The Big News!

So it's been crazy the last few weeks like I had said before...We've been blessed with so many visitors. Cause not only did we get the ones I blogged about before, but Julie Hunt came and stayed with us the weekedn following Thanksgiving, and then my brother Brek was planning on coming last weekend, but travel plans didn't quite turn out.

But it's been even more fun than usual because we got to share without our families and friends that we're expecting a little one in June!! So now that this last Wednesday we were able to go into the doctor's office and get ultrasounds pictures, we thought it was time to share with everyone!!


The other part was Chad's birthday present that I couldn't tell anyone about before was finding out that I was pregnant. To understand the picture of Chad below, you have to know the background....So last year for Chad's birthday 2007, I decided that I was going to get him a pastel pink polo. Now I know that some of your are thinking, Chad? In pink? Well he happens to look great in it. But when he opened that gift last year, he thought that I was telling him that I was pregnant and we were having a little girl. I was totally surprised and thought "How did he get the idea that I was pregnant out of a pink polo shirt that was his size?". So this year when I found out a few days before his birthday I went shopping and bought 2 little baby outfits, one for a baby boy and one for a girl and wrapped them as a present for him to open.

I don't know how many of you have kept a secret like that from your husbands...it was difficult. The night before his birthday, I slept horribly. I kept waking up, (not quite sure if that was hormones or nerves), but when I woke up about 0600 am having to use the bathroom I thought. "I'll just go use the other bathroom and grab the gift and have it waiting for Chad when he wakes up." So that's exactly what I did and as soon as Chad woke up I was shoving a gift in his face and was telling him to open it. It was killing me!!! I just couldn't wait any longer. So in his half awake and half asleep mode he opened the gift and then had to ask me a few times if I was serious. Last year he pulls that idea out of a pink polo and then has to ask me if I mean we're expecting when I give him baby clothes. It was pretty fun and neat all at the same time. What a neat time when it something you've both wanted for a long time. We're just so excited to be parents.

So here's a few pictures of our little one. at 12 weeks. You can see the head and body pretty well in these two. He measure the head to rump lenth at 49mm. So it's about 2.5 inches long so far and so we're right on target for the due date of June 23rd!!

And if you look close at these you can see it's arms, hands and fingers. We wish we had taken a video of the ultrasound, because when it first started it was just kicking it's legs so fast. Dr. Minudri told us we had a fiesty one on our hands!!!

Thanksgiving and the day after.

So this year I was scheduled to work the 3 days before Thanksgiving and then the weekend after Thanksgiving. So needless to say we didn't go anywhere because I only had 2 days off. But we were able to have 2 couples from our married ward over and had a great day.(The Mowers and Duncans) It was fun to see what things were traditional foods for each family. We had fabulous food and lots of it and it was nice not to have to prepare it all ourselves. What a good day over all, even though we missed being with family on such a special day, but thank heaven for the great gift of ward family to fill in the gaps.

So the day after Thanksgiving, Chad and I went crazy and cleaned the house and prepared it for Christmas. Chad has been listening to Christmas music since the day after Halloween, which I thought was hilarious. But we official kicked off our Christmas season. I am a strong believer in not starting Christmas until after Thanksgiving, because I think it's an important holiday that needs to be observed. But I also had been encouraging Chad to go out and put the Christmas lights on the house since he was out for Thanksgiving break. Last year we only got the icicle lights on the first story of our house and felt that it just didn't do our cute little house justice. So to be blunt, I felt disappointed, but didn't think it was worth the life of me or my husband to get out on the roof and climb to the next level and hang more lights when there was snow and ice on the roof. So that is how we did it this year, before the ice and snow came. It worked pretty good and I think that I'll continue to do that as long as we don't get a too steep pitched roof in the future. I personal feel like it faster than a ladder.


