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It's been nice having Keith back around this house. I have my handyman back! And my dishwasher! He's been tackling unfinished business around here, like fixing the siding he had to tear apart to do the foundation, a mini-update of the main bathroom, and a rebuild of the garage door (ask him how fun that was). No pictures - we haven't been too inspired on the photo front lately. Next major project will be painting the outside of the house as it is all patchwork right now.
In the meantime, w
e found out this interesting piece of information:Yep. Pretty crazy, huh? As of now I am 15 weeks along, and most of you that even bother to check here for updates already know this information. Regardless, I will go ahead and answer the most frequently asked questions:
1) Yes, it was planned.
2) No, I haven't had any nausea or morning sickness.
3) Yes, we will find out the sex of the baby.
4) No, there aren't any smells that have been particularly strong or annoying.
5) No, I don't have any cravings (much to Keith's chagrin).
Pretty boring huh? At times I had to remind myself that I was even pregnant. Then we had an ultrasound at 8 weeks (this doc likes to do the first one really early) and saw the little heart beating which made it all a little more real. The only (and most annoying) symptom I've been dealing with is the rapid pace at which my shirts have stopped fitting (and it is not from a growing belly.... ahem....). I was already plenty well endowed before, but this is getting ridiculous. All my friends with babies tell me, "Just wait until you're breastfeeding". Great. Lucky for me, I wear baggy scrubs to work, so I I've been OK there and should be for a while still. When I have to go out in public though in normal clothes, that's when the mental breakdowns occur and my entire closet ends up on the floor. I'm at that awkward stage where I don't really need maternity clothes, but nothing in my closet fits either. So I just hide out at home in my sweats and t-shirts. Kidding. I get out sometimes and have found a few shirts, but the weather is not cooperating with the shirts I have bought. Life is rough, isn't it?
Here is a picture of my belly at 14 weeks. I didn't take one right off the bat, because really, I didn't look much different than this. I always have a poocher of a belly like this, but maybe from here on out it will start to look like something other than too much cookie dough!
In other news, we went on a couple trips since our last post. The first was a nice long weekend getaway to San Diego with John and Jenn to attend our good friend, Kelly's, wedding. I hadn't been on a vacation since New Years' so I was very ready to get out of town for a while. This was early April, and while we were expecting sunny days on the beach, we were instead greeted with cold, cloudy skies and felt more like we were on the Oregon coast rather than a California one. We had a great time, nevertheless. We rented a nice little house one block from the beach where we could cook some good meals on our own when we weren't attending wedding festivities.
We spent one full day at the San Diego zoo which was quite nice. As far as zoos go, it is top notch - really expansive grounds and nice habitats for the animals. We got there early so got a nice view of the ever popular pandas and saw all kinds of other animals like the gorillas, polar bears, black panther and lots more. We took some pictures, but unless you are a photographer, zoo photos, just don't usually turn out that good.
The wedding itself was spectacular and picture perfect. It was held up on a cliff overlooking the ocean, the decorations were amazing and of course the happy couple looked stunning and appeared to have a great time. Kelly was my compatriot through nursing school and has since moved back home to San Diego. I miss her dearly, but love to see her so happy.
A shot of the girls. (Notice anything different about Jenn's belly? Yep, she's having a baby too! Due it September! Yay!).
And Keith and I dressed up, enjoying the festivities.
Then at the end of April, we took a week off and went to visit my parents in St George, UT. Over Thanksgiving, my folks picked out a vacation home for them to use in the winters and closed the deal in February. They bought it knowing it needed a little bit of roof work, so had to head back out there in March to get the work started and done. As house projects tend to go, the "little roof repair" turned into a lot more than they bargained for (i.e. a replacement of the entire roof!), and they are not ones to hire very many jobs out. So they are still there. St George is not a summer vacation place because it gets well into the 100's in the summer. They had hoped to be home by now, but are fighting the heat and fighting to finish up the projects. Dad is still on the roof, although I think he is close to being done by now.
So we went out for a week to visit, share our fun new news and to help them with a bit of the work. The days ended up being slightly routine in that we'd spend our mornings on one outing or another, getting home for a late lunch, then spending the rest of the day helping get some projects done around the house - which meant Keith and Dad up on the roof and Mom and I inside prepping walls for painting. Paul came down my last weekend there so we had one good play day with him as well which was great.
The house they bought has BLM land as their backyard and a big 'ol butte just screaming to be climbed. So that was the first order of business, a scramble to the top of that. You can't see my parents' house in this picture, but it is right down there in that first line of houses.
St George is a thriving retirement community and you would not believe the amount of construction and expansion that is going on there. It's kind of a shame because there is absolutely no regard for the environment, water conservation, etc there. It's just build, build, build. My parents feel a little guilty about that part - but of course they are the ones conserving their water, recycling (if you can find a place to take it) and hanging their clothes out to dry (which takes about 2 seconds - I can't imagine running a dryer down there!).
The next day, dad took us to this cool white slot canyon in the middle of some remote BLM land.
Keith and I walked back via the top of the canyon and coming back down the hill, we recrossed this old cattle corral we had seen before. On the way in, we had lifted Gracie in this tank of water to give her some relief from the dry heat. Well, she remembered it, and as soon as she spotted the water from the top of the hill she ran down way ahead of us and did this until we caught up to her to let her back in for a swim.
A couple shots of the house. How the boys spent their afternoons.
Nice backyard, huh?
Day 3's activity took us to the Red Cliffs Desert Reserve, which is a large piece of land set aside to protect a very rare turtle. It is also riddled with lots of beautiful red rock with trails that take you down to the Virgin River. Keith did a few scrambles up the rocks and Gracie of course enjoyed the river.
A look at the landscape:
Keith scrambling:
And here is a video of Gracie fetching rocks across the river. The current was quite strong in the middle and the water deep, so we all got a kick out of watching her get a little swept up in it. Here is a video of Gracie bringing back a particularly big rock.
The final day of activity we went up near Snow Canyon (a gorgeous state park nearby) and did some off trail hiking. Turned out to be a little more difficult than planned, but still had some very nice scenery.
Trying to figure out the best route.
Cool rocks.
There are lots more photos from Utah on our Flickr site if you are interested.
I had to fly home before Keith so I could get back to work, but Keith stayed behind to give my parents some help and some solid work days up on the roof. He stayed about another week, then made the long drive home alone in the little car with Gracie.
