.

Casey can't come to my baby shower this summer, so she even threw me a baby shower! It was so cute and complete with flowers, balloons, cupcakes and a delicious apple lime drink! Thanks Case :)