Tuesday, February 15, 2011

3 weeks old!

There are lots more pictures on our Flickr account if you are interested... Here are some of my favorites! Sorry for the long delay between uploads to Flickr. There is no excuse for it. Our life hasn't been busy or stressful at all... pretty much just same old same old around here...

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Again, WAY more pictures on the Flickr if you are into sifting through hundreds of other peoples pictures.

Things are still good here! We had a great Valentines day in last night (still haven't forced ourselves out of the house without him yet, but that's coming soon hopefully). Asher has been more mobile this past week, making trips to the grocery story, Target (thanks for all your gift cards!!), several work meetings, a few youth group events, and his first church service on Sunday! He was a huge hit everywhere he went, as you might imagine.

We have been living the good life these past few weeks with people from church bringing us food left and right. Seriously, I don't know how people could possibly go through life without a church family to be there for them. Even if you could, who would want to? Columbia Ridge has been great (as expected) and we feel extremely blessed to have them around.

Friday, January 28, 2011

More we like...

Maybe we will able to say something at some point, but for now we are still pretty much speechless. Asher is so completely wonderful sometimes we wonder if this is even real (the poop on my hands reminds me that it is).

Here are some more pictures we like...
All the rest are on flickr (being added to regularly, so keep checking). Also you should know that we don't delete the fuzzy or bad ones (aka the ones where kirsten let me use the camera). So just keep sifting through those until you get to some good ones.



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Thursday, January 27, 2011

Pictures...

More words later, but for now enjoy some pictures! You can see more on our flickr account. I think there is a link on this page somewhere...

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7 lb 13.6 oz

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perfect.

Monday, January 17, 2011

the post that begs to be made / a very pregnant holidays / weeks 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38 and 39 / still haven't had the baby yet

yes, so i've had a lot of time to think about what to title this post and it's changed several times...sorry about that.

so here we are, two days before the due date, and other things have changed as well...

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(sorry for the photo quality, taken with the phone in a hurry...)

first and foremost, i've started looking scary-crazy-big. like my stomach has a life of its own, which, well, it does. sometimes i feel completely normal and like i did nine months ago and then i'll pass by a mirror and think "what the heck?!" it's crazy. i never imagined i could get this big.

(this one was taken on the 5th)

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as for the baby, he's huge, too. i don't know exactly how big, but he feels big. he stretches inside me and it feels like his foot is going to shoot though my side. we keep telling him that there's more room out here, but he's not listening. he's doing great, though, everything progressing completely as normal. he has (if it's not obvious) dropped, he is super low, and i'm pretty sure he's getting more and more ready every day.

and speaking of getting more and more ready, we're losing our minds. as much as people try and tell you the final days are hard, the anticipation is excruciating. i've been having irregular/occasional contractions for about a week and a half now, and i keep waiting for them to get down to real business, but no luck.

as for the past couple of months, new years was great and quiet—we drank sparkling apple cider and watched one more year of dick clark...christmas was wonderful and crazy-busy and our first (and only?) here in portland...

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we had our two/kind of three/four if you count the dog family christmas morning before anyone got here for christmas and once again loved every minute of the day (and made homemade hot chocolate and marshmallows—awesome)...

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we spent the first couple of weeks of december in atlanta (before i couldn't travel anymore), and we loved, loved, loved seeing some family, and we were able to spend thanksgiving in texas, which we're so thankful for, to have too few days with that family every year.

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(my cousin's wife and i—she's due in april...)

our pictures have been slim, but there they are nonetheless...

okay, more soon, promise...and be praying that we have this baby soon soon soon!!! we're super excited and can't wait any longer!!!

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

31 weeks!

We have a new baby-ready camera (more on that later), so Daniel acted like a true professional photographer tonight and I thought I'd show you the succession of images (and they're dark because I don't let us turn on the flash :) ever. natural light!) ...

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Also, I feel like I look huge. I don't realize I'm that big at all....I think for some reason my stomach looks unusually enormous here. Or what if not...

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And! We've never shown you what's going on inside, so here's what Baby Center says our baby looks like inside my belly at 31 weeks!



