The cats out of the bag

So everyone who we haven't talked to we apologize. Because there is something major going on in our lives and we need to share it with everyone.
We are going to have a baby!! We found out just about two weeks ago and we couldn't be any happier. Its still very surreal for me (Bill), but unfortunately for Danielle the mornings are all too real :( She is a big time trooper though.

We are already getting used to the standard questions.

1. The Baby is Due April 9th
2. No we are not going to find out the gender of the baby (we like surprises)
3. We are kind of hoping for a Boy, just because of the whole generational thing (Bill is the 8th generation William 'insert mothers middle name' Shannon.
4. We are more than happy to share our baby names with you if shes a girl her name will be Zoe Vera Shannon, if hes a boy he will be William Campbell Shannon.
5. Yes we are way excited!

The one thing we are running into is our nursery colors, we are using our guest bedroom and we really don't want to paint so we need to look for bedding that will match and we are having a little trouble. So if you see anything that you think will look good let us know!

Now I know that you are thinking hey where is the pic of the pregnancy stick or ultrasound? Well no offense to those who did show their pee stick, we just aren't going to roll that way, and we haven't had our first ultrasound yet. But feel free to join our baby pool and guess the Gender, Weight, Length, Date and Time.

And because no post should be without a picture I give you this.

Where it all began.

Do we know you?

Hey everybody...so our friends the Bennetts reminded us how horrible we are at blogging and yes we would agree, we haven't been very good at updating this blog. Things have been quite busy and we have been blogging just not here. We have been blogging almost every week on the Element blog.

Things are going very well for us, we love working with the youth group, Danielle is working part time at a CVS and Bill is still plugging away at Duke. In other news Bill is looking to buy a scooter, because A) they rock and 2) they are fuel efficient, he has tortured his co-worker with questions because he owns a Vespa and Bill can't make up his mind. Right now Bill is thinking of buying a rebuilt Vintage Vespa, if you have any connections or ideas or opinions he would love to hear them.

And because Bill doesn't believe in posting without a picture here is a vintage picture via 1996
It's me and my future bro-in-law and the hair on the head is not real but the chin and the chest is all me baby

Weekend with the Presidents

Christy, Marylin, Reagan, and Lincoln came to visit this weekend. Today we went to Duke Gardens and had a really great time. Here are some pictures from it...

Reagan walking the wall

Looking for fishies and turtles


Uncle Billy and Reagan


At the Fountains that aren't on


All of us together


Oooo, a caterpillar!

Our New Car!!!

The Jetta had past it's prime and was exchanged for a new Mini Cooper Clubman. It is a wonderful ride and we are so excited about it!



Here's a picture with the dogs...

Abe v. Jack

Since we adopted Jack a couple weeks back he has made himself right at home. We couldn't imagine him not being in the house now. Abe plays so good with him outside and at the dog park! The weirdest thing though was Abe didn't want to have anything to do with Jack when we were in the house, whenever Jack wanted to play in the house Abe would ignore him and go to his kennel. Well earlier today we were sitting on the couch in the living room tossing a ball for Jack when Abe walked over to Jack so nonchalantly and started playing with him. They wrestled for a good 20 minutes! It was great to see Abe initiating the play. We knew Abe just takes longer to get use to things. Right now they are both sleeping on the couch next to us, happy as can be! We think they well be best buds!

Ladies and Gentlemen...Meet Jack

We picked up Jack today, he is such a cuddle bug! He and Abe are getting along pretty well, he has a lot more energy than Abe does but he is about 9 months younger than Abe. So far it seems like it is a great fit!

Here is the one picture that is just classic.



And another picture.

Dog Search (Updated again)

So we have started looking for a 2nd dog for our family. I'm really not sure where this came from, Danielle and I were watching Deal or No Deal last week and this guy brought his dog on the show with him and we thought it was a cute one. The next thing I know is that we are on petfinder looking around. This past weekend we thought we found a great dog, his name is Munch and he is a Dogue de Bordeaux[Mix] which for everyone who doesn't speak or read french he is a French Mastiff mix, you can check him out here (ain't he a cutie?). Well when he and Abe got together it just didn't work out. Abe basically ignored him, if Munch were going to be our first dog we totally would have gotten him but since Abe didn't want anything to do with him we had to pass.

So now we are back to square one and back on petfinder looking around. We found a couple that look really nice, one is Blackjack the other is Nola. Both are great looking dogs but we aren't sure which one Abe will get along with best. Normally Abe gets along with just about every dog but I'm beginning to wonder if he knows something is up and is thinking he is trying to sabotage these get togethers.

So which one do you like? Any thoughts, if you adopted a dog where did you get yours, any advice for adopting a second dog?

Update: 3.11.08
According to the Schnauzer Rescue they said the background check would take up to 4 weeks. I guess yesterday they talked with our Vet and they gave us a wonderful review, so yesterday afternoon I received an email saying they would like to arrange a home visit to check out our home and see if it would fit for "jack" as he is called. Then I got a phone call and it seems that the foster parent of Jack is going on a vacation for two weeks and wondering if we can get this done by Friday. So one of the board members of the Schnauzer rescue is coming tonight to check out our house and we could have Jack by Friday or sooner! Its all happening really fast, but we really do think Jack would be a good fit, one huge upside is that Schnauzers don't shed and we DO NOT need another dog that sheds. We'll keep you updated!

Update: 3.12.08
Last night we had a board member come by and do a home visit. They brought along another Giant Schnauzer named Magic, they just wanted us to see a Giant and see how Abe interacted with other dogs. It went swimmingly! They had a great time and Magic even decided to claim part of our carpet, but that was quickly cleaned up. So the bottom line is we have been approved and now it looks like we will be picking up "Jack" either Friday or Saturday! It's all really exciting stuff. We will have pictures up as soon as we can take them.