Happy New Year-2009!!!

WOW! What a memorable year 2008 was for us! The year began with excitement, hope and even a little fear when we learned we were pregnant. It was also in January that Dan was accepted into the Masters program in Biostatistics and Bioinformatics (in addition to his full time job!). He started classes shortly after and has continued to be a straight A student. In April we past the first trimester mark in the pregnancy, and we shared our good news with the world. May was an especially special month for us as we learned that baby Riggs was a GIRL! I must admit that Dan was the only one who thought girl. It also marked a time of great contemplation as we pondered what to name our baby girl. We celebrated with a "Mother's Day" vacation to beautiful Gatlinburg, TN. The next couple of months were filled with school work, baby showers, weddings (what better time to act as a bridesmaid) and lots of baby planning. To our shock, on August 14th at 32 weeks pregnant, my water broke while on bed rest. We spent the next 30 hours in an blur until our sweet Emma was born. Despite being 8 weeks premature, Emma was very healthy! She spent 3 weeks in the neonatal intensive care unit and finally came home on Sep 6th just in time for her daddy's 28th birthday (on the 13th). Following Emma's home coming I was able to write and defend my dissertation and participate in the Ph.D. graduation ceremony. Last month, I started as a Postdoctoral Research Associate at UofL, Dan completed his first year of classes, Emma started daycare and now we focus our energy on just finding a routine in our crazy world. As you can see, the past year was certainly memorable and one we could not have survived without our family and friends. We cannot thank you enough! We wish you all the best in the New Year! We look forward to 2009, but our hope is that 2009 is a boring year for us!