If you'll notice in that drawing, the legs are to one side of the mother—that's definitely what he's doing inside of me. Most of the time, his legs are kind of angled at my left shoulder, while his little bottom is on the right side of my belly...There's always this hard mass (his tush) to one side or the other of my belly button, and a lot of times he stretches out his legs or something and there's this lump that rises there.

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Also, at night, depending on what side of my stomach I'm laying on, I'll wake up and feel my stomach or something, and his bottom will have shifted to the side that I'm laying on (so that if I'm on my left side, his back and such is down toward the bed)

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Hopefully this all makes sense...anyway, it's what I end up wondering a lot—where exactly a baby is inside that basketball-sized stomach.

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So nine weeks to go!!!

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Weeks 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 and 30

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Well, if you've never kept a blog, I'll let you in on a little secret—It's just not that easy. It's really hard, in fact. And thus, we haven't blogged in almost two months. Hmmmmmm...

So, just so you know the pregnancy is going well. Here's a few things to update, as I remember them, so they're sort of accurate, I'm sure.

Week 24 (around September 29)
There was nothing really to report week 24, everything was really normal and uneventful. But! We did get a picture this week, so there was that.

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Week 25 (around October 6th)
We had a doctor's appointment this week, and everything went really normal, once again. We do feel so grateful, that being said, that we haven't had anything abnormal happen at doctor's appointments...I did start feeling a bit icky and sick this week, and was super busy, so I just tried to lay low and sleep as much as possible. My doctor, though, when I told her, just blinked at me—she wasn't concerned at all. So I figured I wouldn't be either.

Week 26 (around October 13th)
This week I got my first stranger-didn't-tell-her-I-was-pregnant-first comment, so that was exciting! And, actually, the story is amazing. Like you couldn't make this stuff up. So I actually coordinated a wedding that was on the 16th, and our Pastor, Reed, was officiating. Daniel, Reed and I were at lunch that Monday or so, and Reed asked if we would accompany him to this suit store that is a walk away to offer some opinion (okay, really just me offer opinion...) So, we headed over there and were eagerly greeted by an obviously commission-paid employee who was very kind and helpful (overly helpful, I think she tried to sell Reed everything in the store.) She happened, however, to speak a bit of broken English. She might have been from Eastern Europe or something, I'm not sure. And, let me make it clear that she was completely intelligible and—I'm sure—understood English completely. She mostly just conjugated things wrongly and put s's where they didn't need to be, etc. It may have been a bit more severe than that, but not much. But this impairment meant that she was a bit confused about the relationship between the three of us. She picked up on the fact that there were two married men and one married woman (and Reed doesn't look significantly older than we do by any means...you're welcome, Reed :)...) and that there was something about a wedding involved, but she couldn't really wrap her head around the fact that it was none of us that were getting married, and that Reed was officiating and I knew about colors for the wedding, etc. etc. She was just obviously very confused about the situation. So. we had been in the store about 10 minutes when Reed, me and Daniel (in that order) sat down in a few chairs waiting on her to take care of some things. And she turned and was making small talk with us and then looked at me and said "so when are you due?" I told her January, and she smiled and nodded and probably jumped up and down excitedly or something (she was eager to make a sale) and then, staring directly at me, she said, exactly: "And do you know who the father is?" Seriously. I just stared at her smiling gripping my stomach while I tried to think of what to possibly say next before I just said "yeah, it's a boy" She smiled and nodded some more and then Reed, trying to clarify said, "yes, they're (pointing between Daniel and I) having their first." I'm still not sure she got it...

Week 27 (around October 20th)
This week I had my first shower! My mother in law was in town, so she and my sweet sister in law wanted to throw a shower to be able to celebrate. It was wonderful and we got all sorts of goodies, including lots of adorable clothes and a few toys and teethers and our stroller!!!! yay!!! and then the rest of the week, Debbie and I did tons and tons of shopping and in addition to getting me some things to wear for the rest of my pregnancy, ended up finding a crib, dresser/changing table and glider! So all of the major nursery stuff...which really freed me up to start thinking hard about the nursery and details and planing. More will come on that soon, I promise (there's still stuff on order that's coming in, so don't feel like I depriving you of even just basic pictures.)