Not only did we get the lights up, but we also went and bought our first Christmas tree since we've been married. What a momumental moment. For some of you that have been Christmas tree shopping with me you realize how dumb I can be to find the perfect tree. Which to me is one that is full and evenly shaped. But I was pleasantly surprised that we found one for $25 at Rite Aide. Sweet!! I have been known to pay a pretty penny for my trees in the past but didn't feel like I needed to cause we found a good one for not too bad of price. We could even fit in the back of my Honda Accord. Yeah we just tied the tree branches near the bottom back up and placed a tarp in the trunk and layed down the back seat and pulled the tree in. We even got the trunk latched. No white trash tie-downs this time(in regards to our dining room table escapade). So then we spent the rest of the day decorating the tree and finishing the other decorations.




I even finished making my wreath with lights, that I've been trying to make for over 4 years. AHHH what a rewarding day!!!! One day I'll the get the pictures of the icicle lights and my wreath and post them too. So here a picture of our icicle lights. I'm sure it's a memory Chad will never forget... getting on the second story roof from the first story roof!.

November 22-24 addendum

Something that I forgot to mention about the weekend my brother Derek and his family came to stay, was how fanatical his children have become with the Star Wars series. They play this game of "Who said it?", Which goes like this....One person quotes a line from one of the star wars movies and whoever can guess who said the line and name which one of the 6 movies it's from gets to come up with then next clue. Pretty funny. I guess it wouldn't be funny until you saw 3 little girls between the ages 4-9 beat the pants off any adult I've ever met.

We also got in a little crafting, drawing time. Knowing me (I was this way even as a little girl) we had to get out some constructions paper. I also got out some colored pencils and away the kids went... Not a big surprise when Halle came up with the following picture.

So I hope you can read everything, but basically it's most of the characters from Star wars. Way funny!!

Another wonderful weekend!!! November 22-24

Sorry that it's taken me so long to write all these up, but I'm starting to feel like we've been running a bed and breakfast the last few weekends and then I'm working in between them and it doesn't leave a lot of time to blog.

So I was really excited to get an email from brother, Derek, about 2 months ago asking if his wife and 5 kids could come for a visit!! They haven't been up to visit us due to their own busy schedule and not to mention the 9 hour drive for 5 kids.... So they ended up breaking up their drive a little by driving to Boise on Friday night then driving the rest of the way on Saturday morning. We just had so much fun with them here and were surprised how our 1450 sq foot house handled the crowd.



We got to go to Sunnyside park the first day they were here to feed the ducks and see the animals next door. And how can you not play on the playground equipment too. The older girls really liked the merry go round? Is that really what they are called, please anyone help me..!! Anyway we got them nice and dizzy on that. Kallen on the other hand really likes slides and right off the bat decided to go down the really big slide. I was impressed. He went down without any real hesitation. I just laughed though, because by time he was half way down the slide he was sliding head first!! It was way cute. What a sport. I'll just let the next video of him on the horse say the rest. What a funny little guy with so much personality. It was still a pretty cold that day so we didn't stay too long and we all had cold little fingers and noses by the time we were at home.

Another highlight was going to the single's ward sacrament meeting with 5 kids. It was so funny to see people expressions. It was holiday weekend so the crowd was small to begin with, but we took up a whole row just by ourselves. I was impressed with how quiet the kids were and the various interactions the kids had with people. Cage (21 months) was quite enthralled with the gal behind us as she was doodling during the meeting. He just sat and stared. She stopped for a minute just to see what he did and he still didn't even blink!
We were able to watch some movies together and let the kids explore the backyard. I got some good cuddling with Ellisi while we watched the show. She is so lovey, it's great she'll just climb right in with Chad and I on the couch. Chad and I got in some good visiting with my brother and his wife Brittney when the kids were in bed. All in all, I felt like we had an empty house when they left. I just don't think I could get enough of them and just can't wait to be closer to our families. What a great way to celebrate Thanksgiving with family when you don't really get to be with them for the actual Thanksgiving dinner.