The newest addition to our family...

Gabriella Alexis was born on December 29th at 3:04 pm. She weighed 7 lbs. 13 ozs. and was 20 and 1/4 inches long. She is absolutely gorgeous and we are so happy she's finally here!

For those of you who don't know, she was almost a week late (my original due date was Christmas Eve). We are so happy she waited to come until after Christmas because next year, not only will we be celebrating her 1st birthday on Dec. 29th, but we'll also be celebrating my sister's 30th birthday!

I was induced early Tuesday morning and by the time she was born, the total labor and delivery process only took 6 hours!! I was in shock and couldn't believe it. Brian couldn't believe it either (he missed Bella's birth by 10 hours). I guess it's true what they say - the second one is so much easier and faster :)

Here are a few pictures from the hospital and our first time coming home:

Last vacation as a 3 person family

We just got back from our family vacation a little over a week ago, and finally got a chance to post a "few" of our pictures from the entire trip. There's actually 105 pictures of the various sights and scenes we got to experience while in London, Amsterdam, Belgium (Brussels & Bruges), and Paris. These are just a fraction of the photos we took with our new camera. More stories are to come from the individual places we saw, but for now, enjoy the pics!

So you think you can dance?

Check out Bella's dance moves in this video:

Our little reader

Bella loves to read any and all books, but one of her favorites has to be "Panda bear, panda bear, what do you see?" Here is a video of her reading it to Strawberry Shortcake:

Stuttgart, Germany

Last week, Brian had to attend a conference in Stuttgart, Germany, so Bella and I decided to tag along and join him. We had such a great time! The weather was beautiful (high 70's to low 80's), there were so many trees (all of them green, unlike the ones here in Sicily that are all brown right now), and so many things to do. While we were there, we had a chance to take Bella to a huge waterpark, Legoland, the Wilhelma Zoo and Botanical Gardens, and the Ritter Sport chocolate factory. We also got to eat Chinese and Mexican food, and Popeyes fried chicken, something we don't usually get here in Sicily, and it was ALL delicious. I forgot how much i love Popeyes :) We enjoyed our trip so much, that we've already started planning another Germany trip for next year. Enjoy the pictures!

Summer 2009

Hey there! Sorry it's taken so long for me to update the blog, but this pregnancy has turned out to be a lot more exhausting than my first one (mainly because of a certain 2 year old that i have to chase around :) Here are a few pictures from our summer so far, beginning with our 4th of July celebration and Bella enjoying a hot dog. Some friends of ours are letting us borrow their pool, so we tend to spend many HOT summer afternoons cooling off in there. We haven't been doing a whole lot, besides trying to stay cool, although we just got back from a trip to Stuttgart, Germany (i'll post those pics soon). I also have a few pics of my growing belly that i will post next time.

Still blogging...

Hi everybody! Sorry for taking so long to update the blog. We've been fairly busy the last month or so, and haven't had much of a chance to post anything. Here's a little glimpse of what's been going on (and if you want to see any pictures, check out Nancy's facebook page):
- I attended a conference in Israel for a week, and went to the lowest place in the world (the Dead Sea)... highly recommend going!
- Spent Easter with friends, and Bella got to enjoy her first egg hunt.
- We went to Barcelona for about a week. We wanted to get one last trip in before Bella turned 2. Our trips are going to be a little more expensive now. We had a blast out there, and Nancy's now thinking about retiring to Spain... we'll see about that. We highly recommend going here too!
- Our little Bellarina turned 2, and she had an awesome Elmo birthday party with our Sigonella family.
- We celebrated our 5th year of marriage by making cupcakes for our little princess' b-day party... not too romantic, but it was pretty fun.
- Nancy & Bella flew home to see our friends and family in VA and FL.

Well, I know I'm just making excuses, but we promise to update the blog with a little more interesting stuff when we get a chance. Without Nancy and Bella around, life over here get's a little hectic ;) So wish me and Coby luck over on this side of the world.

FYI, I'll be spending a month in Djibouti for work too, but at least my girls will be back when I return :) Also, it's a little early, but for all you moms out there, HAPPY MOTHER's DAY!!

Take care, B