Week 28 (around October 27th)
This week I had another doctor's appointment, and has a glucose screening test, which was supposed to gauge my risk for gestational diabetes. It meant I had to down this sugary-sweet drink (i really didn't think it tasted that badly, but i had been warned, so maybe i was expecting worse). By far the worst part was that I had to drink it all within a completely unreasonable amount of time, and then rush off to the doctors, because I had to be having my blood drawn at an exact time—down to the minute. Then I had to have lots of blood drawn and a shot in my "backside," so this was a very adventurous visit. Also this week I think I really started noticing an increase in my emotions. I think I cried at least once every day this week. And most of the time it was good tears, but it was always completely random. Like it'd be driving or in the shower and just imagining holding our child and start weeping. Very emotional. But too I feel like it's a really good thing, because I feel like I'm starting to process how very real this is. And how close. Plus! This week we finally got another picture! I've definitely grown!!!

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Week 29 (around November 3rd)
This week I had yet another comment from a stranger. And the thing is...here's the thing. It's just getting weird. Because for several months up until this point, I really felt like so many strangers were staring at my stomach. and eventually i realized they were thinking, "is she pregnant? she could be...but that could be just a gut, so i don't know..." and so i felt like everyone—people I'd pass on the street or the bagger at the grocery store—would take a few seconds to start looking at me in the eyes. but i just got used to it and nothing ever got said. and then something just switched. and people started not even really having to look at my stomach for more than a nano second (so little time that i didn't even notice) before they'd just say something. and it'd completely catch me off guard because i'd think "but how do they know?! they didn't even see my stomach..." anyway, for lunch on my birthday we went to this pizza-by-the-slice place downtown that i love and when i ordered a piece of pepperoni the guy behind the counter said "you want some ice cream and pickles on top of that?" i just stared at him, i think. i didn't get it at all for a while...and then i did, and it was funny.

Week 30 (last week)
We made it to week 30!!!! I can't believe it—only 10 weeks to go! I remember being like 9 weeks or 12 weeks and thinking about 30 weeks and how stinking far along it was and what in the world would it be like....and it's like this. crazy. it's seriously flown by. So, like i said in the beginning, it's going well. i'm definitely feeling a good deal more uncomfortable...it's harder to sleep and i'm surrounded by like 30 pillows to support my back...my stomach...my legs...my arms, etc. etc. no major swelling or anything, yet though (fingers crossed!) so that's nice. But I'm getting more tired again (like 1st trimester) while at the same time feeling a lot of desire to do the nursery and get things ready, especially since all the holidays are just around the corner and then we'll have a baby here! crazy!!!

SO that's it! the last several weeks, all wrapped up! and guess what?! tomorrow marks week 31, so i promise i'll get a shower so that we can get a picture, and have a post all ready for you!

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Vacation!

Not too long ago, even though it seems like ages ago, we went on a little family vacation! Our family of two and a half (actually exactly a half technically speaking) drove down to Crater Lake, spent a couple nights there, then headed even more South to San Fransisco. It was Kirsten's first ever trip to California which was really exciting! We saw lots of cool stuff. I'll post the highlights here and then feel free to check out our flickr page to see all the pictures.


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If you have never been to Crater Lake, GO!!! Seriously, stop reading this post, open expedia.com and book a flight, rent a car and GO! There are no words to describe how beautiful it is. The water is 500 times more amazingly blue than even these pictures show. Seriously. You need to go.

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Also, on a side note, the water is also freezing.

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We drove an hour out of our way for this Chick-Fil-A. It could have been 4 hours. Still would have been worth it.

We did lots of fun stuff in San Fran, including go to a Giants game, which I can do with no moral objections now that Barry Bonds no longer plays there.

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I got this app call AutoStitch that makes panoramic pictures out of multiple shots on my phone. It's pretty awesome!

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This is a picture of Kirsten holding up a paused video of the Full House intro where they are having a picnic in a park in the exact spot where Kirsten is sitting. It's a magical photo. Except of course you can't see the video... oh well.

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It was a SUPER fun pre-baby getaway! There are tons more pictures on Flickr for those of you that really like us. For the rest of you...why are you reading this blog??

ps. GO TO CRATER LAKE!