We have a stroller!

As if just getting the room ready wasn't enough, a few weeks ago we also assembled the stroller, which was a gift from my parents.  Obviously a stroller doesn't need as much prep time as an entire room, but when the motivation strikes, we say go with it, so go with it we did.

DH was in charge of stroller construction, the instructions of which were written mostly in French, but fortunately easy enough to figure out.

That's right Murph, better give that a good sniff-over now - your baby brother will be in that soon!

Staying true to our decision to have Murphy test drive all baby related equipment, we promptly had him try it out. 

 We were already pretty sure that he would be super cute in it, but then he put his paws up on the top of the carseat, rested his head on them, and waited for his ride.  My heart pretty much melted.  Is this was being a parent feels like?

The stroller is the Baby Trend Expedition ELX.  We chose it after "test driving" a number of strollers at Babies R Us.  We liked it for a couple of reasons.

1. "Travel" system that came with the infant carseat and stroller - Baby H can still use the stroller once he outgrows his infant carseat
2. Bigger tires for outdoor pushing - We quite frequently take walks in the development across the street from us, but the sidewalks are bumpy and we wanted tires that would wear as easily as those plastic wheels on other strollers
3. Unlockable front tire - Makes for easy steering when you're just walking 

DH finds it easy to steer and Murph gives it an A+ for comfort

We had already more or less decided that a "jogging" style stroller was more up our alley.  When we thought about when we would use the stroller, the answer was almost always "outside."  I surveyed some people that I knew had both a traditional stroller and a jogging stroller, and the main use for the regular stroller was for shopping at the mall.  We are not mall people - I got maybe 4 times a year, and getting a stroller just for that purpose seemed silly.  The major complaints about jogging stroller users was that the front wheel on some models didn't unlock, making it hard to push around.  This stroller had a lockable/unlockable front wheel which solved that problem.

The biggest con about putting the stroller together this far in advance is that, well... now we have a full-size stroller sitting in our house.  But it's done and I'm glad for that. We just need to install the car seat bases into our vehicles (which we're NOT going to do too far in advance considering all of the traveling we're doing prior to my due date) and then I think we're pretty much ready for a baby!!!